Ogres were not Goblins.

The difference wasn't just in size or brutality; it was a fundamental difference in the quality of their existence.

Goblins were pests, vermin of the dungeon ecosystem that relied on overwhelming numbers to drag down prey. They were unawakened trash.

Ogres were different. Every single Ogre, from the moment it matured, awakened the Strength attribute.

They were engines of siege warfare wrapped in grey, calloused skin. While they possessed the intelligence of a hamster and lacked the swarm tactics of their smaller cousins, a single Ogre possessed enough raw power to crush an Initiate-ranked human into paste.

A glancing blow from those tree-trunk clubs wouldn't just break bones; it would even liquefy organs.

Judas analyzed the battlefield from the shadows. Summer stood beside him, her wand trembling slightly. Her Stagnate skill was a potent weapon against monsters with blood.

But against creatures that were essentially walking walls of muscle, the mana cost to thicken their blood would be astronomical. She would burn out before they dropped.

But what if the pressure came from two sources?

He pulled up his interface, checking his reserves.

[Affection Points: 23,400]

The number brought a smirk to his face. By his rough calculations, he was passively generating around 100 points every hour from each of his three wives.

He hadn't sat down to maximize the formula yet, but he knew the basics: happiness, excitement, and lust influenced the yield.

Even while they were bored in the Couple Space, their absolute devotion to him kept the currency flowing.

'System, purchase Stagnate.'

[Obtained skill: Stagnate (Rare)]

[You have learned Stagnate 1 (Rare-Initiate)]

[You have unlocked a new path: The Path of Blood.] [You acquired a new title: Blood Initiate.]

He dismissed the title notification. Until he broke through to the Apprentice rank, titles were nothing but badges to show off—if the enemy had an appraisal skill, that is.

Judas decided to buy an appraisal skill tonight. Buying it now would almost empty his affection points, and he needed them today for another purpose.

Anyway, once he became an Apprentice, the titles would provide passive stat boosts and unique buffs.

Judas glanced at Summer. He didn't speak, just motioned with his chin toward the monsters.

She understood. She raised her wand, her eyes glowing crimson.

"Stagnate," she whispered.

At the exact same moment, Judas reached out his hand. He felt the mana surge through his new pathways, latching onto the rhythm of the blood in the monsters.

"Stagnate."

The air hummed with a heavy, oppressive energy.

Summer flinched, her head snapping toward him. Her crimson pupils dilated, the red ring expanding as she felt the familiar resonance of her own blood magic radiating from him.

'You too have the Blood attribute!'

She was shocked. Blood magic wasn't something one simply learned from a book; it was usually hereditary or gained through dark rituals.

Judas couldn't help himself. He reached out and pinched her pale cheek, grounding her focus.

"I own everything of you," he whispered into her ear. "Even your magic."

'Sweet mouth,' Summer scoffed internally to mask her flush.

[Affection: 95]

He turned his gaze back to the Ogres.

The effect of the double cast was immediate and terrifying. The massive creatures stumbled mid-stride. Their grey skin flushed a dark, bruised purple as their veins bulged against the surface, struggling to push sludge through their systems.

They roared in confusion, clutching their chests, their movements slowing as if they were wading through invisible tar.

Judas wasted no time.

He activated Stealth. His outline blurred, bending the light around his armor until he was little more than a distortion in the air. Immediately following it, he triggered Dash.

He crossed the clearing in a heartbeat. He appeared behind the Ogre on the left, his sword already mid-swing.

Lightning Sword Slash.

The blade struck the back of the monster's neck. Unlike the goblins, whose heads popped off like dandelion heads, the Ogre's flesh was dense and rubbery.

The sword bit deep, carving through muscle and hitting the spine, but it stopped halfway.

Purple lightning crackled from the wound, frying the nerves and locking the creature's muscles further.

The Ogre let out a guttural roar of pain. It spun around with surprising speed for something so large, swinging its spiked club in a wide, blind arc meant to pulverize anything behind it.

If Judas had been purely physical, the wind pressure alone might have knocked him off balance. But the lightning paralysis combined with the blood stagnation made the swing sluggish.

Judas ducked under the club effortlessly. He didn't stay to trade blows. He utilized his superior Agility to disengage, sprinting toward the second Ogre while the first was still recovering from its swing.

This time, he went low.

Since decapitation was difficult, mobility kill was the priority.

He slid across the gravel, his sword flashing out at the Ogre's ankles. He channeled his Strength into the strike, aiming for the Achilles tendon.

Slash.

Steel met tough tendon. The blade severed the connective tissue with a sickening snap.

The second Ogre screamed, its leg giving way under its massive bulk. It crashed to one knee, the ground shaking with the impact.

Judas rolled away, coming up in a crouch ten feet distant.

Internal calculations ran through his mind. Monsters had a distinct advantage over humans in raw stats. He was sure these two had Strength attributes pushing past 15, perhaps nearing 20. A single direct hit would end him. He was fighting them alone, effectively tanking two raid-boss-level enemies.

An ordinary party of Initiates with Common or Uncommon skills would need a tank, a healer, and two DPS to handle just one of these. He was dissecting two. Such was the terrifying difference between standard skills and a loadout of Rare skills.

The crippled Ogre tried to rise but collapsed again. The first Ogre, bleeding heavily from the neck, roared and charged Judas, ignoring Summer entirely.

