TAINTED HEART
chapter two : Selene

‿︵‿︵୨˚̣̣̣͙୧ - - ୨˚̣̣̣͙୧‿︵‿︵

Leon laughed, "Don't be ridiculous, my darling, you fought hard for that title of queen. You've killed 20 of your siblings for that seat and I'll just take it away from you?" he says, emphasizing the sentence that she killed her siblings for the throne.

Selene could barely control rolling her eyes at him. He was a hypocrite, acting like he wasn't the reason why their siblings killed each other.

"You're right, father. I shouldn't let the souls of my siblings down. That's why I'll kill you if you decide to take away my throne." She maintained a smile on her face and proceeded to eat her fill.

"My, my, I invited you to dinner to talk about lovely things but you're talking about killing..." he wiped his imaginary tears away as if it would do anything to lift up Selene's mood.

Another silence grew again, this time it was longer, the clashing of the metals of forks and spoons on the plates was deafening. The servants around them could feel it.

"So..." her father breaks the ice. "What will you do with that boy who annihilated the ione clan under your protection?"

"The ione clan was a troublesome clan from the start, and I despised them with every fiber of my being. They were under my care, but only when they heeded my warnings. They're barbarians, to say the least, and they go crazy for human blood. As a result, I've chosen to let it go. Even if that boy hadn't appeared to slay them, I would have been the one to annihilate their entire tribe myself."

She sighs. The ione clan had recently gotten on her nerves. They were always the type of clan that did whatever they wanted as if their queen, whom they serve, didn't exist in the first place.

She intended to put them in their place sooner or later, but that boy, riki, came ahead of her and did exactly what she desired.

Her father chuckled, "Don't you think the vampire nobles will start gossiping about how an incompetent leader you are?"

"I don't need to listen to the helpless. They are the ones who seek my protection, thus they must demonstrate their worthiness. I don't protect vampires who don't realize how insignificant they are."

"Pfft! Haha! Why do they have to be insignificant? This is why I like you, Selene! Oh, my dear lovely Selene haha!" He laughed, almost out of breath, "So... so what about that lad? What are your plans if he decides to attack your forest again?"

"My plans...?"

Selene stopped, eyes frozen to nothingness as she remembered something. The hunter niki, his hidden surname was nishimura and it made her remember a memory.

Of course, how could she forget the first ever human to not see her as a monster but a living being?

- Selene's last past life (100 years after the dark moon)

I was reincarnated. Again. In my last life, I perished at the hands of a human I believed I could trust. I was a fool. I sought to live amongst humans because I liked them; I liked how they thought, I liked their material creations, literature, and festivities.

I dreamed of being able to talk and laugh with them. So, even as the knowledge of my past lives, that if a human were to discover our existence they would always choose to destroy it, despite that... I still...

I still loved them.

So, when in my last life, as soon as I was reincarnated, I decided to stray away from the vampires, from my own kind. I headed to a town of humans and tried my best to hide anything that would prove that I was a vampire.

No vampire had ever thought of living with humans because it was a great risk one shouldn't even think to take. But I did so anyway. I met humans, humans I thought were my friends, but... as soon as I did a terrible mistake believing their words: "You can tell me anything, we're friends aren't we? We'll accept you for whoever you are!"

I showed them. My deepest darkest secret which I wasn't supposed to show them. I thought because of our memories that we shared they would accept me even though I'm a vampire.

When they found out about my existence, they feared me. Because they feared me they told the town and hunted me. They bound me, stabbed me through the heart, and burned me in their town center.

It was then that the Dark Moon happened, covering the skies, making vampires go crazy.

I was no exception.

I went berserk and bathed in the blood of the humans I once thought of as friends.

I died and was resurrected again but this time a human has taken my heart hostage and used it to control me to do errands for them for their hands to not get dirtied.

It's Vampire trafficking, to be precise.

It was ironic. Was this the universe telling me that in every lifetime, humans would always disappoint me?That I can't love them because loving them destroys me?

Maybe that was it.

The human who was controlling me had other vampires in his clutches. Though, it was only a few compared to the population of vampires. This young body was one of the unlucky ones and I was sent to carry out a mission; to kill a human.

A vampire hunter.

And that hunter... was a nishimura.

I battled him with the sole goal to kill him, but because my heart wasn't with me, I only possessed half of my powers. Even if I had half of my power I could still defeat a normal human but he was different.

He was on par with half of my power or maybe even surpassing it. He defeated me at the end. When I thought he was going to kill me and that I was going to reincarnate again, he didn't.

Instead, he crouched down and smiled at me. He raised his sword, my eyes shutting tight to prepare for the pain, but he was actually aiming for the collar at my neck.

The collar was the one enabling my heart to be captured by the human who's bounding vampires. I couldn't take it off myself since it restricts my power and inflicts me great pain. His sword had some sort of power, that power was coming from him.

