The villagers devoured the slime with manic desperation, their gaunt fingers clawing over each other, shoving and trampling as they fought for every last drop. Those who had been hiding before surged forward like a starving horde, their eyes wild with the same frenzied hunger that dictated their entire existence.
“GET OFF! IT’S MY TURN!” one of them shrieked, lashing out and knocking another to the ground.
More fought and ripped at each other, grabbing them by their clothes or hair to get more food.
The well was too small to sustain all of them at once. Though there were only thirty or so villagers, their sheer desperation turned the feeding into a brutal struggle.
A scrawny man clutching a bowlful of slime was suddenly tackled to the side. His bowl slipped from his trembling hands, crashing into the filth-ridden mud below. The slime spilled out, mixing with the grime, yet before it could even settle, three others dove onto it, scraping at the dirt with cracked nails, lapping it up like animals.
The air filled with snarls and guttural sounds as another fight broke out—this time escalating far beyond mere shoving. One villager produced a crude dagger from the folds of his ragged tunic and drove it into the back of another, his blade sinking into the sickly flesh.
But no blood emerged. Instead, a sickly green sludge oozed from the wound, trickling down the victim’s tattered clothes like thick sap.
And then, as if drawn by instinct, the other villagers turned on him.
The wounded man didn’t even get the chance to scream before they were upon him, tearing at his flesh, their teeth sinking into his arms, shoulders, and neck. They didn’t just eat him—they consumed him, ripping chunks of his body free, devouring him as if he were nothing more than an extension of the filth they had already been feeding on.
Ludwig watched in mute horror as the frenzied feeding reached its peak, hands clawing at any piece of flesh they could grab. The only sounds were the grotesque squelching of tearing meat and the wet, gluttonous gulps of those feasting.
“They’re eating each other…” Ludwig murmured, disbelief coloring his voice.
Not a single one of them seemed to recognize the atrocity they were committing. It was as if it were second nature—something they had done countless times before.
And then, just as suddenly as it began, it ended.
The well gurgled again, the grotesque, green sludge retracting back into the depths of the pit as if being drawn away by an unseen force.
The instant it was gone, the villagers’ frenzy dissipated. Their frantic movements slowed, their ravenous energy extinguished as though a switch had been flipped.
They now stood in eerie silence.
Some of them, still covered in remnants of their feast, raised trembling fingers to their lips, sucking at the leftover slime that clung to their skin. Others looked down at their empty bowls, their hollow expressions slowly twisting into pitiful sorrow.
And not a single one of them even glanced at what remained of the man they had just devoured.
His remains were scattered—a shredded pile of corrupted bones and broken limbs barely held together by torn sinew.
Ludwig swallowed the disgust rising in his throat.
And then, the village head turned to them.
“This is why we can’t leave,” he said, his voice calm, matter-of-fact.
Van Dijk, for all his centuries of experience, looked visibly repulsed. His lips curled in disgust, his fingers tightening slightly at his sides as if resisting the urge to burn the entire place to the ground.
Ludwig had seen Van Dijk endure horrors with a placid expression before, but now, even the vampire’s infamous composure faltered.
“They’re too far gone,” Van Dijk said, his voice cold, final.
Ludwig had no rebuttal. These people—they weren’t living. But neither were they dead.
They were something caught in between.
Ludwig activated [Inspect] on the village head, hoping to understand what exactly they had become.
[Inspect]
Name: Bilal Saldor
Type: Hollowed Wretch
Level: 11
HP: 300
Status Effects:
[Pseudo-Chimerism] – Currently suffering from a malicious curse that causes abnormal growths to manifest on its body.[Gluttonous Curse] – Cursed with Eternal Hunger, sourced by the Gluttonous Death.[Hollowed] – A curse that has stripped the mind and body of its former self. Devoid of will, existing only to consume—not truly alive, but not quite dead either. A boundary between life and death.
Abilities: None.
Addendum:
The Hollowed Wretches were once settlers—mercenaries, scholars, or mere fools who wandered too far into the corrupted lands of Tibari. Those who dared to use the slime as sustenance found temporary strength, only for it to erode them over time, robbing them of their will and identity. Addicted, enslaved, and bound to this land by the creeping grip of the Gluttonous Death, they exist now only as vessels of endless hunger.
Ludwig stared at the information in silence.
“That’s the look,” Bilal Saldor muttered, staring at Van Dijk. “That’s the same look everyone has when they first see us. But soon…” His bony hand gestured toward the younger man—the one who had collected firewood earlier.
“They become like us. The hunger always prevails. You cannot resist it. No matter what you do… you will always hunger.”
Ludwig remained still, unimpressed by the warning. Hunger? He was undead. He didn’t need food and didn’t crave sustenance like mortals did. Whatever curse they suffered, it had no hold over him.
But they—they were beyond saving.
Van Dijk finally spoke, his voice sharp and dismissive.
“You’re weak. Utterly lost.”
The words struck like a blade.
“It was not by choice!” the old man spat, his skeletal fingers tightening around his walking stick. For the first time, his voice cracked with anger—a human emotion struggling to emerge from something that was no longer human.
“We had no choice in this!”
Ludwig’s voice was calm, steady. “Why didn’t you leave?”
“Do you think we didn’t try?” The old man’s laugh was dry, bitter, insane. “You don’t understand. We can’t leave. The moment we first tasted it—the moment we ate, we were claimed. We’ve been trapped here ever since. No matter how far we walk, how hard we try… we always end up back here.”
His sunken eyes bore into Ludwig’s. “And every time we try… we lose more of ourselves. Bit by bit, we forget who we are. Until nothing remains but hunger.”
Silence stretched between them.
Van Dijk’s expression darkened. “…This is worse than I thought.”
“What is it, master?” Ludwig asked.
“The last time I was here, that thing—the Gluttonous Death—didn’t have control over sentient beings. This level of corruption, this degree of madness… it wasn’t like this before. The expeditions we sent—some of them came back broken, but not like this. Something has changed.”
Ludwig exhaled, looking back at the villagers.
“And what do we do about them?”
Van Dijk turned his crimson gaze on him.
“Do you think they can be saved?”
Ludwig met his master’s stare, his skeletal fingers tightening slightly.
Did he care? He wasn’t human. He didn’t share their pain, their suffering.
But that didn’t mean he couldn’t care.
“If they can be saved,” Ludwig finally said, his voice even, “what would it cost?”