The city of Trifas, with a population only around 20,000 individuals, you personally thought it was more of a quaint and peaceful town than a city.
It's just like the last location where you tracked HIM down, that small French village Roa slaughtered to the last, is this a pattern? You note with a grimace.
Still while you can vaguely sense the snake's whereabouts by his stolen power, it's never been more accurate than that, unfortunately. Sometimes you wish it was, so you could just rest again and take a break from the monotonous cycle the Serpent of Akasha imposed upon you.
Nearly all your problems could be laid at the feet of that man. If he is even a man right now, you remember his last incarnation was a woman, of course his gender doesn't matter as all his vessels act the same, are the same.
You feel something lightly brush against your leg, breaking you out of your current train of thought, looking down you spot a small black cat adorned with an equally black bow.
A small smile tugs at your face "Sorry Len, I was brooding too much, huh. How about we both get a cake at one of the nearby shops? Still I'm not sure if they'll let you eat it in that form."
Len's face tilts to the side as if coming to a difficult decision, after what seems an eternity she runs into a small alley on your right. Within a few seconds a small girl with unusual features emerges from the alley, slowly walking towards you with a feline grace.
While Len was taking her sweet time, the wind kicked up blowing your blonde locks all over your face "Len you're walking slowly on purpose aren't you, do you want cake or not?"
With those words Len's sluggish pace picks up quickly, as she wildly looks at the houses nearby trying to find any kind of confectionary shop; As if her cake will run away from her.
Perhaps your teasing was a bit too effective as it's now you who must catch up to her frantic pace, finally the two of you come across a bakery that also serves cakes alongside the usual bread, Len hurriedly tugs you into the shop by your sleeve wanting to have her snack as soon as possible.
"Alright, alright Len you don't have to rush me, we were going to get cake anyway." You can't help but lightly chastise her actions.
Len merely pouts in return "Pfft hehehe your little sister must give you a tough time huh, always begging for sweets." a warm voice interrupts your lighthearted banter with Len.
Looking towards the voice, you see a young woman occupying a wooden counter with a glass display, showing off all sorts of sugary goodness. You could practically see Len drooling at the sight, well if she wasn't so stoic that is.
"How could you tell she was my sister?" You don't see any reason to correct her misunderstanding, Len wasn't your sister by any means, she was more a pet or servant than a sister.
"Well you both have red eyes, I don't see many people with that eye color, so I think it just has to be hereditary, you know?" she gives such an earnest response for such an inane issue, how cute.
You absentmindedly watch Len pull the shopkeeper's attention, her hand wavering over several different cakes. Len refuses to talk much, causing the female shopkeeper no small amount of confusion as all the familiar does is point towards what she wants while giving little shakes of her head if asked if she was sure.
As the girl is occupied by Len's antics, your mind slowly starts to wander towards the subject of siblings.
The only being that could be considered your sister is Altrouge Brunestud and your relationship would be called strained at best if not downright hostile. It was to the point where the two of you could never be near each other without fighting, the both of you simply have never gotten along. It's not as if the two of you inherently dislike each other, but her constant jealousy towards you has always soured your relations. You can't help but wonder if the two of you will ever get along, but somehow you doubt it.
"You want all of those?" Len rapidly nods her head in agreement.
"Oh alright, don't say I didn't warn you! It's a bit too much, but it's not my stomach that will be crying tomorrow." the shopkeepers voice is full of exasperation at this point since she seems unwilling to upset her small customer.
You hadn't been paying much attention to the events before you, lost in your own thoughts as the shopkeeper's honey brown eyes turn from Len's towards your own.
"You shouldn't spoil her too much you know, haah" she gives a tired sigh "Anyways the cost of the seven cakes is…" she trails off as your eyes flicker to a golden hue.
"Thanks for shopping with us." the shopkeeper responds, waving the two of you off with a vacant smile.
You didn't much like using your mystic eyes, still you've used them plenty of times in the past, and you'll use them in the future as well since they're quite useful in this modern age; and well, you've never bothered with mortal money.
