Chapter 114: Blood Bug (5) [Bonus]
The deer’s body weakened quickly. Its blood entered Lucard’s palm, warm and thick, carrying a faint earth taste. Lucard did not absorb all of it into himself. He separated it while it moved through his blood path. The cleanest part went into his body to restore what he had used. The rest, he kept moving under his control.
He mixed a very small amount of his own blood with it. It was not much. But it was enough to mark the blood and make it safe for the mother bug.
Then he guided the mixture toward his heart.
Inside his chest, the tiny blood chamber opened.
The mother bug woke up at once.
It felt the food before it arrived. Its small body is uncurled. Its hunger came through the connection so clearly that Lucard almost laughed. The little creature was starving, but it did not dare bite the chamber walls. It remembered his command.
Lucard sent the mixed blood into the chamber drop by drop.
The mother bug drank.
At first, it drank too fast.
Lucard stopped the flow at once.
The bug shook in panic, thinking the food had vanished. Lucard pressed his blood sense against it, not harshly, but firmly.
"Slowly."
The bug waited.
Only then did Lucard send the next drop.
This time, it drank slower.
"Good."
The feeding lasted several minutes. The deer’s blood was weak, but it was clean enough. The small earth mana inside it helped steady the bug’s body. His own blood worked like a guide, forcing the beast blood to settle instead of turning wild inside the blood chamber.
When the feeding ended, the mother bug looked less dry. Its red color deepened slightly. Its tiny legs moved with more strength. It curled up again, but this time it did not look like a dying insect hiding from the cold. It looked like a young creature sleeping after its first real meal.
Lucard absorbed the remaining deer blood for himself and left the body near the stream.
He continued moving before dawn.
The second beast came before sunrise.
It was a black forest boar with two bone-like tusks and a row of rough hair along its back. This one noticed him first. It charged from the bushes with angry red eyes and mud on its body. Its strength was higher than the deer’s, and its blood carried a rough fire-earth mix, probably from eating mana roots near the ridge.
Lucard did not avoid it fully.
He needed to test his body.
The boar rushed toward him like a small moving wall. Lucard stepped aside at the last moment and struck its neck with a blood blade. The cut was shallow because the beast’s hide was thick. The boar turned with surprising speed and swung its tusks toward his legs.
Lucard jumped back.
The tusk cut the edge of his cloak.
He raised one finger, and a weak orange flame appeared. It was basic fire magic, small and unstable, but it obeyed enough. He threw the flame into the boar’s face. The beast roared and shook its head. That one moment of blindness was enough.
Lucard moved in.
His blood threads wrapped around the cut on its neck. He pulled hard, opening the wound wider. Then he placed his palm against the blood and absorbed it.
The boar fought for longer than the deer.
Its body was stubborn. Its blood was hotter. The rough fire-earth mana resisted being guided. Lucard’s Crimson Vessel handled it without danger, but the mother bug inside his heart became excited by the stronger blood scent.
It pulsed hungrily.
Lucard’s eyes became cold.
"Wait."
The pulse stopped.
He continued absorbing the boar until it fell.
Only after the beast was dead did he begin separating the blood. This time, he removed the rougher mana first. The mother bug was still too young for such wild blood. If he fed it directly, it might become violent and try to lay eggs too early.
So Lucard used blood control carefully.
He pulled the beast’s blood into several thin streams. One stream carried the strong mana. He absorbed that into himself. Another stream carried clean blood essence. He mixed that with a few drops of his own blood and diluted it inside his blood path. Then he sent it slowly to the chamber near his heart.
The mother bug drank again.
It obeyed better this time.
It drank slowly, stopped when Lucard ordered it to stop, and curled around the blood essence without trying to seize more. That was a good sign. It meant its mind was weak, but not stupid. It could learn command through blood.
Lucard placed one hand over his chest.
"You will not feed by instinct anymore. You will feed by my permission. You will grow when I allow it. You will sleep when I order it. You will never lay eggs without my command."
The mother bug gave a soft pulse.
Agreement.
Lucard accepted it.
For the next two days, he moved carefully through the nearby hills and forest paths. He did not travel directly back to Gravehold because he wanted to test the blood chamber and make sure the bug could survive inside him without disturbing his heart. He hunted when he found good prey and ignored weak animals that had no mana. He killed a red-eyed fox beast near a hollow tree and fed the bug only two drops of its blood because the beast carried too much poison in its veins. He caught three blood rabbits near a thorn bush and used them as simple food, mixing their blood with his own before sending it to the heart chamber.
Each feeding followed the same rule.
First, Lucard absorbed the blood into his own blood path.
Second, he separated poison, wild mana, and useless filth.
Third, he mixed a small amount of his own blood into the clean portion.
Fourth, he used blood control to guide the mixture through his chest and into the chamber near his heart.
Fifth, he made the mother bug wait before drinking.
The waiting was important.
A blood bug that could not wait would become a danger. A mother bug that followed hunger alone was only a parasite. Lucard needed a weapon, not a wild sickness living beside his heart.
The bug learned slowly.
It was young and incomplete, but its mutation made it very responsive to his blood. A normal mother bug would resist more. This one had no old instincts from a divine breeder. It was blank enough to be shaped.
That made it better.
On the second night, Lucard found a wounded bandit hiding near an old road camp.
The man had a cut across his side and a stolen purse in his hand. Two dead travelers lay near a broken cart, which explained both the purse and the wound. When Lucard appeared from the trees, the bandit first looked relieved because he still saw the old doctor disguise. Then he saw Lucard’s calm eyes and became uncertain.
"Old man," the bandit said, lifting a dagger. "Heal me, and maybe I will let you keep your boots."
Lucard looked at the dead travelers.
Then he looked back at the bandit.
"You should have asked for a prayer."
The bandit cursed and rushed forward.
Lucard caught his wrist, broke it, and drove two fingers into the wound on his side. The bandit froze. His eyes widened as his own blood began leaving him through the injury.
He died confused, never understanding why an old doctor’s hand had become stronger than iron.
Lucard absorbed his blood.
It was not enough to level up. The man was too weak. But his blood carried small memories. A robbery near the western road. A minor bandit group hiding in the trees. Nothing important enough to chase right now.
Lucard fed none of that blood to the mother bug.
Human blood was more useful, but not all human blood was suitable for training a young mother bug. This bandit’s blood was dirty with cheap wine, fear, wound fever, and weak poison from a bad blade. Lucard absorbed what was useful and burned the rest with bloodfire.
The mother bug pulsed once, hungry.
"No," Lucard said.
It went quiet.
That pleased him more than the feeding.
Obedience before hunger.
That was the first real lesson.
Lucard returned to Gravehold on the third day.
By then, his white hair and beard were gone. His face had returned to normal. His black hair moved slightly in the wind as he approached the city road. The disguise had been useful, but there was no reason to keep it now.
Inside his heart, the mutated mother blood bug slept in its small chamber.
It was still weak. It was still young. But it was no longer dying.
Level twenty nine remained same.
The city walls of Gravehold rose ahead under the afternoon light. Somewhere inside those walls were Jenny, Jake, Peter, Celia, Robi, Ash Wolf’s offer, Ravencroft’s fear, Velkhur’s coming anger, and the next step of House Vardros.
Lucard walked toward the gate with calm eyes. He had left the city as a fake doctor. He returned with a living weapon in his heart.