Vampire Cultivation System in a Hidden World of Monsters

And he never put it away, because what did he care if he had a measly thousand dollars stuffed between papers on his desk? He personally made that much in half an hour. I'm not talking about the business as a whole. I'm talking about his personal salary.

Aside from the money I had snatched off his desk though, I was flat broke. I had millions of gold giblets but no way to turn them into money without potentially getting caught. And despite how little I liked keeping a low profile, I would have to be careful until I could make it back underground.

Johnny may have been a jerk, but he still was my adoptive father. He may have used me as a kid, but I still think he cares about me. I would know the truth of that if I had bothered to turn my domain aura back on during our conversation, but there was always next time. Unless there wasn't.

Having thought about it, I concentrated and turned my domain aura back on. My soul beast Midas had been following me everywhere I went but I often ignored him simply because I didn't want people to think I was crazy by talking to or petting my invisible dog thing.

He hopped up onto a bar stool next to me and nuzzled me with his headless shoulders. I petted his back, but low, so people wouldn't notice in the dark club.

Getting back to my money problem, I figured I could just mash the gold giblets together and mold them into a ball of gold, but I was pretty sure pawn shops wouldn't accept a ball of gold.

They might accept bars of gold, because those were an official form gold was sold in, but no one sold balls of gold. They might assume I'd stolen it or they might just be afraid they couldn't sell it.

"Yeah, no one is going to accept your gold balls," a floating gold mouth said to me.

Oh. I guess they could give general advice now too. That was new and appreciated by me. But, if I could turn the gold into gold bars, they might accept it.

How would I do that though? I didn't have a smelter or bar molds to pour the melted gold into. Hmm. Maybe Vi manipulation could work? Vi was often the answer to every one of my problems. Vi or Vi infused blood.

I emptied five giblets out of my inventory into my pocket. I put my hand in my pocket and just mashed the coins together with my fingers until it was a solid chunk. The cultivation had really paid off. I was unbelievably strong at this point.

Then, with my hand in contact with the chunk, I poured condensed Vi into the gold. Once the chunk was saturated with condensed Vi, I began to reshape the gold by just manipulating the Vi. I messed around with the gold for around ten minutes before I got it into an acceptable bar shape.

I pulled it out and put it on the wooden bar. I felt pretty safe doing so, since no one could beat me up and steal it from me as far as I knew. And if someone grabbed it, I could get it back by manipulating the strand of Vi I had attached to the bar.

I used the same technique that I'd used for my head but this strand was thicker. It was more like a small rope than a strand. So I could just yank it back if someone grabbed it.

When I placed it on the bar, I checked to see if it laid flat. It did. Then I checked the top and the sides and they all were perfectly flat. I had tried to get it as close to looking like a gold bar from the movies, just smaller.

The bartender saw me playing with it, and said, "What you got there? Is that one of those memorial metal bars that you get engraved to remember someone?"

"No, it's just a bar of gold. I'm light on cash and I've been trying to sell it, and no one will take it. They think its stolen or something. It's not. My parents just passed away and left their gold collection to me," I said. Nearly everything I just said was bullsh*t other than the fact that I was looking to sell it.n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

"Are you sure it's real?" He said, his eyes fixated on the gold bar.

"How can you tell if its real?" I said, trying to fish for clues on how to convince this guy it was real. I mean, it was real. I still would have to convince him of it, if I wanted to sell it.

"Well, usually there's a karat symbol on it somewhere. Can I see it?" He said.

"He's not going to try to steal it. He just wants to verify for himself that it's real and you're not trying to scam him," a golden mouth created by my domain aura said.

"Ok," I said. As I slowly handed him the bar, I used Vi to quickly engrave a small "24k" onto the gold bar. Then I let him take the bar from my hand.

The bartender put on a pair of glasses and took out a small flashlight. He shined the light on the bar and read, "24k?!?! Your parents left you a 24 karat gold bar?" He was so shocked and stunned by this that he stumbled backwards.

I concentrated on the gold bar and two numerical values appeared above it. The one on the left was the real value and the one on the right was the perceived value.

