Sunlight streamed through the window and spilled into the room. Its golden glow fell across that face, pale to the point of looking sickly, and lit up the bright red lip marks scattered over her cheeks.

When Zila woke up, her perked heart-shaped tail should've been swaying with energy. But the moment she saw the blushing, sleeping vampire girl by her bedside, she froze on the spot.

Her whole body went blank. Her tail lost all strength and drooped limply over the edge of the bed. She stared at Tongxi from up close, still unable to recover from the shock of their lips meeting just now.

She blinked twice, then took a huge breath in. As her chest rose with the inhale, both cheeks bloomed like white lilies in full maturity.

Only now, those pure white petals were tinged red. This time, it was Zila who was blushing furiously. She wanted to cry out, but she held it in.

Biting her lip, Zila quickly sat up. She breathed fast, her hands naturally cupping her cheeks. Then, after calming down a little—

Last night, she'd lost control. She'd done a whole series of overly intimate things to Tongxi. The kind of things only girls in those yuri stories would do. Things between one girl and another.

Zila couldn't believe she'd actually done all of it. And to a little demon girl at that. A vampire, no less!

At that thought, the redness on her face deepened. Her cheeks looked like a red apple steamed to softness, and there even seemed to be faint heat rising from her forehead.

Lowering her head in embarrassment, Zila grabbed at her hair and muttered softly, "I... I... I..."

As she spoke, her muttering took on a crying tone. "What the heck did I do last night?! Aaah...!" That final cry wasn't loud.

But it was full of despair and collapse.

And then Zila realized something else. Under the blanket, she was completely naked. She could tell just from the feel of her skin.

"What's wrong with me? Why did I turn into such a pervert? I was only halfway through bathing, and I went kissing a girl all over without even putting clothes on?!"

Just then, a rising sensation welled up from her stomach, and Zila couldn't help letting out a little burp.

There was a faint warmth of fullness in her stomach. Her body, which had been starving before, was now strangely full of energy. That was the last thing Zila had expected.

Wondering why she suddenly felt like she'd just eaten a rich, satisfying meal, Zila shyly touched her lips. There was still a faint sticky sweetness lingering at the corner of her mouth and on the tip of her tongue, like some kind of food she couldn't identify.

It made Zila want to swallow down that leftover sweetness. She gulped, then shyly turned toward Tongxi.

"Could it... could it be... that I ate Tongxi's...?" Thinking back to last night's loss of control, it really had felt like she was sucking something out from between Tongxi's lips.

Even though she was embarrassed, Zila's mood wasn't actually all that bleak right now. At first, she'd only wanted to take care of this demon girl who longed for her. Just take care of her, nothing more.

Zila had still tried her best to keep a clear boundary between them. But now, that distance between them seemed to have been dragged across an entire qualitative gap.

It had gone negative.

As a knight of Gaelkani, getting intimate with a demon should've been a bad thing. But Zila realized something.

Her food problem had been solved.

She discovered that in last night's loss of control, driven by her body's instinctive desire, she'd carried out a form of feeding that actually suited her appetite quite well—by kissing Tongxi and drawing away her essence.

Though doing it that way only let her absorb a very thin amount of essence, she'd been kissing her for the entire night. Because of that, even if each bit was faint, she'd still fed quite a lot in total.

But then she thought of something else. After kissing Tongxi all night long, could Tongxi have suffocated or something? Worried, Zila looked at Tongxi.

Sadly, her worry was for nothing.

Just as Zila was worrying, Tongxi was already showing signs of waking up. Her closed eyelids twitched slightly a few times.

"Oh no, Tongxi's waking up. I can't let her see me!" Zila muttered, her cheeks flushed red.

As she spoke, she buried her head into the bedding and slipped her body under the covers. Then she peeled the blanket off Tongxi and off the bed with her whole body wrapped inside it.

Using the blanket to cover herself completely, and because her frame was rather small, Zila wrapped herself up very tightly. Not a bit of skin showed. She was just about to head for the bathroom.

But before she'd taken more than a few steps, she suddenly felt something tug at the blanket hanging around her. Zila hurriedly turned her head, only to find—

Tongxi was already awake.

Wearing a slightly wrinkled nightgown, she sat in a duck-sit at the corner of the bed. Her eyes weren't fully open yet, still carrying a trace of sleepiness. One hand rubbed at the corner of her eye.

The other hand was tugging on Zila. Tongxi's gaze was directed toward her.

Zila tried pulling at the blanket around herself, but that little hand clutching it just wouldn't let go. It filled her with despair.

When Tongxi fully woke up, she looked at Zila with pitiful eyes. Both hands grabbed the blanket, holding onto her.

That gaze seemed to say, "Don't leave me! I'm scared!"

"No, that's not it, Tong..." Zila had meant to ask Tongxi to let go, but the moment she opened her mouth, what came out was a sweet, childish voice.

