The end of another day at the academy had come. Dameon Ridrick was not one of the native kids, he was different an 'Outsider' also known as filthy scum that wasn't wanted on this 'sacred' island. It was fair to say that he hadn't been enjoying his time on the Island so far but he put on a brave face to please his farther. Almost anywhere would be better than Hidyosho Island, from the hot savannah of Africa to the harsh Russian winters. Never did Dameon suspect that his farther would find any real magic, on earth anyway. But here they were living among magicians, all Dameon could do was attempt to mingle.

One of his ways of doing this was by visiting the library after classes, most days, to read up on the history of the island. This was exactly what he was doing on that afternoon. As he browsed though the History section looking for a book on Capital City, he came across a book shelf that held a book named The Hidden Powers Volume IV - Vampires. The book looked strange and so he picked it up and opened it to the first page. "Vampires have lived among civilisation for hundreds of years, going unseen to the average Human. More recently signs of these magical creatures have been becoming more common, especially after our discovery of Hidyosho Island." Dameon stopped reading suddenly as he felt a shock flowing through his hands. Dropping the book he stood back as the bookcase before him began to flicker in and out of visibility, eventually disappearing all together.

The corner of the room left uncovered seemed old and untouched. It was empty apart from one large floor board that looked lose. Feeling curious once again Dameon look down the gap next to the board but only darkness was to be seen. It was then that without thinking he touched the board, being flung backwards by it's power that also broke itself. Dameon didn't know what he had just done but he didn't think it was anything good.

Vermillion light shone faintly down upon the lonely chamber, catching the dust that fluttered slowly about through the stillness and scattering over the dimly lit stone floor, painting the room in various shades of deep red. The silence was not broken by anything, not even the stillness of an insect or vermin. In fact, it was doubtful than any such pests even existed in this place. It seemed to the prisoner who dwelt within this silent jail that she was the only form of life in existence in this place, and since nothing readily appeared to prove her wrong, she had long since regarded that fact as truth and moved on to the harder to answer question of "Was there any life besides her at all?" Having never seen the outside world in waking memory, Vermillia couldn't answer that inquiry quite so easily. While it seemed probable that she wasn't the only being alive in the world - the books around her had to have come from somewhere, and to be locked here, she had to be sealed by something or someone, didn't she? - she had nothing but her own logic and some small bits of evidence to point to this fact. This was nowhere near enough to reach a complete, doubtless decision, and so her theory that there were other people outside of her room known as "Humans" and "Vampires" were largely unsubstantiated. But, it didn't really matter, anyway. She existed here, sealed away in this silent room of books, without any hope of escape that she could reason. Likely, she would simply continue to exist until the room around her slowly collapsed and buried her alive, a fate which would hopefully kill her. As far as she could tell, her chains could not be broken, and the room around her could not be escaped. This was her world, and she, an immortal, would live in it until it came to an end.

This realization, which she had come to long ago, had never stopped her for an instant, however, from experimenting in various means of freeing herself, or, at the very least, making her imprisonment more bearable. Ever since she had discovered her powers, she had pushed her abilities to the limits she instinctively recognized, always trying to find out more about them, and to discover their full potential. What she knew so far was that she could make things into things they were not - although this consumed a great deal of power, and generally yielded unfavorable results - could make things do things they shouldn't have been able to - this was somewhat more successful, but nonetheless tiring - and could form some sort of energy with various levels of coherent shape and destructive power. The two forms she had mastered were the form of momentary, ultra-destructive bursts on one end of the spectrum, and compact, long-lasting butterflies which she found she was able to control and feel the senses of. But the explosions, while pretty, were useless when it came to the purpose for which she had created them - blowing up the chains that bound her, to be specific - and the butterflies were too weak to carry any of the impossible-to-reach books from the upper shelves so she could find new reading material. And so, she sulked, dissatisfied with her failure and wracking her brains for a solution to her problem. Her prison was inescapable as ever, the outside world as far out of reach as it had always been. This room, and the area in which her chains allowed her to move, was the only world her arms could reach, a radius of 85 centimeters that always had and always would encompass her existence, from now into the rest of eternity. Even as she sighed and angrily twisted, trying to spin around even through her shackles immediately bound her and kept her back with an audible rattle, she knew this to be a fact. "Oh well," she murmured, and slowly dropped into a crouch against the crimson window that formed the rear boundary of her little circle. She let her head hang, as though she had given up, and slowly reached out to a tattered, dusty square of black cloth, which, aside from the practically nonexistent rags with which her body had always, in places, been halfheartedly wrapped, was the only source of warmth she had in the cold chamber. She had long since discovered its use as a blanket, and, in times where she sat, unmoving, for long periods of time, it was very convenient to cover herself with it, for even in the warm season called "Summer," the room itself was always cold, considering her own almost complete exposure to the chill air.

