XIV · Nine Thousand & Something

🎧 Illusion by Dua Lipa

✵ ✵ ✵

"Do you like cherries?" The question left my lips on its own.

"I love cherries, and everything that has its flavor," he purred. "It's always been an addiction of mine, that and vanilla flavored things, together with cognac. Can you imagine how addicting your scent is, cherryling?"

If I said I am addicted to his scent too, would it make things weird with him? I think it's too soon, so, I'mma keep it to myself for now. "Mmm, yeah?" I breathed, moving my hips over his erection, a frightening one. "I wanna know the reason, because I've been dying to have you inside me ever since we were left alone in the hallway," even before that.

"I can't not bite when having actual sex," he groaned. "It's a need."

Fuck, I should have picked phoenix.

"I hate this world," I cried. "I need you, Dorian, I really need you in me. I don't know if it's because those sirens messed with me, but I've been burning to have sex ever since I got here, which is bizarre to me. I literally lost my virginity yesterday, and,"

He frowned, "You lost it yesterday? With whom?" Was that a hiss?

"Funny enough, I thought I was fucking you," I mean, it's true.

And men, if he didn't look furious, "What the fuck? What does that even mean? Didn't you say you didn't know who I was?"

"That is precisely the point," I chuckled anxiously and told him a short version of the story, which got him red with anger, in a very comic as much as frightening way. "I don't think it even lasted two minutes, one and a bit, at best. As soon as the fake Dorian began to move inside me, he had the brilliant idea, as a vampire, to bite me, and since I was clueless as hell, I let him. How was I supposed to know he would die? I freaked out when he began to bleed profusely from all the orifices of his body, above me, then I threw him at the side of the bed and… watched him die."

But when I thought he was going to question the copycat, he made a totally different one, "You moaned my name as you lost your virginity?"

I blinked, face burning, "I thought it was you."

"So, you technically lost your virginity with me on your mind."

My blush deepened, "It sounds weird when you say it like that."

"Sure, I feel like murdering the bastard and tearing his body to tiny pieces, then burning and dusting him out of existence, for both taking your virginity under my name, and for using my name to begin with. However, it's satisfying to know that it was my name that you were crying for, when you first felt a cock inside you, not because he had my name, but because he was impersonating me," he grinned mischievously.

"That's devious," I gasped, embarrassed. "I think you know him."

He frowned, "I doubt I ever met someone faking to be me."

"He was an assassin and a thief, so, I think I have your notebook."

"You do have my notebook, I looked into your backpack," he said.

I scoffed, pressing my tits on his naked chest, "I'd do the same."

"But I don't think it's the same person, he looked nothing like me, cherryling," he mocked, "at all. He was shorter, smaller, weaker, and the only reason he come out alive from meeting me, was because he activated the one chance I had to open the portal here, and got the books from my backpack when I was leaving to cross it. That was probably the only time he used his brain. I doubt he was an assassin, he was probably attacked by the assassin, who then stole the books and my notebook, had the audacious idea to impersonate me."

"The assassin was weaker, shorter, and smaller than you."

He frowned, "What color was his hair?"

"Blood red," I tilted my head, "having golden eyes."

Dorian cursed, "That piece of shit, it was him. Fuck, how did you thought that freaking twat and I were the same person, cherryling?" Well, he looks profoundly offended.

"In my defense, I never knew what you looked like, I had just gotten in this world, I was confused about everything, he was taller, bigger, looked to be stronger than me, and as I was used to humans, in that very moment he seemed otherworldly hot. Which is funny, as you easily put him to a humiliating shame, but again, you don't look real, so much that it feels mean and unfair to try comparing any male to you."

He clicked his tongue, "Tsk. I'm still offended, what did 0009694 tell you about him? It can give info on those weaker than you, right?"

Of course, he knows that as my dad's apprentice. "No need to keep calling her that anymore, her name is now Seraphina, Sera for short. And yes, she told me his name was Juan Sanchez, that he's full blooded vampire, and a trained assassin with a body count of 464. 116 years old, he stuck on level 78 for twenty years. He was also born and raised in the slums of the Vampire Kingdom. I can give you part of the money pouch I got from him."

"Why would you do that?" He frowned confused.

"Call it a moral refund. There's also more than 🎴400,000,00.00 in the pouch, so, if we do a 50/50, we'll get 🎴200,000,000.00 each, which will actually refund the money you wasted here on the temple, and you will be able to get the home you wanted out of he tower or whatever," that made his eyes go ice blue, a meaning I don't know. "Apparently murdering pays better than researching, meaning I got both my class and my job wrong."

He chuckled to that, "What jobs were available?"

"A nun, healer, merchant, writer, librarian, journalist, spy, cooker, adventurer, artist set for random talent, assassin, and authorized researcher," sigh. "Again, my curiosity fucking me up. Being a researcher sounded like a perfect idea in my mind, but now I'm regretting."

"I doubt that's true, cherryling."

"Okay, not regretting, but annoyed about it," I rolled my eyes. "And I may also have picked it because in my mind, being a authorized researcher would give me more freedom to travel around, and do whatever I have to do in here, whatever mission I have."

