The next thing I knew, I was lying on the ground, looking up at the ceiling.
My skin felt disgusting. When I touched my chest, big threads of goo connected between it and my hand. I tried to shake it off, but there was so much on my body that it didn't make a difference.
When I raised my head, I was still in the boss arena. There were a few random items lying around as well as a treasure chest standing proud in front of a large doorway, but otherwise it was empty.
I thought back to the last thing I could remember, but suddenly I had a massive urge to throw up.
My mind was filled with the images of the last few minutes.
When I went to kill the ant queen, the sight of it's heart beating beating under it's abdomen carapace made me succumb to my hunger, and I bit down, tapping directly into the organ as it sprayed blue fluids around every time it contracted.
I sucked the monster dry, but having lost all self control, I moved from one ant to the next, before finally collapsing with nothing more available to eat.
My stomach was filled with that bright blue liquid and my body covered in the yellow goo that came squirting out as I crushed and ripped the ants open to access their circulatory system.
I wanted to hurl. To reject the fluids from such disgusting creatures, but my body denied me. As I tried to think about how much I didn't want to eat the ants, I couldn't help but remember how good it tasted. It was like deep fried chicken served with a huge helping of sweet and sour sauce.
No matter how much I spit and squeezed my stomach, my body refused to let the blood I consumed go to waste.
After a few minutes, I gave up. My mind and body were obviously at conflict when it came to this floor, and my mind stood no chance at winning while I was still so hungry. Despite their large bodies, those ants didn't have much blood in their bodies.
I took one glance at the monster drops, but turned my head away. I didn't want anything they left, lest it remind me of the taste of their blood.
The treasure chest was different though, since it's contents had nothing to do with the boss.
I opened it to reveal a pair of red leather gloves.
A shirt would've been the best outcome for me, but clothes were clothes. I held onto them without putting them on for now, since my hands were still sticky with ant goo, it was pointless to wear them before I cleaned up. Hopefully there'd be a fountain in the next room just like last time.
Past the double doors, down the stairs, I arrived to the welcome sight of another fountain.
Dropping my things on the dusty floor, I ran and jumped into the cold water, not even taking the time to remove my clothes first.
I submerged my entire body and rubbed my hands against my skin and clothes. Sticky strands of goo drifted away from my body as I desperately tried to remove all traces of those ants from my body.
"Puaaah!"
I burst out from the water when I couldn't hold my breath any longer.
The worst of the goo was now gone, but I was far from satisfied.
I removed my clothes and continued to scrub my body, getting rid of every trace of ant from my body. Eventually there was enough loose goo in the fountain water that it wasn't really possible to get any cleaner.
Slightly disheartened by that, I stood in the fountain stream to at least get half my body completely free of the gunk. As I stood in the cold water, I washed my clothes, then retrieved the rest of my stuff and washed anything that got dirty from that fight.
Since there weren't any traces of this fountain being used before I got to it, I cleaned it up as well so I could lay my things on the lip to dry. Then I sat on the central pedestal to wash any remaining trace of sticky ant goop from my body using the fresh fountain streams.
When I was finally done, the mental exhaustion had finally caught up to me and I just lay on the pedestal, letting my legs dangle over the edge and the water spray lightly massage my calfs.
I reflected a bit on what had happened to me up until now.
The last floor was absolutely terrible for me, with the results from the boss fight being the lowest point of all.
But despite that, I couldn't help but be glad I chose to become a vampire. If I had stayed human, or chosen a normal fantasy race, I would've most likely died already. This dungeon was rich in resources, but it was a bit monolithic when it came to variety.
Not only that, I had no confidence that I could've found enough food to survive for long outside of the dungeon. But inside, there was only meat. It was possible I could find fruits, vegetable, and grains further in, but betting on that was pretty foolhardy. At the very least, even if there weren't any monsters that dropped food on the first floor, I could've tried to cut the monsters themselves up before their bodies disappeared.
But even then, the human body wasn't meant to survive on meat alone, let alone raw meat, since I doubted even now I could start a decent fire to cook that meat.
As a vampire, it was all irrelevant.
While I had been all alone so far, it really hasn't been a problem. This dungeon was providing me with everything I needed as a vampire. Not having anyone to talk to wasn't even that big of a deal. I was pretty isolated the last year due to working so hard on my failed game, and I didn't have much in terms of friends even before that.
And while the last few hours were pretty terrible, I've been enjoying this new life of mine a decent amount.
It wasn't hard to say that I was looking forward to the future.
Sometimes I really wanted to take back my words with all my heart.
After resting up and drying my things off, I got dressed and headed to the next area.
What greeted me was the interior of some sort of ruins made of stone. The entire hallway I was in was lined with stone bricks, and the dirt behind the occasional missing brick suggested that I was underground.
Rather, in an underground zone.
While the atmosphere was pretty creepy, that wasn't the problem. The problem was the first monster I faced was a skeleton wielding a cheap, rusty looking scimitar.
The rattling undead with jerky movements was a bit unsettling, but that wasn't the problem. The problem was the fear that every monster was going to be similar to it. And not because they were undead, or made of bone, or that the very sight made a shiver run up my spine.
It really wasn't. I wasn't scared. Really.
The problem at the root of things was that they didn't have any blood.
My stomach had already been having a tantrum while I'd been waiting for my clothes to dry. I'd only been able to placate it with the thought that I could eat my heart out on the next floor. Those hopes were shattered with the sight of something that didn't even have blood running through it's nonexistent veins.
I sighed in the end. There wasn't anything I could do about going hungry on another floor.
