Blood and Qi: A Vampire Xianxia LitRPG

Three strange beasts of the Nether crested a hill, all three young for their species, and all three natural enemies that should never walk together peacefully, though they were.

The worlds within the NetherRealm were created to train and advance demons. Unlike demons, Netherbeasts were often born at higher tiers and grew from young into full adults in the span of days.

Like all advanced life, Netherbeasts could advance in tier, and did so by eating their dead foes. If too many of the same beasts within an area were killed too quickly, the Nether would spawn more of them, and at higher tiers.

The first of the three young beasts to crest the hill looked like some sort of armored dog-frog hybrid.

The second beast looked like a giant scorpion with two demon-like clawed hands instead of pinchers, and a hornet’s stinger where a scorpion’s tail would be.

The last beast was vaguely human-shaped. It walked upright on two skinny legs ending in very large feet. It had two skinny arms with massive hands and claws. The body was bulbous and oblong. It had no neck. Its head was just the top third of the torso. It had a massive fang-filled mouth. The nose was just two holes side by side, and the eyes were two small black beads. It had wild and long knotted locks. When the thing attacked, it cackled madly and frighteningly. Even still, in death, it cackled when it attacked.

John called that beast a cackler. He thought of them as female even though he knew every beast and demon of the Nether were male. When he first saw the cacklers, he had thought they were of a female tribe of a strange sort of demon. The adults wore some clothing, so he assumed they were more than beasts. They weren’t. They couldn’t talk or use weapons. Some natural instinct had them rip hides off prey and don the hide wet and untreated.

If he could, John would definitely use only adult corpses for his undead minions. Using the young in combat, even the young of Netherbeasts, seemed wrong. But he was only able to get his ‘vampiric’ concept to reanimate corpses up to a certain size. If his enemies were smaller, he’d use only the corpses of adults.

The minions behaved very similarly to hoppers, minus all the hopping. They were just mindless and violent, attacking anything living near them, but he had control over these corpses, unlike hoppers.

John was almost certain he had improved the spell he thought of now as [Create Minions], [Undead Minions], or just [Minions] enough to control four corpses at once, but they’d have to be a little smaller. Without the NCS, he couldn’t check his [Skill] Mastery level. Or officially rename [Puppet]. He definitely wanted the word ‘minion’ to be part of the new name when he could rename it.

If John wasn’t feeling for harmony gains, missing a [Skill] increasing in Mastery was easy to do. He thought his gains had been pretty good so far. All he had done over the last month was fight. The beasts rarely left him in peace long enough to meditate and fill his dantian.

Immediately after feeling a tremor, John jumped back and gathered blade energy. As soon as the giant nightcrawler-thing left the ground, he released the energy at it, splitting the beast’s pincher-face. His minions rushed back down the hill to finish it off.

John collected the crystals from the corpse and tried to add it to his undead forces. He couldn’t, so he got his knife out and took what mats he could. He thought the pinchers had to be worth decent points. Without a helmet, it was all guesswork though.

After securing the mats in his spatial storage, John climbed the hill to look around. The next area didn’t look so bad, and he saw a rocky outcrop they could use. His vision was becoming less and less reduced and confused in the Nether, so he could see and sense more and further.

John wondered if they should stay in their current area before risking a new one. The nightcrawler-things were only Platinum and easy to kill.

The prior areas were much, much tougher. But John knew he had to find the edge of the continent and cross the great chasms separating them. He started to head back to Seven-four, sending his minions to scout ahead and act as bait.

The nickname John gave Seven-four was Talker. He didn’t call the brute that to his face, but it was a fitting nickname. Seven-four talked nonstop.

John was surprised that a higher-tier Oli hadn’t killed Talker long ago for talking too much. All the other ones seemed the quiet type and value silence.

Since the first day, as soon as they managed to escape the humongous lizard-praying mantis thing they stood on, Talker had talked. And talked and talked and talked and talked and only stopped while running from massive foes, during fights, and when sleeping.

The lizard-praying mantis and other things its size had souls, but the souls were only about two or three times the size of a human’s and hard to spot in their huge frames. Most were armored enough that he couldn’t see the vital essence within them. The things were bigger than the large housing buildings in DC. Some were nearly as big as dark walkers.