Leaning in, he nuzzled his nose on mine, "What's your mission?"

"I don't know yet," I breathed, brushing our lips. "I'm waiting."

"Waiting for what?"

"To ask Sera about it… I didn't have alone time yet," I huffed.

Hand on my neck, he kissed my jaw, down my neck, this time just kissing, no sign of his fangs for his own safety, but it got me malfunctioning badly.

"Master always picked AR," he whispered on my skin, "always on the field you picked," I hugged him tighter as he tilted my head, his lips on the other side of my neck, sucking, "have you heard of the Dark One?"

Ugh, how am I supposed to even think with his lips on my skin like this? This is torture, the best kind. "I… no… I… fuck… Mmm… copycat… he mentioned… mentioned this Dark One… but I… don't know who it is."

Smiling on my skin, he retracted a bit, eyes on me, and it got me all pouty, needing more of him, "The strongest being who ever passed by the Nightcrawler Tower, used to be the Great Grandmaster, the highest position in there, the most successful on his field of work, Artifact Creation, for not only owning an envy-worthy collection of artifacts, but for having created one himself. Know as the Dark One because he succumbed to the power of the artifacts for a long time, enough to apparently modificate his soul to its core, just like his physical appearance."

"He became a pseudo-entity, having a full faction of the freaks of the Tower going as far as to worship him as a God, even more after he all but vanished. But while a faction of the tower had him on their highest of regards, 80% of them, the part that really held power, saw him as a danger, a bad influence, and a stigma fell over everyone who was part of the field he had excelled on, everyone worrying that they would end up like him. A being that is hungry for power, and would do anything to get it, even if it meant succumbing, darkening his soul, hence the Dark One nickname."

I froze, connecting the dots.

There's no way.

"My dad is the Dark One?" I breathed.

A nod, "You're the daughter of the most infamous male to live in Auradoom, between us, cherryling. Feared by most, worshipped by a few, and inspiring a bunch who doesn't know the real danger of your field. My master became a symbol of transcendentalism, that with hard work, a being like us, could became something more, an entity, or even a God, and that is a dangerous aspiration. And though who aspire for them, are out there, after artifacts and doing anything to get their hands on them," he grew serious.

"Now imagine what they wouldn't do to get their hands on the very daughter of the Dark One. Not just his daughter, but the one he had after he conquered such power, after he transcended himself, after he became that pseudo-entity, after he mated to someone we know nothing about, that could be dangerous and extremely powerful. His void dweller daughter."

Chills of the bad kind ran down my spine, "You better not be even suggesting I try to go after the female who gave birth to me, Dorian."

"Do even know where you were born?" He arched his eyebrows.

I swallowed, "A garden, I think. Hyacinth Garden."

His eyes widened and I got a bad feeling, "Bad witch territory."

Witches are a real thing? "As in witches in general, or one?"

"One bad witch, a very bad witch. Known as the Witch of the West, the Daughter of Night with Destiny, witches are the kind that's closer on their birth to entities, cherryling, that's why they are so deep into magic in a way no other kind is, no common kind, at least," he gave me and up and down look, that said a lot. "And this witch in special, isn't just blessed by the entities like the others, but she is the daughter created by the entities of Night and Destiny."

"Cherryling," he held my face with both hands, tenderly, "she is so powerful, so ancient, that she is taken as an entity herself, by many she is known as the entity of the West, the immortal witch, the strongest witch to ever walk on earth. And your father, had a grudge with her, ever since he recklessly stole Cora, the grimore that's now in your possession, and the most powerful artifact of the witchlings, from her. In fact," he chuckled anxiously, "we had to run away from her in countless occasions."

"What? She tried to hunt my dad and you down?" I gasped.

"I was collateral damage," he mocked, "as I was his apprentice, and he took me everywhere he went to, ever since I was 12 years old."

"Arent you three hundred and something years old?"

He seemed surprised, "How do you know that?"

"Copycat presented himself with that age, so, I took it as yours."

Dorian scowled, "That bastard. I'm actually 469 years old."

"Well, that's a lot," I chuckled anxiously. "You're 445 years older than me, and here I was, think the biggest gap I would have with a guy was 8 to 10 years at maximum. Seeing like this, humans are really nothing."

"They ain't," he scoffed.

"Wait," my eyes widened. "If dad vanished from Auradoom about 26 years ago, and you've been his sidekick from the time you were 12, does it means you've spent 431 years with my dad?"

"420, actually," licking his lips, be tilted his head. "Some times he would vanish for months doing hell knows what, then he would come back with something new, either an idea, or something he stole to make an idea come true. But your dad was 9694 years old when he vanished, cherryling, which actually makes him 9720 years old by the moment he… died."

What the hell? "How did he live for that long?" I cried in shock.

And he pointed to my wrist, "000… I mean, Sera."

Shit.

Rising my right wrist, I asked her, "Sera, how old dad was when he got his hands on you? And how old was he when he finished you?"

[He got my fragments at 24 years old.

Finishing me as I am now, at 94.

First using me at 96.]

There it is, those damned numbers again, 96 and 94. I can't shake the feeling that it means something greater, but what?