The demon wore the face of a young woman.
It stood at the edge of a burned-out farmstead, its head tilted at an angle that was almost—but not quite—human.
Moonlight caught its eyes, and for a moment, they flickered with something that might have been mistaken for sadness.
"Please," it said, its voice trembling with rehearsed grief. "Please, won't someone help me? The fire took everything. My family... my children..."
Dante watched from the treeline, his crimson eyes cutting through the darkness like a predator sizing up wounded prey. He had been tracking this thing for three days. Three days of following the scent of old blood and false tears through the northern territories of the Human Realm.
Demons don't feel grief, he reminded himself. They don't feel anything. They just learn to say the right words.
He had read about them—no, he had watched them in another life. In a world where "Frieren" was just an anime on his laptop screen, something to binge after another fourteen-hour shift at the office. He remembered the scene where Frieren explained it to Fern: demons evolved the ability to speak not for communication, but for predation. Every word was a lure, and every plea was a trap.
The demon turned, sensing something. Its expression shifted: Loss. Confusion. Hope.
"Is someone there? Please, I need—"
Dante moved.
The distance between them vanished in a blur of shadow and killing intent. His hand found the demon's throat before it could finish its sentence, and he slammed it into the charred remains of a wooden fence post. The impact shattered the wood into splinters.
"You need what?" Dante asked, his voice flat. "Go ahead. Finish the sentence."
The demon's face contorted. The mask of humanity cracked, revealing something hungry beneath. Its mouth split wider than any human jaw should allow, revealing rows of needle-like teeth.
"You're not human either," it hissed, its voice dropping the false femininity. "What are you? Your mana is weird. Your smell is—"
Dante's grip tightened. "I'm asking the questions."
He could feel the hunger stirring in his chest; that cold, hollow ache that had been his constant companion since waking up in this world. The system pulsed at the edge of his consciousness, feeding him data he didn't ask for.
[Target Identified: Lesser Demon]
[Threat Level: D]
[Estimated XP Value: 450-550]
"How many?" Dante asked. "How many people have you killed wearing that face?"
The demon laughed, a sharp, discordant sound that held no joy. "Does it matter? You're going to kill me anyway. I can see it in your eyes. You're a predator, just like me. We're the same, you and I. We both wear masks. We both hunt. We both—"
"We're nothing alike, mate."
Dante's free hand shifted, and he felt the familiar surge of power rushing through his veins. Dark crimson energy coalesced around his fingers, forming curved claws of solidified blood.
[Skill Activated: Blood Claws]
"Demons kill because it's your nature," Dante said quietly. "I kill because I choose to."
He struck.
The demon's body dissolved into black mist and fading mana, scattering on the night wind like ashes from a funeral pyre. A notification flashed across his vision.
[Lesser Demon Eliminated]
[+500 XP]
[Current Level: 10]
[Blood Essence Absorbed: Trace Amount]
[Note: Demon blood provides minimal sustenance. Human blood required for optimal function.]
Dante let out a slow breath and dismissed the notification with a thought. The hunger remained, gnawing at the edges of his awareness, but it was manageable. For now.
He looked up at the stars; countless points of light scattered across an unfamiliar sky.
Somewhere out there, the Era Meteor shower was probably still visible, its tail fading after weeks of celestial brilliance. He hadn't seen it himself. He'd been too busy trying not to die.
Two months, he thought. Two months since I woke up in this body.
The memories of his death were hazy. Fragments of a hospital room, the steady beep of machines, the distant sound of someone crying. Thirty-four years old. Single. No family to speak of. Just another casualty of corporate grinding machinery, worked to death in the most literal sense possible.
And then... this.
He had opened his eyes in a forest with a floating blue screen demanding he accept something called the [Vampire System].
He'd thought it was a fever dream at first. Then a demon had tried to eat him, and instinct—or perhaps the system itself—had taken over.
That was Level 1.
Now he was Level 10, and he had learned enough about this world to understand exactly where—and when—he had landed.
This was the world of Frieren: Beyond Journey's End.
The continent that had been terrorized by the Demon King for centuries was now entering its era of peace. The Hero Himmel and his party had slain the Demon King roughly fifty years ago. And just recently—within the last few weeks, according to the mourning banners he'd seen in every village—Himmel himself had died.
Not in battle, and not fighting some great evil.
He had simply grown old, watched one final meteor shower with his friends, and passed away in his sleep.
Dante remembered how that scene had hit him in his previous life. Frieren standing at Himmel's funeral, crying for the first time, realizing that ten years of adventure had passed in what felt like moments to an elf who had lived for a thousand years. It was the emotional core of the entire series; a meditation on time, mortality, and the connections people fail to appreciate until they're gone.
But now he wasn't watching it. He was living in it.
The main story doesn't start for almost thirty years, Dante calculated. Fern is probably just a toddler right now, if she's even been born yet. Heiter is alive but aging. Eisen is in retirement somewhere. And Frieren...
Frieren was out there, wandering the continent, collecting spells, and trying to understand why Himmel's death had affected her so deeply. She wouldn't meet Fern for decades.
Which meant Dante was alone in a world full of remnant demons, fading magic, and a humanity that was slowly forgetting why it should be afraid of the dark.
He pulled up his status screen, the red text glowing softly against the night.
[Name: Dante]
[Race: Vampire (Halfling)]
[Level: 10]
[HP: 145/145]
[MP: 80/80]
[Blood Bank: 0.3 / 5.0 Liters]
[STR: 24 | AGI: 31 | END: 20 | INT: 18 | CHA: 12]
[Active Skills: Blood Claws (Lv.3), Shadow Step (Lv.2), Night Vision (Passive)]
[Warning: Blood Bank below 10%. Feeding recommended within 48 hours.]
[Warning: Sunlight Resistance: 5%. Prolonged sun exposure will cause rapid HP decay.]
The warnings were familiar by now. The system wanted him to feed on humans; that was the optimal path, the one that offered the most XP and the fastest growth.
But Dante had drawn a line there. He refused to cross it.
There has to be another way, he told himself. Monsters. Demons. Magical creatures. Something.
He turned away from the ruined farmstead and began walking north. According to the maps he'd found, there was a town called Äußerst a few days' travel from here. It was known for its guild of monster hunters and its archive of magical texts.
If he was going to survive in this world—if he was going to find a way to exist without becoming the very thing he hunted—he needed knowledge. He needed allies. He needed to understand the rules of this world beyond what a half-remembered anime had shown him.
The Era of Peace had begun.
But for a vampire walking in the shadow of a dead hero's legend, peace was just another word for hunger.