Luz B. Noceda: The Next Belmont

Chapter 4: Relics

I want people to guess which Castlevania game Luz's dream memories are from. If you guess correctly, you could win a prize! Or not...probably not. But still, it's fun! And with that out of the way, enjoy the chapter.

The year was 1830. At an Austrian castle, a beautiful yet dangerous vampiress managed to summon her Lord of Darkness in the land of the living. Three hunters had arrived to stop her, only to have their Master kidnapped and the two younger hunters cast into an abyss. Determined to save his father, the eldest hunter instructed his young friend to flee and leave the Dark Lord to him. But the Young Hunter wanted to save his master as much as his friend, though, and set out on his own.

Using the power of an enchanted whip with the power to repel evil, the Hunter advanced through the castle and met up with his ally. After steadily gaining power, he had single-handedly saved the Eldest Hunter's life multiple times and defeated many of the monsters in the castle. Near the end of his journey, the Young Hunter was confronted with the horrible truth: His friend had been manipulated by the dark forces into forsaking his father and siding with The Dark Lord. After being forced to best him, the Young Hunter confronted the Lord of Darkness to defeat him and save his Master...

That dream was odd. Luz did not recognize any of the people as members of her family. Yet the whip that the hunter carried, light brown leather with a silver metal handle. She looked down at her own whip and saw that it was not the same color, being a darker brown and gold inlays around the handle, and having her family crest at the bottom of it. This was the very same whip used by her ancestors, yet it does not explain how there could be others like it. Had someone managed to recreate the whip of alchemy before? These were questions she wished to find the answer to...later.

For now, Luz got herself ready and soon enough met with Eda and King on the beach. What they were there for was...making Luz want to puke in her mouth.

"Well, Luz?" Eda said happily, elbowing the grossed out child. "Did you ever in your life think you'd see something as breathtaking as this?"

They were looking at a giant slug that was washed up on the shore. It was covered in trash and junk, had flies hovering over it and even they were dropping dead. The smell made Luz cringe in disgust.

"Nope. I don't think I would've." Luz said plainly, not enjoying the sight...or smell of the slug's corpse.

"Exactly." said Eda. "It doesn't get much more inspiring than a trash slug. It makes a home, a life from what others have thrown by the wayside. And then blam! It gets blasted by a wave one day and croaks from all the salt. And then we get to sell the stuff it ate."

She says this while pulling a rubber chicken from the slug's mouth and then pulls out a pickaxe to start digging through the slugs corpse. But Luz was not amused as she crossed her arms.

"...Yeah, I'm not doing that." Luz said in a serious tone.

"Aw, come on Luz." King said while unfolding a towel and laying on top of it. "It's not every day you get to go to the dump and pick apart a garbage carcass."

"Ah. Nuts to you both." Eda said as she continue pick through the slugs corpse.

"This is degrading." Luz said straight on. "I wanna do something fun."

"What could be more fun than this?"

"I don't know...training with my whip, learning how magic works around here, things like that." Luz said.

Then Eda replied while tossing garbage. "Meh. Sounds like old boring school stuff to me."

"...Wait, you guys have school here?"