How to Keep a Vampire - Chapter 14

“Brother.”

Shi Yu suddenly leaned in close to call Wen Si, his eyes bright and filled with intimate trust, as if he were laying a sweet trap.

His fingers pointed obliquely toward Wen Si, his beautiful face full of confidence. “I am weak, but that doesn’t stop my brother from being strong.”

Brother.

According to Shi Yu’s plan, posing as brothers was the perfect cover for Wen Si to bring him into the team.

Wen Si froze. After a long while, he twitched the corner of his mouth. His gaze was dark and indistinct, and in a voice that only they could hear, he called out to him: “Baby.”

Shi Yu: “…”

His heart skipped a beat.

Shouldn’t it be ‘little brother’?

But considering they were human ‘brothers,’ it was certainly possible for an older brother to call his younger sibling ‘baby.’

Soon, he accepted it with composure.

Although Wen Si was younger than him, he would let the puppy have his way this time.

Shi Yu continued to emphasize earnestly, “My brother is very strong.”

“Don’t you think so?” His eyes turned upward, amber pupils widened as he looked at him, like a small cat borrowing the tiger’s prestige. “Bro-ther.”

Shi Yu clearly heard Wen Si chuckle softly, and he replied, “Mm, you’re right.”

Shi Yu’s actions were outrageous; none of them were predicted by anyone. It turned out his confidence was well-founded.

The man now turned his gaze to Wen Si, whose handsome appearance would stand out in any crowd.

“This must be the brother who asked the question earlier.” The man looked at him sternly, asking aggressively: “Why didn’t you come up to challenge earlier?”

Wen Si’s tone was deep and languid. He said carelessly: “Just now, Baby hadn’t encouraged me yet.”

“If I had gone up, I would have been afraid.”

Nothing is more frightening than a sudden silence.

Fortunately, Shi Yu was already accustomed to this.

The first round of the test was combat, but the man didn’t make Wen Si choose a single student as an opponent.

“Since you’re so strong, brother, why not let the elites of our academy come at you all at once? What do you think?” He felt he hadn’t misjudged the man; this youth’s ‘brother’ should truly have some skills.

A show of strength right from the start.

Wen Si looked back at the youth below the stage. His eyes were sparkling, filled with calculation.

Wen Si twitched the corner of his mouth, his words laden with meaning: “Alright.”

【Wow—】

Sunlight fell through the clouds, casting a halo, and Shi Yu’s eyes were filled with anticipation.

【Fighting, fighting!!】

Lan Yin had also become a member of the audience.

Shi Yu took out the paper bag he had brought from the carriage. Wen Si had been feeding him snacks the whole way, yet plenty remained. He grabbed some dried fruit, melon seeds, and other treats, keeping them on hand.

He wouldn’t be able to finish them anyway.

Shi Yu called out happily: “Selling dried fruit, melon seeds, and peanuts in the front row…”

Shi Yu’s competitive spirit was very strong, especially regarding strength.

After he had fallen into a deep sleep, Wen Si had been able to replace him. He was curious to see how long it would take for Wen Si to deal with these blood hunters.

Fights are actually different. One type is about efficiency—to resolve the opponent quickly, which makes the scene messy and noisy.

The other type is when one has energy to spare. When there is no major threat, the fighting is steady and ruthless, just a bit more time-consuming.

Wen Si leaned toward the latter.

When the people from the Blood Hunter Academy swarmed him, he didn’t retreat. It was more like he was nonchalantly waiting, breaking their attacks one by one.

His movements were sharp and swift, yet clear enough for everyone under the stage to see every moment it was a posture of perfect ease.

The sounds of fists hitting flesh rang out on the stage; one could vaguely hear the crisp sound of bones striking against flesh.

When the last person hit the ground, Wen Si withdrew his hand and turned to look at Shi Yu.

It had to be said, this moment was very impactful.

The man carried a sense of ruthlessness, his eyes filled with undisguised killing intent and hostility, yet the moment he turned his head to look at him, he slowly reined it in.