It seems the wind has calmed down after you left the shop, so Len decides to eat her cakes outside on a bench, you simply watch her happily stuffing her cheeks full with her newly acquired cakes, she looks more like a cute hamster right now than a cat.
As you wait for Len to finish her snacks you can't help but marvel at how calm this city is, the grass is green, doves and other birds frolicking joyously in the sky as if everything is perfectly peaceful.
Oh, how wrong they are, this peace is an illusion waiting to be shattered. Roa has already awakened and his methods always lead to one thing, bloody mayhem consuming everything. Where dead apostles run rampant on the streets until everything is twisted into a mockery of what it once was.
Roa will do this all to feed his own desires, just as he tricked and used you to fulfill his so long ago. That's why you must stop him, why you hunt him down to the ends of the earth. Yet you can't help but feel your actions are almost meaningless, this is his eighteenth incarnation and each time you end his life he comes back using another person as his vessel; Sometimes you can't help but feel this is all you will do until the end of time, never able to truly end him once and for all to reclaim the power he stole from you.
"Kghh" you grunt as a sudden pain brings you out of your depressing thoughts, your left hand the source of a burning pain. Quickly looking at it you see some sort of magical tattoo engraving itself unto your hand.
You didn't expect anything to happen right now since it was in the middle of the day,
damn, damn, DAMN IT!
You let your guard down. Roa has always acted during the night until he's grown enough to feel confident, his presence didn't feel strong enough for this kind of action! No, you can't be fooled that easily, perhaps this isn't Roa's doing, but if that was the case then whose?
Moreover how did this get past your magic resistance? Even if you haven't encountered this type of Magecraft before, something which you doubted, your initial passive resistance should still be more than up for the task of countering modern mysteries.
Len slowly looks towards you, wondering what's happening, she gives you a silent question with a tilt of her head "Just give me a moment, alright Len?" That's all the confirmation she needs to go back to her sweets.
Still even if this magical seal isn't connected to Roa that doesn't mean it's not a hindrance, best just get rid of it then.
With a wet squelch you easily rip off your left hand at the shoulder crushing it with your right.
"AAHHH What the hell are you doing, you fucking crazy bitch!" you turn to meet some random nobody's eyes with a golden glare.
Right, you forgot that you were in a public place in the heat of the moment. Still it's nothing your eyes can't fix.
The man who yelled at you before now looks at your completely whole left arm with dead eyes constantly repeating "Everything is normal..." while slowly meandering away in a daze.
Now with that distraction out of the way you look back at your completely rejuvenated left arm, looking no worse for wear compared to before you destroyed it just a few moments ago, just as expected.
What was not expected and entirely unwelcome was that magical seal was somehow still on your left hand and it was continuing to inscribe itself. This was no longer something that you could easily dismiss, and while you could tell the marking was magical you didn't know what it did which made it all the more concerning.
Your mind rapidly whirled with possibilities, but you quickly recognized worrying about it wasn't going to do anything. So, you thought of your options to figure out this problem. While it was certainly concerning you couldn't help but feel excited, this was something new! Something different from the usual monotonous cycle of slumbering in your castle and killing Roa.
Len meanwhile merely looked to you with a questioning gaze, as if you lost it… again.
Now how are you going to figure out what this weird magical Tattoo does?
[] Simple, you'll just get the nearest magus you can find and work them over until they spill what it does.
[] Some random two-bit magus probably won't know what such an intricate work is, you'll send Len to get some advice from Uncle Zel, she'll be fine, Probably…
[] What it is doesn't matter in the slightest you need to find Roa and eliminate him as quickly as possible, this stupid marking is probably just a distraction of his, a red herring to buy him more time.
Pick a Command seal color.
[] Your Command Seal is Black.(Must pick one of the two)
[] Your Command Seal is Red.(Must pick one of the two)
A/N: So I cranked out this chapter pretty fast so I hope I didn't make too many mistakes. Also the reason why I emphasized Len is that she'll be one of Arcueid's primary companions at least for now considering she's the only one she knows at the moment and also to drive home the point that Arcueid does not live in a vacuum and quite a few threats are going to follow her 
Also one thing I noticed is that no one caught the invis text in the first chapter lololol.
