"It seems the bloodsuckers have taught you lack of manners."

Hoseok couldn't help but scoff at his father's words.

"You look like shit," he commented, earning a glare from Micah. Out of the corner of his ear, he could hear both Taehyung and Jungkook airing the lowest of chuckles— something he was sure he wouldn't have heard before if he were still human. His father certainly hadn't heard it, focusing his gaze instead on Hoseok, looking far more disappointed than Hoseok had expected him to be.

"You speak like my son," Micah said softly, edging closer to Hoseok. "But you don't look like him. Your features are hardly recognizable. Is that what happens when you're Turned? I can't say that those gold eyes of yours suit you. They make you look unnatural. Like you're not human. It's unsettling. You're dead."

Hoseok's lips curled upward. "I may be dead, Micah, but I've never felt more alive. It appears you've failed at preventing the inevitable. I can't imagine how that feels for you."

"All I wanted was for my son to retain his humanity," Micah answered. "I wanted what was best for him. You don't know the bloodsuckers the way I do, and you willingly Turned yourself into one."

"I didn't."

"Don't lie to me, Hoseok," his father laughed humorlessly. "The end goal of you being with the Pureblood was for you to end up just like them. The same way Jungkook ended up, and the other one before that."

"I didn't."

Micah raised an eyebrow. "I always knew you were capable of many things, but a liar wasn't one of them. Have I not taught you better?"

"If I were lying, you would have no one to blame but yourself," Hoseok spat, hands balling into fists. "You have been a liar your entire life. A liar and a murderer. I see the urns you keep with you, father. Ones you've never let me see. Would I have become a part of your collection, too? If you had found my body buried underneath the pillars of the fallen palace, broken beyond repair, would you have burned my body so you could keep it as a gift's sake? To remind you how much of a horrible father you were to your family?"

"You don't know what you're talking about."

If Hoseok didn't know any better, he would believe him.

"How old are you, Micah?" Hoseok asked quietly. "How long have you been alive?" When Micah refused to answer, Hoseok continued. "Hasn't it been almost three hundred years? You went to Yoongi, asked him to get rid of the royal line, and you used me as a bargaining chip. You killed generations worth of your children— my half-siblings, and now you keep them in those urns as a reminder. And when my mother finally had me, you did everything to make sure Yoongi wouldn't come for me, and you killed my mother— your wife, and my siblings. Then you had me killed too."

That's what had hurt most of all. Ultimately, his father played a role in his demise. Hoseok wanted Micah to feel something, but the only thing that stared back at him was someone else. This wasn't the father that he had growing up— or maybe it was, but Hoseok had been too blind to see it. He'd admired his father too much to notice that he'd done some very terrible things, ones that he could never recover from. For someone that condemned the Purebloods and vampires, Micah sure seemed to behave like one. He'd had the benefits of being a vampire without actually turning into one, and it wasn't until Hoseok died the first time that Micah began to age.

"I did everything for you," Micah said, his expression twisting into anger. "Everything. They killed my father— your grandfather. Then they threaten to take you away from me? I loved you as a father would do a son, Hoseok. You were the best thing in my life. I had to do what I could to make sure you could remain human. I set you up with Seokjin because I knew he would be good for you, and he was. You two would have gotten married and ruled happily. I set you for life. You messed it all up."

"My grandfather killed Jungkook's wife and child," Hoseok snapped. "He deserved to die. Now, you're blaming me for making the choice that was meant from the start? Yoongi warned you multiple times, and you never once stopped. Why couldn't you talk to me about it? You could have done something, anything so that no one else would get hurt by your decisions. I could have had a family! A mother, my siblings, and we could have been happy."

Tears were streaming down Hoseok's face, his voice contorted in rage and bitter melancholy. It stung him far more than his father wasn't even batting an eye at Hoseok's breakdown. He didn't look sorry. He just stared in the way that he'd stared at Hoseok every time he'd made bad decisions in his childhood. For someone that claimed to love him like a child, Micah had a funny way of showing it– not at all. He'd rather let his son break down than admit that he ever did wrong.

