Charlie had gained a body of flesh, and for the first time she was truly alive, at least more alive than she’d ever been as a skeleton. Now she was a vampire, a kind of undead creature, at least as far as Luke understood. And with that came a whole list of new concerns that had begun gnawing at him as he read the system’s explanations: sunlight, vampiric hunger, and something ominously called a Vampiric Beast.

  Could sunlight kill her? How strong was that hunger? And what was a Vampiric Beast?

  The answers were right in front of him. Or rather, on the paper he was holding, Samael’s handwritten guide, proudly titled Manual on How to Take Care of My Lovely Vampire Servant.

  “Master Luke…” Charlie murmured, voice small and downcast. “It was bad… wasn’t it? Me getting a body of flesh.”

  “No, Charlie,” he replied gently. “You’re happy. So I’m happy.”

  “Of course it wasn’t bad!” Artemis blurted. “Girl, you have a pair of boobs now. I repeat: a pair. Of. BOOBS!”

  He didn’t silence the loudmouthed soul this time. At least it made Charlie give a tiny, shy laugh. A sudden knocking echoed through the room.

  Luke’s eyes snapped toward her in reflex.

  “Luke Moon, you’re next for the teleport,” called the attendant from the hallway.

  He stood quickly and rushed to the door before she got any ideas about entering. He cracked it open just enough to see her standing there.

  “Sorry for the delay. I was just waking up,” he said.

  “No problem at all. Would you like me to reserve your spot? If you’re tired or would like to continue enjoying our courtesy rooms, you can delay your teleport.”

  He hesitated, thinking immediately of Charlie.

  “How long can I postpone it?” he asked.

  Until he understood her situation, fully, he couldn’t leave. He needed to know whether exposing her to sunlight would make her turn to ash the moment he summoned her outside his soul.

  After talking with the attendant, he learned that as a VIP he could delay teleportation for up to a week while continuing to use the room without issue. Convenient, he only needed a few more hours anyway.

  Once she walked away, Luke slipped the Rank skill onto her just in case, waiting until she was well out of range. Only then did he return to Charlie.

  “Charlie,” he said softly.

  Her innocent red eyes lifted to his, worried but undeniably happy. Being here in flesh and bone, with him, seemed to override every other fear.

  “First thing’s first,” he said, turning his gaze aside. “We need to fix your… clothes situation. Or, well, your complete lack of them.”

  He called out mentally, “Angie, can I pull the adventurer outfit from your inventory?”

  'Of course, lord Luke', she answered.

  Luke transferred the set directly into Charlie’s inventory.

  “What are you doing, Luke!?” Artemis screeched. “This is a crime! I demand to see everything!”

  The outfit materialized on Charlie instantly, fully adjusted to her new feminine form: white shirt, brown pants, fitted boots.

  “I I I can wear clothes!” she exclaimed, springing up from the bed with bright eyes. “Real clothes, master Luke!”

  She spun around the room, touching the fabric, brushing her hands down her arms, over her torso, marveling at every sensation.

  “Look, I’m wearing a bra!” she announced proudly, lifting the hem of her shirt,

  You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

  And Luke immediately looked away.

  “Okay, Charlie. Let’s… try to control the excitement a little,” he said carefully.

  “Where is she? I didn’t see! Show me again!” Artemis shouted.

  Luke tightened his grip around the pendant at his neck. Charlie was far too innocent to be exposed to that perverted soul’s commentary.

  “We’ll need to buy clothes for you,” he said. “This outfit goes to Angie since, well… wings. So later we’ll pick something out for you.”

  Charlie nodded with a bright, almost sparkling smile. “I would love that, Master Luke… going out with you… to buy clothes.”

  He sat beside her on the bed. At least the idea of shopping had lifted her spirits, wiping away that lingering gloom from when they’d read what being a vampire meant.

  “Let’s finish reading the letter,” he suggested.

  “S-sure, Master Luke.” She was nervous, but this was the best way to understand how they would deal with the problems tied to her new race, especially the Vampiric Hunger.

  Luke unfolded the letter. In truth, it was a stack of neatly arranged papers. The white pages belonged to Samael’s message. Inside the larger envelope was a smaller black one, and he’d already guessed that must be Azazel’s invitation.

