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.

I only took the gem and moved on. The bow and arrows disappeared with the rest of the body, so I had to remember to grab it more quickly next time.

Even more importantly though, I wanted more of that taste. I thought I wouldn't get anything because they were undead, but to my surprise, I did get something to eat, even if it was weak in flavour. On a floor with nothing but bloodless undead, it was miles better than not getting anything to eat.

The nutritional value was probably pretty low, but getting sugar candies was better than starving.

 

Once more, I wanted to take back my words.

I had been exploring this level for hours. Unlike the second floor, I actually fought all the monsters I encountered, explored the side passages, and grabbed what loot I could. All the monsters ended up being various types of skeletons. There were ones wielding scimitars, bows, a bardiche, then there was one that was basically a skeleton dog.

None of them gave me any drops aside from bone or bone related materials aside from black gems as expected. I did take their weapons, but soon I reached my limit since I wasn't using them on this level. Skeleton monsters were just too slow to make it worth it. They were more annoying in their relentlessness, and it looked like their attacks had a decent amount of punch behind them due to the markedly higher quality of weapons over the first floor goblins.

Of course, I benefited from that fact by taking them.

I also looted the treasure chests I found, but like the first floor, the majority of the loot were just crystal bottles with various coloured liquids inside of them like the first floor. There were also a few gemstones, but the best item I found was another pair of pants. This time it was made from some sort of sturdy black cloth. I'd rather have gotten a shirt, but the pants were more comfortable and much easier to move in than my previous one. While the comfort came from the nicer material, the ease in movement came from the fact that they were hotpants.

While it was a bit embarrasing, it wasn't like anyone was watching, so I prefered the hotpants to my leather ones for the slight boost in mobility.

That said, I really wanted a shirt. It wouldn't have been much of a problem if I was still a guy, but right now, I couldn't help but feel how inappropriate this was, basically showing off my underwear.

The problem, then, was the fact that eating the essence of those skeletons hadn't been working out for me nearly as well as I hoped.

It wasn't like taking raw sugar to temporarily deal with starvation until you can get a proper meal. It was like eating artificial sweeteners to trick yourself into thinking that you were putting food into your body while desperately hoping that you didn't succumb to starvation.

In reality, it wasn't that terrible, since I got skills out of it, but the more I ate from the skeletons, the harder my cravings hit back after I finished a meal.

And with my cravings hitting me so hard, I was really irritable. If someone saw me, they'd have though that I was a crack addict desperate for her next hit.

In a sense though, food was an addiction so the analogy wasn't too wrong. It was just that food was one that was necessary to live.

I had completely lost track of time though. As hard as it was to keep track of time in a dungeon where nothing changed on top of being a vampire that had no need of sleep, now that it was so difficult to concentrate on anything at all due to my hunger, I couldn't even get a general grasp of how long I've been wandering on this floor.

It could be days, weeks, even months if I was more out of it than I thought. Or maybe it's only been a few hours but my cravings had made every hour so excruciating that the seconds ticked by like minutes.

I was loathing the floor that denied me proper feed, that kept tricking my body into thinking it finally got what it wanted most, only to be cruelly shot down at every turn.

My actions had lost proper sense or strategy. I wandered like a zombie, and any time I found an enemy, I pounced on them like a beast, hoping this time that this monster had at least a drop of blood somewhere inside it's body even though my senses told me that was impossible.

My body had become covered in scratches with some deep gashes here and there. At first when I noticed, I had thought that since I was bleeding, I had finally found some blood to drink. But when I did so, rather than finally being able to sate my craving, my blood didn't taste like anything I had had before.

It wasn't sweet. It didn't remind me of a hearty meal, or even some half-baked snack. It was more like drinking tap water when I had already drank my fill of coffee. It wasn't terrible, but it was plain and unfulfilling. Just the act of sucking on my own wound made the dark void in my gut grow instead of shrink.

That realization made me cry for the first time in this life.

 

Finally, after so much struggling, I was blocked by a large double door.

"Fufufufufu...wahahahahaha! Finally!"

After so long, I couldn't help but burst into laughter. Just one more fight and I would be free from this hell. I'd be able to rush to the next floor and eat to my heart's content!

Without any mental leeway to create a plan, I simply charged into the room and pounced on the first thing that came into range. It was a skeleton with a scimitar.

I had gotten plenty of levels already, and even raised some skills, so it was no match for me, and I quickly sucked it's essence out before it could even strike.

A hot, searing sensation filled my right biceps just as I was letting go of my empty prey. When I glared in the direction of the offender, I saw a skeleton with a bow pulling out an arrow from it's quiver.

Without any thought, I lept at the archer automatically. A sharp pain came from my right calf, but I ignored it and bit into it's neck bone, sucking it of the energy that made it move.

Only when my second prey was drained that I looked at the source of the pain. It was skeleton dog trying to rip open my leg with it's jaws. But the fact that it had bit me didn't register in my mind. Instead, I simply raked my claws across it's skull, shredding it instantly, and bit into it's spine to get that feeling of feeding for even one more second.

When I was done with my third prey, I looked up and saw two more wielding bardiches. Despite the pain in my calf and arm, I sprinted at full throttle at those two and plowed into the first, violently biting into it's neck, then leaping at the other to drain it as well.

It had probably only been a handful of seconds and broke every rule of engagement I normally followed, but I didn't care. It was still taking too long.

When I rose up again, the only enemy I could find that was still standing was a large skeleton a head taller than the others. It wore a full fledged chest plate, gauntlets and greaves. In it's hands was a sword and shield, and it was in a defensive position as it slowly approached me.