"If you had a child of your own, Hoseok, you would understand what it means to give them the world," Micah whispered. "Peace between the vampires and humans had been fragile before, and they're nonexistent now. Why would I want you to accept the fate that you were given? It's cruel. I would have given everything up if it meant you wouldn't be paired with that soulless monster."

In a flash, Hoseok sped to Micah's side, grabbing him from his collar harshly. His eyes flashed goldenly, and the rage he'd already felt was beginning to spill, vision turning a blurry red. His fingers itched to grab Micah's throat and effectively crush him, but he forced himself to reign it in. He should have done it, but the hope that maybe just maybe, a tiny fraction of Micah's conscience would feel compelled to mutter two simple words was too strong for Hoseok to ignore. Yet, all he could see in front of him was the exact thing his father was describing Yoongi.

"If a soulless monster has the capability to tell me the truth and love me regardless of my upbringing with you, I would hate to know what you are," he spat venomously, his hold tightening on Micah. "I will fucking crush you, Micah."

Micah strained a laugh, his expression loosening on his face. "If that were the case, you would have done it from the moment you stepped into this room. I raised you to be loving, Hoseok. To humans. To your kind. Not to them. They don't deserve the heart you have. You remind me of your mother in that sense. She had a heart of gold. It's a shame she didn't get to raise you."

"My mother is dead because of you!"

"Hoseok, stop!"

But it had been too late.

The last tendril of Hoseok's patience had snapped, and without hesitation, he'd thrown Micah on the floor with all the strength he could muster. His father wouldn't die— Hoseok knew that because Yoongi wouldn't let him die yet. So when Micah's back hit the floor with a sickening crack, his frame breaking the marble floor, and blood beginning to spill out of his body. Still, all he could see was Micah's sickening smile, one that Hoseok wanted to wipe clean. He raised a fist and swung at his father's face, not caring that the person underneath him— his father had cried out, ignoring the pain that came from his recovering hand as it grabbed Micah.

All Hoseok had wanted was an apology from his father. All he needed was for Micah to accept his wrongs, to admit that what he had done hadn't been for Hoseok but rather his own selfishness. That's all Hoseok had asked for. It hurt that he couldn't get it. He wouldn't be getting it anytime soon. Proud until the end. Oblivious that he was the reason why Hoseok was this way. He wasn't even sorry that Hoseok had died. He'd only been sorry that Hoseok had become like them— that fate had run its course and acknowledged that Hoseok had always meant to be Turned.

It wasn't until the smell of Micah's blood registered in his mind that Hoseok froze in his tracks. The sickening sweet smell of it had brushed Hoseok's nose, the adrenaline pumping through him, hazing his mind and leaving him breathing erratically. As his eyes focused on Micah's bloody state, Hoseok noticed the blood around him and how his fist was stained with it.

"You really are one of them," Micah croaked, coughing blood to Hoseok's face. "Look at you. You haven't had human blood yet, have you? Don't you want a taste? You're a monster already. Seal the deal, my dearest son. You wanted to be like them so bad."

A pair of arms pulled Hoseok away from Micah. A snarl escaped Hoseok's throat, and he thrashed at the arms, his fangs sliding out. Micah could only laugh, weakly pulling himself up to see his son going completely animalistic as the two grabbed him— one he recognized to be Jungkook, and the other he assumed to be Jimin's soulmate. While it was to be expected, he had never seen Hoseok's expression turn into the one he currently wore. There was no humanity in Hoseok's face. Any capable thought of rationality had flown out of the window, replaced with nothing but a bloodthirsty bloodsucker. It was pathetic, really.

The one thing he hadn't wanted for his son had unfolded before his very eyes.

He was surprised Hoseok had held that long. Usually, vampires would go mad as soon as they smelt the scent of a human— regardless of injury or not. Hoseok had managed to keep his composure, and it wasn't until he'd been made aware of the sight of blood that he'd lost his control and now had two other vampires restraining him. Hoseok couldn't be a full-blooded vampire. If Micah were to make his bets, he'd say that his son was now a Pureblood. It's the only thing that made sense. Hoseok had died— the palace wouldn't have fallen down any other way, which meant that someone had to intervene. The injuries Hoseok had suffered were not minor. If the slice to the throat hadn't killed him (Micah could see the scar of the blade on Hoseok's throat as he thrashed around wildly), then the collapse of the infrastructure of the palace would have.

