Chapter Text
Mo Ran is about to meet the man that has turned him into a vampire. The only information he has about him is that his name is Chu Wanning, and that he is part of Sisheng Faction. Not that Mo Ran knows a lot about vampire politics. He’s like, three weeks old. In vampire terms, that is. In theory, he’s twenty-three, but he got into an accident the other day and died. Except then he didn’t, because someone turned him into a vampire, which, hello?
What the fuck do you mean, vampires are real?!
But oh, turns out they absolutely are real, and Mo Ran is one of them now. For some reason. Because someone turned him, which is still batshit (ha. Bat. Get it?) crazy to him, but nothing he can do about it now. He supposes he’s immortal now.
Look, Mo Ran is over his teenage suicidality, but immortality wasn’t actually in his plans either, if he’s honest. Well, he supposes that he has been told vampires aren’t actually immortal. They just get very old. As far as he knows, the oldest vampire in the world is some old fart that’s like, slightly above a thousand years old. Or at least, Xue Meng had said. Who’s also a vampire.
Goddamnit.
Mo Ran hadn’t thought his annoying coworker was a vampire. Or in other words: Mo Ran hadn’t thought that pretty much everyone at the company he works at is a vampire. He didn’t have a single clue. He’d feel somewhat threatened in hindsight, if not for the fact that the single only thing he knows about vampire politics is that Sisheng Faction is hated as hell because they don’t drink human blood. Vegetarian, so to speak. Partly because vampires don’t actually need blood, and partly because animal blood absolutely will suffice if you truly have a craving too great to face with a piece of bread or a bowl of noodles.
Mo Ran did get blood, when he woke up. Xue Meng was feeding him something almost immediately, which he’d later told Mo Ran was because otherwise he would go on a rampage and hurt someone in a search for human blood, because that’s what happens when you get turned. But it didn’t, because Mengmeng was right by his side feeding him cow blood mixed with a bit of human blood stolen from a hospital to satiate the first craving. The thing is, Mo Ran had figured it would be medicine, since he’d been run over by a carriage of some kind, so he’d just drunk it, thinking it tastes slightly metallic, but not making much of it.
Only when he came to properly and was confronted with the fact that he’d just downed three whole liters of cow blood (he feels like the few drops of human blood in it mattered significantly less, somehow) did he feel somewhat sick at the thought.
Over the past three weeks, then, Mo Ran has learned a lot. For the first two, he was sickly, as if he had a cold, and people – Xue Meng, Xue Zhengyong and Wang Chuqing, who were his two bosses back when he was still human, and this random guy named Shi Mei – kept bringing him blood. Mostly cow and horse blood, but once Xue Zhengyong wormed his way in with a bottle of a swirling, deep-blue liquid, grinning. That was at the two-weeks mark, and he’d handed it to Mo Ran with a wink, and told him that well, alcohol won’t really do the job anymore when you’re a vampire, so he’ll have to make do with, well.
Octopus blood. A rarity, apparently.
Mo Ran got entirely smashed and woke up with a headache much worse than the one he’d had after being hit by a carriage and then being turned into a vampire. Not again any time soon. Given he has since learned the price of octopus blood…
Yeah.
Not again any time soon.
In the past week, then, Mo Ran has simply started to work again. He still needs to eat and sleep like normal humans, so he got up at seven – although in company quarters rather than his own flat still, went to work, took his lunch break, went back to work, and then he went back to his quarters. Or, in other words: being a vampire has been weirdly uneventful. Mo Ran hasn’t gotten a single craving for blood, nor has he lived any differently. He’s noticed he’s stronger, and he’s had some trouble with picking up glasses without breaking them, but that only made him feel like some super strong dude in a novel, and thus, he quite liked even that difficulty. Xue Meng said that the one who turned him, Chu Wanning, might teach him some stuff. How to get around and all. He did that for the rest of them, since apparently it was this Chu Wanning guy who turned most of the people at the company.
Mo Ran had asked why. He could’ve just let him die.
Xue Meng’s response was to bristle and scold Mo Ran for ever questioning Chu Wanning’s decisions.
Xue Zhengyong’s answer was a little sigh and a smile on his face that you’d expect someone to give about an unruly child, saying that Chu Wanning just truly cannot stand to let people die. Honorable, Mo Ran guesses. After all, you can literally just live like before, and if you’ve got enough of it all, get yourself a wooden stake or a silver bullet and have it over with and all.
