Chapter 11: Codeword
Adele went to bathe. She was a very clean vampire. In her own words, spending too much time with other vampires would make their blood scent cling to her, and she hated that smell. If she didn’t bathe every day, she would feel uncomfortable all over.
While waiting for Adele to bathe, Jasmine poured herself a cup of black tea and drank it. She didn’t need to add sugar cubes, but she didn’t really like drinking bitter black tea either. Adding milk and sugar would be ideal, but in the vampire world, there were no real sugar cubes, only those infused with blood.
She didn’t want to drink blood, not even artificial blood, so she could only drink plain black tea.
Adele didn’t bathe quickly, as the young mistress preferred soaking in the tub. After half an hour, Jasmine got up, washed the teacup and teapot, replaced them with a transparent glass jug, poured in boiled water, and let it cool naturally.
Just as she finished doing all this, Adele’s summons echoed from the bedroom. Jasmine put down the jug and turned to enter the room. She picked up a towel from the counter, walked over to Adele, who was sitting on a lounge chair, and pulled up a chair to sit in front of her. Then, she began drying Adele’s hair with the towel.
Adele had changed into a nightgown, a silk one with lace trim that looked exceptionally soft. Her silver-white hair dripped with water, slightly dampening the nightgown, but Adele didn’t mind. Her hair draped over the armrest of the lounge chair, water dripping down steadily, as she closed her eyes and enjoyed Jasmine drying her hair.
Adele’s hair was very fine, each strand soft to the touch, feeling like the silk of her nightgown. In its damp state, it seemed to shimmer with a radiant glow.
Jasmine patiently dried her hair strand by strand. This was a very time-consuming task. Back in the castle, Jasmine was often scolded by the head maid for this, accusing her of being lazy and taking too long. But the head maid wouldn’t dare tell Adele to stop letting Jasmine do this.
Now, at the school, with fewer tasks to handle, drying Adele’s hair had become the most time-consuming job.
After drying her hair, Jasmine stood up to take her leave. Adele grabbed the hem of Jasmine’s skirt. Jasmine turned back to look at her. The vampire puppy didn’t open her eyes but simply asked, “Jasmine, can’t you stay?”
“No.” Jasmine refused decisively, “Unlike you, Miss, I haven’t eaten yet. If I go to sleep like this, I’ll be hungry.” In reality, with Jasmine’s physical strength, she could easily go without food for three days, but as a human, not having three meals a day was cruel.
Hearing this, Adele released Jasmine’s skirt. “Humans are so troublesome.”
Jasmine excused herself and went to the kitchen to eat a bowl of creamy mushroom soup with a fried pork cutlet. After finishing her meal, she returned to her room and, as usual, waited for daybreak.
She would sneak out to the Hunter’s Association while all the vampires were sound asleep, to see if there were any suitable tasks or if the tasks she had posted had been completed.
These days were boring and routine. Ten days later, when Jasmine once again set foot in the Hunter’s Association, her task was marked as completed. She received the token from the outpost and a reply letter, which clearly stated that they understood the current situation and that personnel from the outpost would soon depart for the school and establish a nearby station for communication.
In reality, the humans didn’t know Jasmine’s true situation. Jasmine had only told them that Lady Dawn would be staying in the area of the vampire school for a long time and that she was figuring out how to deal with these students. They didn’t need too many people, as security here was very tight. They only needed someone to set up a communication station to keep in touch.
Receiving the reply letter made Jasmine feel much better. She looked at the small pile of gold coins she had saved up and felt a pang of sadness – the day she would have to give them to the humans didn’t seem too far away.
Apart from her own matters progressing smoothly, Anna, the girl with freckles, still puzzled Jasmine. During these ten days, Jasmine had established a relatively friendly relationship with the other human maids. However, it could only be described as relatively friendly, not truly friendly. They were friendly because she was human, and in the vampire world, humans naturally had a sense of camaraderie.
The reason it wasn’t completely friendly was that her master was different from the masters of the other human maids. She wasn’t a declining noble but a member of the renowned Thirteen Nobles of the vampire world.
This news was revealed when the maid of Miss Golden, out of curiosity, came to meet Jasmine, who was also the maid of a young mistress from the Thirteen Clans. Her first words were, “I thought the young mistress of the Blake family would bring something impressive, but I didn’t expect it to be a lowly human. It seems the Blake family is nothing special after all. Maybe one day they will even be removed from the Thirteen Clans.”
