When Marie tried to access her implant’s GUI she felt a curious sense of mental resistance, almost as if her mind was having to push throw a layer of ‘stuff’ to access the interface. Instead of immediately pulling up her information she received a message which overlaid itself on her vision.

~SYSTEM~

SYSTEM IS CURRENTLY RECOMPILING DUE TO SIGNIFICANT CHANGES TO HOST’S DATASET. IT IS LIKELY FURTHER CHANGES WILL BE MADE IN THE FUTURE BUT MORE DATA IS REQUIRED.

HOST, PLEASE BE PATIENT.

LOADING…3

LOADING…2

LOADING…1

LOADING, PLEASE WAIT.

I bought the best implant on the market, and they said it had the ability to learn and grow because of its AI software but this seems a little more extreme than the examples they gave. At least I have this though, otherwise I wouldn’t have any idea at all what was happening to me, or what my condition is. Let’s see what it says before I start freaking out.

After a few more moments, the GUI finally loaded but it didn’t look like before. There had definitely been some changes to not only the format, but also the information displayed. As she took it in, Marie also took in a deep gasping breath, which made her start coughing again horrifically.

~PROFILE~

[NAME: Philadelphia Marie Ludwell]

[REGISTRATION: XTF2963]

[STRENGTH: 4.8] [AGILITY: 5.1] [VITALITY: Error]

[SKILLS] (Acrobatics IV)(Climbing II)(Dagger II)(Grappling III)(Longsword II)(Striking II)

(Shortsword II)(Wilderness Survival I)

[LANGUAGES: Common, Elven]

“Okay, so according to this I am almost five times as fast and strong as the average male human, and I am dead. Got it.”

She shook her head ruefully.

“I start burning in the sunlight, and I was bitten by the most stereotypical-looking vampire I can imagine. I don’t think you have to be a genius to see where this is going.”

The sound of her voice echoed inside the dark, hollow interior of the tree and Marie took a moment to center herself. She wasn’t dead, and that might not seem like much but ‘death’ was game-over for humans. She might be ‘undead’ but that remained to be seen, and that was different from lying on the ground being eaten by vermin.

It was all starting to click, and the shock was wearing off, and so Marie did what any (former) human would do and sat down and cried wracking, heaving sobs of bitter loss. This made her feel more human once more, until she looked at her hands and saw that she had been weeping tears of blood, and realized that she had stopped breathing during that crying out and nothing had happened.

Then, the numbness set in. The reality was that she didn’t want to die, so she was likely stuck on this side of the Portal.

Even if her new body could survive travel through that magical gate, she would never be able to escape the scrutiny all returning Travelers received on Earth. The medical exam alone would spell her doom, condemned to a lifetime of tests in government labs as they tried to pick apart this condition.

Okay, so I’m stuck here. I need to find out how vampirism works here, some of it seems similar to Earth lore but you never know and I don’t want to find out about weaknesses at the moment I am dying to them. I also need to find out how the societies here treat vampires, because that is going to determine where I need to try and make my base. I need to try and extract the maximum amount of resources from Earth that I can as well, before my keepers discover something has gone haywire. They will definitely send people to find me and bring me back, and once they discover my changes they will only try harder.

Marie held it together by thinking over her options and making plans, but eventually the mental and physical toll of the previous night became too much to bear. She squatted down on the ground, leaning back against the trunks and let herself fall into a deep, dreamless sleep.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

***

In the depths of darkness where her consciousness floated, Marie could feel the sun go down. It wasn’t so much that light ceased, because the interior of the tree was quite dark, but rather that there was this sensation of a great weight being lifted from her body. It felt like carrying a massive pack around, for a very long time, and then it just disappears; the relief is effervescent.

One eye opened with a snap, and she realized that she could see the inside of the tree as if it was brightly lit. Marie stood up, enjoying this feeling of lightness that filled her body, and took a look outside the tree and was astonished to see that it was completely visible outside as well. It seemed like once the sun went down her eyes could see in the darkness like others could see in the daytime.

“I really am just totally opposite of regular people now…”

Marie squeezed out of the tree, and out in to the night air. A moment of giddiness overtook her and she started running as fast as she could, and then leaped forward into a handspring. Her body leapt into the air and flipped over a few times before landing effortlessly.

“Holy shit!”

It’s one thing to see your abilities are different on a GUI screen, but to do that… I couldn’t have conceptualized it before I did it. I’m the weapon now!

She began moving back the way she had fled earlier in the day, hoping to find the camp from the night before. She needed to collect whatever remained of her things, the state of the clothes she was wearing cannot be imagined and she didn’t want to stay in them if she didn’t have to. Now that the immediate danger was over, it was time to improve things.

