"Mission complete!"

Xiao's voice echoed throughout the dungeon.

The rusted and bloody chains rustled as Xinya returned to his original world. As if he had never left, his wrists were confined once again, forcing him to stand. Even whilst constrained, he could feel a foreign strength within his body that wasn't there before.

He wasn't sure what kind of mission he had to complete, but from the fact that his "stats" had been allotted, Xinya knew that he'd certainly completed a mission. From his point of view, it felt as if he'd blacked out for no longer than a second with only an expanse of black nothingness to indicate that he'd left his world for another at all.

Although he especially hated anything related to mind and memory manipulation, Xinya had no room to complain this time as it was better for him to have no recollection over what had transpired as long as he was around. Thus, he put no more thought into the matter regarding his memories and focused on the other functions of the system.

For example, the rewards for completing missions were the fixed 50 stat points and the physical objects.

"Hey," Xinya ignored the burning sensation on his left hand as he called out to the silver rosary with his deep voice that was slightly hoarse as if it hadn't been used in a while.

Xiao only felt a myriad of complex emotions as he observed the man who was colder than an ice block just like when he first met him. Luckily, he was only a piece of jewelry, so his inner feelings and thoughts could not be shown on his "face."

"Reward."

Alas, there was one thing never changed throughout all those years. Xiao inwardly complained about his host's stinginess with words. Even with his lover, his host never spoke more than what was required. It didn't help that the little kitten didn't need much to understand what Xinya's intentions were.

Yet the almighty rosary's embedded ruby flashed in excitement as he recollected himself, "An unexpected reap!"

Pausing for maximum effect and suspense, silence drowned the mausoleum so that not even Xinya's vampiric breathing could be heard. After over two minutes of that awkward tension, Xiao no longer dared to draw things out.

"Ahem. The mission reward consisted of the standard 50 stat points, which you have already allotted with an additional egg with unknown origins! An egg! Isn't this totally a flag for a main character's OP pet?!"

Unfortunately, as opposed to the system's enthusiastic reaction to the reward, Xinya showed nothing whatsoever. He expressed neither disappointment nor happiness--just complete disregard, making Xiao wonder if he would have at least furrowed his brows if he had received the system god's "blessed" underwear.

"Uh," Xiao hesitantly asked, "Would you like to see it?"

The man who had the rosary tightly in his grip despite the adverse reaction of his sinful body towards a relic of holiness that was Xiao, ignored the question and seemed to no longer be paying attention to him at all.

Well, even after he met Xue Yang, Feng Xinya completely disregarded everything apathetically. Only towards his little Yangyang did he show even the slightest shred of humanity... Xiao pitied himself for contracting such a host whose motto was "silence is consent," yet more often personally used "silence is refusal." How could someone be so unreasonable yet so! Damn! Competent!

With his piercing golden eyes narrowed towards the bloodied ground beneath his feet, Xinya was immersed in his thoughts as he revised his former plans accordingly with the addition of the system's merits.

During the time that he had, Xinya quickly adjusted to the newfound strength in his body and calculated the feeling of such power multiplied by 10. Although he didn't feel anything towards the first physical reward as it was too full of variables for his liking, Xinya did take it into consideration in his schemes.

"He's a pro, but definitely a bast---AH?! WTF! What is thi---XINYA HELP MEEEE!"

After a little over an hour, Xinya suddenly used his consciousness to force the silver cross into the system space. When he was feeling out the abilities given to him by the system as well as the properties of the system itself, this was only one of many functions that he'd discovered available to him.

In actuality, such a thing like forcing his system in and out of the world should not have been possible under normal means.

That was why, as Xiao's silver body was being sucked into the small pitch-black vortex, he was shouting in horror as he thought he was going to die again. In his panic, he failed to realize that the one he was calling out to, was the one responsible for the frightening occurrence in the first place!

"AAAAAAAAAAAH---wuwuwu I'm just a lowly system who just got a second chance at life ah~ Let me live...sob..."

Towards the ridiculous rambling of the system, Xinya furrowed his brows in annoyance.

"Shut up."

Then, using the same conscious force as before, Xinya silenced the noisy rosary and sped up the pace of its transfer into the space. In less than a second, Xiao's presence could no longer be detected. Furthermore, the burn he'd inflicted on Xinya's left palm was completely healed, leaving only the former scratches that were already there from before Xiao's initial appearance.

Not even a nanosecond after the system's complete disappearance, there was a ripple in the atmosphere before a blade had lodged itself deep into Xinya's abdomen. Knowing him, how could the blade possibly be made of any ordinary material?

