Chapter 1: "It Sure Is Dark and Dank in Here…"

'It sure is dark and dank in here' was Mahiru's first thought as he went down the stairs to the basement library. The old wooden floors creaked every time he put his weight on the dangerously-unstable boards, so he tried his best to tip-toe lest the floor broke and he had to be rescued by Sakuya. Speaking of Sakuya… where was he anyway? They went in together but he lost him along the way.

"And this is his whole idea as well…" the brown-haired boy sighed as he continued venturing down. The candle he held in his right hand flickered threateningly, as if trying to tease him of his predicament. Mahiru was never afraid of the dark – but in this kind of scary setting, even he felt as if something sinister was about to jump at him from the shadows anytime soon.

"Why do I even agree to this…" he said to himself as he recalled the day before when Sakuya burst into the classroom and started blabbering about an abandoned house at the outskirts of their city.

"Legend has it that there is a magical item stored inside the basement library in that house!" exclaimed Sakuya, his eyes shining with eagerness.

"Yeah right, Sakuya always has the most boisterous rumors…" one of their classmates, Ryuusei, said nonchalantly as he flipped through his manga magazine.

"EH? It's not a rumor, you know?" the green-haired boy interjected as he faked an exaggerated gasp. "Mahiru! Why don't you go with me to prove it?"

"Me? Why does it have to be me?" he protested.

"Well, there is simply no one else who would do it, right~"

"In a sense… I guess he's right. I really should stop volunteering for this kind of thing…" the boy announced to no one as he finally reached the bottom ground and was now facing the door to the library. Without further delay, he pushed open the slightly heavy door and stepped inside. The candle continued flickering as he tried to make sense of the room. There were shelves upon shelves filled with various books lining up neatly from each side of the walls – and in the center of the damp room, there was a lonely medium-sized desk covered with dust.

"Let's see… Sakuya said something about an untitled black-covered book…" he muttered before going to a nearby shelf and started tracing the old, cobwebs-laden spine of the old tomes. There were books written in languages other than Japanese; some of which he didn't even recognize. "The owner must have loved them very much… could he or she even read them at a-"

Suddenly, he heard something heavy dropped onto the floor from behind him. With a slight gasp, he turned around to face… nothing.

"… Is it just my imagination?" Mahiru questioned warily under his breath. He braved himself to go to where the source of the noise came from and found a single item lying on the floor.

'A book? Is this what dropped just now?' he thought while kneeling down and taking the black hardcover. It was plain; no single writing or picture adorning it. He flipped it over to make sure, but it was simply nothing but a black rectangle of leather-bound papers. Curious, Mahiru slowly lifted the cover…

*FLASH!* A blinding light filled the entire room as gale whooshed out from inside the tome. He yelled and covered his eyes; but before he did so, he caught sights of thin, rectangular items flying out at the same time – dozens of them. Just as he almost fainted from being suffocated by the strong wind, everything stopped. The room was silent once more. It was now pitch black as the light of the candle had been extinguished during the whole ordeal.

Mahiru was about to get his spare candle from inside his pocket when he suddenly saw a floating hand holding a single burning matchstick… And behind it, the boy witnessed a pair of glowing red eyes.

"AAAAAHH!" Mahiru screamed bloody murder at the monstrous sight. Was it the ghost of the owner of the house? Sakuya said something about it, he was sure! Was he going to get killed? And yet, what replied him was an annoyed, baritone voice. "Geez, why do you have to shout so loud? Can't deal…"

"H-Huh?" the 15-year-old uttered, confused. His eyes finally adjusted to the poor light, and he saw a young-looking man staring back at him with accusing eyes.

"You barged into someone else's property, loitered about, and then shocked the sleeping person living inside… How rude…" the blue-haired man continued as he took the boy's spare candle out of nowhere and lit it casually before walking to the center of the room and placed it on top of the table.

"Y-You are… the owner of this house?" Mahiru asked, half afraid-half apologetic. He wouldn't like it either if someone trespassed into his uncle's house and gave him a rude awakening…

"Hm… Do I, really…? You can say so… but then again, maybe not…" the mysterious guy said, cocking his head. Seemed like it didn't bother him at all that the brunette was staring at him funny.

"If you're not the owner of this house… then what are you doing here? Who are you, really?" the high schooler asked, getting more and more confused by each second.

The other paused as if wondering if he should bother answering. He eventually opened his mouth and replied with a straight face, "I'm the guardian vampire of that book you opened just now."

Silence descended upon the room as both parties braced for each other's reaction…

"Um…" the younger one started after he realized that the guy in front of him wasn't going to explain further, "you're… a vampire."

"Yeah."

"…"

"…"

"You're joking." Mahiru said blatantly.

"No, I'm 100% vampire." The older one insisted, looking as deadpanned as ever.

Mahiru opened his mouth to object further, but before he had the chance to do so, he was interrupted by a loud explosion.

*KABOOM!*

"Wh-What was that?" the boy stammered out after he managed to get ahold of himself. The explosion was loud enough to make the ground shake and send some books flying.

"Tsk, how troublesome…" the self-proclaimed vampire sighed while scratching his head.

"What do you mean?! What is going o- hey! Where are you going?" Mahiru called out as he noticed the guy slipping away into the darkness. He wanted to call him out, but he didn't remember him introducing himself, so he addressed him with as simple of a name as he could think of.

"Wait a minute, Ku-Kuro!"

Another flash of light filled the room, but this one had a different feel. It was warm and protective for some reason, and he could see a ring of light circling his right wrist. From one side of the room, he could hear the vampire lamented exasperatedly, "Ugh, totally can't deal…"

*End of Chapter 1*