Chapter 114: Chapter 31: Queen of the Night III [Update 7]
On the way back.
Van Helsing eagerly asked Su Ziyu about what had happened. Upon learning that some vampire banshees had lost everything, he couldn’t help but burst into laughter, "How interesting!"
"Truly interesting!"
"You devil! How come I didn’t think of such a method?"
I don’t know what Van Helsing was thinking, but it’s certainly nothing good.
On the way back, Su Ziyu couldn’t help but ask, "What’s the situation with these vampires?"
The vampire banshees of the Night Queen are quite special.
They don’t seem aggressive, and apart from a hint of chill in their demeanor and low body temperature, these vampire banshees are indistinguishable from ordinary women, perhaps only slightly more attractive.
"They are moderate faction vampires," Van Helsing said as he lit a cigarette for himself.
No one knows when he got it, but Su Ziyu noticed the dwarves smoking these during the day, a kind of unfiltered tobacco rolled in paper.
This guy’s quite good at using a dharma seal to light a cigarette.
"Moderate faction?" Su Ziyu asked, very curious.
"Yes." Van Helsing nodded, explaining: "Vampires are also intelligent beings."
"For some special vampires, blood is not a necessity for survival. Their craving for blood is like our craving for fine wine; some high-tier vampires can even completely give up their blood cravings."
"Anirella is one of the leaders of the moderate vampires."
"This faction believes in not easily taking human lives and prefers to satisfy their blood cravings in other ways."
Su Ziyu was a little surprised and said, "So she opened a brothel? Considering blood as extra payment?"
"Her identity is more complex than that." Van Helsing shook the ash from his cigarette and slowly said, "Moderate vampires are only moderate by comparison; some among them still keep humans, but their methods are less intense."
At this point, Van Helsing began to give Su Ziyu a detailed account of vampires.
The vampires in this world are products of a celestial convergence, all from other worlds, left here due to some mishaps.
The Demon Hunters often deal with not vampires, but a kind of blood-sucking beast from their world.
This lowest tier of vampires has beastly, ferocious appearances, and many of their feeding methods don’t involve sucking blood but tearing people apart and feasting on the flesh. Known low-tier vampires take on beastly forms, very vicious and aggressive.
In the vampire world, they are viewed as beasts, but high-tier vampires can control them.
Demon Hunters in the past mostly dealt with such monsters!
Vampires that can appear in human form are usually dangerous; they belong to mid to high-tier vampires, who in their world are akin to humans, while the low-tier beast form vampires are like their domesticated beasts.
Demon Hunters rarely actively hunt humanoid vampires.
Partly because they are highly intelligent and good at hiding their identities, and partly because they are very powerful and hard to deal with.
As intelligent beings.
Vampires also have different factions, and Anirella, seen today, is a leader of the moderate vampires, who rarely attack humans and prefer to obtain blood through transactions.
Besides, there is another traditionalist vampire faction.
These vampires are the ones Judy talked about, who keep humans like livestock. They even proposed a plan to breed humans, believing this could yield higher-quality blood, far more efficient than hunting humans. These vampires are divided into captive breeding and free-range breeding.
The former believe in caging humans, providing them with resources, letting them breed, and periodically harvesting their blood.
These humans are kept like slaves, many of whom gradually die in captivity.
This category of vampires was the main target of Demon Hunters in the past, and Van Helsing once rescued Melissa from their clutches with help from the Night Queen’s madam.
The latter believes that since humans are intelligent, it’s better to put them in a natural environment, create realistic settlements like villages, and through psychological manipulation, make them dependent on their captors, viewing blood offerings as honorable.
The rumored vampire-enslaved human villages in the Northern Continent are the products of such vampires.
Of course.
These powerful and well-resourced vampires operate differently.
Ordinary vampires prefer hiding, blending into villages to hunt unnoticed by Demon Hunters.
Those daring to operate openly in big cities are tough characters.
Like the female night demon they encountered at the start.
"In this world, we humans hold the dominant position," Van Helsing said, taking a deep puff of his cigarette, "but in their original world, vampires are the rulers of everything."
"The humans who originally lived there or accidentally entered."
"To them, they are like our livestock."
Van Helsing extinguished his cigarette and said solemnly, "Moderate vampires think this approach is too primitive and barbaric, and not the behavior of a civilized intelligent species, some even giving up blood cravings entirely."
"If we want to establish ourselves here, we must find a way to win them over."
Vampires in this world are unique.
In Su Ziyu’s previous understanding, vampires were a type of monster.
Yet in this world, he hears that vampires consider themselves as civilized intelligent beings, even engaging in disputes with traditionalist vampires. Their original world must have had many vampires, to birth such a dovish ideology.
A few individual vampires not harming people might be a personal choice, but a special existence like the Night Queen’s brothel must be due to some societal phenomenon.
"Can they be trusted?" Su Ziyu asked in return.
Van Helsing laughed heartily at the question, patting his shoulder, "How could they? They are vampires, after all!"
"Even if they don’t kill, they are still vampires."
Su Ziyu understood Van Helsing’s point.
Cooperation is possible, but not friendship.
Demon Hunters aim to deal with those vampires still adhering to human-hunting traditions, while with these dovish vampires, cooperation is possible when necessary.
Su Ziyu always thought he was quite good at managing interpersonal relationships.
But in Van Helsing, he found much to learn!
......