Wang Chuqing’s answer was a kind little nod, telling him the same thing, but in more respectful terms.
What Mo Ran has thus gathered about his savior that he is about to meet in no fucking time at all is that he:
One: Has a massive savior complex.
Two: Is the leader of an age old faction promoting non-human blood consumption from either ethical animal sources or each other, as vampires can drink from each other and be entirely fine about it.
Three: Is apparently imposing as fuck, because everyone has been hyping him up.
Needless to say, Mo Ran is terrified to hell and back now that he is about to meet this man. Shi Mei is taking him down to the basement, where Chu Wanning mostly operates from. There’s a whole network there. Mo Ran’s been told that if he wants to, he can join their vampire work, but he doesn’t have to. It’s up to him. but he should at least meet Chu Wanning once to talk it over with, and receive some instructions on what to do now that he’s been turned.
Also, apparently, Chu Wanning is the traditional kind, who absolutely insists on properly introducing himself to the people he has turned. Mo Ran didn’t know this is related to tradition, but okay. He’s new to the whole vampire thing. What the fuck does he know?
So, yeah. Savior complex, massively respected, traditional, and apparently, Chu Wanning is also feared because he has a horribly short temper and fits of anger. He’s intimidating. Everyone speaks of him like he’s some sort of monster, but always with that weird sort of reverence that makes him not a monster at all.
Mo Ran is terrified.
He thinks it’s a reasonable fear.
“Uh,” he starts, looking down at Shi Mei, “what if he like, hates me?”
“Lord Chu does not hate people without reason,” Shi Mei says, probably for the fifth time. “Just be respectful.”
“What if I do something stupid? Is he going to like, kill me-“
“Mo Ran. He saved your life. He is not going to kill you. That goes against everything he stands for.”
“Haha… well, look, it’s just that everyone says you can get real issues from your creator rejecting you, and I already have a lot of issues with just my actual father, so it’d be nice if I didn’t get more, you know-“
“If you are respectful towards Lord Chu, he will treat you the same,” Shi Mei repeats, slowly starting to sound a tiny bit annoyed with Mo Ran. Mo Ran can’t blame him, but he also can’t blame himself, because hello? ‘Lord’? Mo Ran has never interacted with someone deserving of that title. He works at a newspaper company, alright?
“Is he really as imposing as they say?”
“…My opinion on him differs from many others, so I may not be the best source,” Shi Mei says. He gives a small shrug, and then points at a large iron door in front of Mo Ran.
A fucking iron door. This looks less like the entrance to Lord Chu Wanning’s Vampire Lair, but instead like the fucking gates of hell. Isn’t that what Christianity is all about? An eternal fire and all that burns you to death while the devil laughs at you? He doesn’t remember. Been a while since Mo Ran learned about Christianity in school and all. But that’s what it looks like.
“You can just go in. Take a seat at the table, just not at either end of it. These are reserved for Chu Wanning and the boss. He’ll be with you shortly, since he is still talking to a client.”
Mo Ran gives a nod, and Shi Mei just leaves him in front of this huge fucking door.
Nothing to be done about it. If he stays here, he might just offend Chu Wanning and get off on a wrong foot with the seven hundred years old vampire that’s turned him.
Because oh yeah, Chu Wanning has lived a crapton, basically. It’s said that he was turned by the oldest vampire around, so it makes sense he’s over seven hundred. Mo Ran forgot his exact age. It’s not like he’s going to exactly ask for it. Would that be considered to be as impolite as when you ask humans?
Good god. Are there any books on vampire etiquette? Mo Ran desperately needs one.
And so, accepting his defeat, Mo Ran pushes open that massive iron door.
The room is, in fact, not hell itself. It’s a very spacious large room with a big table in the middle, kind of like you’d imagine one for western knights or something. There is a dark red carpet laid out around the table, and the walls are almost entirely covered in bookshelves.
Other than that, there isn’t much in the room. Some glasses are set down on the table face down, and there are bottles of water, juice, and wine on the table.
(Kind of just a waste of money, if alcohol doesn’t even do anything – at this point, Mo Ran would think vampires would just opt for grape juice. Or, you know, refill a wine bottle with grape juice to make it look fancy but save the money.)
In the back, however, there is a door, and next to it in an open space is a ladder. Probably for the book shelves, given they reach right up to the ceiling. The door then, probably, leads to Chu Wanning’s private chambers. Or at least Mo Ran would assume as much, since the others have said he lives here in the basement usually. Mostly to avoid sunlight, because the vampire that turned him did have that trait, and even though it isn’t as bad in Chu Wanning, it’s still present.