85 centimeters.... That gave her a new idea, one she couldn't believe she hadn't thought of before now! Casting off her blanket, she rose to her feet with newfound determination. The answer was simple, really. She had been foolishly trying to spin using only the very center of the room, standing in place and rotating herself around. But, in fact, she had a larger area in which she could spin than that. A full radius of 85 centimeters was the distance she could move about, so if she spun around by running around the edges of the circle that radius created, that gave her a 17 foot area in which to whirl to her heart's content! It was so delightfully simple, now that she thought of it. If she moved like that, then the chains binding her would have room to rotate in their sockets, and she would be able to whirl about the room by keeping them taut and moving continuously. The mere thought of it was exciting. A game that involved moving around... it was a dream finally come true! In an instant, she had positioned herself next to the window, at the very limit of her moving space. Then, bracing herself against the eagerness that threatened to completely overwhelm her, she took her first step sideways, catching onto both of the heavy chains with her hands and holding them taut so as to minimize the strain on her arms. Then, she took another step. The chains did not twist and bind her as they usually did, but rather simply held fast behind her, anchoring her in place without actually limiting her movements. Her confidence surged, and she took two rapid steps in quick succession, and still her chains did not stop her as she skirted the edge of her space. So she accelerated, taking steps ever faster and faster, and soon found herself whirling around the room at an astonishing rate, laughing aloud for the joy of her new game. She was moving, watching her world go by at a speed she had never imagined possible, and even as she finally grew too dizzy to stay on her feet any longer and slowly collapsed by the window, she was too elated at her success to care. She had finally done it! She had managed to create a game! Even if she could never escape this world, she could at least exist in it until it ended. These 85 centimeters... she had finally found a way to move within them. And, for now, that was enough...

Or at least, so she thought. But just then, something strange occurred. A loud crash resounded out from above her, and with a loud thud, a small wooden panel that had, up until that point, been placed innocuously enough within the stone roof, crashed to the ground nearby and shattered into countless pieces. Draping her blanket over herself in a futile hope for a means of protection, she gathered her dizzied wits about herself as best she could, and began to prepare to deal with whatever had just happened. Her world... was it ending already? Was these merely the start of a collapse that would end her and the existence around her? Or was this an invasion from the outside world she feared and yet desired to see so greatly? Only time would tell, but either way, she would be ready. If the world around her chose to end at this moment, she would die happy. And if Humans had come to invade her world, to enslave or kill her, or to torture her in her imprisonment... she would make them die, and then she would be happy. In her current state of mind, she actually forgot about the third possibility that faced her: the possibility of escape. But, despite this, little did Vermillia Aurora know that her world would soon grow to the edges of those 85 centimeters around her, and far beyond, and that soon, she would be able to spin about a distance much greater than the 17 feet area in which she had lived out 20 years of her immortal life...

A red light shone through the hole but was all Dameon could see. Everything around him became dark in colour and the only coloured light was that red glow. Dameon crawled carefully towards the light and peered into the hole. What he saw seemed to be some sort of storage basement for the library, full of old books, but it also contained a girl. At first, Dameon presumed that it was a assistant but then he noticed that she was chained up to a post. "Hello, sorry." Dameon muttered not really knowing what to say to the girl. She wasn't wearing what Dameon would call clothes, but instead bundled in wraps that held close to her slender body. "Are you ok down there?" He proceed to ask due to his kind nature. Dameon stayed leaning over the hole to observe the girl, being once again curious as to what was going on.

