The Cub Raised in a Horror Game - Chapter 6 - In Any Case, Everything Will Eventually Reset

From the moment he became a vampire centuries ago, Dreist had never again experienced such close physical contact with another living being.

While others of his bloodline indulged in lavish pleasure and maintained flocks of beautiful thralls, Dreist was different. Beneath his handsome and refined exterior, he cared nothing for luxury. The only pursuit that ever mattered to him was power, and immortality merely provided him endless time to grow stronger.

In the end, he became the overlord of the continent and possessed everything.

Once he surpassed even the Blood Progenitor, the weaknesses of his race no longer applied to him. Sunlight no longer harmed him, and his hunger for blood was dulled… but the instincts of a vampire never truly disappeared.

So even though the infant’s cheeks were soft and her tiny milk teeth harmless, the moment she touched his throat, every nerve in his body snapped into alert. The veins on the back of his hand bulged as he instinctively resisted the urge to strike. Only his extraordinary reaction speed kept the child unharmed.

She may have been kin, but this reckless little creature clearly needed to be taught manners.

He furrowed his brow and began to speak, “You…”

Then he froze.

The dense negative energy that had long clung to him suddenly found an outlet, pouring from the point where Inia touched him.

He could clearly see the fury and malice that had built up over many years clouding his heart materialize into a black force, surging relentlessly like a tidal wave toward the baby in his arms.

The baby, head lowered, ate with earnest focus. Her small stomach felt like a bottomless pit, continuously swallowing the black mist.

It was only a few minutes later that she seemed stuffed to the point of daze, leaning against Dreist’s chest and sinking into a soft, milky sleepiness.

The vampire remained motionless, feeling the changes happening within him with disbelief.

The sensation was extraordinary. Inia was not eating his power itself, but the materialized dark side of his power, a negative energy that was also a heavy burden to him.

It was like a person living long-term in a high-pressure environment; over time, it easily causes negative emotions like anger, fear, anxiety, and if left unrelieved, the person can be crushed by these emotions, eventually affecting their real life.

Not only would physical ailments appear then, but one’s sanity might also be affected by emotional factors, and in more severe cases, it could even change a person’s character.

The same was true for a powerful Boss like Dreist, but the resulting consequences were far more terrifying.

For all these years, he had not merely been trapped in the castle. Apart from him, everything in the entire estate remained stagnant; time would continuously cycle and reset with each batch of players, and even his subordinate monsters would lose the memories of the previous cycle in each loop.

As the strongest vampire in the history of this world, Dreist’s perception was astonishingly powerful, to the point that even the dungeon could not deceive him.

He clearly remembered everything that happened in every cycle. His memory was never reset; he was the only one in the entire estate who remembered what had occurred.

The unvented rage accumulated with each cycle, and eventually, the endless nature of the days blurred everything. He gradually lost count of how much time he had spent repeating the cycles in the dungeon, and everything began to spin out of control.

The hatred overwhelmed Dreist’s consciousness, making him increasingly mad and furious. Even though he now appeared calm, the past anger and hatred had never disappeared.

The once free King of Beasts was chained and imprisoned in an iron cage. At first, it roared every day, but now it merely lay quietly dormant in the cage. Had it truly resigned itself to fate, or was it burying its hatred deep inside, simply waiting for the chance to tear everyone apart in revenge?

Dreist was clearly the latter. Such intense negative emotions were beginning to twist his character, making him less rational and calm than he had been as a ruler.

Now, that darkness, which had been blocking his heart like an ominous cloud, was simply drawn out completely by Inia.

For a moment, he didn’t know what language existed to describe that feeling.

The hatred and fury that had built up over years of cycles and confinement finally dissipated. His spirit felt as if it had been reset to a time before the dungeon incident, when his mind was at its peak and had not yet been clouded by the hatred born from endless dungeon cycles.

He felt a long-lost clarity and tranquility. This relief from the mire surpassed even the pleasure a vampire derives from drinking blood, allowing Dreist to experience his emotions as peaceful and stable for the first time.

He slowly opened his eyes and stared at the small child in his arms with a complicated expression.

The baby was completely unaware of the earth-shattering thing she had done. She only knew that this meal had been exceptionally good.

She smacked her small lips, reluctantly licking them as if still unsatisfied, then suddenly nudged her head forward, pressing another ‘kiss’ to the man’s neck. A loud pop echoed through the quiet room, as if the baby had deliberately kissed Dreist.