But unlike dark walkers, these giant beasts would never passively let John crack a hole in their skulls. Or get close to them at all without attacking him. What manifestations they had, they used, and often, viciously trying to kill their prey.

And all the big ones were on the second Tree, most of them higher up on that Tree, and had to be run from.

And John and Talker did a lot of running. Running and fighting. Talker was a big help in the early days. When his essence ran out, Talker had two EBs, essence-batteries, to use. When those were used up, the brute was of little use against the foes in the areas they had traveled through, though John knew he’d have no issue fighting these nightcrawler-things.

Peerless had this strange way of constantly half-meditating that was more effective at gathering energy than normal breathing techniques, but not half as effective as normal meditation techniques.

Talker told John the main way Peerless filled their dantians was through Advancement Chambers, big rooms on ships where the whole kauwa would gather. The Alii and lower-tier members would sit in the back ranks, the Oliua, higher-tier members, and those deserving by deed sat in the front.

Crystals were fed into some sort of device to purify them of animal taint and make the energy more potent and plentiful. A mist would blanket the room, those in the front getting far more of it, and the mist would be cultivated, greatly increasing the speed of advancement.

Those chambers were the reason that there were so many Peerless Transcendents.

Since Peerless weren’t allowed to consume animals or animal products, they weren’t allowed to use crystals as normally used. Crystals were dropped by animals of both the sentient and sapient variety. The purifying of crystals to remove the animal taint and make them safe for consumption eventually led to the invention of Advancement Chambers.

Faster advancement was great. The Peerless had far more Exalteds than any sector race per capita and in total. Far more by a large margin. But the Peerless relied on tech and not their own manifestations in battle. Their aspects were weak.

At Silver and Diamond tiers, cultivators were able to open a new aspect, advance a minor aspect to an average, or an average to a major. The same at Salt and many other tiers.

At Diamond, when Talker tried to advance one of his aspects from minor to average, it failed to advance.

That was not an issue for anyone else. Just Peerless. Only one aspect-enhancer was needed to advance an aspect. The Peerless often needed two, sometimes three before an aspect advanced.

Since their tech was so powerful and their essence worked just fine as fuel for it, they practiced less and less with their own aspects and manifestations. They still practiced, but not nearly to the same extent as others.

The Nani Aikapu had informed, or strongly hinted at in a roundabout way, the Oli sent on the Purge to use crystals as normal, their own manifestations more, and never mention it to anyone. Talker assumed to see if that could help correct the issue. That was how things were done. If it worked, the Aikapu would be reinterpreted, and a new SOP would be released.

John touched his little horn nub. The Peerless did their best to prevent the taint of the Nether from growing within them, but all the art John had seen of Akua showed him with truly massive ox-horns and claws. From the art, it looked like Akua was about the most Nether-tainted a non-demon could get.

John wanted to be more Nether-tainted himself. He hoped his tiny bull-horns grew to a useful size, and his claws grew longer and sharper. So far, they hadn’t. But he had many months left in the Nether, and he hoped.

As John walked, he gathered and flung blade energy, trying to improve his [External Energy Manipulation] [Skill]. A few other giant nightcrawler-things attacked him, but nothing else. This was definitely the most peaceful and lowest-tier area they had journeyed through. He wanted tougher enemies, but the safety of the area would be a boon for Talker.

Many trembles shook the earth. John jumped back and gathered blade energy. The minions were too close, so he sent them running forward. They didn’t take commands well, so he found it best to overshoot his desires rather than undershoot them. He really wished his minions could use some of the manifestations they had used in life.

Three giant nightcrawler-things burst through the ground. One of their heads was split with blade energy, destroying a pincer, causing John to curse. He felt a good amount of new harmony. He became excited. As soon as the nightcrawlers appeared, his minions, on their own, turned back and rushed to attack them. He let them fight the remainders as he was too excited and needed to think.

The nightcrawler-things were Platinums, and weak for that tier. Two of John’s minions were Diamonds, and the dog-frog was a Salt. He thought they’d be fine even without manifestations. He was wrong. The scorpion-thing died for the second and last time. He couldn’t reanimate a corpse twice.

John collected the crystals and made a nightcrawler-thing a minion. He tried commanding it to hide underground. It ignored him. “Curse you, minion. Why do you all lose so much as undead?” He tried making another corpse a minion in case he could control four total now, but it didn’t work. He became more certain his minion limit was based on size and not the tier of the corpse, since these were only Platinums.

