Struggling to regain clarity moments later, he found himself fidgeting on the cold floor.

Trying and failing to stand up, he found himself gasping for breath. His memories flooded back in, and his mind finally grasped what happened.

‘I’m still alive?’ Leonardo tried to look up.

“Don’t look. If you want to keep your eyes, that is.”

An authoritarian voice interrupted him, prompting him to gulp and lower his head again.

He heard clothes shuffling and decided it’s best not to try his luck at peeking. Instead, he assessed his body and groaned.

His condition was terrible as is, but it worsened significantly after the bite. Pale limbs, shortness of breath and practically no strength left in his body. He was anemic, which given his illness was a death sentence.

“I should have left you in the woods to greet the sun.”

Leonardo spat out with a hateful grimace. Without anything to lose, he rebelliously looked up at her, noting that her worst wounds already closed. No doubt thanks to the vitality she stole from him.

The vampire didn’t seem to mind his curse, and continued to arrange her tattered clothing near a wide mirror.

“This is fascinating,” she exclaimed, tracing her fingers alongside the smooth glass surface, “I don’t think I’ve seen one as clear as this before.”

Just as he was about to berate the monster for acting like an enamored girl, Leonardo felt a painful sting in his lungs. It spread across his chest in an instant. Having seen it happen with Yukiko, he knew he’d lost the battle. His resilience was nonexistent, and the curse flared across his body, awakening the virus’ lethal potential.

Retching, he clutched as his throat as phlegm spurt out of his nose and mouth. His arms lost all strength and he dropped in his own vomit, gasping for life like a fish trapped ashore.

“Woops!” the woman chuckled merrily, as if his death had nothing to do with her. With languid steps, she came over and crouched beside him, watching with sparkling eyes as he struggled to clasp the faintest chance of survival.

“It must be painful, to lose your control over your body. The breath you took for granted suddenly stripped from you.”

“As dignity and ego become meaningless — all men readily turn into instinctual beasts, just for one slim chance at drawing one… more… breath.”

Whether Leonardo turned a deaf ear to her annoying monologue, or couldn’t hear her in the first place — the vampire did not know. She continued to rant, seemingly with great pleasure, even as the boy got closer and closer to losing consciousness.

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Before his gaze darkened however, she reached out with a strangely compassionate smile.

“Alright, that should serve as good lesson,” she harrumphed as she halfheartedly dragged him away from the puddle of vomit, “Told you not to peek.”

Seeing that Leonardo was still unresponsive, the vampire lost interest in berating him further.

Instead, she forced his mouth open, cutting out his breathing entirely.

Before Leo could rationalize what the bitch was up to, he found a chilling crimson liquid stream into his mouth. His blurred eyes regained some focus almost immediately, and he saw the vampire hold her bleeding wrist over his mouth.

Driven in a panic, it took him a while to understand what was happening. But even as he rationalized the fact that he was about to be turned into a slave, he didn’t resist. Whether it was his will or physical strength, he could muster neither, and just resigned himself to his fate, his eyes closing somberly.

She was right. His base instincts dictated his will to live, even if it was a life of servitude.

As tainted blood came into contact with the virus in his bloodstream, a clash ensued. A brief one, because the disease was eviscerated without a trace not a moment later.

Her blood carried within traces of one of the primordial curses, so it came as no surprise that the plague couldn’t compete in potency. Before long, the vampire’s blood finished a full circulation cycle. His body was thoroughly cleansed, with no trace of the disease left.

Yet, this was merely the beginning of his transformation. His own blood melded with the wicked flux, and a rush of strength soon filled his body with renewed vigor. He felt his veins dilate to accommodate more power. Almost instinctively, he guided the flow of energy through his sapped musculature and bones.

The vampire was about to remove her hand and stem the blood flow, but stopped herself with an interested smile as she saw his actions.

It was unnatural for a blood thrall to grasp healing so quickly, and usually it took weeks to learn how to mend even faint wounds. To cure internal injuries of such a scale was a surprising discovery to say the least.

To Leonardo, guiding energy was second nature and not at all difficult. Even if he didn’t understand the immortal blood much, he put its regenerative properties to use as soon as he discovered it.

A few minutes later, Leonardo was effectively reborn. His sequelae from Muchen’s ritual and the disease were all gone. His lifespring was miraculously renewed by the copious amounts of vampiric blood.

The woman stemmed the flux, then sat down next to him, unbothered to hide her apparent weakness.

She didn’t have to, because from the moment he took her blood — he was bound to be her slave. A blood thrall, contracted through a Blood Geas.

“This made me rather hungry,” she complained as she reassessed her condition, “Go clean yourself up, then discreetly get me one of the orphans to feed on.”

“Yes, mistress,” Leonardo blurted out immediately, faint and useless signs of struggle seen in his eyes.

Involuntarily, but with a brisk pace nonetheless, he departed from the basement.

Now that he ingested her blood, her words were supreme orders to him. From someone he hated with a passion, she became the most important person in his life, one he would readily sacrifice anyone for. Even Yukiko.

Coming out of the atelier as he thought this, his body broke into a cold sweat even as the sun boiled above him.

“No!” He screamed out, clutching his head.

A few orphans around him were startled by the sudden shout, but none were more shocked than Leo himself.

‘I would never!’ he argued in his mind, and steeled his shaken resolve. Shooting a venomous glare at the door behind him, he departed urgently with a clutched fist.