Chapter 48: The Bite of Trust
Zane had never experienced anything like it.
It was like watching a high-speed documentary play in his mind—memories, sensations, emotions—rushing past with overwhelming clarity. And somehow, his mind kept up.
Through Erlin’s memories, he saw the truth.
She had once lived in the heart of civilization, a daughter of power and status—perhaps even royalty—on this continent. But her life had been a gilded cage. Her family, strict and suffocating, demanded obedience above all. In the end, she fled—not from weakness, but from the desire to live.
Her retreat to this deep forest wasn’t exile. It was survival. A choice to reclaim freedom.
Zane began to understand this world in a way he hadn’t before—not through System prompts or quests, but through Erlin’s eyes. Her skill, this transfer of memory, wasn’t just a trick. It was her truth. Her last card. And she had given it all to him.
At first, he’d feared she was a vampire. But that fear had shifted.
He now knew the truth: drinking beast blood was a form of practiced ritual here—like alchemy or medicine. Ceremonial, necessary for their strength and survival. Feeding on human blood, however, was taboo. Forbidden. Reserved only for the monstrous outlaws of their society.
That revelation cleared the fog of suspicion in Zane’s mind.
Erlin wasn’t a monster.
She was just... a girl. A lonely, brave, beautiful girl.