  He focused on Samael’s handwriting. The script was elegant, flowing, and unmistakably written in his own language. English. No floating translation box, no system adjustment.

  This guy learned English just to write me a letter?

  Luke resumed from where he had stopped.

  “To begin with, forget everything you think you know about vampires…” Samael’s words began. “Sleeping in coffins, holy water, garlic, crosses, wooden stakes, silver bullets, none of that garbage exists outside your universe. Why the hell would a simple garlic bulb weaken a superpowered being who can fly, hypnotize people, and turn into a bat in your movies? It makes zero sense. I don’t know how humans in your world believed that crap.”

  After reading that, Luke had to admit it. Yeah… the garlic thing was stupid. But then again, he had once genuinely believed speaking Latin phrases could banish demons.

  “I’ll start with the most famous concept: the sun. No, vampires do NOT turn to dust in sunlight. I imagine that’s reassuring. But sunlight IS basically their kryptonite.”

  One less worry on his mind, at least.

  “Let’s begin with how the vampire race originated. Everything starts with Bloodlines. This type of power is rare, coveted, and incredibly valuable. A Bloodline can completely remodel someone’s biology. Look at you. You received Azazel’s blood and became a half-demon. With vampires, it was something similar.”

  Luke’s posture stiffened. He understood his own situation a little better now.

  “There are two kinds of bloodlines. Some belong to specific families or races. For example, there is a demon family whose biology allows their blood to leave the body and infect others, controlling them like puppets. It is a race trait, just like you with your Dark Demon blood.”

  Luke narrowed his eyes. So Samael was slipping hints about his own nature into this letter. The demon was clever, cunning, and, just like his master, fond of leaving trails of riddles behind.

  “Just like any species develops its own biological traits, flying, swimming, hunting, think of birds, fish, lions… there are families whose evolutionary refinement went far beyond the norm. Their signature traits became bloodline. Remember Darwin? Evolution applies to this, too. These traits get passed down as hereditary power, the same way your dear Allison Rhiannon inherited her frozen dragon heart.”

  Evolution and the System walked hand in hand, Luke understood that now more clearly than ever.

  “And then there’s the second kind of bloodline. The kind that grants a Unique Skill. Those are forged by beings at Divine Rank. Passed down to a single descendant. That’s how vampires were born. Five Beast Gods worked together to create a bloodline of their own. They were the last of their species, unable to reproduce. So they used their own blood and fused the concept of a Family Bloodline with a Unique Bloodline… and thus the vampire line was created.”

  Samael was describing something to Luke in a casual, almost trivial way in the letter, but Luke was shocked by just how much power it actually represented.

  “After centuries of experimentation, their cursed blood became compatible with weak mortal species, specifically humans. Most vampires today are human. You won’t see a goblin vampire, or ogre vampire, or elf vampire. Only humans. These five bat gods were named: Nycteris, Antrozous, Barbastella, Lasiurus, and Vespertilio.”

  Luke recognized some of those names. Oddly enough, they were scientific names for bats back on Earth.

  So the System influenced my universe even down to taxonomy…

  Charlie was reading over his shoulder, fully absorbed.

  “I’m going to skip a few millennia. In short, the bat gods succeeded. They built an army of vampire thralls, who grew stronger through the System and even ascended into godhood themselves. Vampire pantheons were born. Eventually, the Original Vampire Gods were killed in an internal conflict, yes, all five murdered each other. Their descendants carried on the legacy. Their names became the Five Great Noble Houses of vampire society: Nycteris, Antrozous, Barbastella, Lasiurus, and Vespertilio. Charlie belongs to the Vespertilio bloodline; her vampiric blood comes from that house. And let me make this perfectly clear: a vampire is never born. A vampire is made. Which means that in the past, Charlie was human, and a powerful Vespertilio vampire turned her.”

  Luke looked at Princess Charlie with a new weight in his chest. She’d had a life before this, one wildly different from his. She had lived experiences, centuries maybe. He suddenly wanted to know how she ended up in that coffin, and how she became a skeleton.

  “Now let’s move on to the race skills of each vampire bloodline. Because Charlie will gain exclusive powers for being a Vespertilio vampire.”

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