Hearing that, Tongxi noticed something was off. She stared into Zila's eyes and paused slightly. In truth, Zila hadn't fully looked at Tongxi at all.

Because right now, compared to before, she'd changed from the inside out—even in essence. Even her eyes had become different.

To keep Tongxi from noticing, Zila had only been sneaking glances at her.

"*Ahem*... Tongxi... *cough*... I... I'm cold. Can you let me go to the bathroom and change clothes? I'll only be gone for a little while. I'll be back very soon!"

Zila deliberately lowered her voice a little. And because she was muffled under the blanket, her words came out thick and stuffy, doing her best to hide how she sounded.

It was just that, perhaps because she'd turned into a Succubus Curse, not only her personality but even the way she spoke had changed. Her tone kept switching back and forth between Zila's current way of speaking and her original one.

It nearly confused even Zila herself.

Fortunately, her explanation seemed to earn Tongxi's understanding. Tongxi's hand on the blanket loosened a little. Seizing the chance, Zila gave a quick yank and pulled Tongxi's hand away.

Then she sprinted toward the room at the speed of a hundred-meter dash. The moment she got inside, she slammed the door shut with a bang without even looking back.

Leaning against the door, Zila poked her head out from the blanket wrapped around her. Because it was winter, her whole body was trembling from the cold. Only after escaping Tongxi did she finally let out a breath of relief.

Outside the bathroom door, Tongxi felt that Ling Yu was acting a little strange. Then the unusual sensation on her cheeks brought back memories of last night, and Tongxi remembered.

Last night, for no reason at all, she'd been kissed by someone. The feeling between them had been very brief, and her consciousness had quickly sunk away.

Covering her face, Tongxi turned toward the mirror. But the moment she saw her reflection, and the face full of lip marks in it, she froze in fright.

Just like Zila, when Tongxi saw her own kissed-up face in the mirror, she blushed furiously and lowered her head in embarrassment. She didn't dare look at that shamefully flustered version of herself in the mirror again.

Tongxi started guessing, imagining things. Could it be that Ling Yu had done that to her last night...?

Only a vague image had just begun to form in her mind when Tongxi instantly covered her cheeks in embarrassment. Like a steam engine, her head buzzed and seemed to give off heat.

Fully prepared and ready to face the next trial, Ling Yu held Tongxi's hand as they headed toward Huangfeng Academy.

"Tongxi, what's wrong?"

Along the way, Ling Yu noticed several times that Tongxi's pale cheeks were a little redder than usual. She guessed it might be because of her loss of control last night.

Thinking back, the moment she'd come out of the bathroom that morning, Tongxi had already been standing in front of the mirror, blushing for a long while. And whenever Ling Yu touched her, Tongxi would suddenly jerk her hand back in fright.

Every time Ling Yu touched her, her emotions would jump all over the place.

"Tongxi, you, I, actually..."

Just as expected, the moment Ling Yu greeted her, Tongxi shyly lowered her head and didn't dare look at her.

That was fine too. At least she wasn't trembling in fear on the street like before, always wanting to burrow into Ling Yu's arms.

...

When they arrived at the trial grounds, Ling Yu finally got to see her old "best bud" again after quite a long time!

After watching a few of Mo Feng's trials with the new students, Ling Yu didn't nap while waiting for her turn this time like she had before. Watching other people get crushed by a stronger opponent was a little boring, sure.

But this time, Ling Yu knew very well that the "best bud" she was facing was someone she absolutely could not lose to!

Know yourself and know your enemy, and you'll never lose a hundred battles. Even if these teachers wouldn't use their full strength against new students, Ling Yu still took in everything she could learn.

"Next trial, student Ling Yu, please step forward and receive your test."

Stepping onto the field again after so long, and facing Mo Feng once more—her former best bud—Ling Yu felt helpless, but also a little restless with anticipation.

Ever since he and Mo Feng had started opposing each other, the two of them had never truly settled who was stronger. This time, Ling Yu planned to use all her strength and bring things to an end with Mo Feng.

A final conclusion to their long rivalry as best buds.

"Teacher Mo Feng, please use your full strength!"

"Oh? You passed the earlier teachers' trials so easily, and now you've gotten this arrogant, student Ling Yu?"

"If I've got the skill, then I can say whatever I want."

"Heh, interesting. You really resemble someone. Even the things you say are alike." Mo Feng pushed up his glasses and let a slight smile curl at the corner of his mouth.

"Enough talk. Let's begin!"

With the cry of "Trial start!", before the crowd could even follow with their eyes, the ground beneath Ling Yu suddenly burst open as a massive boulder shot up from below, smashing the floor apart.

Mo Feng's book flipped open in his hand. The shattered debris and broken stone blasted into the air all around them, but just before they hit the ground, they stopped.

Then their direction changed.

One after another, they shot toward a certain spot on the giant rock.