No, this was the work of a God.

Micah figured any type of conversation that they could have continued to have would be rendered useless. Even with Jungkook's abilities, Hoseok looked no closer to clamping down than when he'd purposefully riled Hoseok up. All this time, Hoseok still managed to play right into Micah's mind games. He should have known from the beginning that Micah was trying to get him to lose control— and Micah had succeeded. Though he took no pleasure in seeing his son looking so vile, it served him well to know where Hoseok's allegiances were, and now that he suspected Hoseok was a Pureblood, more so. There was no cure that could bring Hoseok back to his original species, and as much as it saddened Micah, his son and he was now on opposing sides.

He could only imagine the despicable things Yoongi managed to feed Hoseok without Micah being nearby.

"My son has turned into a soulless monster," Micah grunted, looking impassively at Hoseok, who had managed to free himself of Jungkook and the other vampire's hold, the other two vampires strangely crumpled unconscious. How strong was Hoseok that he'd managed to subdue two vampires in such a small amount of time?

Hoseok's face remained unreadable, eyes completely darkened with thirst, lips pulled into his coldest of smirks showing off his fangs. His face no longer was stained with Micah's blood, a feat Micah found unsurprising as the two vampires that had been restraining Hoseok had made sure to erase any trace of it. His fist still held blood, the bandages on his other hand drenched in both gold and red blood, only further confirming Micah's suspicions of Hoseok being a Pureblood.

"You made me this way."

Gone were the traces of humanity Micah had latched onto at the beginning of their conversation. The ones that had restrained Hoseok from doing anything too overboard and the ones that Micah had managed to exploit so that Hoseok would lose complete control. It was clearer than the night sky that Hoseok could no longer feel anything for Micah. Perhaps it was Micah's fault for having pushed Hoseok past his breaking point, but he wanted Hoseok to know how much a monster he truly was now. Hoseok was no better than him. He was far from innocent, and the way Hoseok was pushing this "monster" agenda on Micah had to be laughable.

Was Micah wrong for trying to protect his son from the impurity that came with the Purebloods and their bloodsucking army of leeches? He didn't think so. He'd done all he could so that he could ensure Hoseok would lead a good, healthy, human life. He'd shown Hoseok what the Purebloods were, what their bloodsucking demons did to innocents, and he still managed to be wooed by the one Pureblood that had killed Micah's father.

"I looked up to you once," Hoseok said, voice stone cold. "I wanted so bad to be like you. I wanted to be the person you were proud of because we only had each other. Now I know that was a lie fabricated so that you could keep me to yourself. You've done nothing for me. If you had even once asked me what I wanted, we wouldn't be in this mess. You would be young. You wouldn't be old and graying and barely being able to defend yourself. I ought to crush you the same way Yoongi crushed your father."

How Hoseok knew so much about the past was beyond Micah, but he wasn't seeing from Micah's perspective. He'd let himself get swept by the words of the Purebloods the same way Micah had let himself get swept away by the promise of being the ruler of Korea. Hoseok had let himself get wooed, and now it was going to cost him. The Purebloods never meant what they said— words and promises were merely ways to lure innocents the way sirens lured sailors to their deaths. Hoseok had let it get too far, and now he was one of them.

He would never get his son back.

How disappointing.

"I won't die," Micah said, fully managing to sit upright. "I'm immortal for the time being. I may be old, but as long as the Purebloods give me life, I will not die. So crush me as many times as you want, dear son, and you'll see, you're no better than me."

Hoseok licked his lips, expression daunting. "Is that a challenge?"

Micah supposed it was, but it was one with an ulterior motive. He needed to make sure that was a Pureblood, and that meant doing one final test. Though he had no weapons with him, he did have a silver ring, and as soon as Hoseok got too close, he would use it to injure Hoseok. Was it cruel? Sure, but right now, Hoseok was misbehaving and being so completely ungrateful. Micah could argue that Hoseok deserved it for everything he was putting Micah through.

He'd tried to be nice before. It was clear that Hoseok didn't want to be nice to him.

Ungrateful little brat.

