CHAPTER 1
SOPHIA
I was only five years old when all this started happening, I was just a child when I saw the world being completely taken over by supernatural creatures that seemed to exist only in books and stories.
But they are real now, and they rule this world with a monarchy system that works well for them, and humans only serve to feed the vampires, we only exist because we have fresh blood in our veins, and they need it to stay strong.
We are used to feeding deadly creatures that kill for the thirst of human blood vampires are too cruel to try to be nice to humans.
I was only five years old when it all happened, I don't know where they came from and how they managed to arrive in our world, I still remember that people thought it was some kind of disease, an epidemic that made people crazy for blood, no one could believe that vampires existed, but they do now and we are forced to obey every one of their strict laws or we are killed in a very brutal way.
Everything that was in the human world is gone, the vampires have destroyed our world and turned it into a kind of place where only vampires are respected, we are a lower class, and we are forced to serve the vampires since I was five years old.
It's been a long time, but I can still remember the taste of the sweets I used to eat with my mother in the city center, in the back of my mind I still have memories of a normal world, without pain, without suffering, and without vampires.
It was a normal world and I loved it, but I remember the day our lives started to change, I couldn't go to school anymore, and we couldn't leave the house because there were creatures that were killing everyone in the city center.
Everyone believed in the hypothesis of an epidemic that was spreading all over the world quickly, but three months later vampires dominated all the countries, humans lost the battle against the bloodsuckers and that's why we live this way today.
There is a vampire monarchy that rules every part of the country, here there is a royal family that rules the whole place we live, they live in a way that feels like we are back in the 1500s with long dresses and no technology.
The technology that once existed and was being developed more and more was destroyed and forgotten by everyone, this is forbidden here because vampires hate this kind of thing, they live as if they were in the past and we are forced to do it too.
This whole place is surrounded by high walls and many vampire guards who capture you if they find you trying to escape from this zone and take you to the castle where you are killed by one of the ruling vampires.
There is no escape from this place, we have no other choice, if you leave these walls, they will find you because they injected into our bodies some kind of identification device as if they are our owners now.
You can't remove the device that is injected into every human's wrist, that's how vampires can identify us, we are not identified by names but by numbers.
They do not care about us, they need humans only for blood and nothing else, there is a system where all adult humans can work in the city center for the vampires, but they are not good jobs, the reward for wages is only a few coins that keep us alive, if we die, we are of no use to the vampires.
There are small houses that humans live here, we live in a part far from where the vampires are, we are isolated from them by a huge gate that is guarded by guards 24 hours a day, anyone who works in the city center must identify themselves before they can enter that place.
There is also another job for humans, in this job, they pay more because the work is more painful because you become the blood donor of a vampire.
They pay you an amount for you to donate your blood to them, this is horrible because vampires rarely have self-control and always these donors are killed because vampires can't control their thirst for blood and go over the limit, but they don't care about that because they always manage to find another human desperate for money.
I didn't want to live in such a world, I wanted my normal world again, but that was not possible. I live in a small house with my mom, she works downtown as a seamstress for the vampires, and she also usually donates blood to the vampires when we need more money.
I hate that she runs this risk of dying because of me, I wanted to work too to help her support us, but everyone under 17 is not able to serve the vampires, I think that's the only law of theirs where I see a kind of respect towards children.
So, I can't help my mom, but that might change because today is my 18th birthday and I finally get to help my mom. I hate seeing her coming home late completely tired from a long day at work, but I hate even more seeing her with bite scars on her body caused by the man she usually donates blood to.
He's going over and over the edge because she's coming home worse and weaker and that's not good, she needs to stop this job and I have a mission to start helping her.
It's just the two of us in this small house, I never had siblings and my father was killed when the humans were trying to fight back against the vampire attacks and domination when this all started. He was a policeman and was killed by one of the vampires.
It took my mom a long time to recover after my dad died and I wanted him back too, but he was dead and there was no other way to bring him back into our lives.
I grew up hating vampires, my mom said they are very cruel creatures, I never got that close to a vampire, I only went to see the city guards who are vampires, but they all wear some kind of helm on their heads, so I never got to see a vampire's face up close.
It's late and I know my mom should be here any time, if my dad was still alive, he would organize a big birthday party for me with a delicious cake, but that hasn't happened since I was five.
We have no money, the little my mom gets from work is just to buy food, so I don't have the opportunity to eat a cake on my birthday every year anymore, that's my reality now and I'm still trying to accept all of this.
I already took a shower, a quick bath, and put on my best dress that my mom made for me last year, she works as a seamstress and makes beautiful clothes for vampires, this is her gift since when the world was normal.
Today I'm going to stay with my mom, but tomorrow morning I need to go to the city to try to apply for a job so I can start helping my mom, she always says that vampires are too dangerous, and she wants to keep me away from them, but I need to do this to help.