Dae stepped over a fallen log, his breath coming in short, ragged bursts. He looked toward the valley. The stone buildings of the settlement were still just tiny specks in the distance.

  "Too far," he muttered.

  He looked at the woman on his back. Her head was lolling against his shoulder, and her skin felt cold. Every time he took a step, more blood soaked into his own tunic. She wouldn't make it two hours, let alone the time it would take to hike down there.

  The sound of rushing water caught his attention. To his left, a thin waterfall tumbled down a mossy cliff, splashing into a small pool. Right behind the curtain of water was a dark, jagged opening.

  A cave.

  He changed course, pushing through the thick ferns. Inside, the cave was cool and dry, smelling of damp earth. He carefully lowered Elara first, leaning her back against the stone wall. Then, he reached behind him, grabbing the cultivator's legs and sliding her gently off his back.

  He laid her flat on the ground. Without the movement of the walk, the silence of the cave made the situation feel even more real.

  His hands hovered over her, trembling slightly in the cool air of the cave. He wasn't a doctor, and he certainly wasn't a healer.

  For the first time, free from the chaos of the trek, he got a clear look at her. She was dressed in elegant, layered robes of pristine white and light teal, with intricate silver embroidery and delicate, armor-like shoulder guards. But the pristine outfit was ruined. Right at her lower abdomen, just above her hips, the fabric was violently torn and charred at the edges, as if struck by something burning and explosive. Thick, dark blood pulsed from the wound, rapidly staining the white silk around her waist.

  "System," Dae muttered. He wiped a blood-slicked hand across his forehead, leaving a dark smear.

  "System. Hey. What do I do? How do I help her out?"

  He waited. The shadows didn't shift. Up on the ridge, the interface had spammed his vision with critical damage alerts. Now, with her pulse fluttering out right under his palms, the UI offered absolute silence.

  He drove a knuckle into the cave dirt. "Give me a damn manual!"

  A crisp chime snapped through the air. Azure light flickered into existence, painting the rough stone walls and illuminating the dust motes. A stark text box anchored itself directly over her ruined abdomen.

  [HINT REVEALED] USE SILVER BLOODLINE?

  Dae stared at the glowing text.

  "Silver Bloodline?" he whispered, his eyes darting from the screen to his own bloody hands.

  Dae stared at the glowing blue text. Silver Bloodline.

  Right...

  The original prince's memories flared—the Silver royal line wasn't just about political power or pure silver horns. It was pure, monstrous durability. Their blood carried an insane healing factor and raw vitality.

  The blue text suddenly shattered into a strobing, blinding red.

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  [ WARNING: Target Vitality dropping below 5%. ]

  Her spine arched. A thick, wet bubbling sounded from the back of her throat, followed by a long, hollow exhale. Her chest stopped moving.

  Dae slapped at his sides. Empty pockets. He scraped his fingers over the cave floor—smooth dirt, blunt pebbles. Nothing to slice a vein with. Even if he could rip his own arm open, she was too far gone. Dripping blood over her teeth would do nothing. He had to bypass her airway and force it down.

  "If some immortal sect skins me for this, it's on you," he muttered to the flashing red UI.

  He shoved a hand beneath the nape of her neck, lifting her head from the stone. He didn't hesitate. He just clamped his teeth down on his own tongue and drove his jaw shut.

  Copper flooded his tastebuds immediately. He ground his molars together, shearing through the muscle until hot, blood began to leak out.

  He smashed his mouth against hers. Her lips were dead cold. He forced them apart, thrusting his bleeding tongue past her teeth to deliver the dense, silver-laced fluid straight to the back of her throat. Keeping his mouth sealed over hers, he clamped his free hand under her jaw, tilting her head back and massaging her throat to force the swallowing reflex.

  He kept his mouth sealed over hers, forcing the heavy, metallic fluid down. For three long heartbeats, she remained completely slack against the stone. Her skin held the temperature of river ice.

  The dead chill radiating from her skin vanished, replaced by a searing, feverish heat that burned against Dae's palms. Deep inside her chest, a collapsing, heavy pressure—her failing Qi—suddenly reversed, latching onto the foreign blood like a starving animal.

  Her eyelids flew open.

  At first, her gaze was glassy and unfocused. But as the haze of near-death cleared, her pupils dilated in raw, absolute shock. Above her, She saw a young man with pure silver hair and silver horns protruding from his skull, pinning her to the cave floor and forcing his mouth against hers.

  Panic flared in her eyes. She tried to surge upward, to summon her qi or reach for the sword she had dropped in the forest, but her body completely refused to obey. Her limbs felt like dead weight, totally paralyzed by the catastrophic damage to her abdomen.

  Trapped, completely unable to lift her arms to push him away, she resorted to the only weapon she had left.

  As Dae pushed forward to ensure she swallowed the rest of the blood, her jaw abruptly snapped shut.

  Her teeth clamped down viciously on his lower lip, biting in hard enough to draw fresh blood.

  "Ghk—!"

  "Are you crazy?!" He turned his head, spitting a mouthful of red onto the cave dirt. "I'm trying to help you!"

  She lay flat against the rock. Her chest hitched in rapid, shallow gasps, but the wet, bubbling death rattle was completely gone. She still couldn't move her arms, but her eyes locked onto him with a intensity. Her lips were stained red with his blood, and her eyes promised absolute murder the second she could move her arms.

  Before Dae could yell at her again, the strobing red light in his vision abruptly vanished, replaced by a cool, calm blue.

  [

  Ding! ]

  [ Target Vitality Stabilized. Qi Core reacting to Silver Bloodline. ]

  Dae wiped the blood from his torn lip, glaring from the floating system text back to the furious, incapacitated women.

  "You're welcome," he muttered bitterly.

  Dae sat back against the damp cavern wall, still pressing the back of his hand to his bleeding lip. The sharp sting grounded him, but as the adrenaline slowly ebbed, a new, entirely different kind of panic began to claw at his chest.

  He stared at the red smear on his knuckles.

  Wait a minute, he thought, his eyes widening in the dim light.

  "Did I just lose my first kiss?" he muttered aloud, his voice muffled by his hand.

  His brain helpfully supplied a crystal-clear image of Valeraine standing in the palace courtyard. His older sister.

  A cold sweat broke out on the back of his neck.

  Valeraine had specifically warned him not to embarrass the Silver name before he left the capital. If she found out he had just pressed his mouth against a random, women from another world and shoved his royal blood down her throat...

  He looked back at the cultivator. She was still glaring at him with absolute, unadulterated hatred, looking like she was mentally calculating the exact angle needed to sever his head once she regained feeling in her arms.

  "Look, don't look at me like that!" Dae snapped, aggressively pointing a finger at her while trying to ignore the fact that his voice was shaking. "You think I wanted to do that? I was trying to stop your core from collapsing! It was a—a highly unorthodox medical procedure!!"

  The cultivator's chest rose and fell as she took a slow, deliberate breath. Her lips, still stained with his silver-laced blood, parted slightly.