As a dark shape slowly peered over the edge of the hole, the shape wrapped in crimson light stared intently back from where she sat hunched by the stained glass window, her scarlet eyes gleaming in the half-light, the only part of her that could really fully be seen. So... someone had stumbled across this place? If the person's mysteriously apologetic comments were any indication, he hadn't meant to come to this prison. And yet, if that was the case, why would he be here? The place must have been hard to find. If it wasn't, people surely would have noticed it by now. Logic told her that much, at least. But despite that, it seemed this boy had somehow found her regardless? Was he very powerful, strong enough to find her world? Or was he very lucky, simply stumbling across it out of sheer chance? She didn't know, but either way, she couldn't afford to let her guard down. This invader might yet prove hostile.

"You there!" She called up rudely, but to her surprise, she found the words to be hoarse and weak. How much her voice had changed since she had last used it beyond mere murmurs, she thought, coughing painfully several times to clear her throat. "For what reason have you come? Answer me!"

The girl spoke up in a weak voice. Almost as an old woman would sound as she croaked from an armchair. Dameon didn't know how to react to her or if she was actually chained to the post. He was sure that something was wrong. Maybe it was all a dream? With that thought Dameon pinched his arm, letting out a small gasp and noticing that it was all reality.

"Umm, I'm sorry I just opened a book, on vampires, and the bookcase disappeared. I don't know what's going on!" Dameon said feeling slightly distress by the situation and the girls demanding tone. "Are you stuck down there?" Dameon asked still looking at the bindings on her arms. She didn't exactly look like she was somewhere that she wanted to be but Dameon didn't realise that. Maybe she was a criminal, locked up in then academy so she could be held by powerful magic. Dameon was really didn't know what to think at this point.

"A book on Vampires? I do not have nearly enough of those on hand," The girl exclaimed, suddenly sounding interested as she momentarily forgot her caution and spoke quickly, authoritatively, and almost desperately, like a starving beggar impotently demanding to be fed. She, starved of additional knowledge for so long, and unable to even reach out and take it for herself, now commanded and directed in a similar manner. "Give it here, boy!" She called up, extending her arms as though she honestly expected to simply receive it without question. All this did, however, was make the oversized shackles binding her arms all the more apparent as they gleamed darkly in the scarlet light. When no welcome scrap of literature descended like an angel of salvation from on high, however, Vermillia grew impatient, her somewhat indignant words and tone concealing the true desperation in her voice. There was a book on the subject she wished to study above everything else, and it was just beyond her reach! The thought of it was simply infuriating! "If you can take such books so freely, then surely you have little need of a mere one, whereas even one text, no matter how short, will make a welcome addition to the 439 books at my disposal. Only 37 of those books contain information on Vampires, and of them, only 5 contain any substantial knowledge. None of them are books entirely devoted to the subject of Vampires, as you say this one is. Consequently, I am woefully under-informed. I require additional founts of knowledge from which to obtain insight into the outer world! How else am I supposed to understand those things that must be understood before it is too late and all is lost?! Ex nihilo, nihilo, I cannot make bricks without clay, nor can I reap knowledge if I am not given the seeds to sow!" She coughed several times, then went on a truly staggering tirade, her words spit upward with astonishing rapidity as she half pleaded, half commanded the mysterious boy above her to either withdraw the item or let it drop, rather than simply hanging it over her head like Damocles' sword.

"I must know the path before I begin the journey, and I must begin the journey before the world collapses and my days end! Alea jacta est, mors certa, hora incerta! Ignoranti quem portum petat, nullus ventus est!*" Abruptly changing languages mid-sentence, the Vampire began instead to vehemently cry up proverbs in Latin at her now likely quite baffled discoverer. Evidently, his indecision in giving to her the book was causing her no end of frustration, for it was quite clear that she was rapidly becoming very angry. That book the boy spoke of contained information she craved above all else. It was more than just a form of entertainment, it was a source of knowledge she longed to acquire, a possible end in the endless search for a definition of herself. And to that end, she would spare no measure of fury to obtain the object she desired.

