Tap! Tap! Tap!
The sound of rain hammering against the windows and roof echoed throughout the entire house. It was coming down at a sharp angle, and the eerie crimson moonlight had completely vanished, hidden behind the dark, heavy curtain of a stormy night.
At that moment, in front of the tall dressing mirror, stood a young man who was carefully examining his new body, having stripped down to nothing but his underwear.
The face staring back was young, no older than nineteen. His skin was pale, almost porcelain under the lamplight, with a cool undertone suggesting he rarely saw the sun. The bone structure was fine and elegant: high cheekbones, a straight nose with a slight aristocratic bridge, and a softly defined jawline that gave his features an androgynous sharpness. Dark, wavy hair fell in loose, slightly disordered curls around his temples. But his eyes were the most striking detail: they were like a pair of pale, piercing grey-blue gems.
The gas lamp was burning brightly now, casting a warm, flickering glow across the room. It had taken him a moment to figure out that he just needed to turn the small brass knob to light it. In that brief span of time, he had already begun piecing together several crucial details.
First, he hadn't fully inherited the memories of the original Arthur Sturridge. They only came in as short, disjointed flashes.
Second, the most important of all the case notes the previous owner had made were suspiciously sparse. He had found a spiral-bound notebook on the desk, and while it looked intact at first glance, Arthur's newly enhanced, hawk-like eyesight immediately noticed the tiny, jagged strips of paper still clinging to the metal coils. Several pages had been violently torn out.
It's very likely that whoever killed me was the person who destroyed this evidence.
Arthur Sturridge, what did you get yourself into, to end up murdered?
Beyond those torn pages, there was no other clue left as to what might have happened.
"So, this is me now. Arthur Sturridge. Living the life of another man."
The most intriguing detail of all this, and perhaps the most convenient, was that they both shared the exact same first name.
He didn't quite know what to make of the coincidence yet, but he felt it was something definitely worth noting.
He had grabbed a fresh orange pocket notebook from a neat pile on the desk. Based on the surviving notes, the original Arthur used them to document his cases. Now, he was using it to document his own body. He methodically checked for any injuries, puncture wounds, or bruises, but found absolutely nothing. For all intents and purposes, if he had stayed dead and someone had come to investigate a few days later, they would have easily concluded he died of a sudden heart attack.
He had also carefully examined the clothes he woke up in. There was no sign of blood, no tear in the fabric.
Whoever killed the previous owner of this body was a very skilled assassin. Highly likely someone who knew a great deal about poisons.
But there was another glaring problem beyond the cause of death.
I didn't die in this room.
Yes, after a very careful examination of the room and cross-referencing it with the fragmented memory of the dark figure looming over him, that was the only logical conclusion. The layout didn't match.
So, I was killed elsewhere and then my body was moved and placed here. Or… the memory itself is distorted from the trauma of dying.
Both were highly likely hypotheses, so he jotted them down in the orange notebook as well as making a rough sketch of the room from his dream and set the matter aside for now. He walked over to the wardrobe and pulled out a set of casual, comfortable clothes that looked like sleepwear, dressing himself to ward off the chill of the rainy night.
With his physical investigation concluded, he decided to explore a little more of his 'System.' He was clear-headed enough now to think critically and, more importantly, to ensure he didn't accidentally do something to make his Sanity drop again.
He called up the interface. The system didn't seem to have a standard health tracker; the only visible metrics on the main page were the Sanity tracker and something called 'Blood Potency.'
Based on my own knowledge of games, book, my intuition, and that term 'Duskborn' from the overview… I have a working theory. Let's see if the system confirms it.
Methodically, he began to mentally navigate the UI, clicking through the translucent panels. The system was divided into several distinct tabs: [Profile], [Abilities], [Inventory], [Collectibles], [Map], [Socials], [Shop], and [System].
He started with the [System] tab. It contained only two sub-menus: Settings and Tutorial. Opening the tutorial, he was greeted by a massive text blob accompanied by bizarre, chibi-style art of a character demonstrating how to interact with the world and the interface. It was a jarringly modern aesthetic for a Victorian world, but it proved beyond a doubt that this interface was tailored to a modern transmigrator's sensibilities.
The tutorial index read like a densely packed wiki. There were dozens of chapters listed in a neat, glowing font: Attributes & Scaling, Abilities, Map Navigation, Sparks & Ascension, Blood Potency, Sanity & Corruption Mechanics, Common Terminologies, and even a greyed-out section ominously titled [Redacted].
Arthur skimmed the overwhelming wall of text and let out a tired sigh. He had just woken up from an agonizing physical reset, transmigrated into a murdered body, and barely had his bearings. Reading a textbook's worth of metaphysical game mechanics was the absolute last thing he wanted to do right now.
I'll read the manual later when I'm not half-naked and not actively paranoid about the killer coming back, he decided, promptly closing the tutorial.
Moving on, he toggled to the [Map] tab. The screen remained blank, covered by a gray fog save for a large text prompt in the middle that read: 「It seems like you still don't have the map of this place.」
Skipping past the empty [Collectibles] and [Inventory] tabs, he finally landed on the one that mattered most: [Abilities].
The screen shifted. Instead of neat text boxes, the interface was filled with a swirling, dense gray fog. In the very center of the fog sat a single, glowing beacon. From this central node, two black, vein-like tendrils extended outward, connecting to two other dark, organic-looking blobs that constantly pulsed with a faint green luminescence.
Focusing his intent, he 'clicked' on the first node.
Splurch.
An unsettling, organic, fleshy sound echoed directly in his mind, as the node zoomed in, clearing away the fog to reveal its text.
[Day Drinker] Able to walk in the sun. Sunlight halves your overall Health and removes all vampiric abilities while exposed
He clicked the second node. Another wet splurch.
[Lifelike] Has a heartbeat, can eat normal food, and enjoy sexual activities. Most medical checks will reveal nothing abnormal, provided the examination occurs during the night.
Arthur let out a long, slow breath as the green light reflected in his eyes.
Well, that confirms it.
I am not just a detective. I am also a mothering fuck vampire.