Chuckling darkly at the tingling sensation that was closer to a million ants crawling and biting him from the inside, tinges of red began seeping into Xinya's eyes at a frightening speed as his intense hatred poured out towards the figure standing in front of him with his hand holding the hilt of the sword embedded inside of his body.

The tall, dark-skinned man's red eyes flashed brightly in excitement underneath the now-red moonlight. A large, disgusting smile was pasted across his handsome face as he took in the mocking animosity within Xinya's blood-red orbs. He didn't even care that his luxurious purple robe that draped all over the ground behind him was drenched by the dense puddles of blood, or that Xinya's blood had splashed onto his own flawlessly white dress shirt after he'd abruptly stabbed his sword.

Orlan Radley.

One of the Four Generals of the New Empire, General Radley. He was known for his short and wavy black hair, dark skin, and his eyes that constantly remained red to the point that some even believed them to be naturally red. Even Xinya, who'd seen the fucker every day for 18 years could not tell what color his eyes truly were. Not that he cared to know.

There were two reasons he was in charge of Feng Xinya. Orlan Radley was the most omniscient general. More importantly, he desired power and control; naturally, the Feng clan's unique and formidable ability to engrave runes with special powers and properties onto themselves and others caught his interest for more reasons than just the surface facts.

"Feng Xinya," Radley rolled the name through his tongue before licking his right fang, "Still not cooperating?"

He twisted the transparent sword a few times with a warm smile when he didn't receive a reply, "Tonight's play, take a guess what I have in store for you?"

Clenching his jaw tightly as he faced the floor, the initial pain elevated from a horde of bugs' bites into someone digging their hands into his stomach slowly and squeezing his innards piece by piece. Before he knew it, blood was welling up his throat and he couldn't stop himself from coughing it all out onto the pair of black leather brogues in front of his eyes.

That blade isn't normal. Xinya narrowed his eyes at the transparent blade embedded within his stomach. His own dark blood was trickling and trailing along its edge. Not many actions nor substances could elicit a cough of blood from a member of the Feng clan. Although Radley was a formidable vampire, the Feng clan was in a league of its own altogether--to the point that it was questionable whether or not they were truly humans.

Certainly, the only reason the Feng clan fell in the first place was due to having been conspired against by both the humans and vampires back to back.

"Oh?" The smile of his face widened, "Did you think of something?"

Feng blood. How could Xinya possibly not know? The feeling of his own clan's blood disrupting his system, this was an instinctive knowledge. However, they were already long dead. Xinya didn't care about desecrating their corpses or whatnot. All he cared about was massacring those who killed them and put him in this situation.

Seeing the clarity in his eyes, the vampire general's laughter rang throughout the dungeon as he pulled the sword out, only to slash it against Xinya's chest and ribs continuously.

"Tch," he clicked his tongue in disappointment, but the disgusting smile was still diligently maintained, "Did you know? After extensive research and numerous combinations with other substances, your blood has the ability to completely disintegrate bones rather than controlling them! The Feng clan was so full of mystery."

Although his eyes were filled with praise, Xinya didn't have to look to know that the man was actually thinking something along the lines of, "I wish his bones disappeared. How unlucky."

On the topic of decay and disintegration, Radley was a direct vassal of one of the Ancients who was the progenitor of death and decay. He didn't need to use some roundabout method to decay bones as his ability enabled him to make anything he wanted, disappear into nothingness.

Anything, excluding the Feng clan's bones.

As Xinya had been his prisoner for the longest amount of time compared to others, oftentimes Radley would discard his initial intention of trying to extract the method of rune engraving and focus on his sadistic intentions instead.

Like now.

"Whose blood," bringing his lips to Xinya's ear, he slowly sliced the blade across Xinya's pale white cheek, causing blood to drip down his chin and into the puddle beneath him, "do you think is within this sword?"

Withholding his silence, Xinya replied with a smirk as he licked the blood that trailed near his lips. His eyes were still full of the desire to murder the man in front of him, at the same time imbued with his own provocation.

The best way to irritate bastards like Radley was to not succumb to his mental incitements. While he was great at inflicting physical pain, the general was relatively "new" at mental inflictions. Though, calling a few hundred years "new" was a bit inaccurate as Xinya himself wasn't even a tenth of that in terms of age.

He felt a sigh blowing into his ear, sending unpleasant chills throughout his body.