Jasmine stared at her intently and said in response to her provocative gaze, “I will report your words to Miss Blake verbatim.”
Golden’s maid was startled. She glared at Jasmine indignantly, but in the end, she couldn’t say a word. She could only snort coldly and turn to leave. She hadn’t been given the surname Golden, so Jasmine referred to her in her mind as “Golden’s maid” instead of “Maid White” like the one from the White family.
She might be favored by Miss Golden, but there was absolutely no need for her to clash with the Blake family for this. Although Miss Golden and their young mistress were always at odds, it was considered healthy competition. If Jasmine reported her maid’s disrespectful words, it would definitely incur the wrath of the Blake family.
However, Jasmine was just talking and didn’t really intend to tell the young mistress about this.
She wasn’t a child anymore. How could she go and tattle over such a small matter?
After showing her true colors that one time, Anna had been quite well-behaved lately, not doing anything unusual. Her days were dull and boring. The only thing that could be considered interesting was sneaking out during the day to complete bounty tasks for the Hunter’s Association.
Time passed, and in the blink of an eye, a month had gone by since Jasmine arrived at the school. Finally, she met the member from the outpost who had traveled a long distance to get here.
Jasmine’s appearance was similar to when she went to the Hunter’s Association before: a black hooded dress, her black threads forming a mask, and her long hair draped over her shoulders, making it impossible to connect her to her true identity. Jasmine’s appearance was well-known among the human resistance, so she didn’t need to reveal her identity. However, the human in front of her did.
They were currently in a farmhouse not far from the foot of the school hill. This farm belonged to the school, and the outpost member had replaced an ordinary farmer, gaining a small hut. In broad daylight, sunlight streamed through the cracks in the wooden hut, falling on the floor and the two of them. The outpost member was a bearded man whose name Jasmine couldn’t remember.
Please, Western names were really hard to remember, okay? She couldn’t remember so many names. Fortunately, everyone in the resistance had a nickname. For example, the man in front of her was called Voyager. It was easy to understand; having traveled so far, he was indeed a voyager.
The moment he saw Jasmine, he clenched his right fist against his chest and shouted the secret phrase Jasmine had set for the human army, “The anthem of humanity is the anthem of courage!”
This gesture came from a very popular anime, and the phrase came from another one. Jasmine felt a slight sense of shame when she heard him say this. At the time, she had simply thought it was cool, so she had set it as the code. But now, years later, it just felt embarrassing.
However, years of maintaining her ice-cold persona hadn’t been in vain. Although she could dig out a three-bedroom apartment with her toes from embarrassment, her face remained as cold and impassive as a mountain. Jasmine simply nodded faintly.
“As you may already know, due to certain special circumstances, I will be staying here for a long time. Therefore, I need a liaison to keep me in touch with headquarters. If there’s anything I can’t handle, you must inform me immediately.” Voyager nodded solemnly upon hearing Jasmine’s words.
“I understand, madam. Rest assured, I will deliver every message from you to headquarters without a single error.”
Jasmine was greatly relieved. She handed over all the documents she had written recently to Voyager. Before coming to the school, the commander at headquarters had asked Jasmine a question: how to deal with gargoyles.
This question was very simple for Jasmine. She could just crush the gargoyles with her bare hands. But for ordinary humans, it was an impossible task.
Gargoyles weren’t particularly terrifying creatures. Essentially, they were just flying, moving stones with green flames in their eyes, which were their soul flames. They did look quite intimidating, and being made of stone, they were impervious to swords and guns, making them difficult to deal with. Recently, when headquarters was preparing to attack a vampire stronghold, they encountered these creatures.
They obeyed the vampires and guarded the vicinity of the vampire stronghold, making things very difficult for the humans. Jasmine had thought long and hard before remembering the physics and chemistry knowledge from her past life and compiling a document. Unfortunately, before she could send it, she was brought to the school by Adele. She could have asked the Hunter’s Association to deliver it, but the document was too long to encrypt, and Jasmine couldn’t be sure if the other races delivering the letter wouldn’t peek at it.
Of course, it wouldn’t be a big deal if they did peek. After all, it was about dealing with gargoyles. If others knew, it just meant there would be more people fighting against them.
However, the thought of her hard work being seen by others before it was even revealed was quite unpleasant. So Jasmine waited until the outpost member arrived before handing over her manuscript.
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T/N: Names are really weird here haha
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