"You should have died when Seokjin killed you," Micah said. "Maybe then you wouldn't be wishing death on your biological father."

"You brought death to every single person related to you," Hoseok motioned to the urns that still lay neatly. "Your bloodline never flourished. You cut them too short. The life you wanted for me, you could have given to another one of my siblings. You could have learned to love them, give them the father that they deserved."

"Your siblings didn't deserve to live good lives when yours was going to be miserable," Micah answered. "I did what I did to them because I loved you too much to let them have a happy ending. If you had to suffer, so did they. So did the woman who gave birth to you."

Hoseok laughed, the steel of it reverberating through Micah's body. "You don't love me, Micah. I don't think your heart has the capacity for it."

"Then why would I do everything for you?"

Hoseok was on him now, drinking in Micah's bruised and battered state with so much glee, Micah thought that his son had been replaced by Yoongi. Hoseok's nails dug into Micah's skin, and he groaned, feeling Hoseok's fingernails begin to draw blood from how hard they were embedding themselves in him.

"Because you love being in control."

Hoseok's hand wrapped itself around Micah's throat, his lips already at the base of his neck. He could feel Hoseok's fangs poking at the skin, applying the tiniest bit of pressure. With that, Micah pulled his hand up, striking Hoseok on the neck with his ring. Hoseok immediately recoiled from the touch, but it seemed to work against Micah's favor because Hoseok tore at his skin, his fangs cleanly breaking the barrier between the skin and blood vessel.

Micah squirmed under Hoseok's hold, already feeling the blood leaving his body. No matter how hard he pushed the silver ring onto Hoseok's neck, causing his son to take the tiniest of pauses but his fangs never once retracted. Though he knew Hoseok wouldn't be able to kill him yet, fear spiked his heart the longer he tried to get Hoseok off him, and for the first time, he was actually terrified of the lengths his son would go to enact revenge.

He'd often heard tales of what it felt like to be sucked dry by the bloodsuckers. All of them had been good— guaranteed to send the victims on a one-way ticket to paradise. Whoever had said that must have been lying because the feelings coursing through Micah were nothing but pain, fear, and even more agony. It was either that Hoseok was purposefully trying to make it hurt, to remind Micah what a failure of a father he'd been, or it meant that it was always like this.

"Your blood tastes like shit," Hoseok murmured, grabbing Micah's hand. He twisted the silver ring off Micah, causing his father far more pain than Micah had anticipated. "Sings of failure and reeks of betrayal."

Micah could hardly recognize Hoseok's voice. It was as if he'd become an entirely new thing in the smallest amount of time. Spots were dancing in his vision, his heart palpitating even more blood in an attempt to recover the lost blood— the last thing that his body should be doing when a bloodsucker was draining him dry. It didn't matter to Hoseok that Micah was suffering. This time, it was completely Micah's fault. Perhaps it wasn't the best choice of judgment to taunt a clearly unstable Pureblood.

How far was too far?

As Micah's body finally shut down, even he couldn't figure out the answer to that question.

🩸

Something was wrong.

They could all feel it.

Moreso, Yoongi could feel it and the sudden feeling of nausea that came with it, something he'd only felt two other times before. The Moon flickered uncertainly, and they all looked at each other, knowing that there had been only two other times that the Moon had done that in all their existence.

"Where is he?"

Yoongi feared even asking the question. They'd only been gone a couple of hours, and from the looks of it, it had been a couple of hours too long. Yeonjun's eyes glazed over for a moment before he looked back at Yoongi. He was no longer smiling, and all traces of reassurance were gone. Yoongi's eyes widened a fraction, and he looked at his brothers, who were also looking at each other with uncertainty.

"Please tell me he has not gone the deep end."

Yeonjun's silence was the only confirmation that Yoongi needed.

"You know, Jungkook and I actually had a discussion about this," Namjoon remarked, clearing his throat. "We suspected that Hoseok would be the most bloodthirsty out of all of us. He's a Pureblood. We need to find him."

"Charming," Yoongi commented, casting a dirty look. "We told them to stay inside. Jungkook's injured, and an out of control Pureblood is nothing on Taehyung either."

