Chloe stared in horror as her friend who she believed was one of the most saintly and non-violent people she ever met was now assaulting the Goblin Boss like a rabid animal. A rabid vampire, to be more precise.

As she did, Lucy continued to attack the Boss monster, slashing her claws on its face and neck, letting out hisses and snarls of primal rage and bloodlust. The Boss howled in pain, stumbling around while trying to get the vampiric Cleric off of it.

Every time the Boss’s hand got close to Lucy, she swatted it away with ease, snarling each time it attempted this. She then continued to claw at the monster, digging her nails into its skin and drawing blood, to which she would occasionally lick her fingers when it was covered in it.

The Boss desperately tried to get the cleric off, thrashing its body around like a bull attempting to get its rider off. But Lucy viciously clung to her enemy while inflicting more injuries. Injuries that slowly healed due to its holy blessing from the angel’s faction.

Even the wound from Lucy’s Bolt of crimson and yellow mana was beginning to mend back together. Chloe could see its flesh reattaching itself, filling the gaping hole in its shoulder like it was nothing.

But that didn’t stop Lucy, who stacked more and more wounds on its body. Although minuscule compared to her first one, she was still hurting the Boss, and that seemed to be the only thing that mattered to her.

Just then, The boss managed to grab Lucy by the arm, finally getting a hold of her. Gripping it tightly, Lucy released a painful growl before slashing her sharp nails on the Boss’s hand that gripped her. Not wanting to lose this chance, the Goliath of a Boss pulled the cleric off its body and hurled her into a nearby pillar. Chunks of stone debris flew around as Chloe and Arthur witnessed their friend fall to the ground.

“Lucy!” Chloe shouted her friend's name in fear.

Moments later, to their surprise, Lucy slowly stood up from the ground. Even more shocking than that, she barely looked injured, as if her body had become more durable.

The cleric let out a roar filled with anger and savagery then charged at the Boss once again, completely glossing over the fact that she just crashed into a stone pillar and resumed her assault.

Chloe and Arthur could only watch with widened eyes, witnessing the feral state of one of the most innocent people they knew. In the back of their minds, both questioned how this was possible, before remembering what Vlad did to help heal Lucy.

It was the corruption that he mentioned before. Somehow, it had taken full effect and turned their friend into a monster. A vampire, just like Vlad. But unlike him, Lucy was out of control. Following her instincts to kill and slaughter whatever she saw.

Instead of the Boss, it would’ve been Chloe if Lucy hadn’t controlled herself long enough to switch targets. She could tell from her friend's eyes when they looked at one another. Lucy wanted to kill her. Not just that, her eyes were filled with an insatiable hunger that merely saw Chloe as her first meal.

And that alone frightened her.

Chloe was quickly pulled away from her morbid thoughts when she watched Lucy get tossed toward the hall, creating a human-shaped dent before she descended to the ground. The vampiric cleric pushed herself off the ground, shaking the rubble that was on her body.

“Aagh…!” She growled, her crimson eyes glaring at the Boss before shifting to Chloe and the Gralls. “Gralls, assist me!”

Issuing a command to Vlad’s minions, the Gralls stood at attention and then rushed at the Goblin Boss a moment later. Chloe was wide-eyed after seeing this. How could she control Vlad’s Gralls like that? Shouldn’t that only listen to his orders?

Or maybe…it was because of Lucy’s current transformation. Since she was a vampire, perhaps there was a connection between her and Vlad, almost like she became his Kin. Chloe wasn’t familiar with vampire lore, so this was entirely unfamiliar to her. But she couldn’t help but feel that this was the case.

But Chloe knew that Lucy wouldn’t be able to hold out much longer. Even if she was enhanced by her vampiric physiology, it would only allow her to endure this fight for so long. Plus, she wasn’t in full control of her abilities and was currently just following her instincts to attack and feed on her prey.

Lucy wasn’t going to win this fight in her current state…but Vlad could.

“Arthur!” Chloe shouted toward her Knight Friend. “You need to assist Lucy and the Gralls!”

