Morning arrived much faster than Kai expected.
Sunlight filtered through the cracks in the shutters, casting warm lines across the messy bedsheets.
Greta lay silently beside him.
Her breathing was soft and steady, a stark contrast to the exhausted panting she was doing just a few hours ago.
Her green hair spread out across the white pillow, catching the morning light.
'Not a bad way to start the day,' Kai thought, resting his head on his arm to watch her sleep.
"What are you looking at?" Greta asked.
She didn't even open her eyes, keeping her face buried halfway in the mattress.
"You are quite perceptive, aren't you?" Kai replied, letting a smile cross his face.
"Your gaze is very easy to differentiate from a normal person," she said.
She finally opened her eyes and blinked against the light. Propping herself up on one elbow, she let the quilt slip just enough to expose her bare shoulder.
"It always feels like you are calculating how much someone is worth."
"Maybe I am," he teased.
Reaching out, he traced a light line down her collarbone.
Before they could fall back into last night's comfortable position, a familiar blue screen popped up in his peripheral vision.
[Greed Feast has evolved: "Dominant Absorption" unlocked]
[Description: Allows user to dominate a partner during intimacy and forcibly absorb a much larger amount of her power, skills, and mana. The stronger the partner, the greater the boost. Greatly reduces system overload warnings, granting better control to choose specific stolen stats and skills without passing out.]
[New Passive: Overload Resistance (Medium)]
[Strength +6]
[Agility +5]
[Mana Capacity +80]
[Level Up! Current Level: 19]
[Condition Met: Intimate Bond Formed]
[Passive Skill Unlocked: Restorative Touch (Minor)]
[Effect: Base stamina regeneration increased by 15% after resting in a safe zone.]
'So this is what real progression looks like,' Kai thought.
He dismissed the floating windows with a quick mental command.
Getting a fifteen per cent stamina boost was a significant advantage for someone planning to fight an army of the dead.
He could already feel the physical difference in his muscles.
The pain from Shiro's heavy punch was completely gone, leaving no bruises behind.
His body felt lighter, sharper, and fully recovered from the alley fight.
Furthermore, the Greed Feast skill had finally settled down into a quiet, temporarily satisfied by the physical connection.
It proved that he could manage the aura without having to kill everything in sight, which opened up new tactical options for the future.
If he could regenerate stamina this quickly while passively draining enemies in combat, his sustained fighting ability would be off the charts.
He just needed to avoid taking a lethal hit from a high-level boss.
Greta watched him stare at the empty air for a second before shaking her head.
"So why do you want to know about the vampires? You are just one guy with a sword."
"I have business with them," Kai answered.
He sat up and swung his legs over the edge of the bed to find his boots.
She nodded slowly.
Greta was a practical woman, smart enough not to ask any more questions than strictly necessary.
"I heard a few things from the travelling merchants downstairs. But I do not know exactly how accurate the information is. Rumours get twisted when people are scared."
"Anything is good," Kai encouraged her, reaching down to grab his trousers from the floor.
"About a week back, the northern caravans started reporting heavy movements," Greta explained.
She pulled the quilt up to her chest and watched him dress.
"They said the Vampire Queen sent her vanguard towards the human capital. She is not leading the march herself, which means she is busy doing something else in the dark territories."
"Hmm?" Kai paused, buckling his leather belt.
"Who is leading the vanguard then?"
"She has a general named Lilith," Greta said, her tone dropping its usual playful edge and turning very serious.
'Oh, her. One of the main villains from the game.'
"She is the second in command and supposedly the most dangerous one in the entire brood. The merchants claim Lilith is marching with roughly five hundred corrupted beasts and thralls. They are carving a direct path through the Whispering Pass to bypass the main border forts entirely."
'Five hundred enemies and a vampire general,' Kai thought, doing the rough math in his head while lacing up his boots.
It was a complete suicide mission for me.
Jumping headfirst into a battalion of monsters would end badly for him.
But he did not need to fight the entire army in a wide open field.
He just needed to pick off their stragglers, grind his stats up in the shadows, and find a way to cripple their supply lines before they reached the populated human cities.
Dealing with Lilith herself was going to be the real challenge.
If she were a named boss character with a unique title, her base stats would easily eats his.
"The Whispering Pass is a narrow mountain gorge," Kai noted, pulling his borrowed shirt over his head.
"It makes tactical sense. They want to avoid the open sun during the day and funnel their troops safely through the mountains where the local armies cannot flank them."
"It is a complete death trap, Kai," Greta corrected him.
She sat up fully, ignoring the falling quilt and exposing her boobs to the cool room.
"The merchants call it that because the wind traps the sound of screaming travellers. If you go up there alone with just an iron sword, you are going to end up as another mindless thrall marching under Lilith's banner. There is a big difference between beating up a local debt collector and fighting a centuries-old vampire."
Walking back over to the bed, Kai leaned down and placed a hand firmly on the mattress next to her thigh.
He brought his face close to hers, letting his eyes drop to her lips before meeting her gaze.
"You should have a little more faith in your personal pest control," he whispered.
Leaning in, he gave a deep kiss.
Greta sighed against his mouth.
Her fingers tangled briefly in his hair before she pushed him back with a gentle, playful shove.
"You are too cocky for your own good, boy."
"It has kept me alive this far," Kai said. Grabbing the Fang Sword from the bedside table, he secured it to his hip.
"Keep a room open for me. I will be back to collect my deposit once I finish dealing with this vampire problem."
"I charge by the night," she called out, a smirk playing on her painted lips.
"Do not expect me to keep the bed warm forever."
"I think you will make an exception for me," he shot back.
Giving her a confident wink, he stepped out of the room and closed the door behind him.
The Hollow Moon Inn was quiet as Kai walked down the wooden stairs.
A few hungover patrons were sleeping on the corner tables, snoring loudly.
Tossing a silver coin to the tired barmaid cleaning the floors, he stepped out into the crisp morning air of Kravengard.
It was a perfectly normal morning for a city entirely unaware that an army of the dead was marching towards their gates.
Navigating through the crowded streets, Kai moved with a clear, singular purpose.
The information from Greta gave him exactly what he needed.
But walking into the mountains without supplies was a rookie mistake.
Using the remaining gold coins taken from Shiro's men, he stopped by a local provisioner near the market square to get ready for the long journey.