She noticed as she loped through the night that her feet seemed a lot tougher than before, she didn’t have any boots on yet she was able to run over rough ground and the detritus of the forest floor without being injured. It still hurt though, when she stepped on something sharp, it just wasn’t enough to break the skin. One more change to add to the growing list, she supposed.

She smelled the camp way before she saw it, and it was a good thing she had thrown up everything in her system the previous night or she would have lost it. The shattered remains of the five Adventurers were still there, and it was obvious animals had been at them heavily over the course of the day. Limbs were strewn about with great bites taken out of them, and gore was everywhere. The most disturbing part was when she found her old set of teeth; they had obviously fallen out when her new pointy ones grew in.

Marie braced herself, mentally focusing on what she needed to do before she could leave. She checked her pack and found that it remained intact, so she quickly shed the clothes she was wearing and tossed them to the side never to be used again. Donning a new set of fresh clothing was one of the most refreshing things she had ever experienced, but she didn’t spend too much time luxuriating as the ever-present smell motivated her to keep moving. Her armor felt like it weighed nothing as she put it on, a pleasant surprise, and her sword belt felt like nothing hanging off her hips.

Once she had gathered her belongings she almost left, but she turned towards the packs of the Adventurers with mingled regret and curiosity. The dead had no use for possessions, and she very well might need something they had. A quick search netted her a leather hood and mask, in case she ever got caught out in the daylight again, and a few pouches of coins which she consolidated with her own.

Their weapons and armor were nothing special, and their bulk was not worth any coins she might get for them so she just tossed them to the side. All-in-all it wasn’t exactly one of those scenes from a roleplaying game where you find the magic scepter, but at least there wasn’t any poison traps.

By the time she had finished her search, Marie was starting to feel hungry. Her stomach had been empty for something like 24 hours at that point, and she was feeling a gnawing sensation inside of herself that demanded to be satiated. She pulled some dried meat out of her pack and chewed a few bites quickly, gulping them down unceremoniously. She smiled lightly as her mind felt accustomed to the idea that this would make her hunger pangs go away.

It was really disappointing, and disgusting, when her body refuted this long held belief moments later. Marie found herself on her hands and knees on the ground throwing up the dried meat. Her body was telling her mind that this source of sustenance was no longer suitable for her. A feeling of depression started to fall over Marie as she considered this.

Yeah, I was afraid of this. Now I have to start making difficult decisions about what I am willing to do to survive. And I have to be honest with myself that anything I agree to now will inevitably force me into a constant state of descent into ever more disturbing acts. Let’s be real, if I tell myself I am just going to eat animals then someday I am going to be attacked by a person and taste their blood and then I will get addicted or some stupid shit and the psychological drama will be the worst part. Let me just admit to myself now that I am going to do what I have to do to stay alive, and that I will try to do that in the least damaging way that I can, but that sad things will inevitably happen.

With a heavy heart, Marie returned to her tree hideout and left her pack and supplies inside. As far as she could tell, the night was only about a third over so she should have lots of time to try to find something, or someone, she could bring herself to eat. She checked that her longsword was moving easily in its scabbard and started moving out in to the forest, moving away from the road into the deeper woods.

So far she knew that she could see in the dark like it was daylight, and her sense of smell seemed to be stronger as well, but the most handy tool she had discovered is that she could see in the infrared range. This meant that she could see the body heat of the creatures moving around, and even their tracks on the ground if it had been a very short time. This was going to make tracking and hunting a lot easier for her, and it also explained why vampires were such super-predators.

They got hacks!

After a while, she came across a small party of goblins in the woods, and it looked like they were stalking something themselves. Based on the way they were moving, and their lack of lights, Marie thought they must have some kind of night or lowlight vision so she immediately grabbed onto a nearby tree and started pulling herself up the trunk until she was safely hidden in its lower branches. It was sort of exhilarating how easy that was, as her strength made pulling her own body weight up trivial.

The trio of goblins were following a game trail, moving slowly and stopping to examine signs of traffic and check the freshness of dung. They were obviously trying to track down a specific beast or type of beast, and the similarity to her own situation amused Marie.

Being hunted unknowingly, being stalked by someone out to claim your life. Well, just like you might honor the deer or whatever you are trying to kill and eat, that’s the level of respect I will have for you, my meat. The idea of living as a giant bloodsucker is weird to me, but I am enough of a hypocrite to be glad I don’t have to target humans right now. I think these changes have affected my mind though; must be some kind of instinct in whatever this infection, disease or condition is because I’m salivating.