(Way better than trying to fight it from making me eat bugs again)
And of course, the moment when I thought that, a niggling corner of my mind tried to lure me back to the second floor with the taste of the blood of the creatures I wanted to avoid.
I fought down the urge. The skeleton had already approached me while I was in thought and swung down it's weapon.
The monster was still slow despite it being the third floor. Rather, it felt slower than the wolves on the first floor.
I simply stepped inside of it's range and swung my spear at it's neck, entirely ignoring it's attack. Since now I was inside the skeleton's sword arc, what hit me wasn't a sharp blade, but it's bony wrist. The impact stung more than I expected, but I ignored it for the sake of this easy win.
And, while it was a win, it wasn't as easy as I expected.
The hit broke the skeleton's neck, taking the head off with it. But when I stepped back to see what sort of drop I'd get, it's sword arm rose up and swung it's weapon once again.
Surprised by the unexpected action, I dove to the side to avoid the attack, narrowly avoiding an injury.
The skeleton closed in on me and prepared another swing. I rolled away to avoid this third attack before getting back up.
The monster was still moving just as well as before, as if the head was nothing more than a decoration. Rather, now that I thought about it, it probably was nothing more than a decoration, being empty in the first place.
I bit back the wry smile and thrust my spear out from outside the skeleton's range. The cheap weapon impacted squarely on the undead's bleached sternum, and while it did crack, my spear shattered in my hands.
I bit back a curse as I hopped back and took out an axe. I had brought a decent number of weapons originally, but I had already started running out. I had used three against the wolf boss, and another five against the ant boss. I had just lost another spear, leaving me with only a sword and axe left.
In terms of weapons, I was in a dire straight, but while the goblin weapons didn't work well against these skeletons, this one had it's own weapon, and my claws were fundamentally my best weapons from the start, even if I used them the least.
I drew my last axe and charged the skeleton, swinging my weapon with as much force as I could muster. My swing arced down and impacted on the monster's sternum where it had already been cracked. The cracks spread before shattering the front of the ribs. My axe continued it's trajectory and impacted against the spine behind the ribs, separating one of the joints.
The skeleton could no longer maintain coherency and it fell apart. I quickly grabbed it's weapon before the rest of the body disappeared. My axe was now only a splintered handle, and was no longer usable. My claws might've been strong, but the lack of range made them risky to use. It might not actually be much of a problem on this floor, but I didn't know what the next floor would be like, so I needed to be prepared just in case.
The bleached bones disappeared like how everything did in this dungeon, and left me with it's drops. There was a black gem and...a big thighbone.
It was possible that the bone could be used for something if I knew the unique crafting styles of this world, but I didn't. It was nothing but dead weight, and not likely to be useful as a weapon.
Instead, it simply reminded me of a roasted meat on bone without the meat. My hunger was really grating on my nerves, making me think of food that wasn't even edible by the current me.
A little more depressed, I pocked the stone and went on my way.
A bit further into the dungeon, I found another skeleton. This time it was wielding a bow and had a quiver of arrows.
"Tsk"
I clicked my tongue. It had only been the second encounter and yet I had already become irritable. If I wasn't so hungry, I'd have welcomed the fight.
The skeleton slowly prepared it's bow.
I dropped my weapons and raced forward to avoid getting shot. I didn't have a shield, and dodging an arrow looked difficult. I had a shortage of usable weapons here, so carrying them in battle would slow me down, so I ditched them. In addition, I wanted to avoid getting hurt while I couldn't heal by drinking blood.
By the time the skeleton archer fully drew it's bow, I had closed the gap and swatted the bow to the side, making the monster fire it's arrow off at a wall.
Before it could counter, I drove my claws into it's upper arm, splitting it into two. The bone pile reacted by reaching for me with it's left arm, but I simply grabbed it and pulled it past me, breaking the skeleton's balance.
In a mostly smooth motion, I twisted it's arm behind it and mounted it's back, pinning it to the ground. It tried to move and get at me, but it was entirely helpless.
I sighed. This position was perfect to drink an enemy's blood, but this one didn't have any at all.
If anything, my hunger just continued to grate on my nerves, and the thought that I'd continue to suffer like that for the rest of the floor gave me a headache.
I wanted to eat something. Anything. But there wasn't anything to eat, and so it was annoying me to the point where I started to grate my teeth.
(If I couldn't eat anything, then I'll just satisfy myself by biting stuff)
The stupid, childish thought entered my mind, but since there wasn't any problems with doing so, I lowered my head and bit the back of the skeleton's neck, pretending it was the neck of warm wolf, and sucked air through my teeth.
But against my expectations, while I was doing nothing but clenching down on a the dry spine, I could feel something enter my fangs, and it wasn't air like what was entering my mouth.
It was cool and wispy, and tasted faintly like cotton candy despite not touching my tongue.
The skeleton continued to resist against me, but after a few seconds, it shuddered then stopped moving. Simultaneously, the taste disappeared and my fangs were empty again.
I tried biting harder and sucked with as much force as I could, but all I got was a mouth full of bone shards as my fangs pulverized the brittle spine.
Instantly filled with regret, I got off of the monster remains and spat out the fragments.
By the time I was done, the skeleton archer had disappeared, leaving just a black gem and a clay jar about as big as both fists combined. Both my current fists. If it was my old hands, I suspected it would only be as big as one. When I opened the jar, it was filled to the rim with some sort of dull brown powder. It had a slight tinge of blood to it's smell, but the taste was weak and very stale.
It didn't seem to be fit for consumption, even for me despite the faint taste of blood. Most likely, it wasn't actually some sort of blood product.
The jar itself could be useful, but unless if I had a way to get back to my home base quickly, it was a large weight I didn't need.
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