I've Turned Into A Fox Girl?

Chapter 307  Dungeon Origins? 

'Later, but short answer yes.' Alice clearly didn't want to talk about it, but after such a reveal how can I not pester her? Unfortunately, I was being dragged by another Alice, so I couldn't do anything until I was alone.

'Fine, I've put my trust in you so far, so I hope you don't break it.' Doubts began to sprout in my heart, but I was already too deep to run away. If I were to take the teleportation circle back, I would 100% get caught by Alucard.

"Elysia?" Alice tilted her head as I once again became distracted mid-conversation.

"A-ah umm, so where are we going? I'm not familiar with the place at all." No matter the identity of this Alice, it didn't change the fact that she will be a great source of information.

"Hmm, we will go to your temporary room since, with the intruder out and about, it's best not to go out." With a place in mind, Alice continued to walk down the hall with great haste. We took a few turns, going deeper into the cathedral? Castle? Both? At this point, it was just a maze, there was no logical sense to the layout of this building. It was as if they mashed together buildings without considering how confusing it was to navigate.

Eventually, we finally reached some kind of room with no indication as to the kind of room it was.

"You can rest in here. Since Alucard said you can have a meal, I'll go bring one to you." Before I could even say goodbye, Alice darted off down the hall, presumingly to the kitchen.

'There is no way this Alice is you.' Their personalities were way off. Still, this physical Alice looked very young, so despite my assertion it wasn't out of the realm of possibility.

Upon entering the room, I was greeted with a very empty bedroom with a coffin serving as a bed. I chuckled slightly, but what else did I expect from a dungeon filled with only vampires.

Taking a seat on the wooden chair that was positioned opposite the door, I waited for Alice to speak up. Surprisingly, she didn't comment on my comparison and kept her silence. I imagine she must be thinking about how to explain herself.

'Her silence is enough to confirm that the physical Alice is her, but that still begs the question of how.'

'You can stop speculating.' Alice finally broke her silence and so I keenly stayed quiet, waiting for her to speak.

*Sigh* 'First of all, I still do not know how this dungeon came to be. I was not lying when I said I knew nothing. Secondly, yes, the Alice that you are physically seeing is me, but when I was 24 years old.'

'This place we are currently in used to be my old home, although it has been greatly distorted. That is why the building architecture is so conflicting yet everything is put together smoothly. As to where this place is in the real world, it doesn't exist.'

'In the early days of the world, when history was not recorded, we were the sole rulers that reigned supreme. If this place were an accurate representation, you would see the whole continent below, but now it's just an abyss.'

'Wait, then, how are you down there?' Alice specifically pointed out that she was in this abyss, but if there was nothing down there, then how?

'There is a secret elevator in the grand hall that is meant to descend to the land below, which is now transformed into a basement. This is where I have been sealed by the pope and your great-grandfather for the last 100 or so years. I have lost count for a few years now so it might be much more.'

'I see, so what happened in the past that caused the destruction of the vampires?' The journal I was given dated back 2000 years, so why was there no mention of vampires? It was as if there was a glaring hole in history that nobody noticed.

'Easy, I am the sole survivor. As you just thought, the journal dates back 2000 years. However, my actual age is 2400 give or take. As to why nothing from back then is recorded, it's because this place was destroyed in one single blow.'

'I suppose you can refer to that being as the pope's ancestor. All I know is that he held the exact same power, and the ability to carry out the gods' will. He crashed in battle with Alucard, our all-father, but because of his holy light he was swiftly defeated… followed by everyone else.'

'I remember it like it was yesterday, I was just returning from the land below and the entire sky was filled with a bright yellow light. It shot as far as the eye could see and once it vanished, there was nothing left. The entire vampiric race was erased from existence.'

'Also before you ask, there should be no other survivors. The vampires as a rule stayed up in the sky, only those of the Archduke rank were allowed to leave. I just so happened to earn such a position and be the only one out on a scouting mission at the time. I was looking for a human village to restock from as many of our livestock killed themselves.'

'Wait? So this person just exterminated the entire race in one blow?! Where the hell did they even come from?' The fact that this person was like the pope meant that the gods supporting him could be the same ones from back then. If the pope has that kind of power to erase any existence, then I don't think even reaching tier 10 will be enough.

'I don't know. There was no human or any other being that had the ability to use that level of magic, yet this person did. Following that, there seemed to be a worldwide mass memory and it was at this point that I began to live amongst the humans.'

'I wasn't as cruel or conniving as Alucard, so it was easy to mingle, but I needed to be on the move since my looks never changed. That is until I met your great x however many times grandfather and you know the rest.' Alice sounded like she was on the verge of crying, which was understandable.

It explained why she was so desperate to create a new vampire child since everyone else had died. She was the only one left with no one to reproduce with, making her existence one of a kind. I still didn't like how she went about it, but knowing the full story, I can't blame her either.

'I'm sorry, Alice.' There was nothing I could say to make things better, and any attempt to comfort her would only ring hollow. I may have had glimpses of what it was like to lose everything, but I couldn't imagine having to endure that loneliness for so long. Granted, it was probably for the best that vampires no longer reigned supreme over this world, but I wasn't about to be pedantic regarding something that happened so long ago.

'It's okay Elysia, I came to terms with it many centuries ago.' There was a slight shakiness in Alice's voice, but she held strong.

'I see. Well, that was quite the history lesson, but now why is your old place suddenly a dungeon?' I didn't want to linger on the past for Alice's sake and I wanted to shift to the more glaring fact that this place exists.

'It is only a theory that I have no way of proving, but my belief is that this planet is the god's sandbox. When the pope of 2400 years ago erased this place, I believe the gods intervened and preserved it and all the people inside it. As to why there is a version of me here, that is unknown even to me, but time magic is a very big possibility.' It was a scary thing to think about. It put to question many things aside from the dungeons. What if everything was purposefully placed by the gods just to act out a scenario?

'It sounds very plausible and it would mean all the other dungeons are distant places from the past or even from different worlds… Shaman did come from a separate world, so it's safe to say that not everything originates from here.' The cogs in my brain were turning full steam. It was beginning to seem like the only explanation for these dungeons was that they were places preserved by the gods.

Some kind of time magic is placed on these microworlds, which are now being used as dungeons for us to enhance our strength. It was disturbing to know that the "monsters" we have been killing are actual living beings. Then again, if it's anything like Alice's story, they were already wiped out before being sequestered away.

'Glad to see that you accept this so easily, I was worried you wouldn't.' Alice seemed to be in a better mood based on the tone of her voice.

'I've seen enough weird shit that shouldn't be of this world so this isn't that surprising. If anything, it makes the most sense so far.' In reality, there was no other explanation that I could logically think of that would explain the dungeons. They literally just happened to appear 500 years ago.

'Hmm, you do mention this Shaman a lot and how she was transported here, so I guess it isn't too bizarre to think about. Anyway, thank you, Elysia for being reasonable. There is a lot more detail I can give, but that will have to wait.'

'Huh? Don't leav-.'

"I'm back Elysia~!" Alice came barging through the door with a chain in her hand that had a human attached to it.

'Shit, it's this kind of meal. Why didn't I see this coming.'