Mo Ran is fine in sunlight. He burns a bit faster now than he did before he thinks, but nothing some sunscreen or a good tan can’t fix.
…It’s not like tanning himself is going to give him skin cancer or anything now. Since he’s a vampire who literally cannot die until he’s what? A thousand or something? He’s pretty sure that Xue Zhengyong told him that they start croaking their last croaks at eight hundred, but usually make it way further than that, if they don’t take their own lives.
Ah, he thought in they again. It should be we now.
He’s just not quite used yet.
Mo Ran does as he has been told, and he sits down at a random chair on the side of the table, assuming that Chu Wanning, once he comes in, will take a seat at either end of the table.
After that, Mo Ran waits.
And waits.
And he waits so long that he gets up again and walks towards the bookshelves because he gets really fucking bored, and then he’s already reading about the art of forging blood seals on someone’s neck to enhance their powers temporarily or help cure them. Which is a rad fucking power to have in his humble opinion – obviously just vampire-to-vampire, though. Vampire to human doesn’t work like that, and Mo Ran knows that. The next chapter is about some bullshit about some disease you might get if your creator rejects you, but that sounds mythical and like a load of crap. Pretty romantic, but that’s about as far as it goes. Who knows how much of that is true? He can ask someone one day, probably. Maybe it’s just to deter people from inappropriate relationships or something. Mo Ran has no idea, he’s new to this whole vampirism thing.
He's roughly three chapters into this pretty ancient text (it literally said it was translated into Chinese from Latin) when the door opens again.
And in steps definitely not Chu Wanning.
No.
Because in steps a child that barely reaches the handles of the iron door, though the boy opens it quite easily. Vampire, then. Superhuman strength and all, even at age…
Eight?
Nine?
Ten, maybe, at most?
Mo Ran’s not entirely sure.
He’s a cute little kid, though, Mo Ran has to admit. Chubby cheeks and silky black hair worn in a ponytail way too strict for someone his age. He’s wearing a white dress shirt and a grey vest adorned with a small, golden brooch – the emblem of Sisheng – and grey dress pants to match. His feet are clad in brown leather shoes, and even his white socks are showing.
All serious, for such a small boy. Mo Ran almost snorts at the sight. Just who the hell are his parents, to make their little darling son look like some European eighteenth century vampire? Look, Mo Ran knows that vampires originated in Europe and all, but do they really have to take those traditions so seriously?
Mo Ran stares at him, while the boy stares back.
He has to admit that this kid does have a weirdly imposing aura, with his stern phoenix eyes and his tightly drawn lips, but the chubby cheeks and the fuzzy baby hair falling out of his ponytail on the sides of his face make Mo Ran feels like he’s still in his good right to tease the kid a bit.
“Hey, Didi,” he says, looking at the kid. “Did you get lost? I’ve heard this Lord Chu can get quite angry when you just walk into his home, so if I were you, I’d try getting lost somewhere else.”
The kid cocks an eyebrow. He doesn’t seem particularly amused, Mo Ran notes.
“I am not lost.”
“Oh, then are you like, a servant boy? Aren’t you a little too young for that?” Mo Ran walks over to the child and crouches down a little to have a good look at him. Up close, his cheeks are quite rosy, actually. “Hm, no, you look way too pretty ‘n pampered to be something like that. Didn’t think Chu Wanning took any proper vampire disciples. Oh, oh, don’t tell me, you’re his son? Oh wait, can vampires even have children-“
“Do you never shut up?”
The serious tone makes Mo Ran give a snort under his breath. Oh, a little brat who thinks super highly of himself, isn’t he? Mo Ran reaches for that little cheek and gives it a quick pinch.
The child is way too taken aback for a second to react and catch him in time.
“Cheeky one, aren’t you-“
And then, Mo Ran gets thrown back a good few meters by a black wall of pure dust that suddenly gathers from all over the rooms, whirling around the child’s feet for a second after Mo Ran has landed square on his butt. Then, it dissipates around him, leaving behind a greyish, ashen trail on the carpet, and a thin cloud in the air.
Oops.
Mo Ran thinks he might just have fucked up, actually.
“Insolent,” the child judges him, casually grabbing the chair at the end of the table and pulling it back before climbing into it. Because it’s quite the high chair. He has to use the small step on the chair to go sit down. “Do they not teach you to respect your elders these days?”