(*Two different latin proverbs. "Alea jacta est, mors certa, hora incerta" translates directly to "The die is cast, death is certain, but the time is uncertain" while "Ignoranti quem portum petat, nullus ventus est" translates to "The wind is never favorable to those who do not know where they are going.")

"I can not give you this book until you have given me some answers. If you want knowledge then you must first give me some." Dameon proposed a sort of trade to the girl. This trade would result in her getting the book, as she wanted, and Dameon finding out what was going on. "First, who are you? A simple enough question. Second, why are you down there and are you stuck? Perhaps you do not want to tell me but you do want this book, right?" Dameon spoke as he displayed the front cover of the book. The cover it'self was fairly blank, only consisting of the title and a funny emblem that Dameon presumed symbolised vampires somehow. He had never read any books about vampires, all he knew was passed to him by word of mouth, but if the islanders had been writing books about them then they must believe in their existence. The girl however didn't seem to just believe in vampires, it seemed like an obsession.

"A contract?" The girl asked, eying the boy warily. It seemed that he knew at least some things about the subject on which they now spoke, for he had directly appealed to her honor as a Vampire through this approach. A contract was the sole secure method of exchange of any sort between two Vampires, a method by which they would be bound to their word in an honest trade as equals, bridging the rifts made by struggles for power and cunning manipulations. Now that this boy had proposed a contract, Vermillia's pride as a Vampire dictated that she should accept it, lest she appear suspicious or untrustworthy. Making the boy think she was plotting against him would go against her purposes of acquiring the book, which meant that the only option now was to go through with the deal. Still... wasn't this boy Human? Could he really be trusted to uphold his end of the deal? Seeing her chained, he was probably thinking that she couldn't possibly do anything to him, even if he did go back on his word. The "Contract" he was proposing, then, was probably nothing more than a lie. In that case, it would do to be prudent. She might be obligated by honor to accept the contract, but that didn't mean she couldn't haggle over terms.

"Very well, then. I accept, but only under one condition. No wise peddler would ever part with his wares before he is paid for them in full, and in the same manner, as my reach is limited and I have no means of discerning your veracity, you must grant me the book first. I pledge in advance that I will answer your foolish questions upon receiving that tome, so hearken to me. I hereby swear on the honor of the Brotherhood of the Wicked Night and on the dignity of the Nightwalker Court, and upon this scarlet blood flowing through my veins, that in exchange for the book you now hold as a price, I will grant to you the information and the answers you seek. Would you like me to sign some physical parchment in Oathblood, also, or will you accept my word?" Vermillia said with a smirk, her scarlet eyes flashing brightly in the darkness. She had now turned the tables. He, having proposed the contract in the first place, with what seemed like a knowledge of Vampire customs, would be painted as an Oathbreaker, should he now back down from the negotiation. Better still, he would now have no way of turning the negotiation back on her, as, having given her pledge, was now above suspicion of traitorous intent. By Vampire customs, at least, he would be forced into accepting the contract, compelled by honor to fulfill his part of the deal, and, even if he perhaps did not follow that same code, if he wanted answers, she had just made it clear that there was only one way to get them from her.

Dameon had no idea what he just heard. The girl seemed willing to part with the information but only confusion was in Dameon's head as he listened to the pledge that was spoken. This girl seemed really strange to him, almost as if she didn't know how to not be formal during conversation. Not formal however could be used to describe her clothes, or rather her lack of. "Ok, here." Dameon reached down as he spoke to get the book closer to the girl before dropping it near where her hand were at the time. "So, how about those answers? I have done my part of the deal. Oh, can you talk normally this time too." Dameon said sarcastically, not even sure if she would pick up on it. Dameon was now getting more and more interested by the girl, who's name he was yet to discover, as time went on. Wanting to learn about her he stayed around without noticing that no one else in the library had noticed what was going on in the corner.