In that instant, Shi Yu felt as if he had seen the Wen Si from his dreams.

When looking at him, he always had that puppy-like gaze.

He was hopeful, sincere, and pathetic, as if waiting for a compliment he hadn’t heard in a long time.

Compared to the crushing defeat of the previous few, Wen Si’s victory was exceptionally brilliant, and a wave of enthusiastic cheers erupted from the crowd.

But not a single one was what Wen Si was waiting for.

He contained his emotions, masking what lay deep in his eyes.

The blood hunter’s attitude became clearly more amiable: “Brother, what should I call you?”

As he spoke, his hand reached out to pat Wen Si’s shoulder.

Wen Si dodged, openly and clearly.

His attitude was cold: “My surname is Wen.”

“Wen…” the man muttered: “Brother, don’t mind me, but it’s been a long time since I’ve heard of the Wen family.”

Wen Si had taken his mother’s surname.

A thousand years ago, the Wen family was a famous family among blood hunters, yet now they had fallen so low that no one remembered them.

“Congratulations on passing the challenge.” The man smiled, extending his hand again: “Welcome to the Blood Hunter Academy.”

Wen Si nodded, “Thank you, but my hands got dirty just now, so I won’t shake hands.”

Logically speaking, it was hard not to get clothes dirty in a fight, let alone white ones, yet Wen Si’s clothes were still crisp and clean, as if he hadn’t experienced a battle at all, but merely stretched his fingers.

As for his hands being ‘dirty,’ it was clearly just an excuse.

The man withdrew his hand awkwardly, only then hearing Wen Si say in an indifferent tone: “Besides, Baby doesn’t like it when I touch other people.”

Him?

The man recalled the beautiful youth from earlier and understood. The youth looked like someone raised in indulgence; it was only natural for him to make such unreasonable demands.

Although the man felt something was wrong—why did these brothers look so strange together?

He asked: “Where does Brother Wen live? We have a tricky mission recently and might need to depart soon.”

“I live nearby. Just tell me the time and location of the mission, and I will be there on time.”

“That’s great!” The man’s fierce-looking face continued to wear a smile, looking like hypocritical enthusiasm.

This mission was highly difficult and the academy was short on hands. He couldn’t be anything but pleased that such a person had joined.

Wen Si: “Mm.”

After Wen Si’s victory, no one else climbed onto the challenge stage, and the thrill-seeking crowd gradually dispersed.

Only a few people remained beside the challenge stage.

Wen Si suddenly said: “I have one request.”

The man stopped, thinking Wen Si wanted remuneration, and answered without hesitation: “No problem!”

“Good.” Wen Si curled his lips. He stared at Shi Yu, who was still idly eating melon seeds and daydreaming under the stage, and said slowly: “For this mission, I will bring him along.”

“Huh?” The man was caught off guard.

Shi Yu saw Wen Si coming down from the stage and neatly dumped the melon seed shells into a nearby garbage pile.

He ran toward Wen Si, calling out dependently: “Brother—”

“Mm.” Wen Si brushed the hair that the wind had blown into Shi Yu’s face. “Sorry for making you wait so long.”

“It’s alright.”

Shi Yu thought, I just finished eating the melon seeds.

The man here mused that he didn’t seem to have said more than a few words, so it couldn’t have been too long.

Distinct and separate, unlike his interactions with others, Wen Si only carried a hint of imperceptible warmth when facing Shi Yu.

“Brother Wen, it’s not that I’m trying to avoid it,” the man said with a hesitating look, “but your brother… he is too thin.”

It wasn’t nice to attack someone’s self-esteem, but Shi Yu had been quite frank about being ‘weak’ earlier, so the man just said it directly: “This mission is dangerous, and we cannot guarantee your brother’s safety.”

“If he gets hurt, or if something worse happens…”

“If you cannot guarantee it, I will.”

Wen Si spoke decisively, and Shi Yu could sense his attitude.

The blood hunters could barely protect themselves; how could they talk about protecting Shi Yu?