John hoped his new minion would go underground when he started walking again. He’d find out later. He had a far more important task to see to. He collected what mats he could from the corpses, including the broken pincer, and put them in the storage bracer Talker let him borrow. He then sat down in the same position he used to meditate and commanded his minions to guard him while knowing they’d attack anything that got close anyways.

John’s dantian was a little over half full. He wanted his Gar’tar [Title] active for this even though it involved shen. He turned half his essence to shen, and most of the shen to emptiness. He got into his ‘battle-mind,’ sent vital essence to heal, then increased his strength and speed with it. Finally, he began meditating and gathering energy before slipping into his Mind’s Eye.

The NCS was the only way most cultivators at his tier could enter their Mind’s Eye, but John figured out how to enter his without it. It wasn’t all that hard. His mind space was dark and completely empty without the NCS feeding him digital information.

John had long ago trained with Avatar on how to merge [Synergies]. He trusted Avatar but his ego always whispered in his ear, telling him he could do it better. Some parts would be very tricky without the visual guidance the NCS provided. Dragging and dropping [Skills] into the synergy slots made things much easier. In the Nether, he was on his own.

That strange NCS page with the symbols and untranslated language felt a certain way. John couldn’t see it, but he could almost feel it in his blank mind space. He had been offered something special. He needed to do everything possible to ensure he absolutely eked every last small drop of power out of this special thing he was offered, every tiny bit he could manage.

John had put a lot of thought into this. He had to make certain he didn’t miss a thing.

Having failed all his prior attempts to find the strange page in his blank mind space didn’t mean anything. John had thought it would take more time to raise his [External Energy Manipulation] [Skill] to the next Mastery, so he hadn’t put all that much effort into finding it. He had no choice but to figure it out now. He wouldn’t wait any longer for this strange power.

John now tried to create something out of nothing. Just a small block. He pointed and thought ‘block’ for as long and hard as he could. He focused with such vigor his face and whole head shook with tremors.

Well, that didn’t work, thought John. He then tried to create a block as he created his body in his Mind’s Eye. He focused completely on visualizing one side of the block. After he had the visual locked in, he focused on another side, then another. Once he had a perfect picture of the full block in his head, he visualized it in his hand.

John opened his pretend eyes and saw a block resting on his palm. He closed his eyes and tried to recreate that page as best he could. Hours later, it had failed to work.

John was certain he could feel the page. He grabbed hold of that feeling and yanked. It felt closer. He yanked, and heaved, and pulled for hours, trying to brute force the page into existence.

Finally, an image appeared in front of John. It was slightly different from the page he remembered, and transparent, but the symbols and words looked to be the same from what he remembered. And most importantly, nothing was grayed out. Only the middle snake was empty.

But after talking to Avatar about that inner snake, they both thought it was possible his [Class] ability would go there.

John would still attempt the [Synergy]. It would either work or he’d have to figure out what went into the circle. He suspected the requirements were met, as the light connecting the symbols into a triangle shape was a different color and glowed a deep white.

John first pictured and held onto his [Vampirism] [Skill]. He went through all the [Skills] required by the [Synergy] in the same way, and the associated [Perks] listed under the [Skills]

Avatar had told him, at this point, he would just focus on merging his [Skills] together in his mind. He wanted to try a couple other things too. He thought of harmony and tried to infuse that with his [Skills] and [Perks]. He did the same with all his essences, most concepts, shen, and emptiness. He did it with his vital essence healing him and increasing his strength and speed. Then he did it with the symbols on the page. Lastly, he grabbed hold of his ‘vampirism’ concept with his mind and tried to wrap that around everything like a blanket.

John had no idea if any of that extra effort helped or would do anything, just as he had no idea if creating shen and emptiness and beginning to meditate before entering his Mind’s Eye would either. Nothing ventured, nothing gained, he thought.

John then prepared his mind and readied it to bring all his tremendous willpower to bear on the next task. As clearly and strongly as he could, he pictured all the elements he held in his mind merging into one thing. A much better thing. A much more powerful thing.

