Chapter 54
“What choice do I have?” Fu Xia heard herself say. “Isn’t that a question you should be asking the Progenitor?”
When he had chosen her as the key to his legacy, he hadn’t exactly consulted her. If Fu Xia wanted to live as a human, she would have to face constant danger. Becoming a vampire at least offered a chance at survival.
Fu Xia found this Prince in front of her to be very annoying. “So, are you planning to stop me, or did you just want to chat?”
Eva was silent. She shook her head gently and met Fu Xia’s gaze. “I just think… you shouldn’t have been turned into a vampire.”
Only then did Fu Xia notice that her eyes were pure black.
When the woman retracted her aura of pressure, Fu Xia realized that she actually looked very human. It wasn’t that she wasn’t beautiful, but the sense of weariness she exuded was rarely seen in a vampire. The ones Fu Xia had met so far had all been… supremely arrogant, looking down on humanity.
Fu Xia tilted her head. “You don’t seem to like your own kind very much.”
A faint sorrow crossed Eva’s features. “Before I give you my blood, take a look… at the future you are about to face.”
The moment she finished speaking, the moonlight before Fu Xia twisted and blurred, and the surrounding scenery reassembled itself into a new image.
Fu Xia saw herself in the first hundred years after becoming a vampire, reveling in the power she had never had before. But gradually, the people she knew died off, one by one, until only vampires like herself were left. She could never fully trust them, even after a long time had passed.
She began to feel lonely.
In the following centuries, she grew bored of the power struggles and returned to human society, trying to find something to pique her interest.
Another hundred years later, she met her Lighthouse, but he was human…
“Wait,” Fu Xia interrupted the illusion. “I don’t care about any of that.”
In reality, she had no one in her life worth cherishing or missing.
Meeting Eva’s dark eyes, Fu Xia chose her words carefully.
“I don’t think I will fall in love with a human in the future—and even if I do, I will do everything in my power to turn him into a vampire.” After her transformation, Fu Xia was even less the type to consider others’ feelings too much.
Eva stared at her. Her dark eyes reflected Fu Xia’s image. She didn’t move, just watched, silent.
“…Don’t tell me you did the same thing back then?” If so, why had Song Yingxi said her Lighthouse was dead?
Eva sighed. “I… did not turn him.”
The scene before Fu Xia changed again. It took her two seconds to realize she was seeing Eva’s past.
Eva’s soul had been “dead” for a very long time.
In the beginning, the number of vampires was extremely small, countable on one hand. As one of the first, Eva hadn’t been like this in her first few centuries. She had been curious about everything, with an endless supply of vitality. For the first few hundred years of her existence, Eva had always been happy, joyful. Though she couldn’t walk in the sun for long, she had still made good friends.
—Human friends.
But a human’s lifespan was limited. Her happiness gradually faded as her friends died, one by one. Eva kept making friends, and kept losing them. On a cold night, she suddenly felt lonely.
So, she tried turning a human.
But the companion she had hoped for never appeared. The humans who were turned, without exception, found they could no longer fit into their original lives. Humans treated them as monsters. They could no longer touch the sunlight and could only watch the outside world like creatures from the dark underground.
…Eva had ruined their lives.
For nearly a century, Eva had faced their intense hatred. The vampires she had turned then turned others. And so, the number of vampires grew, and they even developed different, opposing factions. Her world descended into chaos.
In the end, it was the Progenitor who came and solved everything. The heavily wounded Eva became silent and resolved to live in seclusion, far from society.
Until Eva met her Lighthouse.
He was a young man with a gentle disposition. He had been sketching at the edge of her castle, and by chance, his eyes had met hers as she stood on the terrace.
She had met her Lighthouse.
She walked out of her lonely castle and spent many seasons with the human. He never asked about the strange things about her and always accepted her for who she was. Their platonic love lasted for over fifty years.
Those were perhaps the happiest fifty years of her long life.
Eva didn’t dare to turn him. She was afraid he would resent her, just like the others had.
The moment he died, her entire world went dark. She became a monster wandering in the darkness, with no chance of ever returning to the light.
She was certain—a long life was a vicious curse.
Fu Xia watched Eva cry by the human’s deathbed, her own heart unmoved.