Judas held his ground. When the club came down, he didn't block. He Dashed sideways.

The club slammed into the earth, spraying rock shards. Judas pivoted on his heel, slashing at the creature's exposed arm.

The Ogre adjusted. With a grunt of effort, it twisted its wrist, deflecting the blade with the wooden shaft of its weapon. It was learning. Despite the brutal wound gushing blood from its neck, its fighting instinct remained intact.

'Monsters sure are blessed with vitality,' Judas thought, impressed by the creature's tenacity.

Then he heard the chant.

"Blood Spike."

Summer's voice was cold and precise.

She used the gallons gushing from the neck wound Judas had opened. The red torrent suddenly defied gravity. It hardened instantly, crystallizing into a spear of jagged crimson ruby.

With a flick of her wand, she drove the spike back into the open wound.

It punched through the remaining muscle and severed the spinal cord completely.

The Ogre's eyes rolled back in its head. It collapsed like a marionette with cut strings, dead before it hit the ground.

Summer spun toward the crippled Ogre. The beast was trying to crawl toward her, sensing the mage was the true threat now.

She didn't flinch. She pulled the blood pooling around its severed ankle, formed a second spike, and drove it upward through the creature's jaw and into its brain.

Silence fell over the rocky pass.

Judas stood up, flicking the gore from his blade. He walked over to the corpses. Above the first Ogre, a small, glowing orb hovered. An attribute drop.

He reached out and touched it. The energy rushed into him, hot and aggressive.

[Strength +1]

[Strength: 11 -> 12]

Killing monsters of the apocalypse gifted them attributes, sometimes helping to comprehend a skill. But not every monster dropped attributes. It required luck.

Summer walked out of her hiding spot behind the boulder. She dusted off her dress, her hands clasping together. She stared at him, her red eyes filled with a whirlwind of questions.

[Affection: 95 -> 100]

[Summer's affection for you has reached Absolute Devotion.] [Reward: You have obtained 5 Random Rare Lucky Draws.]

Judas grinned.

"Boy, don't you think you have some explanations for me?" Summer asked, trying to maintain her haughty demeanor, though her voice lacked its usual bite.

Inside her head, the spirit was losing it.

'What is there to explain?' Zephriya screamed mentally. 'Bitch, he is a System User! He can copy skills and perhaps even attributes!'

'Shut up, Abyss Whore,' Summer snapped internally. 'If you say that out loud one time, I will self-destruct us both.'

'You—'

"How about I show you instead?"

Judas cut off the internal debate. He walked up to her, hugging her. He simply curled his lips upward into a smug, knowing grin.

He winked.

"Let's go home."

He activated the Couple Space.

The world twisted. The rocky pass, the rotting Ogre corpses, and the gloomy sky vanished in a blink.

Summer blinked, and when her eyes opened, she was standing on solid ground.

The air was clean, smelling faintly of roasted meat and lavender. She looked around, her mouth dropping open.

The space stretched roughly fifty meters in every direction. Beyond that border, the world ended in a thick, opaque white screen that rippled like milk.

Inside the bubble, it was domestic chaos. There was a sewing machine sitting on a table. A campfire was crackling in the corner with a pot of stew bubbling over it. A stack of blankets formed a makeshift nest.

And three women were staring at her.

Summer frowned. The silence in her head was deafening.

'Zephriya?' she called out tentatively. 'Why aren't you saying anything?'

Nothing. No scoff, no insult, no panicked screaming. It felt as if the Abyss Princess had simply been erased from her mind.

For the first time since her awakening, her head was empty of the second presence. It was jarring, lonely, and terrifyingly quiet.

Judas watched her reaction, knowing exactly what had happened.

The Couple Space was a sanctuary anchored to his soul. Only women married to him with absolute devotion, his bonded monsters, and inanimate objects could enter.

Zephriya wasn't any of those.

The System had filtered her out, suppressing her consciousness or blocking her entry entirely while Summer was inside.

He had left Nubble and Nibble back at the pond to guard the crops, so the only living beings here were his wives.

"Husband!"

The shout broke the silence.

Nina scrambled up from the floor, her eyes lighting up. She made to run toward him, her arms wide open.

A hand grabbed the back of her collar.

"Did you forget what we decided?" Luna hissed, giving the wolf girl a hard look.

Nina froze, shrinking back. The wolf girl's fluffy ears flattened against her head, though her tail betrayed her, wagging furiously as she looked at Judas with longing eyes.

Ezra didn't even stand up. She sat by the sewing machine, pushing a needle through fabric with aggressive precision.

She didn't look up, though her dark eyes darted toward him every few seconds, checking him for injuries.

They were staging a protest. He had ignored them for days, leaving them in this boring white void while he frolicked in the woods with the vampire. They were trying to punish him.

Judas sighed, scratching the back of his neck. He could play their game. He could apologize, grovel, and spend hours coaxing them out of their mood.

Or he could handle this like the horny husband that he was.

He grinned.

Dash.

He exploded across the space.

The three women gasped, feeling the impending sense of danger, but they were too slow.

Judas tackled the group. He scooped Nina up with one arm, grabbed Luna by the waist, and crashed into Ezra's lap, taking the whole pile down to the floor in a tangle of limbs and squeals.

"I'm home!" he laughed, pinning them down with hugs before they could organize a resistance.

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