"When have they ever listened to us?" Jimin sighed, leaning against the table. "They have their outings when we leave for family dinners. I'm sure they managed to convince Hoseok to get whisked away. The only issue is figuring out what triggered Hoseok's bloodlust."

There had to be an injury of some kind. Hoseok couldn't miss what he couldn't smell, and when it came to being around humans and having never tasted blood before, Hoseok wouldn't have been tempted by mere human scent alone. Namjoon, Yoongi, and Jimin hadn't been tempted by how humans smelled at all. It wasn't until there was human blood in their eye vision that they could finally register the smell in their minds.

Yoongi remembered the first time he'd had human blood. They'd been in Rome, and the blood of the Romans had been from another world entirely. He could still remember the sudden adrenaline pumping through him, the way his mind hazed and wanted nothing but to consume the intoxicatingly iron rich food source, regardless of who he was taking it from. He'd become an entirely new being, attacking mercilessly and without a thought. That was the downside of drinking human blood for the first time, and it's why Artemis despised vampires despite her playing a part in their creation.

Vampires had basic survival instincts. To survive, they had to live from the gift of life. As vampires were essentially saner versions of the undead, with incredible hunting instincts and an even stronger intelligence. They had traits that all hunters should have, and it made them a powerful species. But, because they were dead, they needed to take life to sustain themselves. They couldn't survive on human food because their bodies couldn't digest it the way that a human would, so the only option they had was blood.

Blood helped them fulfill the life component, and the more a vampire had of it, the more they remained satiated. Animal blood was good, and when Yoongi had first begun drinking blood, he was fine with it. There were ones that were better than others— carnivores gave him more satisfaction than deer or other herbivores, but none of that compared to the thrill of the first taste of human blood. It was as if something in a human's blood unlocked a frenzied desire that couldn't be shaken off until it was relieved. He'd always been satiated before, but when human blood passed his lips, a new hunger coursed through him, and though he could drink animal blood with ease, it did nothing to quench the thirst he'd had.

A Pureblood's first time drinking blood was crucial. If there wasn't anyone there to attempt to control them, they could go on forever. It was something he withheld from Hoseok because he hadn't thought that it would come as fast as it did. He thought he would have more time to explain that it was far more than just drinking human blood. Vampires drank human blood, and while they went bloodthirsty, it wasn't to the extent of the Purebloods. The reason why Purebloods went on rampages (which they hadn't known at first) was that abilities didn't solely surface with one contact.

To gain the abilities each of the Purebloods and their soulmates possessed, there needed to be large quantities of human blood in their systems. Gaining abilities was no small feat, and when it came to the especially powerful, they needed to drink until they were fully satiated. When Namjoon had drank blood for the first time, it had taken him around two hundred humans to have his power surface just a fraction. For Jimin, it had taken nearly five hundred, and for Yoongi, who was considered the most powerful out of the three, well, he'd lost count after the first couple thousand.

The other reason why Purebloods had to consume so much human blood was that they weren't balanced enough. Before awakening their vampire half, Purebloods solely lived on their God side, and it meant that their God side held more power than the dormant side. Once awakened, the body needed to match the level of the other side to maintain balance. Just like balance was important in the everyday world, it applied to the smallest of things. One side of a Pureblood could not overpower the other, therefore, a Pureblood, upon first human contact, had to continue to feed.

It wasn't easy to force a Pureblood to stop feeding. Even if Yoongi were to stop Hoseok right now, it would do nothing to satiate the burning that he'd have over the next couple of weeks because his vampire side wouldn't let him rest until his ability becomes fully awakened and for that, he needed to feed. There would be nothing rational about trying to get Hoseok to stop what he had already started. Still, there were already so many little people in Korea— sure, there were more than fifty million still, but that didn't mean that Hoseok should have free reign.

One thing was for certain.

Yoongi was going to have Taehyung and Jungkook's heads.

"He's not even in Korea right now," Yeonjun gasped, getting Yoongi's attention once more. Even his brothers seemed confused, and they turned to Yeonjun, waiting for him to continue. "From what I can see, he drained those who live in the palace, and once he was done, he headed west, no dbout looking for a place that had more people."