“My-“ Mo Ran chokes, and he thinks that he might just have fucked up, actually.
Shit. There’s no way. Please no.
“Chu Wanning does not take disciples, and he does not have servants, either. I am interested, though. You said he has a short temper?”
Mo Ran freezes, still not having gotten off the floor. He’s not sure he can allow himself to get up anyway, without this kid’s permission.
“I just-“ he starts, “I’ve just heard.”
“So that’s what they say,” the boy sighs, his high voice, matching someone his physical age, not at all corresponding to that severe tone in his words, “interesting. I suppose there are likely more rumours about my person still?”
Yeah. Mo Ran has massively fucked up, because this quite literally is just Chu Wanning. Oh, fuck him, of course he just had to take a big misstep again. In his fucking defense, no one told him that Chu Wanning looks like a child! They said he’s a super imposing seven hundred years old vampire! In Mo Ran’s eyes, that would be an adult person, not some scrawny pre-teen with the cutest chubbiest cheeks known to mankind! Vampirekind! Whatever!
“Not… not that I know of, Lord,” Mo Ran stutters, still awkwardly looking up at the boy.
His mannerisms, undoubtedly, are that of an adult. He takes some of the wine that’s close to him and pours himself a glass. It’s red wine. He swirls it a little, and then takes a sip before he crosses his arms a little.
His eyes travel to the chair that’s off-set, where Mo Ran had previously sat. It moves on its own.
“Get up and sit down.”
Mo Ran does as told, because he’s absolutely terrified of what this guy could potentially do to him, if he’s honest. He scrambles to his feet and then sits back down in the chair prepared for him as fast as he can.
“I’m sorry, I did not know that you…”
“I could tell, boy,” that ten-year-old-looking kid says to Mo Ran, a grown adult that towers over him by several heads. “It is no matter. I know that behind my back, people oftentimes speak quite… uncharitably. I suppose no one has described me to you?”
“N-no Lord,” Mo Ran continues, very direly hoping that Chu Wanning’s mood will improve from here on out. This is truly the worst first meeting he could’ve had with his creator, but no use in lamenting around about that – he’ll just have to do his absolute best to fix this now, and to do that as fast as possible. “You were only described to me… in passing. I did not mean to offend. It was just that I had no idea…”
“Again. I could tell. …Help yourself to something to drink.”
“Ah! Of course,” Mo Ran yelps, reaching over to take just some water. He’s scared to touch any of the obviously expensive drinks now. He pours himself a glass and takes a small sip, afraid to make any sort of loud noise at all.
Chu Wanning seems to want to forget what just happened just as desperately as Mo Ran, luckily, and thus just begins introducing himself; his name, the year he was turned, and his age. Seven-hundred-twenty-nine. Damn. Now that’s an age. Over seven hundred years Mo Ran’s senior. He explains shortly, and with a very pissed off glare at Mo Ran, that he was turned at age ten, hence his looks. After that, it’s already all technical. He asks Mo Ran about some things in his life; facts, mostly. His birthday and occupation, his relation to the company before he got turned, since Chu Wanning hadn’t seen him around. How much he knows about vampires, which isn’t a lot at all. Chu Wanning explains what can and can’t kill him, albeit only briefly so. He gives him a short rundown about blood drinking as a whole.
You do not need it to survive, though it does come with benefits or elevated strength and the like. It can become an addiction on both sides, both for the physical aspect of it as well as the benefits. Drinking from humans can lead to them turning if it’s done often enough, and most deaths of unclear cause that Mo Ran has heard about in the media are likely vampire-related. Drinking from another vampire comes with less benefits, and is thus mostly done ‘recreationally’, or to still thirst if it ever occurs and there is no food nearby, as Chu Wanning phrases it.
Yes, yes, Mo Ran gets it – basically this is like opium or something. Less bad, probably, but he gets the gist.
It’s just…
Throughout the entire conversation, Mo Ran can’t quite stop looking at that cute little nose in Chu Wanning’s face, because he’s literally just adorable. He supposes his aura is indeed imposing, but he can’t fathom being genuinely scared of the guy. Not when he looks like some pampered young master that should still be learning his hanzi right now.
“Mo Ran,” Chu Wanning then starts again.
Mo Ran’s head shoots up.
“Hm?”
“I know I have turned you against your will,” he says. Mo Ran blinks. He hadn’t really thought about that much, if he’s honest. “I refuse to kill you simply because you are still young, but if you ever reach an age at which a human would usually die, and you prefer seeking death… You may request me to be the one to do it.”
