My Stepmom Is A Vampire & Her Entire Bloodline Wants To Breed Me

Chapter 213: Human & Vampire

"Don’t you ever get tired of studying us while humanity continues to fall behind?" the vampire asked.

He lowered his hood, revealing a tall figure with long dark hair and crimson eyes that glowed faintly in the candlelight.

"Lord Latros," Mark replied calmly, standing his ground. "Studying the enemy is the only way humanity can evolve. One day, we will surpass your kind."

The vampire laughed, deep and amused. "And yet, you show no pride by using our core to fight against us."

"What use is pride, when my side is losing?" Mark answered bluntly.

Latros stepped closer, the firelight stretching their shadows across the stone walls.

"Then let me help you. I will show you the secret of vampires. I will raise humanity to stand beside us."

Time passed.

When they sat again by the fireplace, the vampire’s voice was lower, deliberate, as if carving each word into stone.

"Progenitor," Latros said. "Study the history of Iscaron, King of Morum. That is where it begins. Together, we can build a new world. A world ruled by power."

"A world where humans and vampires stand on the same side," Mark murmured, staring into the flames, "with the same strength."

"And where the weak," Latros finished softly, "no longer exist."

---

Maria watched as years slipped by like turning pages.

Mark grew old. Faces changed, architecture shifted, even the government rose and fell.

Yet Mark remained trapped in rooms filled with books and scrolls, his body thinning, his hands shaking with age, his mind consumed by the same obsession.

One day, someone entered the room.

It was Latros. He had not changed at all. The same calm posture. The same patient, cold eyes.

"You found something?" Latros asked.

Mark nodded. "The king mutilated his body and scattered it across the North," he said.

"I still don’t know the exact locations, but vampire corpses leave corruption behind. The land changes, and animals mutate. If the Progenitor’s body exists, it should leave the same trace."

"So we search the North," Latros said lightly. "It would be simpler if I took the land and conducted large-scale research."

"You want to start a war?" Mark raised a brow.

"That land is already unstable. The North is full of unexplained phenomena. Snowstorms, distortions, places where nature breaks. It’s like the land itself is cursed, along with the people living there."

He unfolded a map on the table, marked with seven red circles.

"These areas," Mark said. "Based on weather records and reports of unnatural phenomenons going back a thousand years, they show repeated abnormal activity. If the body exists, it’s likely in one of these places."

For the first time, Latros looked pleased. The corner of his mouth lifted slightly.

"I will turn you into a vampire."

Mark shook his head. "You promised humans could stand equal to vampires. Then prove it. Give me the same power without turning me into one. Make me powerful without the curse of immortality."

Latros frowned. "You will be dead long before that happens."

"Then so be it," Mark replied calmly. "I was born human. I will die as one."

"That’s foolish," Latros said with a short laugh.

"Then maybe that’s what humans are," Mark answered, his eyes fixed on the fire as it devoured the wood and reduced it to ash.

"Weak creatures filled with ambition and imagination. We die, and our efforts turn to nothing."

Latros tilted his head, confused. "What is interesting about dying and losing everything?"

Mark smiled faintly. "Someone driven by greed and immortality would never understand. When you never reach the end, nothing is ever enough."

***

On Mark’s deathbed, he lay alone in the dark room. There was no trace of ambition left in him anymore, only a strange calm, as if he had already accepted the end.

Then, suddenly, he sat up.

With trembling hands, he reached beneath the bed and pulled out a small box. Inside was a syringe, filled with a pale golden liquid, carefully sealed in a glass container.

There was also a letter.

"My friend, Mark."

"I know you hate the idea of immortality, and you despise our kind. Deep in my heart, I still wish you would join us one day, so together we could become something unstoppable."

"But your human spirit, even with how foolish and fragile it is, has always touched my heart. You remind me of her. As if even after her body and soul were claimed by death, her principles still live on through humanity."

"So, as promised, this is the prototype called the Golden Seed, derived from the Progenitor’s spinal fluid. It will grant you power comparable to a vampire, but with a limited lifespan, just as you wanted. We weakened the fluid and halted the mutation process."

"Yes, we, some of the Caduceus members, agree to join."

"I hope you will walk with us into the new era, and see for yourself whether eternity truly leads only to endless greed and destruction."

Robert Latros

***

The flashback ended.

Maria stood there in silence, confusion settling deep in her chest. Mark’s actions did not feel cruel or malicious. If anything, they felt... human.

"What is your purpose, really?" she asked slowly. "And why are you showing me all of this?"

Mark looked at her and answered with a question of his own. "Aren’t you curious about Latros’ goal? About what kind of future he wants to create?"

"I’m not," Maria replied sharply, her eyes narrowing. "You really think humans and vampires can ever be equal? Humans are just food to them. Vampires sit at the top of the food chain."

She took a breath, steady but tense.

"The future you’re imagining would only turn humans into slaves again. The only difference is that a group of ’humans’ with power given by Latros would be the ones maintaining the system. It’s just another form of slavery."

The strong would never willingly lower themselves to stand beside the weak. Pride alone would never allow it.

Maria had met enough vampires to know the truth. They were arrogant, smug, greedy, and cruel. They were all the same.

Mark laughed softly. "I agree with you. But isn’t that system already how humans operate now?"

"The only real difference is that under Latros, vampires would be the ones in control. Tell me, Maria, what truly changes?"