[Congratulations! You have leveled up Beast Taming!]
Don't tell me! Elanore checked her status, and sure enough, there it was.
It had gone from Novice to Apprentice, and now the transformation made sense. The shelf had changed color. The wood became white like one of those old picket fences, but the green eyes had changed to pink. Elanore heard the sound of gasps behind her, and the voices weren't coming from her floating cauldron or her wyvern.
Students of the cloth were lined up and watching the spectacle. How long had they been standing there? The vampire had no idea. She was too focused on her conversation with Palentis. A conversation that had netted her with leveling up her beast taming. Why did I have to give him mana?
She looked towards Naela, hoping to find a savior within the girl's face, but she received a look that told her, "you did this to yourself." Can my lover really be so cruel? Wait, isn't she the one who said I could top off his mana!?
"Palentis has not given someone a rite of purchase in years," the old librarian said. "Since I have been alive, it has only happened once in fact."
"Miss Porter, are you serious?" A student asked. Her voice was enthusiastic, and she looked at Elanore like something to be studied. "Palentis even changed colors! What will this mean for..."
"Silence child," Miss Porter said, "it will be Palentis that answers those questions. What is the meaning of this?"
"The Great One has bestowed upon me a gift. She has overwritten my contract with Her mana. It is unfathomable that I would decide anything on my own from this point forwards."
Elanore looked between the shelf and the old woman. The more that Palentis spoke, the more that concern was written on Miss Porter's face. As for the students, they were loving every second of this. Some of them had started to take notes, and others silently admired and looked at her with sparkling eyes.
Miss Porter focused her attention on the witch. Her old, wrinkled eyes stared into Elanore's purple eyes. It made Elanore feel a slight sense of fear. Even though she was not an any danger, the look reminded her of school teachers on Earth. It was the similar look of, "you're going to the principals office," but those words never came.
Instead, the woman's face lightened after a couple of seconds, and she smiled. "You are a vampire?"
The question caused further gasps among the listeners. The students looked like they wanted to rush forwards to bombard Elanore with questions, but a stern gaze from the librarian stopped them all.
"I am."
"I see, and what are your plans with Palentis? Do you wish to take him away from here?"
Elanore started to shake her head, but the shelf in question emptied its contents onto the floor. Palentis placed all of the potions down in neat little rows. Red potions were lined up with red potions. Blue potions were lined up with blue potions, and green potions were lined up with green potions.
Palentis turned into a pink mist that Elanore had seen multiple times, and she felt a small tug somewhere inside of her as the shelf disappeared. Sure enough, there he was inside of her inventory.
"Um, would you believe me if I said I had no plans to take him away! He took himself away!"
The elderly woman chuckled and looked at Elanore with astonishment. "You are an enigma. Why would you care to answer to me? You could have taken Palentis without argument. I suspect that even if we had our strongest wizard here, it would not make a difference..."
At the mention of a wizard, Elanore noticed how Naela's tail waved.
"Palentis called you Great One, and you seem to have the capacity. However, what is most perplexing is your demeanor. You act similarly to my students, even though I am sure you're old enough to be my ancestor."
Elanore tilted her head. "I act similar to your students?"
"Yes, when I looked at you in a certain manner, I expected no reaction, but you acted like someone that was caught stealing. Most perplexing, indeed. You have the manner of someone that is afraid of people."
I am afraid of people! People were always variables that Ella had no idea about. They could easily lie or throw you in a jail cell for wearing a pink caterpillar on your lip. There were certain things that never lied to Ella. Magic and energy drinks had expected effects. Should she be scared of the latter because it caused her death? Blasphemy! That was the expected outcome if you drink too many of them.
Miss Porter sighed and reached a hand towards Ella's shoulder. Though, midway through the action the hand was pushed away by the hand of a wyvern.
"That's enough," Naela said, "you should not push your luck. Her Majesty is beyond anything your mortal mind could ever picture. You've been nothing but rude when in the presence of a great queen."
Miss Porter and Elanore shared a look of astonishment towards the wyvern's actions. The elderly librarian was surely only trying to comfort the vampire, and Elanore had never heard Naela call her such names. She'd even fed into the greatest delusions of the vampire witch and mimicked the behavior of a certain fanatic cauldron.
Pot flapped his bat wings, imitating the sound of clapping. "That is correct. Her Majesty is someone to be respected. In all of your arrogance, you've assumed things with the mind of a mortal. But everything she does, it's all a plan for her queendom."
Miss Porter's demeanor completely changed. She went from an old woman with conviction of her hypothesis to someone who looked like she'd seen a ghost. She knelt down as fast as her old legs could will her to.
"My apologies, Great One. I was wrong. Even though it should have been obvious the moment Palentis chose you."
Elanore watched as the students followed in line behind their librarian. The beating of the witchpire queen's heart started to calm. Her previously meek demeanor became something else. Her servants words had stricken a chord with her. She looked to Naela especially. Thank you.