"Palace?" Jimin asked, surprised. A beat of silence passed through them before they all realized. "You don't think...."

This had Micah written all over it.

"I'm going to kill him," Yoongi vowed, his eyes glistening in fury. "This is exactly why I didn't want Hoseok seeing that despicable excuse of a human being. If there's one thing Micah knows how to do, is to manipulate his son. He could have easily gotten Hoseok to snap. Shit." He turned back to Yeonjun. "Where is he?"

Yeonjun's eyebrows furrowed in concentration. "Well, he was in China for a bit, but now he's in Mongolia? No, he's moving towards Europe. Yoongi, what in the Moon does Hoseok have as an ability that has him moving from place to place so fast? The Moon can hardly keep a location on him."

"Hoseok's not special," Namjoon snorted. "Jungkook managed to land in the Americas for his first time."

"That's nothing on Taehyung, who traveled through all the corners of the world," Jimin argued, crossing his arms. "We were chasing him for days."

"Yeah, well, if we do not stop comparing whose soulmate traveled the world more, we won't be able to stop Hoseok for weeks," Yoongi deadpanned, chewing on his bottom lip. "We need to locate Jungkook and Taehyung. It's possible that they're in the palace, and if Seokjin discovers that they are still there, he will kill them."

Yeonjun frowned. "They have made it out of the palace alive. I believe Seokjin caught a glimpse of Hoseok before Hosoek disappeared. I'm surprised he did not go after him."

"Seokjin is half God," Yoongi answered. "What we need for our first time is pure human blood. It's the only way to fully strengthen our vampire side without having it overridden by our god side."

"He's still healing, is he not? From his hand?" Yeonjun questioned, answering his own question in the next breath. "I see the bandage still on him, but at this point, it is doused with so much human blood I assume his hand has effectively healed. He looks like a mess, Yoongi. I hope you have pairs of clothes nearby."

He'd need a lot more than clothes to forcibly get Hoseok to stop consuming human blood.

Yoongi could either let nature run its course and let Hoseok continue to feed until he fully felt satiated, or he could risk Hoseok completely hating his entire existence. Both were impossible situations to be in. The first one, because Yoongi had little idea how much Hoseok had to feed to have both of his halves to finally balance the other out. The second one was because if Yoongi did force Hoseok to stop, and he very well could, the thirst wouldn't go away. Nothing would make it go away. No, not until Hoseok had finally had his fill. Not until his sides were fully equal.

Nothing Yoongi could do would get Hoseok to stop, making the second choice completely useless. There were not any binds Yoongi could put on Hoseok, no ways to restrain Hoseok without hurting him. The only place Yoongi could think of was his mother's island, but even then, Hoseok would be inconsolable. It wasn't like this was new anyhow. They'd done this twice before, and each of the times, it had been a wild goose hunt chase that ultimately ended with fully satiated vampires.

This was the first time that they had to deal with another full Pureblood.

"Keep me posted on his location," Yoongi ordered. Yeonjun nodded. "Do not let him out of your sight. I will be paying a brief visit to the man who caused this, and then I will be on my way to him."

Jimin sighed. "Must you go pay Micah a visit? Hoseok's your soulmate."

Yoongi's eyes narrowed. "I distinctly remember running around trying to find Taehyung when you decided to enact your slow revenge on the village he came from." Yoongi turned to Namjoon. "Do not start. I helped you find Jungkook after we lost a visual on him down in Argentina. We only have to go through this one more time."

Jimin and Namjoon made faces but agreed sullenly. Yoongi grinned in triumph, already stepping into the teleport Yeonjun had conjured, his eyes busy maintaining all attention on him. Yoongi waved goodbye, his easy-going expression slipping into the deadliest of stares as he stepped foot into Micah Jung's newest room. He was unsurprised to see Seokjin over him, shielding Micah from view but supporting him nonetheless. Seokjin tensed as Yoongi silently walked towards them, and when he fully turned to look at Yoongi, Yoongi already had his arms up in mock surrender.

"I'm not here to hurt you, Seokjin," Yoongi said. "I'm here to figure out what my wonderful in-law did that will have me working overtime."

"He's dead," Seokjin responded bluntly, a hand already on his weapon. "You will be too."