Arthur turned to Chloe with a surprised expression, as if what she was asking of him was outrageous.

“You want me to help?! I feel like I’ll only get in the way! Or end up as her next meal!”

“Just do it, man!”

The Knight player hesitated for a moment, clearly uncertain that his assistance would make a difference. But, after taking a deep breath, he steeled his resolve and followed the Brawler’s request, charging at the Boss to assist Lucy and the Gralls as much as possible.

Meanwhile, Chloe got to work with their other vampiric friend. She anxiously stared at Vlad, seeing his even paler complexion as he made a pained expression. Her eyes trailed down to his gut wound, seeing puffs of steam emanate from it due to the holy energy causing further damage to his body.

“Hold on, Vlad,” Chloe muttered, gripping the dagger tightly. “Just for a little longer.”

Placing the blade on her arm, she swiftly cut into the skin, drawing blood. Chloe grimaced in pain, feeling the crimson liquid leak from her wound before dripping into Vlad’s mouth. To speed up the process, she released the dagger then reached over and squeezed her arm, pouring out more blood.

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“Come on, Vlad,” Chloe muttered. “Drink it and wake up, already!”

She continued to feed Vlad her blood, desperate to heal her friend so he could save them from this problem. Unbeknownst to her, the vampire in question was still unconscious…experiencing a very vivid and strange dream.

…

Vlad’s eyes shot open, staring up at a crimson sky. His body felt wet and his nose was assaulted with the strong scent of iron. It seemed like he was lying in a puddle of blood.

He slowly got up to scan his surroundings, and his eyes widened in shock, realizing that he was not, in fact, in a puddle. More accurately, he was in a shallow ocean of blood. Looking around, Vlad witnessed the crimson liquid span out beyond the horizon from every direction.

And he wasn’t the only one there. Scattered and sprawled all over the shallow blood were dozens to maybe even hundreds of bodies. Dead bodies to be exact. It was practically a scene straight out of a thriller sci-fi movie.

“W-where is this place…?” Vlad muttered, confused regarding the current environment he was placed in. “What happened to the warehouse?”

The last thing Vlad remembered was his fight against the Goblin Boss with his friends. Then after that…his stomach got cut.

In a panic, his hands reached over to his gut, feeling around to see if the wound was still there. Surprisingly enough, it was gone. In fact, even the cut in his outfit was gone too. As if it was never there to begin with.

But how was that possible? Vlad knew that his body could heal since he experienced his previous wounds regenerate, but mending clothes together wasn’t part of that ability. Something else was going on.

Vlad stood up from the shallow blood, taking another look at his surroundings.

“This place looks like it just went through some kind of battle or something.”

Aside from the endless corpses all around him, Vlad also noticed weapons like spears, swords, and more lying in the blood pool. Some were even thrust through the blood, and erected like a statue or pole.

Aside from the corpses and weapons, Vlad didn’t see any noticeable landmarks or buildings. It was like a void with nothing but blood and death. It gave off a rather haunting atmosphere. And yet, Vlad felt strangely at peace here.

He walked around the bloody battlefield, taking note of all the corpses around him. A lot of them wore a variety of armor. Some of which not even Vlad could recognize, but there were a few that caught his attention.

The vampire stopped in front of one of the bodies, star-struck at what he was seeing. The corpse in front of him was wearing pure white and golden armor that emanated some kind of divine energy. But what really took Vlad’s breath away were the mangled feathered wings sprouting from its back, soaked in red like everything else.

Even though this was his first time seeing something like this, somehow, he knew exactly what he was looking at.

“An angel…?” Vlad narrowed his eyes, taking in the angelic figure before him.

Angels. God’s soldiers of Heaven. Its appearance matched their descriptions from certain texts. The armor, the wings, and even the heavenly aura they were giving off even after death. It was rather…sickening.

As Vlad continued to stare at the angelic warrior, there was a feeling of hate and rage boiling up inside of him. But he had no idea why.