He smiled at me, "I'm sorry about that, kid. I thought your mind was being controlled but it seems this collar is the cause of it." His hands went to my hair and ruffled it as it took me aback. "What's your name?"

I've had a lot of names but the vampire I've reincarnated to doesn't have one since this vampire was separated from her clan and kidnapped by a human. I don't even want to tell him my name even if I had one.

My physical form would be about a 5 year old in human age.

He could see I was wary of him. "Humans..." he trailed off, causing me to gaze at him, wondering about what he was about to say, "Humans tend to fear what they can't understand, they either avoid it, use it to their advantage, or kill it. I guess you could say it's our animal instinct." He smiled.

I couldn't help but release a small laugh of ridicule, "Do animal instincts include causing pain to someone who's done nothing to them?"

That made him silent. "— Although vampires aren't better. After all, we do suck your blood in order to survive" I added and chuckled. Caressing my neck from side to side, I stood up.

"We just don't want to understand each other. But..." he looked down. "I believe that someday, we could coexist without inflicting pain to each other." He looked at me, eyes basically shining with pathetic hope.

"Coexist?" I say, laughing. Yeah, there was also a time where I believed we could coexist but...

"Burn! Burn her! She's a monster!"

"She'll kill us!"

"Rot in hell!"

I shut my eyes tight to snap from the memories and glared at him.

"That's impossible, human." I growled, crunching my nose, furrowing my eyebrows, and my fangs showing. My eyes glowed golden, a very unusual color for a vampire, although I do change colors every time I resurrect.

He seemed to not expect the color of my eyes as it took him a minute to respond, "Vampires... are just like humans. I know that you have once cherished something, you feel emotions, the same emotions us humans feel. The only thing that separates us from you is you possess powers we don't possess. But I've seen humans and vampires being friends! I know a human who fell in love with a vampire—"

"And did their story end well?" I cut his sentence off. He gulped, pupils shaking as he looked down, realizing how that love story ended.

I already know how it ended, in blood.

If a vampire falls in love with a human, the king of all vampires, Leon, would find a way to punish them. Love between a vampire and human is forbidden, that was the rules set by the royals in order to keep the vampires from staining pure vampire blood with a human's blood.

Although, there has been already cases of hybrids being born but they are very weak since their blood has already been mixed with human blood. Hybirds could only live for 5 to 10 years at most, there was never a hybrid who reached an age beyond 10.

The punishment for falling in love with a human would mean that the vampire will suddenly go on berserk and kill their human lover with their own hands — that's only possible because the king of all vampires, Leon, made it possible. There are vampires and humans who are in a relationship and is still alive since they have been keeping it a secret since they'll be fine as long as it doesn't reach Leon's ears.

Once a human-vampire love relationship is found out by the king, Leon, he will always find a way to end it in nothing but bloodbath.

"I thought so..." I say, mocking his claims. I was about to walk away now that I've fully regained my powers and my heart is back but—

"The human...!" He suddenly shouted.

I turned around to face him again. His fists were clenched, he was biting the inside of his lips, and it was evident that he was about to cry. He brought his head up and opened his eyes to look at me.

"The human who fell in love with a vampire... was me."

...

I didn't expect that revelation. I sigh, rubbing my temple, "Look, human, if you want to cry and vent your heartbreak to someone then the vampire you're looking for is definitely not me. I'm going now..." I raised my hand and was about to go—

"My kid is a hybrid."

That made me stop on my tracks. This man... is saying more interesting things than I thought.

"You do know the thing about hybrids, right? They're very weak compared to other pure blooded vampires and they can only live for about a few years."

"I know..." his voice breaking, "he's always suffering from colds, he's always stuck in bed unable to play with other kids, he's just so fragile and he's suffering so much because of me..."

Ah, fuck. I ended up staying and listening to this human's worries.

"If only... if only there's a way for me to give him a normal life I will do it even if it's the cost of my life."

This is why humans are pathetic, weak, but also admiring.

I stayed silent, not because I didn't know what to say to him but because I know there's a way for a hybrid to become strong enough to live. Though it's only my hypothesis, is it cruel for me to say that I want his kid to become my test subject?

I hid the growing maniacal smile forming on my mouth. "So that's why you're out here in the woods... it's because you're searching for a vampire who knows how to make your hybrid kid survive?"

He could only nod.

I had a smug look on my face, it was a gamble, it was an evil gamble, if I do this it would either lead to the kid's survival or suffering. I don't even know what side effects the kid may feel if he ever do survive.

"Well, I guess you're lucky. You're looking at probably the only vampire who has a way to save your hybrid kid." I pointed to myself proudly.

His face lits up, he seemed to believe it. How desperate was he to save his child that he would trust a vampire who's physical form hasn't even lived in this world for hundred of years? I looked like a child but he believed me.

In his perspective, I probably look like a silver lining. An angel but a devil in disguise.

I'm a vampire, it's a given to be evil.

After that, he led me to his house. We had to leave the forest since his house was located at the city — a place dwelling with humans.