A triumphant, almost cackle-like laugh erupted from below as the young, red-eyed prisoner swiftly reached up, clanking her chains loudly as she caught the book, careful not to let it open as she did so, lest the pages be bent. She had finally got it: a book on the subject she desired to learn of most! Finally, answers to questions she had asked for decades might finally become known, and she might pull back the shroud of mystery to see the true world, and her true self, in the light of the reality she now understood! This was the day she had dreamed of now for countless days, every minute of her waking life devoted to finding the knowledge she now held right in her very hands!

A voice from above snapped her out of her triumphant revelry, and she glanced up at the boy who still stood over her with a somewhat bored air, as though he was no longer interesting enough to warrant her time. Still, she remembered, she had just pledged to fulfill a contract with him, so she supposed she would have to answer his questions to the best of her ability.

"Oh, right, I suppose you still want me to answer those questions of yours, then," She mumbled. She'd gotten a bit ahead of herself in her pledge, and now realized that she would actually have to try to answer his questions, some details of which even she herself did not know. This was going to be awkward. If he called her on the unsatisfactory nature of her answers, things might become troublesome...

"Fine. In answer to your first question, I have no official name - as in, given by a figure of importance - but I title myself Vermillia Aurora, the Endless Scarlet. A fitting and beautiful name, is it not? I think it suits one who dwells eternally in a sepulcher of vermillion light quite aptly." She spread her arms with another audible clank of her oversized shackles, and began to stride about as she spoke, as though addressing some invisible crowd only she could see instead of the very real Human who had asked the question in the first place. At last, however, she swept back her dust-coated black hair with a rather overdramatic gesture, and, adjusting the blanket she had draped over herself, a mantle which had been nearly knocked to the floor by her melodramatic gesticulation - unintentionally providing a rather clear view of the ragged, exposing nature of her sparse garments in the process - she turned back to the boy looking on from above. "And, in answer to your second question, I must regretfully inform you that even one such as I, a superior being at whose fingertips lies endless time and a vast quantity of wisdom left in store by the minds of a greater generation, have spent my life in attempting to discover the very answer you now seek, with no success to speak of. Therefore, I must warn you that to seek this knowledge is, perhaps, foolhardy, and will lead to a journey that you, perhaps, as one with needs far greater, and time far shorter than myself... will never be able to complete." She had begun another speech, it seemed, for her voice and features had become grave, and she had begun to pace about in the tiny area in which her chains would allow her to tread. Overall, she looked incredibly comical, speaking like a queen addressing her subject, while she herself was confined to a mere distance of 85 centimeters on all sides by painfully visible shackles.

"Tell me," she continued, looking seriously back up at the boy. "Do you ever wonder why you, yourself, are up there, in that world? Have you, for all of your searching, ever come up with an answer to that which is beyond doubt or reproof? Have you ever uncovered the meaning for your existence? It is exactly the same for me. Why have I become aware of myself? Why is it that I have lived my life in this place? Why is it that my chest aches with the heat of a flame, and my throat feels as though it will crumble to dust at any second? Why is it that my body feels as though it is being pierced by countless invisible blades, drawing me to curl up against the unseen adversary known as 'winter' or 'cold?' Why is it that I have endless time, and why is it that my world is limited to a distance of exactly 85.3 centimeters on all sides, while those in the world above were evidently allowed to stride about for miles in whatever direction they chose. Why is it that there are books in this place, and yet so many of them lie beyond my reach? These are all questions I have yet to fully understand, let alone answer, so therefore, I must simply admit that I am incapable of answering your question at the present time, and needs must, perhaps, instead offer my response at a later date once things have become more clear. Perhaps this book will give to me some of the answers I seek." She added the last sentence, almost as an afterthought to herself, as she finally seated herself at the base of the scarlet window, and, opening the book, gave a final glance up, asking a final question in a very bored voice.

"Now, is that all you wanted, or will you request some other trivial task of my endless scarlet time? If you will do so, make it quick, and find another interesting book as payment, for I must warn you, I tire of such games as these quite quickly."