Chapter 39 – In which we talk about vampires a bit

“... You don’t look scared.”

“Should I be scared?”

“... You also don’t look very surprised.”

Mimosa looked almost disappointed by the lack of reaction on Saffra’s side.

Maybe it was because it took her so long to finally gather the courage to tell her little sister about ‘that’.

Saffra, on the other hand, deliberated on what she should say.

“I’m sorry, but…” She looked Mimosa up and down. “You look like an obvious vampire.”

“Yes?”

“Um, well, I suppose it’s obvious if you know what to look for. I don’t think normal folks would recognize you as a vampire.”

“What gave me away?”

Mimosa looked down at herself, as if she couldn’t comprehend what she did wrong.

Saffra smiled awkwardly.

“First of all, you always wear a hat and dark glasses, even indoors.”

“... That is because light is still annoying.”

“Mhm.”

One false fact about vampires: they turn into ash in the sunlight.

They don’t. Mimosa could walk in sunlight just fine.

The little grain of truth in it was that they were sensitive to light, especially when hungry.

As their skin and eyes were sensitive, they often covered themselves, just like Mimosa covered her eyes with dark glasses and shadowed her face with a wide-brim hat.

The belief that vampires turned into ash in sunlight was probably because one ancient sun god swore to wipe vampires out and began a crusade against them.

The faith in that ancient sun god later transformed and changed, sprouting a few new sun gods and completely transforming the previous, that’s to say that the ancient sun god was in some way dead and gone.

Other sun gods didn’t prosecute vampires, but the belief spread by the ancient sun god persisted and the relics made with his power still rolled around.

“You also rarely eat anything, even when you invited me to eat breakfast with you, you only pretended to eat. If you eat, you choose something red and suck on it. And you also always drink red things.”

Vampires feed on blood.

They still could eat ‘normal food’, but they didn’t gain any nutrients from it.

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It was similar to how humans weren’t able to digest cellulose no matter how much they ate it.

The only normal food that could probably sustain a vampire was probably red meat or blood rich organs, but even so, it wasn’t very healthy for them to eat that.

Their instinct was to seek blood, so they naturally favored red liquids and red, juicy fruits.

And they often suck on them, without even realizing it.

“And during Miss Golderodi’s incident, you literally said to me that you ‘smelled a lot of blood’. Not to say that humans wouldn’t be able to smell a lot of blood, but it isn’t a statement you see a normal human often make. And there wasn’t that much blood in the first place. By human’s nose standards.”

Vampires’ senses were much more sensitive.

It varied from person to person, but their hearing, eyesight and sense of smell were usually much better than humans.

On the other hand, according to Ver, their sense of touch and pain was inferior to humans.

Their sense of taste could also be considered worse, as they weren’t able to detect sour and bitter flavors, but when it came to the delicate difference in taste of blood, they were unrivaled.

And though Mimosa didn’t present it in front of Saffra, vampires were also very physically capable.

Especially their movement abilities were something else.

“And you can’t tell me that this dark red liquid isn’t blood.”

“... You could assume it's wine.”

“Woah, what a strange sangria you have here, dear sister!”

Saffra pointed at the drink standing before Mimosa and attempted to make a joke, but Mimosa just blinked.

She sat stupefied for a moment, her face completely blank, and then slowly asked:

“...Sangria… dear sister?”

Assuming Mimosa didn’t understand the joke, Saffra awkwardly twirled the spoon in her hand and said:

“Umm, sangria means ‘blood’ in one of the ancient languages. Some believed it was named after the procedure of bloodletting…So you know…”

“Yes. I understand. That’s a good joke.”

Mimosa’s blank face made it very hard to believe that it was a good joke.

Saffra coughed and then changed the topic.

“That’s to say, I figured some time ago that you’re a vampire.”

Some time ago meant a week ago.

The previous Saffra had no idea that her older half-sister was a vampire.

“I see… And that doesn’t disturb you? Even a bit?”

“Should I? Being a vampire doesn’t change the fact you’re the same person I grew up with.”

‘Rather, should you be disturbed by me? I may not be the person you grew up with.’

Mimosa knew nothing of Saffra’s dark thoughts.

She smiled slightly, relieved.

“I see…”

“By the way, can I ask a question? About your vampirism.”

“Sure.”

“Are you a born or created vampire?”

Vampires were one of the human races.

Classifying them as a race meant they were of the same species as humans, even though they differed so greatly from them.

That also meant that they could reproduce with other human races.

So one of the ways to create a new vampire was to just ‘have a baby’.

The baby would grow completely naturally, without exhibiting any vampiric traits until it turned about twenty five.

At that moment they would enter their adulthood and gradually stop eating ‘normal food’ and switch to blood.

That's how it worked for most inter-racial children.

Their bloodline would stay dormant until they reach a certain moment in their life or a specific trigger is activated.

The same rules actually also applied to children between different species, such as dragons, demons, angels, etc. who could have children with whoever they desired.

Some divine beings and beasts also could choose to take on a human incarnation, and when such incarnation reaches its adulthood, it could also have children with whoever they desired, passing down parts of their divine nature.

But there was also a second method.

To ‘create’ a descendant.

For vampires it involved finding a dying person and doing a specific secret ritual, which would reborn that person as a vampire.

If the reborn person was a child, they would undergo the exact same process as naturally born vampires.

If the reborn person was an adult… they should become a vampire immediately, but according to what Saffra heard, there could be complications.

In fact, ‘creating’ descendants was a naturally risky process for any species.

Unless you were an extremely powerful higher being creating life out of nothing, it was rather troublesome.

“You know a lot about vampires.”

Mimosa noted, to which Saffra shook her head.

“I only heard about things here and there.”

“Mhm… I’m a born vampire.”

“Then your mother…?”

“Yes. She was a vampire.”

At the mention of her deceased mother, Mimosa’s eyes blurred slightly for a moment.

Saffra remained silent for a minute and then quietly said:

“About the question you wanted to ask me in exchange…”

Mimosa nodded, she looked down at her bloody drink, her finger tracing its edges, creating a low humming sound.

Finally, she gathered her thoughts and looked Saffra in the eyes:

“Can I ask… Who are you?”