Episode 2 — Blood Baptism
The city stank of blood.
Vert walked calmly through the neon-lit streets, blue veins glowing faintly beneath his skin. His hoodie still dripped from the massacre in the alley, but nobody looked twice. Why would they? Humans were disposable. Every second, a new one was born somewhere in the world. Every second, another was ripped apart in a dungeon.
This was a world of endless life, endless death.
And Vert had finally found his place in it.
⸻
He stopped in front of a convenience store window. Fluorescent light washed over his reflection: sharp jaw, cold eyes, a faint smirk pulling at his lips. He still looked human—pathetic, even. But the blue veins crawling across his neck whispered otherwise.
He raised his hand, flexed. His knuckles cracked like breaking stone. His skin felt thicker, harder, like a shield had been sewn into his flesh.
[Defense Increased.]
[Level: 5]
He almost laughed. "I could get addicted to this."
⸻
A scream cut across the street. Not human this time. Something deeper. Something monstrous.
Vert tilted his head, already walking toward it.
At the end of the block, a dungeon gate had split the pavement open. Jagged black crystal spikes jutted upward, glowing with violet light. The air hissed with sulfur and ash. From the crack in reality crawled creatures—monstrous, humanoid shapes with mouths where their eyes should be, and too many arms tipped with bone blades.
Humans ran screaming. Bounty hunters scrambled into formation, shouting orders.
Vert's grin widened.
"Perfect."
⸻
The monsters rushed forward. Hunters fired rifles, launched nets of burning silver, trying to contain the flood. Blood sprayed as one hunter's head rolled across the pavement, body twitching.
Vert walked into the chaos without hesitation.
One of the creatures lunged at him, bone-blade slicing down. Vert raised his forearm and blocked. The blade screeched against his skin—and snapped in half.
The monster screeched. Vert's eyes lit up.
"My turn."
He drove his fist through the creature's chest, bones cracking like wet branches. Blood and ichor sprayed across his hoodie.
[Level Up: 6]
The rush hit. Vert's smirk sharpened.
Another monster slashed. Vert twisted, deflecting the blow with his shoulder, then ripped the thing's jaw off in a fountain of gore.
[Level Up: 7]
He laughed this time. Out loud. The thrill was intoxicating. Every kill, every heartbeat, he could feel himself growing harder, sharper, deadlier.
Hunters froze mid-battle, watching him tear through monsters like tissue.
"That one—he's not human!"
"Shit, he's feeding off them!"
Vert licked the blood from his hand and locked eyes with the nearest hunter. Calm. Cold. Disrespectful.
"And?"
⸻
The battle became slaughter. Vert's movements blurred between elegance and savagery. He ripped off limbs, snapped spines, painted the pavement with gore. His hoodie clung to his body like a second skin, soaked through in red.
Monsters fell. Hunters fell. It didn't matter. Prey was prey.
[Level Up: 8]
[Level Up: 9]
[Level Up: 10]
Vert stood amidst the wreckage, chest rising and falling slowly, calmly, as if none of it mattered. His veins glowed brighter now, blue burning under pale skin.
Bodies twitched at his feet. Hunters groaned, broken. Monsters lay in heaps of shredded flesh.
The dungeon gate still roared, spilling more creatures into the street. Endless. Limitless.
Vert licked his fangs, blood dripping down his chin. His smirk was cruel.
"This world really doesn't know when to stop giving me gifts."
He stepped forward, welcoming the next wave.
⸻
High above, on the rooftops, cloaked figures watched the scene unfold.
"Report," one whispered, voice mechanical through a mask.
The other lowered a scope. "Target identified. Blue-veined infected. Not collapsing. Not dying. He's… evolving."
"Impossible. The infected burn out in hours."
"This one doesn't."
Silence hung between them as Vert tore through another monster, laughter echoing through the street like a hymn of slaughter.
Finally, the leader spoke.
"Mark him. Bounty priority: Absolute. He isn't a vampire."
The scope gleamed blue under the neon sky.
"He's something worse."
[To Be Continued…]