"I would rather not go in technicalities with you, Seokjin," Yoongi sighed harshly. "I will figure out what my in-law said one way or another, and if you don't move, I will make sure you end up the same way your guards outside are."

"You did this?"

Yoongi shook his head. "No, Seokjin, I have more important affairs to deal with than to feast on your human guards. If I wanted my in-law dead, I would have killed him a long time ago. I assure you he is not dead. As per our deal, he is still immortal. Old, sure, but still."

"But you know who did this."

"And I assure you, Seokjin, you do not want to know the answer, so if you know what is good for you, you will let me speak to my favorite in-law."

Seokjin's eyebrows furrowed. "He's not your in-law. Why do you keep calling him that?"

Ah.

Yoongi smiled menacingly. "That is for me to know and you to...how is it you humans say it? Oh, yes, find out." He cleared his throat briefly. "Though if you must know, the wedding bells are ringing beautifully. The only downside of it is this man is my future father in law. Can you believe that?"

Seokijn's eyes widened, a frantic but confused look overtaking his face. "Hoseok? But he's dead."

"As dead as his father is right here," Yoongi responded cheekily, eyes flashing purple. "Sleep, Seokjin. Remember nothing of this conversation."

The first thing Yoongi noticed after Seokjin was properly taken care of was the mess Hoseok had made. Not that his father didn't deserve it, but from the cracks of the floor, Yoongi knew Hoseok had done a number on him. Pride swelled in his chest, and he hummed softly before fully focusing his attention on Micah. His eyebrows furrowed as he noticed Micah's appearance. He pressed a finger to Micah's heart, and Micah sat up with a start, coughing blood and looking around bewildered before looking at Yoongi.

"You turned my son into one of you," Micah hissed. Yoongi rolled his eyes. "Don't you roll your eyes at me! My own son bled me dry with those animalistic fangs that your people have—"

"Good to see you too, Micah," Yoongi remarked dryly, the meeting anything but. "We were given no choice. You had him killed, remember? My mother, bless her, saved him. He was my gift. And now, he's mine. Forever." Seeing Micah's fuming face, he smiled haughtily. "I'm not here to exchange pleasantries, Micah. Your insolence has caused your son to start terrorizing the world. As I am completely enamored, I am looking at this with a happy lens, so I will ask you once. What did you tell Hoseok?"

Micah shrugged. "He came to find me, not the other way around. It is not my fault he got upset over our differences. I cannot believe you taught him to be disrespectful towards me, his father."

"You did that to yourself," Yoongi dismissed. "Have you looked at yourself in the mirror lately, Micah? I'm surprised at your appearance."

Without waiting for an answer, Yoongi forced Micah up. Micah's eyes widened, his hands immediately going to his face. He was young again. Not just forty year old young. He was twenty years young. He looked about the age of Hoseok and, considering that he was Hoseok's father, looked so much like him too. He looked at Yoongi, confused.

"Did you do this?"

Yoongi grimaced. "Why would I willingly give you your youth back?"

His eyes flashed purple once more, though this time, he held onto Micah. He watched their interactions— how Hosoek had been crying, asking, almost flat out begging Micah to say something that could soothe Hoseok, and how Micah had relentlessly denied it.  Micah had pushed Hoseok to the limit, and it brewed anger within Yoongi. Anger and frustration were the last things Hoseok deserved to feel, especially from his manipulative shit excuse of a father. He watched, albeit proudly, at Hoseok slamming his father on the floor, witnessing Jungkook and Taehyung trying to stop him and failing before Hoseok fully gave into his thirst.

Micah had tempted Hoseok through it all, making a mockery of Hoseok by using his blood. He deserved to get drained dry, and Hoseok did so. Micah had technically died, and from the looks of it, Hosoek had been far from satisfied. He couldn't see where Micah had gotten his youth back, though he suspected Hosoek might have accidentally had something to do with it.  Micah couldn't die— not until Yoongi decided it was finally time for him to do so, but draining Micah dry wouldn't have had him be almost reborn. It unsettled Yoongi, seeing Micah as young as Hoseok currently was, and he averted his gaze, wanting nothing more than to wipe that slow smirk crawling on Micah's face.