Ever since the dark moon happened, human civilization adapted to the discovery of the existence of vampires — they created vampire hunters, vampire hunter organization Solace, fortified their human defenses, and continues to research on effective ways to defend theirselves against vampires — or erase them from existence.

That's why the vampires claimed vast forests in the country as their territory since there were little to no humans living there and the humans know it's dangerous out in the woods so they avoid it as much as possible.

Of course, there are vampires who has adapted living with humans — to be precise, vampires lived longer than humans so if there's anyone with a big advantage, it's the vampires.

The humans are still developing and advancing their technologies and knowledge about vampires but the vampires already know everything about humans — especially the royals.

It's too late for the humans to discover more about the vampires because we have already been existing even before the beginning of the human's existence.

But... I guess when humans learn more about the vampires, the more they can create something out of the vampires scope of knowledge.

I stared at the barely breathing little boy tucked in the bed, his blood cells are really unstable. The human and vampire blood inside him are fighting dominance that his frail young body can't handle it.

It doesn't matter what blood dominate anyways because a hybrid cannot live with only one type of blood, a hybrid lives with human and vampire blood so the two shouldn't dominate one another but coexist together in his body.

The blood could only coexist when the human body can handle it and it could only happen when the body is matured enough.

An adult body can survive a hybrids blood but it's impossible for a hybrid to live beyond 10 years old. This kid is around 5 or 6 that's why he's in this state. The longer he lives, the more he suffers — not if his two bloods will coexist inside his body.

"D...Dad?" the kid called out. The hunter grabbed his son's hand and smiled at him.

"Niki, I'm here. I'm with someone who could help you, she's a good person."

I furrowed my eyebrow from the word "good". I'm not good. I killed humans — even at the brink of my death — I killed humans because that's how I functioned.

JOSEON DYNASTY

"She's not dead yet!"

"Quick! The rope! It's going to snap!"

"It's too late—!"

I escaped from the ropes, my whole body was burnt, but the burning rage within me was stronger than the flames the human villagers engulfed me.

I was conscious but I had no control of my body.

I don't know what got to me, I moved in an incredible speed for a vampire. I killed every human in the village, even those who were inside their homes. I left no one alive, and after that, the sky was painted with red; it was a dark moon and the last thing I remembered before dying was me staring at the dark moon — it was beautiful.

(to be precise, the day the dark moon happened, where all vampires went bat shit crazy, our female lead here also went bat shit crazy and started murdering the people who tried to burn her because she was found to be a vampire. So it all happened in the same day - just to clear things in case of confusion of the timeline.)

I woke up probably a hundred years later since the human inventions evolved so much. There were tall buildings instead of wooden houses and there were inventions I wasn't familiar with.

Anyways, now I'm here staring at this weak hybrid boy.

"Please, save him." The hunter pleaded.

"You kill vampires but you're kneeling to one." I made fun of him. He threw away his values as a hunter just to save his son — well, he did fell in love with a vampire so I guess his values were long gone before our paths crossed.

I got closer to the boy, his eyes were half open as he struggled to keep it open to see my face although his vision was probably nothing but a blur.

"Mind letting me borrow a pocket knife?" I told the hunter, he didn't ask anything and just gave me one.

I brought it to my wrist and sliced my skin. I could feel the hunter was surprised and was contemplating to stop me, but the weight of his care for his son weighs more than his care for a vampire he barely knew.

"Drink." I say, forcing the little kid's mouth open. He didn't want to but he didn't have any say.

He gulped my blood.

hm, nothing happened...?

"Eughk—!" I backed away from the bed when his son suddenly started to go into a seizure.

Black veins were popping on his skin as it crawled up to his neck up until it was covering his face, his eyes were glowing red — that's a good sign, right...?

"Niki! What's happening!?"

"I believe this is a side effect." I say.

"Side effect!? You never told me there was a side effect?" He turned to me, eyes filled with confusion and frustration.

I shrugged, raising my shoulder, "I didn't know either. This is the first time I'm doing this." I smiled.

"Y-You! You tricked me!"

"Still think vampires and humans can coexist?" I asked him, I was dead serious.

I didn't know why but I wanted to crush his hopeless dreams about humans and vampires coexisting — I wanted to crush it before it could even crush him.

His son, Niki, started to cough out blood, but it was black. The hunter ran back to him and held his hands tightly.

"Well, good luck with your son, hunter."

"Wait—!" Before the hunter could even stop me from leaving, I disappeared into thin air.

-

That was the last time I've seen the hunter. After that, the royals found me and told that I'm with royal blood which explains the color of my eyes. I never expected to reincarnate into a royal vampire who got kidnapped by the humans.

Niki... that was the name of the hunter's son and they're both nishimura — is it the same boy that I forced to drink my blood?

Was he the hybrid?

Did my blood work, was it able to stabilize the human and vampire blood inside him?

But if it gets out, Leon will really go on a rampage and kill my successful test subject one.

I have to get to him before Leon gets suspicious of anything.