The world seemed to blur by as it did when he entered and exited his Mind’s Eye. He became worried, thinking he was being ejected from his mind, but only for a moment, as the traveling lasted far, far too long for that.

When the world and stars stopped blurring by him and all stilled, John looked at a symbol he had never seen before but somehow knew its meaning. The true symbol for infinity, and extremely complex.

The symbol started to break apart and John tried to force it back whole with his mind and will. He did well at first, until the symbol broke apart into millions of lights of every type of color, madly dancing around. He couldn’t remember the symbol enough to attempt to recreate it.

The more John tried to force his will on the lights, the more beautiful patterns they’d make, and he watched all the beautiful shapes in awe. It took him a while to realize his mind was not working right, as if he were heavily drugged.

John had no idea how long he watched the amazing shapes morph. He could’ve done nothing else with the rest of his life but that. And die content. It was as if he was being shown the secrets of the universe, of the fundamental truth of things. Truths that only higher beings with minds far more advanced than his own could grasp. He hardly noticed as he started to slide somewhere else, his mind still fixated on the beautiful shapes dancing and morphing so majestically.

When John stopped sliding, he was in a pitch-black and damp cavern, his ability to see in the dark was barely able to pierce the deep blackness. He could make out a few tunnels and some sort of creature completely covered in eyes. He instinctively knew the creature was peaceful and meant no ill will.

With John’s mind working so strangely, it took some time for him to realize the creature had six wings and was covering most of itself with four of them.

Without the creature moving or talking, it somehow bid John to follow it down a tunnel, and he followed as the creature slowly flew along.

The tunnel was very long. John suddenly knew that while his mind was not thinking as it should be, he was thinking better than he ever had before.

A bright light from further down the tunnel burned John’s eyes. The creature stood aside and somehow bid John to pass and exit into the light. As John did so, he heard the creature say, “He who was, and is, and is to come,” without his ears or mind. He couldn’t explain how he heard it. He just did.

The bright light was so bright John could see nothing else. He turned and tried to find the tunnel entrance, but he could see nothing but pure, bright light everywhere. He felt something looking for him, not an eye, but something that served the same purpose. It turned to him.

A very soothing androgynous voice asked, “Will you attempt to save the girl?”

“I can’t,” replied John, knowing exactly what girl he was asked about. “There’s no way I can. There’s so many Transcendents. With their tech, I couldn’t even beat a Silver when I was Bronze. It can’t be done.”

The voice then asked, “Would the best of men make the attempt?”

John knew the answer. He still said, “No. No one can do the impossible. If there was a chance, any chance, I would. There isn’t.”

“And your companion,” asked the voice. “Your friend. Your enemy. If you stood in front of the portal back home today, would he walk through it with you?”

John wanted to say the portal didn’t lead to his home but bit his tongue. His goal was to destroy the Peerless Empire. Another dead Peerless furthered his end. Unless that Peerless could be of use to him in the future. He had grown to like Talker, but he couldn’t let that or anything like it get in the way of his mission. And he didn’t have to decide yet. He and Talker weren’t even on the same continent as the portal.

“I don’t know,” was John’s answer.

The voice said, “I see. Farewell, child of darkness and light.”

The vision ended. John was back in the Nether, a strange energy surrounded him. His energy gathering technique attempted to grab some of the energy. His dantian painfully rejected it. He stopped meditating and felt the energy infuse into every atom of his being, strengthening him.

Minutes later, when the energy was fully gone and part of him, John felt within himself. He felt a lot stronger and more powerful. A lot more. It wasn’t clear how. He somehow knew the name of his [Class] was [Vessel of the First]. He felt a strange new ability within himself. He knew the name of it was different from the name of his [Class], though he had no name for it, and no idea what it did.

John wondered whose voice spoke to him and what that whole weird event was about. His mind was working so strangely during the whole thing. He couldn’t describe it. It had a certain feeling about it, close to how he felt during the dream he had while last ascending.

John wished he answered the last question asked by the soothing voice with, ‘I’ll play it by ear.’ He always forgot to use that phrase when it fit. He opened his eyes to see that his new nightcrawler minion was dead and that there were four new corpses.

After spreading his senses to find enemies and not finding anything, John set to it. He rose from the ground with more grace and ease than he was used to, surprising himself. He was very anxious to find out how much stronger he was and what his new ability did.