"Guess my son is useful after all," Micah commented, receiving an immediate punch to the face. Yoongi looked at him innocently.

"Some of your teeth fell," he said. "You should probably get that checked. I'm going to go find my lover now. You're going to have to figure out how to break the news to Seokjin about your youth. He's going to be very confused in the morning. It is up to you to break the news of Hoseok's return. Or don't. We both know how much you love to hold all the chess pieces."

Without so much as a reflex, Yoongi slammed Micah's face onto the mirror, relishing the way Micah cried out in agony. After a couple of seconds, Yoongi threw him onto the floor, stepping on Micah just enough to break Micah's leg. He chuckled, shaking his head.

"Your life is still mine, Micah," Yoongi said, crushing the other leg. "You will recover in a couple of hours. Shame, really." A pause. "I suggest you start getting your affairs in order, Micah. I have a feeling your death is rapidly approaching."

Yoongi stepped on Micah's arms for good measure, walking out of the palace with a smug grin. There were plenty of other things Yoongi had wanted to do with Micah, but time was of the essence for him. Now that Hoseok was loose, it wouldn't take long for Artemis to cast her unneeded judgment.

He was sure Artemis had already seen the flickering Moon and the other telltale signs that Hosoek had descended into madness. Artemis usually never interfered with the first feeding, but knowing that only a while ago Yoongi had taunted Artemis's and his mother's previous relationship, Yoongi wasn't too sure Artemis would keep out of this one as well. He contemplated calling for his mother, but he hadn't needed her before when it came to the others. He didn't think he would need her help for Hoseok.

Yoongi could hardly imagine the feelings coursing through Hoseok. He could, but he didn't want to invade, and the most appropriate action for bloodthirsty vampires wasn't to subdue them— rather to guide them. Namjoon and Jimin were probably already close to where Hoseok was, and Yeonjun had already altered Yoongi of Hoseok's most updated coordinates. It would cost him a lot more post-feeding, as there was no humanly way to explain thousands of corpses being sucked dry.

Granted, the world knew about vampires, but that didn't mean that Yoongi wanted the human population to worry. If things were already horrible in Korea, he couldn't even begin to imagine what the rest of the world would do and act if they knew they had a "big vampire" problem. Then came the matter of figuring out what Hoseok's ability was— one that had already presented himself in Micah, who'd suddenly reverted decades of his age after being drained completely of blood.

Still, something about Hoseok being drenched in blood and a complete mess excited Yoongi. Apart from the heaping pile of bodies that were nothing more than statistics on Hoseok's mind currently, a vampire's first feed was always a wonderful sight to see. Hoseok was already a beauty that rivaled Aphrodite herself, and to see Hoseok completely ruined as he caved in to his vampire side was an exciting prospect, to say the least.

Yoongi couldn't wait to get his hands on Hoseok.

a/n: kind of a reminder/making it clearer: technically micah's life is "owned" by yoongi per the deal that was struck back in the prologue, so that mf can't die until yoongi's finally like "yeah, you can die i guess." so he's going to continue to be an annoying little shit.

hoseok does tend to flash back and forth between the father and micah, but it is okay he's trying his best </3

when these mf's get thirsty they go into their hunting instincts so rn hoseok doesn't feel jack shit about what he's doing (is a regular tuesday for him), but when he comes back to his senses its going to be a different story. 

seokjin's back! can't wait for him to remember hoseok's alive <33

i was going to end it with the micah part but i was clearly having too much fun so i kept going. this was actually not in the outline at all, i was writing and then all of a sudden hoseok's bleeding his father dry ??? idk i was so confused too. i think it makes sense doe for micah to be hoseok's first "kill"

hoseok: 1 micah: 0

this was me in the dm's like:

trust me no one is ever more confused than me bc when i write and suddenly shit happens ????

(the time stamp was 12:11 am, i have been writing this for the past 4-5 hours)

i can always count on mfm to get me out of my writing slumps. i love this book so much i never want to end it<3

we have passed the 125k mark y'all this is fucking crazy

this was brought to you by me drinking wendy's strawberry lemonade (not sponsored but that drink's hella fucking good)