Ah. Yeah. Mo Ran supposes this does make sense. He could also kill himself. He’s tried before. He’d probably be unafraid to try again, if he got any worse again, mentally.
“Eh,” he says, thus, “no need. I’m just gonna live for now. I hadn’t wanted to die either way, so thank you for saving my life.”
“I didn’t. You are not alive anymore.”
“Well, it’s kind of all the same, isn’t it?” Mo Ran laughs, “I’ve still gotta be grateful for it. I’ll keep it in mind, though. It’s a kind offer to make. Doesn’t it hurt you, to kill others? Just ‘cause you were the one to turn them, doesn’t that still bother you?”
Chu Wanning, who had just lifted his cup of wine, lets it sink right back down.
“What?”
“Well… after all, you’ve still turned them to save their lives. Doesn’t killing them kinda defeat the purpose of that? And like, I guess I’d probably feel bad killing someone, just point blank. Have you ever done that?”
It’s probably way too personal of a question. Mo Ran only realizes that after he’s already asked. Chu Wanning looks at him. He doesn’t respond for quite a while.
“Yes. I have.”
It’s everything he says, and then nothing else. He doesn’t talk about how he feels about this. That makes sense. Mo Ran probably shouldn’t expect that of him, no matter how young he looks.
“Either way. If such a time comes for you, let me know. It is my duty. Now, are you planning to stay?”
“Hm? Where else would I go? I kinda work here.”
“I meant at Sisheng, not at the newspaper company,” Chu Wanning says, clearly a little annoyed with how slow Mo Ran is on the uptake of his very, very vague words.
“…Why would I not stay?”
“Some vampires prefer to drink human blood, after all. We are against this, as it is unnecessary past one’s first turning, but I also understand that this is not for everyone.”
“…But aren’t you trying to convince people not to do that anyway?” Mo Ran stutters, because he feels entirely lost.
Chu Wanning clicks his tongue. He crosses his arms and looks at him.
“Obviously this does not work on large scale. We try to protect as many humans as possible. Not every vampire is irresponsible. However, there are still no laws in place for a need of consent between a vampire and the human, and we are trying to establish at least this much. However, when you live here, we would ask you to refrain entirely from harming a human, unless you are in some sort of intimate relationship and they clearly agree.”
“…I’m not,” Mo Ran says, “and besides, there’s plenty of-“
Hot people who are vampires, which will be enough.
This time, he realizes that he shouldn’t say these words out loud to someone like Chu Wanning. Not because he looks like a child (he’s over seven-hundred years old, after all), but because Mo Ran gets the vibe from him that he’s a horrible prude. Not that he should be anything else, probably, given his physique.
“Either way. I don’t care about harming anyone, and I’ve never been the best at controlling myself, so probably better if I don’t get into all that.”
What Mo Ran doesn’t tell Chu Wanning is that he had extensive alcohol escapades, and if blood drinking can become something of an addiction, then he better abstain from it entirely. Mo Ran is somewhat stable in life now, so he doesn’t feel comfortable about the idea of becoming all fucked up again, like when he was a teenager.
Doesn’t mean that he can’t still be a snarky bastard.
“Alright. Do you want to work for us, too? You have a strong and sturdy build, and given that I was the one to turn you, you potentially hold great power if you cultivate it properly.”
“…What work would I do?”
“Anything, really,” Chu Wanning says. “What we do ranges from activism to relatively dangerous jobs, however you do not have to do anything that you do not want to. I usually take care of the most difficult work, such as capturing rabid vampires. However, you could be used as a bodyguard of sorts. But you are under no obligation.”
“…I could try, I think,” Mo Ran says, his heart somehow skipping a beat. He hasn’t really been good in his life so far. When he was a teen, he’s fucked up a lot of people. And now, being represented with the possibility of saving others, suddenly? And someone teaching him to use his physical might for good?
It’s a strangely appealing idea.
“Alright. Monday to Wednesday, seven in the morning, here.”
“Seven in the morning?”
“You’re a vampire. You need sleep, but tiredness will feel different. Seven in the morning causes no issue.”
“…And what exactly are we going to do?”
“I will train you, obviously.”
Obviously. Like Mo Ran isn’t new to this whole vampire thing or whatever.
He gives a confused little nod at that boy sitting in front of him, still just kind of wondering what the fuck is going on in his life at this point.
“Okay. I’ll be there.”