He despised this angel. So much so that if it were still alive, he would’ve mutilated it even more. Until it was unrecognizable. The Beauty they displayed, the righteousness they preached…Vlad wanted to destroy it all and leave it in ruin.

He tilted his head in confusion, realizing his train of thought. Where was this sense of hate for angels coming from? Obviously, he didn’t like them since they put his friends in danger and such, but this felt more…personal. Almost like a feud between them.

But until a little while along, Vlad only just talked to these guys. Anything before was non-existent. And yet, why did Vlad hate these angels as if he had for millennia?

Millennia? Where did that come from? Vlad’s only been alive for twenty years. Not a thousand.

He furrowed his brow suspiciously. He once again felt that something was wrong here. Not just the battlefield but also his behavior and hostility toward the angels. This…this wasn’t his emotions.

This was something else.

Suddenly, Vlad’s instincts kicked in, warning him of a nearby presence. He whirled out to identify the newcomer, only for him to stare in disbelief.

A man was standing in the pool of blood right in front of him. He was tall, slender yet reasonably built, and...was drenched in blood. Even his hair was stained crimson, leaving only traces of its former black color. In his hand was a crimson spear that radiated a menacing aura filled with bloodlust and malice, almost as if it were alive.

The blood-soaked person stood there for a moment, staring at Vlad. Taking a close look, he could tell that even the guy’s eyes were blood red. Even more so than Vlad’s. It was like his entire eyeball was soaked in blood like the rest of his body.

Aside from his appearance, this man also radiated bloodlust. So much that gave Vlad the chills.

Two of them stood on opposite ends of the blood pool of corpses, neither one saying a word and maintaining eye contact.

Finally, Vlad was the first to speak out.

“Who are you? What do you want?”

Even though he tried to question the blood-soaked stranger, he said nothing. No, wait, he was. Vlad squinted his eyes and noticed that he was opening his mouth to speak, but no words came out. What was he trying to say?

“W-what are you saying?”

Before Vlad could get some kind of answer, the entire world started to shake, as if experiencing a major earthquake. The vampire momentarily lost his balance and fell to his knees in an instant. And when he looked up to see the stranger, he was gone.

“W-what the…?!”

Where did he go?! Why did he disappear just like that?

Suddenly, he felt a chill run down his spine as if sensing danger behind him. But, before he could turn around to see, a faint breath caressed his neck as he heard a voice from behind.

“It is not time yet…”

Vlad didn’t have the chance to question the stranger before he felt a sharp pain run through his stomach as if he had been stabbed by something. Looking down, his eyes widened as he bore witness to a spear piercing through his gut.

He gasped, trying to collect air for his lungs, only to aggressively cough up blood instead. His hands reached down toward the spear, trembling all the while due to the pain and shock of getting impaled.

He tried to grab it and pull it out of him, but his arms quickly lost strength and they dropped to his sides. Vlad remained on his knees, slowly dying from the wound.

In his last moments, his entire life flashed before his eyes. His birth, his childhood, to even the night of the tragedy of his parent's death to how he met his friends and slowly recovered from the trauma.

Experiencing this, Vlad couldn’t help but feel how unfair it was that he was dying now. He couldn’t die yet. His friends needed him. His sister needed him. He couldn’t leave them alone in that apocalyptic hell.

But more than that…he needed to make those angels pay not just for putting him through that dungeon, but also for endangering his friends. He wanted to find every single angel from that faction and tear them to shreds.

Slowly, his mind was engulfed in rage as power surged throughout his body. Just then, an image flashed before his eyes. Another blood-soaked battlefield with thousands of corpses all around from a different variety of races. Human, humanoid beasts, elves, Orcs, Goblins…demi-gods, angels, celestial beasts…all of them were lying dead at his feet.

His vision pans out, displaying himself in third person…no, it wasn’t him that was shown. It was someone else.

It was…

Vlad’s eyes suddenly shot open as he awoke from his vivid dream, releasing a primal roar as his mind was consumed by bloodlust.