Vampire Cultivation System in a Hidden World of Monsters

I woke up to a splash of water in the face. I blinked my eyes and looked around. I seemed to be in someone's basement. A middle aged woman was standing in front of me with a pot of water with a cross at the bottom and cloves of garlic floating in it.

"Oh no! You found my weakness! Dirty water!" I said, pretending to be hurt by it.

"Very funny asshole. Now, would you mind telling me why two bloodsuckers were trying to break into my home?" She said.

"First off, we didn't break anything. Your door was unlocked and the sign said you were open. And second, we didn't know it was your home," I said. "Is that why we passed out? Because we crossed the threshold of a home uninvited?"

"Yes. That's what happens when you break into human's homes!" She said. Explore hidden tales at empire

"We didn't break in! I just saw the sign with the golden giblets on it and thought you might be able to help me get back into the monster underground," I said.

"Oh, that? A friend of mine made that for me. Said it would tell monsters that I was friendly towards them," she said.

"Hello? I am a monster, and I did think that you would be friendly toward us. Not tie us up with BDSM rope and splash water in our faces," I said.

"Yeah, but you're a vampire! Vampires are evil. I thought he meant more big foot or moth man monsters," she said.

"We're not all evil. That's a harmful stereotype and I don't appreciate your prejudice. And if you're going to accept monsters, you have to accept all monsters. You wouldn't just accept some minorities into your shop and not others. That's called being racist, lady," I said.

"Geez! I'm sorry, I guess I didn't think about it that way. How am I supposed to know if you're evil or not though? How do I know if I'm safe?" She said.

"How do you know that with people? You don't. You just have to trust until proven otherwise. Just like with other kinds of people. We're just people like everybody else. The only difference is we have a curse that makes us undead immortals. That's it," I said.

"You're conveniently avoiding the fact that you have to feed off the living to survive," she said.

"Ok, that's fair," I said. "But we find ethical ways to do that. My friend Alice here is an actor. She performs her art in front of crowds and feeds off their emotions. That's not so bad right? I mostly feed off animals and mindless monsters, as well as video game characters but we won't go into that confusing mess."

"My girlfriend just sucks dick to feed. Well she used to suck dick to feed. Now she just sucks my dick to feed. But either way, she's not hurting anyone. Her victims like getting their dicks sucked! Me included!"

"Huh. I didn't know there were so many different ways to feed other than just sucking people's blood," she said, as she put the pot of water down. "I guess I'll untie you both, but then you have to leave."

"Uh, so you're not going to give us tarot readings?" I said. "I have good money to pay you with."

"Hmm. I guess I could give you both readings," she said. "Just don't suck my blood or my dick! I mean, I don't have a dick, but don't suck it!"

"Ok, ok, I won't suck your nonexistent dick. I get it," I said.

She untied me and Alice from the chairs she had put us in. She took the rope and put it next to a bunch of whips and bondage stuff. I was right! It was BDSM rope!

She decided to do my reading first. She made Alice stay out of the room and closed the door. She turned the lights off and lit an extraordinary amount of candles all around the room and on the circular table we sat across from each other on.

She had a crystal ball, but she said it was mostly for decoration and it always got in the way of the cards. So she took it off the table and put it on the ground.

She shuffled the cards, made me cut the deck multiple times and then spread the cards across the table face down. "Pick three cards. Place them horizontally from left to right."

I did as she said and picked three cards, placing the first one on the left, the second in the middle, and the third on the right.

"I'm going to do a basic 3 card past, present, and future reading for you. The first card will represent and tell us things about your past. The second card will represent and tell us about your present. And the third card will represent and tell us about your future," she said.

"Oh, and before we go any further, my name is Tara." She put her hand out. I shook it.

"My name is Dylan. Nice to meet you, Tara. Now that the customary screaming and accusations portion of our introduction is over," I said.

"I'm sorry about that. But surely you can see where I as a human was coming from?" She said.

"I do, but honestly I'm just glad the misunderstanding is behind us. I'm focused on moving forward," I said. "And in that spirit, would you be able to invite me and Alice into your home?"

"Oh, I already did that. That's how I got you to wake up. Otherwise you would've been knocked out for who knows how long," she said.

Oh shit. We would have just been unconscious in this woman's home forever? This threshold stuff was a lot more dangerous than I realized. I needed to be more careful in the future.

"Oh, thanks," I said.

We moved back to the cards. Tara flipped over the first card, the one on the left. "The Tower reversed. You have faced a sudden change or transformation of some sort in the recent past. That could've been changing into a vampire. I don't know for sure. It can also indicate a break down of your old life, into a new one. The reversal suggest that by embracing the change, you avoided potential disaster."

Hmm. That all fit pretty well. I was recently transformed into a vampire. My old life ended and a new one began. I did embrace my new life as a vampire rather than trying to run from it. Embracing it led to a decent amount of success. My cultivation, my personal wealth, my friends, my lovers.

"By reading your expression, I'm guessing that resonates with you. Ok, that's good. Now let's do the next card," she said, as she flipped over the second card. "The Emperor."