Also, the man didn’t mean his safety; he meant that he might become a burden to the team.

The smile on Shi Yu’s lips faded, and his delicate little face was covered in gloom—he was annoyed.

Even if his strength wasn’t what it used to be, he wasn’t that trashy.

“How about this…” The man had an idea, his eyes flashing: “Let’s use the most traditional method of selecting blood hunters. As long as your brother can pass, we will go together.”

The most traditional way was to release low-level blood clan members and let the blood hunters demonstrate their skills in actual combat. These blood clan members were basically in a weakened state and would not cause too much harm to humans.

Human streets and alleys extended in all directions. They passed through a dark alleyway, and the view suddenly opened up.

The man led them to a large lump of black cloth and commanded people to pull it away. The scene underneath was instantly revealed.

There were hundreds of iron cages, each containing a few young, thin bats. The cages were treated with blood hunter-specific medicinal water, designed specifically to deal with the blood clan. This medicine was useless against high-level blood clan members, but it was twice as effective against vampire cubs.

As soon as they touched it, their flesh would corrode, and the membranes of many bat cubs had already been corroded away, deep to the bone.

The blood hunters had people specifically to spray the medicine. Even if the little bats didn’t move and touch the edges of the cages, the medicine would condense and drip down from their heads, corroding their skin.

It was a scene that made one’s hair stand on end at first glance.

Shi Yu’s face turned cold. His amber pupils were murky; ruthless intent was slowly breeding in his eyes, and he smiled in anger.

“This is truly spectacular.”

“Isn’t it.” The man seemed to have heard the expected response, lifting his chest with pride: “These bat cubs were newly caught today; they are all low-level blood clan—more accurately, vampires. Most are still in the cub stage.”

He boasted proudly: “To cut grass, you must remove the roots. Wiping out these cubs now saves them from harming people when they grow up.”

Wiping them out when young…

Shi Yu scanned the room. Many of the little bats were already on the verge of death, curled up together. A few were struggling to keep their eyes open as they looked at him, their eyes filled with deep panic and timidity.

Just like human children, bat cubs did not understand the world; they were still in their ignorant stage.

The cubs didn’t understand why, when they opened their eyes, it wasn’t the embrace of their parents, but cold, terrifying cages and a group of humans full of malice.

“The current blood clan shouldn’t be directly feeding on human blood anymore,” Shi Yu asked.

“That’s what they say.” The man shook his head, refuting: “But who can guarantee that the nobles among the blood clan aren’t privately keeping up the old ways? After all, aren’t we humans their food reserves?”

Shi Yu took a deep breath and sneered: “Then what are you doing catching these low-level vampires?”

The man spoke casually: “Some human restaurants need these low-level vampires. After all, ordinary food can’t satisfy those nobles among humans.”

“They don’t understand the blood clan vampires either; in their eyes, they are all the same. These vampire cubs have been very popular in restaurants lately, and they think they are turning the tables and eating the blood clan instead.”

“I see.” Shi Yu’s fingers turned white from clenching. “Is it this number every day?”

“How about it? Is it a lot?” The man thought Shi Yu was exclaiming in wonder and said haughtily: “This number is small; sometimes there are even more.”

“So…”

Blood-pigeon-red light flooded Shi Yu’s amber pupils, escalating. His eyelashes lowered, hiding the tumultuous clouds within his eyes.

Shi Yu was losing control.

He wasn’t a little duke raised in a greenhouse; he was a blood clan member who had grown up drinking blood.

Driven by the instinct of a pure-blooded blood clan member, Shi Yu’s little fangs ached, as if something wanted to grow out and pierce the other’s throat, making him shut up.

At that moment, a pair of slender hands gently wrapped around his clenched fist, prying open his fingers one by one, interlacing with them.

“Why are you clenching your hands so tight?” Wen Si’s words carried a soothing power, like a special sedative, and Shi Yu gradually calmed down.

“Do you find him very annoying?”

Wen Si whispered in his ear.