“Why do you seem so distracted?” Farrow asked, curiously leaning closer.
“Is it bloodlust? If you don’t hold a blood rite on your birthday, your mind and body will be tormented to the point of madness, right?”
An Xiaoxue instinctively covered her face, thinking her expression betrayed her emotions.
But in fact, there was nothing on her face that could reflect her inner feelings, at most just spacing out, and the daze of reverie.
“I’m used to it,” she said, not wanting to talk about it.
“How can you tell I’m distracted?”
“Your eyes always seem to be thinking about other things,” Farrow said, sitting beside her.
“Tell me.”
“Why should I tell you?”
“It’s been a month, and I thought you could trust me. In your eyes, am I just a strange aunt who’s always overly solicitous for no reason?” Farrow sighed heavenward again.
“You look quite young.”
“What’s wrong, anyway? When I called you in your dorm, I thought your voice sounded a bit… disappointed,” Farrow said.
“You’ve been acting strangely this past month too.”
“Met some friends.”
“Friends, are they friends you can use, or truly trustworthy friends?” Farrow asked oddly, giving her a deep look.
She seemed to understand her very well.
An Xiaoxue was puzzled. “What do you mean?”
“As far as I know, you’ve never had friends since you were little, and it’s not because you didn’t want them.”
Farrow’s words were meaningful.
“I know everyone has their own quirks, including vampires. Some vampires are prone to mental illnesses. Someone who acts for too long can even deceive themselves.”
An Xiaoxue met her gaze, then turned her head, looking up at the crystal chandelier hanging from the ceiling.
The lights in her vision were brilliant, and the halo gradually blurred.
An Xiaoxue then lowered her head, lost in thought.
She didn’t say.
She just felt… inexplicable.
“Never mind that, let’s talk about your friend. Did someone stand you up? You didn’t take leave just for that, did you?” Farrow winked.
“Mm.”
“What kind of friend? A professor, or a student?”
“A professor, I guess.”
“Are you going on a date?”
An Xiaoxue’s hand, stealthily reaching for a cookie, trembled slightly.
She abruptly looked up at the spirited woman.
“Looks like I hit the nail on the head!” Farrow said, beaming with triumph, gently nudging her with her elbow.
“Is it an older woman? You weren’t really tricked, were you?”
“Just friends, she invited me out,” An Xiaoxue sighed helplessly.
“Really?”
“Really, ugh,” An Xiaoxue said weakly.
Feeling An Xiaoxue wasn’t lying, Farrow stared for a long while before leaning back in disappointment. “Tsk, I thought it was something serious. Turns out you just got stood up. What’s there to sigh about? You’re giving me the impression of making a fuss over nothing.”
“I’m sick, a severe case of schizophrenia,” An Xiaoxue said indifferently.
“Hurry up and leave, or I’ll eat you later!”
Just then, outside the French window, another helicopter flew away from the airport next to the twin towers of the Enforcement Bureau.
Another helicopter.
She wondered how many enforcement officers had been dispatched tonight.
“Are missions very frequent lately?” An Xiaoxue asked curiously.
“In this city, there have been many disappearances recently, and dead servants and blood slaves have appeared multiple times. The estimated number of missing people exceeds twenty,” Farrow whispered to her.
“They can’t catch it; it hides very well. The Honghu Police Department has had to dispatch a large number of SWAT teams for support, even using heavy firepower. The problem is it vanishes without a trace after each crime.”
“I remember there are powers that can track pure-blood vampires based on blood slaves and dead servants.”
“Such powers are rare. A professor at St. Antiona Academy possesses one, and two elites from the Executive Bureau, but they’ve been dispatched to Europe and won’t be back anytime soon.”
“There must be others, right?”
“The Federal State’s enforcement officer who possesses that power won’t be discharged from the hospital for another seven days. It’s been fourteen days since his last use; it puts a tremendous strain on the body,” Farrow sighed.
After sighing, she secretly glanced at An Xiaoxue.
An Xiaoxue could already guess what was coming next, but she still put up a symbolic resistance.
“Don’t look at me. Although I’m a Count-level vampire, I don’t have many powers.”
“To be precise, you only have one power,” Farrow said, smiling.
An Xiaoxue was startled.
“Your power has no name, let’s just call it… Vampire True Form. It allows you to transform into your current appearance, and then you have the ability to replicate any power. Am I right?”
An Xiaoxue opened her mouth in surprise, almost jumping out of her chair.
“How do you know?”
“Oh, the first night you arrived, I video-called your aunt, and she told me,” Farrow shrugged.
“She also said you can’t perform a blood rite, or something terrible will happen.”
An Xiaoxue gnashed her teeth a little, wishing she could cross the screen and beat up her aunt right then.
“It’s okay, I’m a good person. You should understand that by now, after this month.” Farrow leaned back in her chair, behind which hung a portrait of the first headmaster, Trede.
An Xiaoxue buried herself in her food, her appetite like a bottomless pit.
“Hey, happy birthday.”
“I remember you said that,” An Xiaoxue said, finishing her drink, puzzled by the headmaster’s repetition.
“You’re still distracted. I just wanted to say it again to cheer you up,” Farrow said, looking into her eyes.
“So? Are you willing to help out just this once? Help find that vampire, and ideally, kill it.”
“Can I refuse?” An Xiaoxue recoiled.
“Whatever you want.”
“Mm.” An Xiaoxue nodded, as if it were for the “Happy Birthday” the headmaster had said.
She looked up again at the crowd in the hall, urgently wanting to find a certain figure.
Finding no one, she pretended to be nonchalant and unconcerned, continuing to eat desserts and drink glass after glass of beverages.
A banquet, it turned out… wasn’t as enjoyable as she’d thought.
A banquet attended with a purpose was destined not to meet expectations.
“I’m full, goodbye.” An Xiaoxue patted her clothes, stood up, and left.
Watching her figure blend into the crowd, Principal Farrow leisurely sipped red wine while leaning back in her chair, her gaze unconcerned.
“I was just bluffing about your power earlier. That indecisive personality is also a disguise for others, isn’t it? Your personality is truly unfathomable… but the emotions you felt when thinking of her, those were real.”
She mumbled.
“Should I help you again, old friend…?”
As the banquet neared its end, An Xiaoxue stood behind the crowd, following them out the grand doors of the auditorium.
She stood out remarkably, as students and professors alike gazed at the dreamlike silver-haired girl.
She hadn’t expected so many students to pour out at this hour; they had probably all finished eating.
Those gazes…
It wasn’t that there was no suspicion, but mostly curiosity.
Seeing a silver-haired girl always made people instinctively think of vampires, thanks to film and television, which led to the stereotype of vampires having silver or gold hair.
In reality, there weren’t many silver-haired vampires, and one could even say An Xiaoxue was the only one with silver hair.
This is because vampires are inherently monsters; they merely wear human skin to disguise themselves as humans.
However, many vampires are unwilling to reveal their true forms even until death.
She had never seen her family’s true forms.
And An Xiaoxue’s own true form was, in fact, no true form at all; she was simply a silver-haired girl in human appearance.