'Man, I love hot water.'
Dante exhaled deeply as he sank deeper into the water. Fafnir also seemed to be enjoying the moment even in his shadow form.
He, Skylar, and Elizabeth were in a warm spring of water, while Maxwell and Selena were protecting them outside.
A few minutes ago, they all went to get the bags that the knights dropped while seemingly chasing Skylar, then Skylar led them to this hot spring.
Dante couldn't understand how a spring could be that warm in this frozen place, but he didn't think too much about it and just blamed magic.
Fafnir had washed himself a few times in similar springs, but he had to warm them all himself back then. He wasn't lucky enough to find a natural warm one.
In the spring, Elizabeth and Skylar were swimming in the middle, while Dante stayed alone on the edge. This time, the reason wasn't because he wanted to stay away from them.
'I can't swim…'
The spring grew deeper toward the centre, therefore Dante stayed on the safe side where his feet were still able to touch the ground.
"Mr. Vampire, how do you know too much about this place? Why are you even here anyway? Isn't the Vampire Kingdom in the central region?"
Hearing Elizabeth's questions, Skylar smiled while pushing his hair backward:
"Hehe, one year ago, I decided to leave the kingdom and explore the world to build a name for myself. One thing led to another and I ended up in the northern region. As for why I know too much about this forest, it's because I've been living in this kingdom for three weeks and have explored it a little."
"Cool!"
Hearing his response, Dante couldn't help but wonder:
'How vast is this world?'
There was the Dragon Palace, Holy Kingdom, Vampire Kingdom, and apparently, this place was also a kingdom, and many more according to them.
Just then, a question popped into Dante's mind as he looked at Skylar and asked:
"Skylar, why were they calling you a blood sucker? And why did they seem to be hating you too much? You don't look different from humans."
Skylar scratched his head awkwardly, feeling a sharp gaze from Maxwell and Selena:
"Yes, compared to these ugly knights, you and I look more like humans."
"You damn—"
Selena and Maxwell cursed as Skylar continued:
"But there is something special about vampires—we can drink blood to live. But not only human blood! And we can also eat normal meat when we want!"
'Drinking blood? Like bats and mosquitoes?'
Dante wondered inwardly while remembering the infamous blood suckers from his past world.
Skylar glared sharply at the knights:
"We drink all kinds of blood, just like how humans eat all kinds of meat! Humans can eat each other if they want, and it has already happened before. We aren't too different from them, but for an unknown stupid reason, there are rumours about us loving only human blood. And all these fools are easily believing the rumours!!"
Maxwell glared back at him: "It's not stupid rumour when there're wanted vampires who have sucked their victims dry."
Skylar chuckled: "Really? What about the wanted humans who ate human flesh? Will you call them exceptions as well? You are just a hypocrite."
For the first time, Maxwell couldn't respond.
"By the way, Dante…" Skylar looked at Dante suddenly: "Are you… the shy type?"
"Just ignore me."
Of course, to clean themselves, they had to be in their underwear, but Dante was the only one wearing all his clothes.
Why? Because he had scales covering his chest, centipede exoskeleton on his right arm, and a demonic tattoo!
Unlike all his relics, which he could store in his soul, Centipede of Greed was the only one that would always stay visible on his arm.
'I don't understand anything about this relic.'
Shaking his head and feeling clean, Dante left the spring and dressed in one of Beatrice's outfits behind a tree. They were a little too big for him, but still manageable.
A few minutes later, Skylar and Elizabeth ended their bath and dressed as well. But Dante noticed that Elizabeth was barefoot, so he offered: "I have some boots if you don't have any."
"No, it's okay." Elizabeth shook her head: "It's just that I can't see anything, so I'm trying to use all my other senses."
'Oh, she is really blind. But how isn't she feeling cold?'
Wasn't there supposed to be some dangers of walking on snow? Something like a frostbite?
And she also wore only her robe without anything for warmth under it. How was she okay with only that?
'Maybe she has a relic like mine.'
Shaking his head, they finally began to move with Skylar ahead of them.
"Follow me closely, my friends. It'll take us two days at least to reach the nearest village."
Dante's eyes twitched: 'Two days? Did that woman have to waste four days every time she wanted to buy or sell something?'
In his past world, Dante was used to living in a city where everything was near. He didn't know that in the old times, people had to travel for days and even months from one place to another.
Sighing in annoyance, Dante silently moved forward.
¢¢¢
The dark night came quickly, forcing the group to stop their travel to rest.
Maxwell, Selena, Elizabeth, and Skylar had made a small campfire and gathered together around it, chatting casually and sometimes fighting.
Dante, on the other hand, was a little far from them, sitting alone and trying to make his own source of warmth.
His cloak was warm, but it wasn't enough against the cold wind. Thankfully, Dante knew how to make a good campfire.
Or more accurately, Fafnir knew how to make a campfire, but Dante had his memories now.
Dante cleaned a small circle from the snow and used some logs to make a platform. Then, he used some rocks to make a ring on this snowless area.
Using some sticks, leaves, and logs, he made a basic structure, waiting only for ignition.
'Now for the last and hardest step.'
He needed fire. Fafnir and Beatrice had the Fire Aspect, so they didn't need a lighter.
The knights and the vampire had a strange tool to make fire, but Dante didn't want to ask for their help.
Thankfully, one of his aspects seemed to have a solution for this.
'I need to use my Shadow Aspect.'
The runes increased his comprehension to 25%, giving him an idea about what shadows really could do.
He had always thought that it was too weak and useless. It only made things lighter and less visible, but that was because he had been using it wrong all the time.
The Shadow Aspect could particularly mimic the other aspects!
But it was really hard to do that.
If he wanted to mimic another aspect, Dante had to understand the other aspects, as well. But if he didn't have an attunement for the domain of that aspect, then how was he supposed to learn about them?
Usually, a shadow user would need to spend months studying an aspect due to lack of attunement, but Dante was different.
He had the comprehension of the former owner of his body!
Fafnir had two Domains, which were Sun and Cosmo.
From the Cosmo Domain, he gained Space and Time.
From the Sun Domain, he gained Fire and Light.
So now, Dante had to use his understanding over Fire Aspect and try to mimic it.
Dante took a dry leaf and brought his fingers under it. Then, he snapped his fingers.
Snap!
Nothing happened.
He tried again.
Snap!
Nothing. But he didn't give up. It was never supposed to be easy.
Snap after snap, he focused his will and used his understanding over both his current and former aspects.
Eventually…
Snap!!
A small flare of dark flames burst out of his fingers, catching the dry leaf in an instant.
'Yes!'
Happily, he used the leaf for ignition. The fire spread instantly, and black flames erupted in front of him.
The warmth hit Dante instantly as a wide smile spread across his face. The fire didn't produce any light, it even seemed to be darker than its surroundings, but Dante only wanted the heat anyway.
That was his first mimicked magic, and that was only the start.
The Shadow Aspect was so weak in its raw form, and the Misfortune Aspect was all about luck. But now, Dante gained some understanding of his potential.
However, this wasn't the time to think about that. Now that he had a fire, it was time to do something he wished to do for a long time.
'Cook meat!'