"This is why I don't like you (You really aren't my type)," Radley took the sword's blade into his hand and exerted some of his ability into it, causing it to liquify. Then, with the poisonous substance in one palm, he lifted Xinya's chin with the hilt of the sword and forced the fluids into Xinya's mouth.

As the substance trickled down his throat, it scorched everything it came into contact with, causing Xinya's hands to tremble subconsciously. The chains shook and rattled along with his movements, finally pleasing Radley's perverted desire to watch someone restrain themselves even whilst suffering.

He pat Xinya's cold cheek twice, "As a reward for your performance today, you can have the blood."

Then, he disintegrated the empty hilt and turned to leave. However, before he completely disappeared through the distorted space, he muttered, "Oh! Even though you don't seem to care, I will tell you."

The vampire general cackled as his figure and presence completely disappeared from the dungeon, leaving behind only a sinister whisper, "It was your mother's."

The endless agony that the ingested fluid gave Xinya was beyond describing. It could be seen from how his normally tough and resilient body was convulsing every half-second; his fingernails dug deeply into his palms, drawing blood. The pain was enough to make him wish that his heart did not pump blood throughout his body, as it continuously spread the foreign toxin over and over again.

Of course, it was just a passing thought. While enduring the torment, Xinya was also integrating the substance into his system albeit gradually.

There was no way that the cunning General Radley did not know that adding his own clan's blood into his body was a long-term benefit to him in more ways than one. The fact that he initiated it was to show his overwhelming might--his vain attempt at trying to instill in Xinya the thought that no matter how much he resisted, Radley would always win.

Along with the blood of his mother, was Radley's own. This was why he hadn't directly fed his own blood this time.

Only after two hours did Xinya finally calm down the raging blood inside his body. At the same time, he was recovering the state of his organs at a decent pace.

Three more hours after he was no longer fidgety and breathing heavily due to the effects of the fluids, Xiao puffed back into the dungeon through an inferior vortex than the one Xinya had created before. He floated about two feet in front of Xinya in victory.

"Puhah! Finally! Out! Hah..."

He had spent over five hours trying to find a way to return to the physical world! Really made one wonder who was the real system. If only he had spent those 10,000 years reading that big fat book, then he would have known of all of his capabilities, but alas Xiao did not regret leaving that fat thing to rot in nothingness...

"Eh...six hours have passed since your first mission..."

There was only the sound of Xiao's loud voice within the mausoleum as the rosary took the time to do some simple math in his head, "That means we only have to wait for another...wait, what was 24 minus 6 again? 24, 23, 22, 21, 20, 19...18! 18 whole hours?! Ughhh..."

If he had eyes, he would be crying tears of blood. Xinya could hear the rosary groaning about how much he hated this dreary world.

That, Xinya would tacitly agree with. This world held no hope and only destruction. Even if he killed all those who'd transgressed him, only more violence would follow. Not that he cared for what came after his vengeance.

"Uh WOW!"

Finally paying attention to the sorry state of his host, Xiao screamed in astonishment.

"What happened ah! I was only gone for five hours!"

The silver rosary orbited around Xinya's disheveled frame, scanning his condition. Only after confirming that there were no major internal injuries, did he sigh in relief.

"Huh?"

But as much as Xiao portrayed himself to be naïve and dumb, he had his sharp moments albeit extremely rare.

"You! It was you, wasn't it! You sent me back into the void!" As he shouted out in injustice, his mood was complex. This was because he now knew why Xinya had sent him off so swiftly. The fact that he couldn't even detect the residue of the other person's presence sent chills down his spine.

Sure enough, his host truly lived in a crazy world full of crazies. No wonder he turned out the way he did, ah.

Although he had many questions, he already knew Xinya wouldn't bother explaining anything. That's why he just flew back into Xinya's hand and silently threw a tantrum by burning his palm like always.

Now that the major event had passed the two only had to wait for the time to pass quickly.

***

A man stood motionlessly in the vast expanse of darkness. In front of him were countless floating projections of a boy with beautiful, short platinum hair. His every smile, frown, those clear, pale jade green eyes stared up at him with love and affection.

With no visible emotion present on his face, the man wordlessly brought up his palm to touch one of the projections, and it disappeared as if it never existed. Slowly, he did the same to the others, a tear unconsciously streaming down his cheek.

Xiao watched on in silence as the man erased his own memories, one by one, until only one remained.

In the last frame, the boy smiled softly as he whispered into the man's ear, "I love you."

But that too, disappeared after the man brushed his fingers against the boy's fair cheek.