She heard a sigh from behind her.
“…This is my past,” Eva said. “Actually, I know you are their Lighthouse. I’m even a little envious of them.”
She seemed to be lost in her own world, the sorrow on her face deepening. Fu Xia suspected she just wanted someone to talk to. But Fu Xia couldn’t empathize with this at all.
“What’s the purpose of showing me this?” Fu Xia asked. “I’m already a vampire. As far as I know, there’s no way to turn a vampire back into a human.”
“…The Progenitor will give you a chance to choose your race.”
Eva hoped Fu Xia would cherish this second chance.
Fu Xia paused. She felt that Eva didn’t have any malicious intent, so even though Fu Xia didn’t understand her thinking, she said patiently, “I’m not really interested in love…”
“Besides,” Fu Xia added after a moment, “if it were me, I wouldn’t give them a chance to resent me.”
Eva thought Fu Xia would follow the same path and wanted to warn an ignorant newborn. …But she didn’t know that Fu Xia’s personality was a much better fit for a vampire.
“You probably don’t know, but even before this, I was used to being alone,” Fu Xia said.
Compared to a future of potential loneliness, Fu Xia believed the present was what mattered most. At worst, she could just kill herself in the end.
Eva’s gaze turned pitiful.
“…Don’t look at me like that. I’m sure I won’t regret it.”
“Then come and take it,” Eva sighed. She opened her arms, her compassionate gaze resting on Fu Xia’s face, as if looking at a poor traveler who had lost their way.
The look made Fu Xia’s skin crawl. She thought Eva was a little too self-righteous. But as long as she could get the heart’s blood, that was all that mattered. She had no intention of continuing the discussion on whether a long life was a good or bad thing.
Fu Xia held the dagger. The silver blade pierced flesh, and blood flowed down the groove. She took out a container, collected a small cup, and drank it.
Eva didn’t struggle at all.
“Is the Progenitor’s legacy under our feet?”
Eva shook her head, as if feeling no pain. She pointed in a direction. “Follow that path, and you’ll reach it.”
Fu Xia looked. The path hadn’t been used in a long time and was covered in a thick layer of moss.
She pulled out her dagger and thanked Eva. —At least she hadn’t tried to stop her. If they had fought, Fu Xia was sure she couldn’t have beaten this ancient vampire.
“By the way,” Fu Xia asked before leaving, “how are you so sure your Lighthouse wouldn’t have wanted to become a vampire?”
Eva stood there, stunned. A smile that was uglier than crying appeared on her face. She turned away, no longer looking at Fu Xia.
Fu Xia didn’t care what Eva was thinking. She gripped her dagger and carefully stepped onto the moss-covered path.
The faint sounds of fighting in the distance gradually faded. Fu Xia ducked under some crossed branches and arrived at a very simple, arched tombstone.
Moonlight covered the coffin. Perhaps because the Progenitor had died recently, it wasn’t covered in moss like the surrounding ground.
The legacy was right in front of her.
She suppressed the excitement of her goal being within reach and scanned the area, making sure there were no traps, before finally standing in front of the tombstone.
A string of ornate English letters was written on it, probably his name. It was too fancy for Fu Xia to read.
She had thought he would have chosen a more magnificent resting place, but she hadn’t expected it to be in such a desolate wilderness. But placing his legacy in such a place was in line with his malicious personality.
Fu Xia knocked on the coffin.
Naturally, no one answered.
She tried to kick the lid, but it was sealed tight. So she had to bend down and pry it open with her dagger—thanks to her new vampiric strength, she had the power to open it.
A few seconds later, the lid was completely off.
Fu Xia saw the young man lying inside.
He was handsome. The coffin was lined with soft red satin, and beautiful preserved flowers were scattered around him. He was lying with his eyes closed, his hands folded on his chest, looking like a dead human from a movie.
The moonlight on his handsome face added a touch of sanctity.
—But there was no “legacy.”
Fu Xia was sure there was only this corpse.
She narrowed her eyes, raised her hand, and the dagger shot down—just as the tip was about to pierce the person in the coffin, he suddenly took a sharp breath.
Fu Xia saw the supposedly dead person open his eyes.
“Phew,” he said. “You scared me.”