I scowled at it. The shield meant that it would take more time to get close enough to feed on it, and I hated that.

Despite that, I made a mad dash at the offending creature and grabbed at it's shield. But before I could do anything, the shield rushed at me, knocking my entire body down.

The impact disoriented me as I rolled end over end before coming to a stop.

For a second, I didn't know what happened, but the gears that have been gunked up due to my hunger had managed to turn, and I realized that it bashed me with it's shield.

"Waaaaaaahhh!"

I yelled as I charged at the big skeleton again. I was angry. Angry that it didn't have the decency to go down quickly when I was so hungry.

It tried to block my path again with it's shield, but this time I wasn't having any of that.

Instead of trying to pull the shield to the side, I stabbed at it's middle with my claws and easily broke through the metal boss and the bony hand behind it. Without anything to hold it up, the shield that was half as tall as I was fell onto my arm.

I swung my arm to free it of it's weight, but the sharp edges of the broken shield left scratches all along it. I didn't even notice as now I was so close to reaching the next floor.

With my other arm, I grabbed the collar of the skeleton's breast plate and pulled my body up and bit into it's neck.

There was a few dull thuds and a sharp pain in my body, but I ignored it. Fresh blood was so close that I could almost taste it.

The big skeleton finally lost strength and collapsed.

My body hurt all over. There was a big gash on my right arm and I could feel a dull pain in a few other areas. It seemed that the monster struggled more than the others before it stopped.

I didn't care though. The wounds I had would stop bleeding after a minute. It seemed like any cut would stop bleeding pretty quickly with my current body. And the wounds themselves would all get better when I finally got a proper meal.

I was giddy with excitement. I was looking so forward to the feeling of warm blood oozing out of my prey's body. I wondered what the next monster would taste like.

As I did that, the skeletons all disappeared, leaving their drops. I wanted to hurry, but there wasn't any harm in spending a few seconds to gather my loot and leave them in the next fountain while I went to feed. There wasn't anything in between me and my next meal anymore.

I only gathered the gems from the normal skeletons, but from the boss I got it's big breast plate. It was unfortunate, but it felt like a waste on me. Something that heavy would slow me down when I was currently a speed type. My long awaited top was going to go unused for a while.

The treasure chest also contained a breast plate in it for some reason, making me twitch.

Nonetheless, I grabbed it all and dragged them to the fountain past the boss room.

Nothing could lower my mood now that I would get my long anticipated meal.

To speed the process up, I left everything in the fountain room. My weapons, my loot, even my bag. I was only going to have breakfast, so I didn't want anything to weigh me down as I went to enjoy it.

While I couldn't muster the patience to fully clean up for my meal, I did at least wash my hands. It might not have any health effect for me, but being at least a baseline level of sanitary was etiquette.

With a big smile on my face, I headed off to the next floor.

After exiting the fountain tunnel, I was greeted with another cave of some sort. This time it was more of a grey colour, and the rock walls were much rougher, like it was a naturally formed cave.

I wondered what sort of monsters inhabited this floor. Not like it mattered.

(Whatever it is, I'll just grab it and sink my teeth in)

After my second turn, I was face to face with the first monster of the floor, and my smile instantly disappeared.

What stood in front of me was a giant, humanoid thing more than twice my height. But it's size wasn't the problem. Nor was the fact that it's skin was a dull brown with a metallic sheen. The problem was that what stood in front of me was obviously a golem. Another creature that had no blood.

"Why the hell!!!"

I was furious. I would've been happy with virtually anything as long as I could suck it's blood.

Tears crept out of my eyes. It was as if the universe was deliberately trying to torment me.

I ran at the golem and kicked it with all my strength. Pain ran up my leg, but I ignored it. The huge metal object toppled from the force I imparted onto it's dented midsection.

Without any delay, I jumped onto it and started to claw at it.

I wanted to release everything that had gotten pent up in me in the last floor and just let it all out on this big, cold, unfeeling piece of trash.

My hands hurt from the sharp edged as I tore the monstrosity apart with my claws, as I peeled away it's outer metallic shell and stabbed the glowing orb in it's torso.

The golem had stopped moving, so I got up. I felt empty. I was hungry, and miserable, and just felt like there was virtually nothing left to make me keep going.

I started to walk again. Hope against hope that it was just a fluke. That the universe didn't conspire against me.

Something seemed to have been left behind by the golem, but I didn't care. It wasn't going to conveniently be a blood bag or something.

I dragged my feet around one corner, then the next, and what greeted me was a giant. It was a light orangy brown colour, and almost the exact same shape as the previous golem.

That was it. I've had enough.

Tears wouldn't stop falling.

Unable to bear with it, I just ran away, all the way back to the fountain.

I just jumped into the fountain and moved to the far side and hid myself from both entrances, and just cried.

I was so hungry that it physically hurt, yet the dungeon had denied me three times. It was like it was saying that it didn't want me here or something.

Up until then, I thought of the dungeon as a paradise. A gift from the gods for vampires such as myself. But the reality was starting to seem more like that was an illusion. I can get stronger here, possibly extraordinarily so, but only if I could survive through this hell of constant hunger and denial.

I didn't have that sort of strength, and that was presuming that this wouldn't keep going until I collapsed and starved to death.

"This...I can't do this"

There was no way I could continue and finish this floor at this point. Not with how much hunger had weakened me. I wouldn't last that far.

My only option was to go back to the second floor and fill up on those disgusting bugs. I hated the idea, and despite everything I hesitated to do that.

And so, I cried. The second time in this life I cried. I held my knees and hid behind the fountain's pillar and cried my heart out.

"I wish I was back on the first floor..."

And everything went dark.