The real value was $500 dollars and the perceived value was $500 dollars. Since the numbers were the same, I supposed it was 24 karat. I wasn't that surprised considering where it came from.

"Would you be willing to sell it?" He said.

There was literally no one else besides me sitting at the bar. All the other guys were seated in chairs around the stage or platform. I'm not sure what you're supposed to call it. Oh and they were all guys. There weren't any women in this establishment other than the ones who worked here.

"This guy really needs a win. He's behind on his rent and his child support payments and he's been eating cereal for every meal all week," the gold mouth said.

"Yes, I'd be willing to sell it, but on two conditions," I said.

"Great! What are the conditions?" He said, a little nervous.

"That you don't pay me any more than half of its worth and that you use the profit to pay your bills," I said.

"I can meet those conditions easily, but why? Why would you sell it for so little?" He said, looking relieved.

"Because I know a financially desperate man when I see one, and I'd like to help you out. As long as you help me out. I have a lot more gold where that came from and as long you're willing to keep buying from me, I'm willing to keep selling at half price," I said.

I figured that was fair. It was also two birds with one stone. I would be helping out this guy down on his luck and I would be fixing my money problem without getting the authorities or worse, the vampire association, involved.

Sure I could go to a gold buying shop and get a lot more money, but then I wouldn't be helping someone out who I now knew was in need. I even knew a guy who used to buy stolen jewelry from me because he was friends with Johnny.

"I'd be happy to!" He said.

"Great! Just so no one asks any questions about where you keep getting all this gold, go down to Mo's Gold Shop and tell Mo that Dylan sent you. If he doesn't remember that name then mention the name Johnny," I said.

"Oh, ok. That makes me a little nervous. Did you really get this gold from your parents?" He said.

"No, but I can promise you on my honor that I didn't get it from doing anything illegal," I said.

"Do you swear?" He said.

"I swear," I said and shook his hand. His eyes flashed gold for a second and then it was gone. "I have a really good feeling about you. I feel like I can trust you when you give me your word."

Weird. That gold flash in his eyes had to be something to do with my domain aura. Did it make people trust me more or like me more? Or both? I'd figure it out in time I guessed.

Right now I had to get this transaction over with and get back to watching my prey. I glanced in the direction of the stage, and Chad was still there just staring at the women. I checked my watch and it was close to closing time.

"Not to rush you but if we could complete this transaction soon, that would be great because I may have somewhere I need to be in a few minutes," I said.

"Oh! Right! I'm holding the bar in my hand and I haven't paid you," he stuffed the bar into his pocket and pulled out his wallet. "Wait, how do I know what to pay you if I don't know how much the bar is worth?"

"It's worth $500. Trust me. Mo will probably give you something like $450 for it. I'll be back, so if I'm lying I'm dying," I said.

"Wait so then should I pay you $225 or $250?" he said, acting really nervous.

"Just give me $200 even. We'll call that good. I just need enough to get me through the next few days," I said.

"Ok!" He pulled out two hundred dollar bills and handed them to me.

I took them and put them in my pocket. I looked back at the stage area and Chad was gone. I looked around until I saw him heading out the front door.

"Ok, gotta go! Thanks!" I said to the bartender who waved at me and nodded his head.

I followed Chad out the front door but not too closely. I saw him walk around the side of the building into an alley. I nonchalantly leaned against the building just around the corner and pretended to play with my phone.

After a few minutes I looked around the corner. Chelsea was just coming out of the back door of the club and Chad was hiding behind a dumpster. It was fairly dark in the alley, but I could see clear as day with my Vi enhanced sight.

Chelsea walked past the dumpster and Chad grabbed her and put his hand over her mouth. He was holding some kind of cloth against her face. After a few seconds, she went unconscious and he lowered her down to the ground. He must have used chloroform on her.

I watched for a little while longer to see what his plan was. He hadn't hit her or harmed her yet, other than the chloroform of course. When he started taking off his belt, I knew it was time for me to take action. I walked down the shadowy alley with a singular purpose. To take this bastard down.