Realizing something significant must have occurred, Norton pressed further, "What exactly happened?"
Asta hesitated slightly before responding. "If it’s a confidential matter, there's no need to tell us," Norton added considerately.
"It isn't exactly confidential… well, I suppose it won't hurt for you young ones to know; it might even make you more cautious." With that decision, Headmaster Asta began to explain, "In fact, just last month at the start of the Magic Moon, on the night of June 1st, something happened. Although the magical chaos made precise measurements almost impossible, we noticed something amiss by daylight."
"What was amiss?" Norton internally tensed, immediately suspecting it was related to his own activity—the disruption of the ancient tomb’s barrier using the power of the Red Moon Moriah. Outwardly, he maintained a façade of innocence and curiosity.
"About 40 kilometers from Dekenhof Castle, an area experienced a severe depletion of the Winds of Magic, so much so that it was noticeably thin even during the day. The Citizen Assembly consulted your mother, Lady Windsor, who then dispatched a team to investigate. They discovered an ancient imperial tomb that had gone unnoticed until then."
The more Asta explained, the more anxious Norton became, fearing his actions had been uncovered. If so, it would be disastrous; there were limits to how persuasive he could be, unlike his clever feline companion.
"And what happened next?" Norton asked, his voice betraying a slight tremor. Luckily, neither Asta nor the younger children noticed any inconsistency in his tone, given their lack of perceptiveness.
"Upon initial exploration, the dispatched team discovered significant signs of excavation. Many traps had been disarmed. It's evident that the magical depletion was tied to this tomb," Asta continued.
"Who excavated this tomb? If it were our kin, there’d be no reason to risk the dangers of the Magic Moon; they could have simply reported it to the Citizen Assembly," suggested another cousin.
"Precisely," Asta nodded. "Had it been one of us, secrecy wouldn’t have been necessary. This bears the hallmark of an outsider’s handiwork. Subsequent evidence gathered reinforced this suspicion."
Hearing this, Norton felt a wave of relief wash over him. It seemed that the inherent trust among vampires spared him the scrutiny. Besides, imagining a child orchestrating a tomb excavation was rather far-fetched.
"So, who was behind this?" With the tension lifted, Norton’s voice steadied.
"After gathering evidence, the team reported back to your mother, who quickly involved the Citizen Assembly. We concluded collectively that this was the work of traitors from the Strigoi clan," Asta’s voice carried a note of hatred and disdain at the mention of the Strigoi, and the same emotions were mirrored by the children around him.
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"The Strigoi traitors?" Norton feigned disdain as well, matching his peers' expressions, while inwardly relieved.
"Indeed, the hasty and covert manner of the operation, leaving the main burial chamber and the most valuable treasures untouched, opting instead to excavate and remove the bones of slaves and soldiers, indicates insufficient power. Their aim seems predominantly to bolster their forces. Who else but the Strigoi traitors would conduct such an act?" Asta muttered curses under his breath about those "damned bastards," his voice too low for the children to catch. After venting, he continued, "But they won't succeed! We are prepared. If they dare creep from their filthy dens, we’ll cut them down once more, as before!"
His words, laden with too much information for the younger children, left them bewildered. Slightly frustrated by their confusion, Asta ruffled his hair and concluded, "In any case, you should all stay indoors more than usual. You older kids should have additional escorts to and from school. If trouble arises, call for help immediately. Stay safe. Understand?"
"Understood," the children replied unevenly, not fully grasping the gravity, which slightly irked Asta. Nevertheless, he reassured himself that their parents would likely reiterate similar warnings soon, ensuring they took proper precautions if the children themselves didn’t.
The Strigoi clan, unlike the integral vampire families of von Carstein, Lamia, Necrarch, and Lahmia, were outcasts in vampire society. Universally depicted as treacherous in literature, the Strigoi sought solitary dominion, aiming to enslave other vampire clans instead of coexisting peacefully. Their conspiracies and betrayals culminated during the first comprehensive war against the Old World forces.
As other vampire clans focused on external threats, the Strigoi allied with human and dwarf forces, betraying their kin. This treachery fractured the once-mighty undead empire, nearly leading to the extinction of the vampire race. The surviving vampires retreated, relinquishing vast territories to restore their strength in Sylvania, while the Sigmar Empire emerged as a dominant power in the Old World.
Ironically, the Strigoi’s "allies" did not honor their promises; instead, the Sigmar Empire and the Dwarven Kingdom abandoned them. Other vampire families treated the Strigoi as mortal enemies, leading to their systematic expulsion, slaughter, and hunting.
Bereft of allies, their lands seized, their armies destroyed, the Strigoi clan swiftly fell. Only the cunning or cowardly managed to escape, some fleeing to the eastern wilds and northern mountains, others hiding in the borderlands between Sylvania and human, dwarf, and greenskin territories.
Over the ensuing four thousand years, the Strigoi avoided the public eye, the four noble vampire families of Sylvania never ceasing their hunt. Concurrently, human witch hunters, the Sigmar Church, and the Morr's Black Guard sought these "heretics" with equal fervor.
The most pitiful aspect was their descent into squalor. Without territories or the audacity to attack the living openly, the Strigoi subsisted in filthy underground lairs, sustaining themselves on newly buried corpses, drinking congealed, lifeless blood to sate their hunger.
Four millennia later, the Strigoi have physically devolved, their noble features replaced by grotesque deformities. With hunched postures, cracked, gray skin, and hair like straw, they bear no semblance of vampiric nobility, appearing instead as wretched monstrosities. Their transformation left them bitter, intensifying their hatred of their Sylvanian cousins, mirrored by Norton and his kin’s enmity towards them.