“Alright, enough of that for now. It’s getting late and I’m hungry, I’m sure you’re too. We’ll be cooking by ourselves, as while I love to pamper and spoil you, I don’t want to see you grow up into a lady that can’t do anything on her own. Though, in the many years you have to yet to experience I’m sure you would pick up cooking somewhere along the way, so it may be my own selfishness. It’s a mother’s duty to teach her daughter how to do such things after all.”

It’s funny, but I’ve never really loved cooking. Of course I have tried numerous times to learn how to cook, but in the end it never stuck. Then I ended up making magical artefacts that would recreate a dish or a drink endlessly. On one such occasion I accidentally came close to drowning the world I lived in by making an indestructible cup of tea that would always be filled automatically to the needed level and losing it somewhere.

I guess fate doesn’t wish for me to be able to make tasty food. Well, I might as well try anyway…

******

“Don’t worry, no one gets it perfectly on the first time! Not everybody does it on the ninth either…”

…

“Haha, I’m sure you can get it eventually!”

…

“It’s alright, there’s probably something wrong with the ingredients, I’ll go get new ones, okay? Wait for me.”

…

“Maybe it’s the tools? I’ll-”

“Enough! I understand that I can’t cook, okay! I’m not even sad about it, no one is perfect. Sigh. Mom, maybe you should do it, after all.”

******

In the end, mother cooked our food. I tried to help her a few times, but it seems that even the slightest intervention from my side will cause the dishes to fail. Old news to me, really.

I actually think it might be that I’m cursed or something. Maybe some idiot held a grudge against me and decided to resort to some minor harassment, maybe? But that person must’ve been very good at curses as I have enough anti-curse protective spells on my soul that are functioning even now to make anybody with a shred of common sense consider me paranoid.

Whatever, let’s not dwell on that.

Actually, mother is really good at cooking! So good in fact, that she might even rival my personal spirit I created specifically to make food in my previous world. I asked her how old she really is while we were eating, her answer was around six thousand years. I guess she did need some hobbies in that time.

After we were done with the food, mother showed me around the hut, and it turned out to be not as primitive as I originally thought. There were plenty of magical mechanisms, like a bathroom that appears from the underground. There were many such things too. I guess she wanted to make the hut both cosy and convenient and didn’t want to ruin the simplistic feel?

Anyway, we enjoyed the rest of the evening and then slept together on the big bed.

It was quite nice to feel her warmth near me, so I slept like a log. Since she told me her secret and, as someone who has lived for as long as she, I’m sure mother isn’t a stranger to gore, cruelty and murder. That being the case, I think I will tell her my secret soon too. Maybe after she explains more about our race? Because if I do it now, she will get distracted and need some time to process it. It will get her off course and the explanation will end up not quite as good as I hope it to be.

Now, I feel the Sun shining through my closed eyelids. I open them, as I’m not very sleepy and don’t want to fight against the urge to wake up. The hut has a window in every direction, except the side with the fireplace. Because of the mountains, there isn’t much light in the morning, so I guess it’s around noon now? No wonder I’m not sleepy.

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“Good, you woke up! I couldn’t bring myself to wake you up right now, not with the cute sleeping face you had, so I had to wait a bit.”

Mother says while standing by the side of the bed, crouching over in such a way that her head is right above mine. I didn’t notice it. What a blunder. Or it could be that she stood like that for a long time, so I subconsciously didn’t find it strange?

“Mm, morning, mom.”

“So, today I think is the right time to activate your bloodline! What do you think?”

“Why?”

“You see, after we activate your bloodline your growth will continue for a decade or so, that’s why you should stop aging at around eighteen. I think it would be nice. Besides, in our society, looking young is a symbol of status. You will see that most people from our race will be middle-aged or old-looking and only a few will look young. Those who look younger are generally more powerful than the old-looking ones, so they are treated with more respect. Well, as the only child of our race that was born in the past two thousand years you will be received very warmly but still.”

Oh, so that’s why? Mother looks young. Does it mean that she has a high position in the vampire(temporary) society of this world?

Though vampires don’t need to activate their bloodlines and they stop ageing at around twenty. So, I guess we’re a different breed of vampires or something?

While I’m at it I think I should clarify a few things about vampires from my previous world.

So, there’re six types, or breeds, of vampires in my previous world: Ancestors, Emperors, Kings, High vampires, Nobles, Subordinates, if we list them from the most to the least powerful. Subordinates can match around twenty average mortal humans in physical abilities and have eternal life, like every other breed. On the downside, they need to drink human blood, burn under direct sunlight, need to sleep and have a strange aversion to silver. They stand at the lowest ranks of immortals, can’t have children and can’t turn others into vampires. Nobles can match a hundred subordinates in physical strength, have overwhelming, compared to mortal humans, magical capabilities and can turn mortals into subordinate vampires, whom, as you would expect, they can control to an extent. They have basically the same weaknesses, though they are less pronounced, for example, while a subordinate needs as much sleep as a mortal human, a noble will only need an hour-long nap in, say, a year. A year in my previous world is around six hundred days long, each day is approximately twenty-eight hours. They are stronger than a subordinate, but still not that powerful, if you compare it to other immortals. A high vampire is somewhere in the middle of the immortal rankings, they can’t procreate, but can still turn mortals into noble vampires. Though those mortals are likely to die because the power is too much. As you would expect, they can order nobles and subordinates around. This trend continues the higher you go up the rankings of the breeds. They have no weaknesses that nobles and subordinates have, still, in terms of power they would be slightly below average among other immortals. Now, this is where it gets interesting: Kings and Emperors can’t turn mortals into vampires, but they can have children, those become high vampires. The children are not nearly as powerful as their parents. Kings and Emperors also have unique abilities that only they can have, and by those abilities you would usually differentiate the two breeds. Kings have psychic abilities, like clairvoyance and the ability to look into the past, which puts them at the top of the medium power-level. Emperors have abilities that affect space, which barely classifies them as the upper-tier immortals, as pretty much all upper-tiers can control space. And finally, the Ancestors. Ancestors are genuine upper-tier immortals, with magic just slightly worse or equal to your average witch or a wizard. They can have children, but they will be either Kings or Emperors. Their origin is unknown. It’s generally considered that they are the progenitors of vampires, hence the name of the breed.

And the thing is, starting from High vampires and all the way up to ancestors, the breeds are classified as medium and high-level spirits, as they have no souls and their bodies are made of mana, with varying degrees of purity. So, me being born as any of those breeds is out of the question.

And those below can’t have children. And even if they could, each generation would be notably weaker than the one before it, while it doesn’t seem to be the case for our race. And there’re other inconsistencies as well. By the way, I kind of forgot, but how is our race called? I hope it’s not something stupid like “The Race” or something along those lines. Such names are usually ridiculed and replaced with some different names. There was once a race that called themselves “The Mind Race”, as they had high calculative abilities and people started calling it “The Abacus”. I don’t wanna be a part of something like “The Bite”.

“Mama, how are our people called?”

“I didn’t tell you? Silly me, we are usually referred to as the Temerians. Or the Temerian race.”

Temerians? I’m not fond of the name, but it doesn’t sound too awful.

“So, when are we going to awaken my bloodline? And how?”

“We’ll do it now. As for how, you will have to see for yourself. In fact, let’s begin now!”