However, because of that extra bite, the already thoroughly full baby began to hiccup.

Dreist: …

If he were an ordinary person, even that small patch of skin on his neck would probably have been rubbed raw by the baby.

“Is this your ability?” he muttered in a low voice.

Inia hiccupped again, blinking up at him with wide, innocent eyes. They stared at each other, and Dreist instinctively began patting her small back.

In the natural order of babies, anyone who feeds and soothes her becomes her servant.

Inia’s small head rested on his shoulder, completely unafraid, and she immediately added Dreist to her list of adults who fed her.

Dreist learned how to hold a baby in a matter of minutes. Cradling Inia, he walked over to the window and gazed out at the moon beyond the mist.

For the first time in a long while, his mind was rational and clear, as if he had suddenly broken free from the dungeon’s restrictions and stepped into a third-person perspective, calmly reflecting on everything that had happened over the years.

Based on things he heard from players, he could roughly piece together the situation: the Realm of Refining Space, their strange items and abilities, and the existence of other similar dungeon worlds.

He possessed a wealth of information, but if he could not escape the confinement of the dungeon, it was all meaningless.

Originally, there had been no possibility of changing this situation, yet…

His hand paused, and Inia wriggled, making small noises to urge him to continue patting. He lowered his gaze and met her amber eyes.

He lowered his head, meeting Inia ‘s amber eyes.

—But the arrival of this infant had completely broken the deadlock.

Who was she, and where did she come from?

Their eyes met, and Dreist felt something click—a thin thread of consciousness linking them together.

Dreist perceived the infant’s true name, and spoke it aloud, “Inia, is that your name?”

The unfamiliar syllables rolled off his tongue with elegant, magnetic grace.

Simultaneously, the vampire’s name was also conveyed to Inia through telepathy. However, she was only a small, illiterate baby who didn’t recognize words. Dreist’s grand name flashed like a firework in her mind and then drifted away on the breeze.

“Wa-ah.”

Inia giggled and chewed on her hand. Having eaten her fill, she was growing sleepy.

Seeing her state, the vampire’s heart tightened. “Inia, wait a moment, don’t sleep yet.”

Judging by her age and sudden appearance, she might have been an accidental visitor.

He hadn’t yet figured out how long she could stay or if she would return after leaving. What if Inia vanished from this world once she fell asleep? Could she find her way back here again?

But he knew nothing about childcare, and he had no idea how to keep the baby awake even a little longer. He could only watch helplessly as she let out a tiny yawn and curled up sleepily in his arms.

In the next blink, his arms were empty.

She had disappeared.

Dreist stared down at his hands. Slowly, he let them fall and looked around the silent room. He reached out to search for a trace of her energy, or the mental link she left behind—nothing remained.

It was as if nothing had just happened. It was as if it had all been a hallucination.

An indescribable emotion consumed his heart, and Dreist’s eyelashes trembled slightly.

The handsome vampire looked up at the waning crescent moon in the sky. His pale, striking profile seemed sculpted by God’s own hands—how else could it be so noble and flawless? Yet his blood-red eyes cast a layer of eerie danger over that beauty.

Dreist stared intently at the moon, his chest rising and falling. The next second, the figure by the window vanished, instantly reappearing high in the air.

The boundary of the mist was right before him. His gaze fierce, he exerted all his strength and tore at the white fog ahead—

And a heartbeat later, he stood at the same window, unchanged, his attack swallowed by emptiness.

The same result appeared once again, just like every futile attempt in the past.

His crimson eyes flashed with terrifying, blood-colored light, no longer bearing the tolerance and indifference he had shown before the infant.

Perhaps what was more cruel than always dwelling in the darkness was to be shown hope, only to have it snatched away.

If sunlight only passes by occasionally and will never again warm the deep valley, then what difference does it make? No one can hold onto the sun’s brilliance; one can only continue to sink into the deep sea of endless cycles.

The earth trembled. The top floor where the Lord resided instantly turned into ruins. The undead creatures cowered and hid in the darkness, terrified that their capricious lord would notice them.

On the top floor of the castle, Dreist was not as furiously out of control as they had imagined. The vampire, having vented his rage, was outwardly calm, as if nothing had just happened.

He picked up a bottle of wine that had miraculously survived the wreckage and climbed onto the balcony railing. In the cold moonlight, he poured himself a drink.

In any case, everything will eventually reset.