The silent words were registered with a nod from Naela and a look of encouragement. The vampire witch faked a cough into her hand.
"Though my servants spoke out of turn, they were correct. None of you would be able to comprehend the depth of my power. If you all stared into the abyss long enough, you might become a pink mist yourself. Trying to understand me with mortal psychology? Hah! As if I would be scared of human interaction. I was only here to see what lowly energy potions I could find among the human ranks."
"Energy potions, Great One?"
"That is correct. Now that I have a rite of purchase, I can buy any of them as I please."
Miss Porter once again looked up with confusion on her face. "You would buy them from us?"
"Naturally, this is a distribution of wealth. If I were to steal them, what would happen to the economy?"
"It would suffer, Great One. That is why we had Palentis here to protect them. These are all expensive items and potions. We've forbidden them from commercial purchase in order to prevent chaos in the streets. We'd rather not have our assets resold or diluted on the market."
That makes a surprising amount of sense. Ever since Elanore arrived here, everything had gone different than she expected. Sure there were tensions between races, but people mostly kept to themselves. The leadership also seemed to operate with an ounce of intellect.
Everything went surprisingly smoothly. Elanore's entrance into the city was fast, the public order was good, and the streets were mostly cleaned. The people were living average lives and not suffering as much as she expected. Even the ragged cat mother and daughter pair were not living poorly. Ella fixed her face once again, doing her best to appear like a smug queen.
"I will buy all of the energy potions you have if such a thing exists here..."
Miss Porter nodded. "There are several potions that deal with energy and rejuvenation, Great One..."
Elanore pointed her staff towards the elderly woman. "Please stop calling me great one. Elanore is fine."
"Y-yes! Miss Elanore, is there anything else you would like to purchase?"
The vampire witch looked at the other shelves. It was lucky for her that Palentis wasn't combined with them when he vanished into her inventory. She observed the magic items with her [Inspect].
[Rare: Ring of Mana Regen - Boosts the Mana Recovery of the wearer by 10%. ]
[Rare: Small Box of Holding - Allows the user to store a small amount of items in a time-sealed space. ]
[Legendary: Wand of Fireball - Allows the user to cast fireball one time daily at no cost to their mana. ]
Most of them held no interest to the vampire. They were all tools for studying mages. She was about to stop looking altogether when one of them caught her eye.
[Legendary: Stone of the Forsaken Goddess - A piece of stone broken off from the Forsaken Goddess's throne. It carries the etchings of an incomplete enchantment.]
No way! There it is again! The mystery of that Forsaken Goddess had come back. It was like a checkpoint in a quest, and she'd reached another one. It was a broken piece of black stone and a couple of symbols were etched into it. Symbols that Elanore could read.Indestructibility, Mana Rep-. The words ended there. All of the symbols were cut off from the broken stone after that. It seems like indestructibility was a lie the whole time!
Elanore pointed Manapie at the stone. "I will take this one as well."
"You can read that, Miss Elanore?"
"Of course, for anyone that's been alive as long as me, reading languages is a simple task. I must ask why this was kept out in the open though? Even if Palentis is able to guard something..."
Miss Porter shook her head. "I have no idea what it even is. To me and to others it looked like a stone. Sure, it was indecipherable, but our mage's college deals with such things all of the time."
Huh? This situation is similar to the one before. Elanore wrinkled her brow, remembering how Naela had no idea about the Forsaken Goddess. But what about Palentis? He'd shown outright fear when she produced the tablet, yet he stored a piece of her stone on his shelf. What did that mean? Elanore shook her head and looked back at the elderly woman.
"So, how much will all of these potions be with this stone?"
"The stone itself would not be expensive, but all of the energy potions would be. Each potion costs a gold coin, but we can let that stone go for a silver. Though, since you've taken such an interest in it, the value of it is unimaginable, Miss Elanore."
The vampire grinned and pulled out a familiar white and pink coin. It was the one she'd made a while ago with her face on it. "I can use this to pay for the stone. For all of the potions, I will pay for them with gold coins."Elanore took out 20 gold coins and placed them in front of the kneeling librarian. "And all of you can stand up. It would look weird if someone were to walk in and see this."
"Oh believe me," a new voice said, "it looks plenty 'weird' from my perspective."
Elanore's eyes flashed towards the intruder, spotting a familiar uniform. She remembered it from that frontier city. It was similar to that prince. Only, this one belonged to a different face and build. Surrounding the man on all sides were guards who held their hands on the hilts of their blades, ready to strike.
Though, the gloved hand of the prince was enough to stop them. "Now, now, don't get all riled up. I was just amused by the situation. Besides, causing a scene here is not at all what Father wishes for. Miss Elanore, was it? Your presence is requested in the castle."
A brief recollection of a guard at the gate talking about a royal dinner flashed into her mind. Though, the vampire witch had thought these things would have nothing to do with her. She just wanted to get her magical items and escape the city under the dead of night. Yet, here she was being personally summoned to the castle.