The sun, once golden and proud, seemed to retreat faster each evening—as if the town itself was trying to hide from what it knew was coming.
And in the deep fog of dusk, creatures walked unnoticed.
Steve stood in the bell tower of Whitmoor's old chapel, his boots pressed against splintered beams, staring out across the sleeping town. His silver eyes glowed faintly in the dark. Around him, six fresh corpses hung like puppets—guards, officers, priests. Their blood was drained, their necks twisted at cruel angles, their eyes gouged out and placed in a silver bowl at his feet.
He smiled.
"It begins."
Beneath his coat, a map of Whitmoor burned faintly with enchanted ink. Symbols moved across it like crawling ants. Bloodline signatures. He could see Alex's mark glowing near the suburbs—still dormant, but pulsing stronger every night. But Steve wasn't rushing. The hunt was an art, not a race. And he wasn't alone anymore.
From the woods to the west, a ripple of energy shook the trees. The air trembled as shadowed forms emerged. One by one, they came.
The Broken Court.
Ancient vampires, long thought to be myths, summoned by the scent of the Blood Monarch's heir awakening. They were the forsaken ones, banished by the Circle for crimes against vampirekind—cannibalism, blood sorcery, and rebellion.
They were drawn to Whitmoor like vultures to a battlefield.
Steve turned his head slightly as the first of them stepped forward. A tall, skeletal woman in a tattered Victorian gown with black ichor dripping from her jaw.
"Lady Verona," Steve greeted with a mock bow.
She grinned, revealing jagged fangs.
"You always did enjoy theatrics, Steve," she purred. "But why summon us?"
"Because the game is changing," Steve said simply. "The Blood Monarch's bloodline has awakened in a boy. I want him broken. But I want the town shattered first."
Another vampire emerged—a monstrous brute with twisted horns and scarred wings folded against his back.
"They'll notice if we all feed," he growled.
"They already have," Steve replied. "But let them notice. That's the point."
—
At the other side of town, Mr. Sabastin paced his candlelit office, old scrolls scattered across his desk, books open to pages that hadn't been touched in centuries.
He was sweating.
Not from heat—but from fear.
The signs were clear: every rune he checked, every compass he activated, pointed toward a convergence. The Vault's seals were weakening. And the town's protection spells—old wards laid by alchemists long dead—were cracking like glass under pressure.
He glanced at the window. The sky was wrong. The stars no longer aligned.
"They're here…" he whispered.
He walked over to the vault hidden behind the bookshelf and placed his hand on it. The metal burned under his touch. Not hot—but humming with dark power.
Sabastin closed his eyes.
"Alex," he muttered, "you must awaken soon, or all of Whitmoor will fall."
—
Back near the forest, carnage erupted.
Lady Verona danced through a retirement home, her claws slicing flesh like ribbons, laughing as blood sprayed across faded wallpaper. No alarms rang. No one heard the screams—they had silenced the power grid first.
Two more vampires—the winged brute and a hunched, pale-skinned twin set—descended upon the police station. They didn't kill everyone—no, they turned some. Officers staggered out later that night with blood-stained eyes and sharpened teeth, whispering the same phrase:
"The Hunt has begun."
By midnight, the hospital overflowed with "unknown infections." People with black veins, seizures, bloodlust.
But it wasn't just death—it was control. Fear. Chaos. The Broken Court wasn't just feeding. They were claiming Whitmoor.
Steve, ever the conductor, watched it all unfold from the top of the clocktower. He took notes in a leather-bound book with a feathered pen dipped in priest's blood.
"The boy's town must fall before he can rise," he murmured. "Only in ruin can a Monarch be forged."
Then he paused.
His eyes flickered.
He felt something.
A tremor.
From across the town—miles away—he sensed a sudden burst of energy. Faint, but unmistakable.
Alex.
He was changing faster now. The potion had worked. The bloodline was stirring violently.
Steve smiled and closed the book.
"I'll come for you soon, little Monarch."
And then he vanished into smoke.