•••

Caius felt he was vindicated for his plan to have them make use of Alexia's hunter senses to find Brogan because of how quickly she had gotten here. Hell, Caius and the Leopold Council members only beat her here by a few minutes, at which point they stayed high above the clouds and watched the Manor brought down.

Part of the reason they had taken so long was a matter of strategy. Unlike Alexia who simply marshaled as many Hellsingers as she could and got to work finding Brogan and heading over, Caius and the Leopolds had had a more in-depth discussion.

They had to decide how exactly their assault was to play out. Even with Lyanna's senses having revealed Brogan's location, they had no idea how many Vampires he had with him. A safe estimate was that they numbered in the hundreds. Probably packed tight in as much space as the underground hideout had to offer.

As such, even with Caius coming with them with his Noble authority, they couldn't rely on just a small group. At the time of planning, they hadn't known Alexia was already on her way with an army of Hellsingers herself so they were planning with the mindset that the responsibility of getting rid of Beogan and his minions lay with them and them alone.

After centuries of the Council having a set number, strength was fairly equal all around with Kerwin the undisputed strongest of the bunch. And in the end, those who went along with Caius were Kerwin, Roxanne, Meline, and Kyre along with three other members of the Council named Hayden, Nadine, and Hugo Leopold.

Of those last three through, Hugo caught the eye the most with a massive build that towered over everyone else. Usually giving a visage of a quiet wall standing by and ready to fall upon the first person to prick his ire.

Unlike the Council members with him, Caius, at the fourth Circle, was not capable of free-form flight so Kerwin was keeping him afloat with his magic.

"That's my girl," Caius said with a smile behind his mask as he saw Arlette spot the center of the formation before working in tandem with Alexia to destroy it.

"It's done," he said after that, "Let's go."

And so Kerwin dropped them down, so fast that no one on the ground knew where they had come from. Caius could feel Arlette's eyes on him throughout all that happened next but his gaze happened to cross with Alexia instead.

Interestingly, the decision to put on a hooded cloak and a mask had not been inspired by Alexia in particular or even because of Caius's existing relationship with anyone here. It was really more because the Leopolds have very identifiable features in their platinum blond hair.

Seeing one Leopold with vampire red eyes might be a coincidence that can be ignored but multiple Leopolds whose faces have some similar features would be a stretch and their reveal would be almost certain.

Still, even with the mask keeping his identity secret, Caius could have sworn Alexia's gaze was trying to burrow right through it, driven by some strange familiarity she likely couldn't even explain. It was that half-scrutinizing and half-confused stare Caius saw before descending into the underground hideout.

The landing was soft and his knees didn't even buckle. A second later and the others arrived.

"Many paths," Roxanne said with her eyes roaming about.

The underground hideout was like a Manor underground and turned upside down so there were many doors that could lead one to the next floor of descent.

"Hordes of vampires are spilling out from most of the paths," Kerwin said. His senses were strongest of all but even as he said it, everyone else's senses were catching up.

"Either path is fine," Kyre Leopold said, "We'll just plow through them."

"No," Caius said, "We go for the path of least resistance."

"This way then, My Lord," Kerwin said as his senses guided them all.

The entire conversation had lasted seconds at most and had been done while they all walked. The moment Kerwin picked out the best path, they quickly vanished from the sight of anyone watching from above.

…

Speaking of those above…

"What the actual fuck was that?" Alexia asked with glowering eyes.

The Vampires who had been ordered to fall twitched like they were trying to break free of the order that bound them. Still staring in her annoyance and confusion, Alexia swung her sword and decapitated a good few of them.

Following her lead, the Hellsingers decided not to just look a gift horse in the mouth as they struck the other downed vampires for easy kills. All the while, they jeered and chanted. Alexia didn't hear them and charged toward the hole. The look of the red eyes of the vampire with a subtle aura and quiet authority remained on her mind and for reasons she couldn't exactly put into words, it sent her into a spiral.

It was probably why she was so reckless and almost slammed into a horde of at least one hundred vampires all with claws and fangs bared at her.

"Ah!" Alexia let out as she came out of her reckless mental spiral barely in time to realize the threat before her.

But before she could even muster her Mana in defense or evasion, Arlette wrapped an arm around her and pulled her back with her other hand thrust forward to summon a defensive spell to shield them from the horde.

"Thanks," Alexia said fervently while shaking off her stupor.

"You're welcome," Arlette said in a strained voice. The barrage of vampire bodies slamming into her defensive spell overwhelmed her and it shattered.

Now, it was Alexia's turn to help her as she created a foothold of wind that lifted them both off the ground and into the air to avoid what seemed like a wave of vampires. At the same time, she swung her sword, unleashing slashes that struck a couple of the vampires but were blocked by others.

The ones who blocked the slashes raised their heads at Alexia and Arlette in the air and, while forming the same seals and casting the same spells, they floated into the air, displaying their own ability of flight.

A couple of them then drew weapons from what had to be storage rings while the others just drew Arcane tools such as wands and staffs to more efficiently use their Mana and bolster their magic.

These weren't run-of-the-mill vampires, Alexia realized.

Arlette looked down and realized that while the ones who could fly were likely higher ranked in the Coven, the ones who remained on the ground were no slouches either. They all had some kind of magical or physically augmenting tool/weapon in hand and had already mortally injured a few Hellsingers.

Arlette realized the ones Caius had ordered to fall must have been the same and just hadn't had the chance to draw their weapons and Arcane tools to fight with. This was Brogan's actual Coven and despite their numbers, every single one had proven themselves worthy to serve him.

Alexia smirked, seemingly unperturbed. She took on a stance with two footholds for each of her feet and her sword seemed to glow as she prepared to attack when she sensed approaching auras. Unlike the two—actually eight—from earlier, she sensed these much more clearly and quickly as they didn't hold back the release or their battle intent.

Battle intent that they directed not at Alexia or Arlette but rather at Brogan's vampires.