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Hongjoong stepped into the cathedral.
Or more accurately, into what had once been a cathedral. As if to mock everything the place once stood for, the fuckers had turned the former house of God into a brothel and an opium den.
A sharp breath.
The stench of blood.
It hung so thick it was like a crimson fog had settled over everything, and under its weight Hongjoong stopped breathing. Blood is tangible at the tip of his tongue.
They'd already held a quite a feast, by the look of it. Gorging themselves in cathedrals and cackling about it was a favorite pastime of the bloodsuckers. A revolting habit — and a stupid one, too, since it made Hongjoong's job that much easier. All he had to do was pick them off one by one while they lay sprawled across the pews, drowsy and heavily drunk with blood.
Splash.
Blood lapped against his boots. The marble corridor that must once have led to the chapel was pooled and running with it, as if the marble itself were cut open and left to bleed.
Hongjoong crouched, dipped a gloved finger into it, and tasted. Warm. Fresh human blood. By the scent, it had come from a young woman. Spilled while her heart was still beating — exactly the way the leeches liked it best. Hongjoong rose and kept walking. At the end of the corridor, the chapel opened onto a hellscape painted in blood.
Bodies lay strewn everywhere — men and women, young and old. Blood spattered the walls, and on the floor the thick, clotting pools kept spreading, slowly swallowing more and more of the marble floor slowly yet notably expanding its territory.
Hongjoong drew the tantō from his boot. The blade, as long as his forearm, bore the blessing of the Vatican saints long dead. He pulled out his silver crucifix beneath his shirt, kissed it, and crossed himself.
“Still doing that, huh?"
A voice drifted down from above, laced with laughter. A soft, low voice—beautiful, seductive. The very one Hongjoong had been hunting for a hundred and twenty years —
"Still believe in God, I see."
From the chapel's upper gallery, the owner of that voice sat perched on the railing, gazing down at Hongjoong. Smiling. Smile that has been haunting Hongjoong for God knows how long.
"Long time no see, Hongjoong-ah."
Words barely a whisper. It was a soft, quiet one. To Hongjoong it rang out like the chapel organ at full blast, loud enough to tear his eardrums apart.
"Shut the fuck up"
With a light hop, Seonghwa dropped from the railing. He'd leapt from well over ten meters, with the faintest whisper of a footstep. He straightened. Before he could stop himself, Hongjoong's eyes swept over the monster in front of him, from the tips of his toes to his head.
Still beautiful.
No, more beautiful than ever. A black satin clung to every line of his body. Black shiny blouse fell open at the chest, obscene even if unintended. Waves of black hair spilled past his temple and brushed his shoulders.
Deep-set eyes, a elegant nose rising sharply from between the brows. And lips. Full, tempting lips.
If not for the blood smeared over his hands and clothes, one could have mistaken him for an angel. And how many had done exactly that, and ended up as helpless preys to be devoured?
Hongjoong's jaw tightened, and he adjusted his grip on the tantō. The monster walked slowly toward him. King of the vampires. The monster who had slaughtered dozens of hunters. The most beautiful, most powerful bloodsucker to walk under the moon.
It was no exaggeration to say Hongjoong had spent almost his entire life chasing this creature. Park Seonghwa is nearly all that remained of his existence.
The legendary hunter and the most vicious vampire. Maybe their long game of cat and mouse might actually end, he thought, without being hopeful. Hongjoong put a cigarette between his pouty lips and flickere his lighter.
"Hongjoong-ah."
The monster clicked his tongue at the sight.
“I thought I had told you to quit. They're not well suited for your health, especially considering chemicals these humans have come up with these days."
Hongjoong didn't biother to with an answer. He was late and he was furious. He hadn't imagined these leeches would be bold enough to throw a feast in a cathedral right in the middle of the city. And judging by the fact that their king remained, the whole bloodbath must have been staged to lure him here.
Seonghwa followed Hongjoong's gaze. It led to a boy lying in the distance, his throat torn half open, blood barely dripping out now. Seonghwa smiled apologetically.
"I was hungry, you see," he cooed, his voice and manner smooth as silk.
"But don't worry, Hongjoong-ah. They all had it coming. I handpicked them —the ones who led the charge in shunning half-bloods and driving them out. Young or old, none of them were innocent. Every human who ever threw a stone at a half-blood or pointed a finger — we drank their vile blood here tonight. For you."
“I said shut the fuck up."
Hongjoong dragged deep on his cigarette, as if the smoke could chase away even a little of the stench of blood. But the vampire continues.
"You have no idea how much our kids miss you."
“...shut up." Hongjoong's clenched teeth ground together hard enough to crack.
"I mean it. Mingi talks about you all the time —.”
"Mingi is dead." Hongjoong glared at Seonghwa.
"So are the others. All of them. You slaughtered my family."
Seonghwa's eyes went round, like an innocent bunny and he stepped closer. As if he sincerely pitied the hunter. Those deep brwon eyes were brighter than Hongjoong remembered — rounder, brighter than ever.
Tap, tap.
Seonghwa closed the distance, and Hongjoong took the cigarette from his lips and exhaled, as though the smoke might blot out even a little of the nightmare he'd been living - the nightmare continuing for a century.
"Hongjoong-ah…"
The instant Seonghwa reached for him, Hongjoong slashed across his hand, fast as lightning. Seonghwa dodged, of course. In that split second Hongjoong was behind him, driving the blade down diagonally toward his neck. "Whoops." Seonghwa feigned surprise and stepped back.
BOOM.
The marble floor where Hongjoong's small blade struck shattered to pieces.
"You've gotten stronger," Seonghwa said, genuinely impressed.
“That strength even with the shackle on?"
Hongjoong doesn't answer. He abandoned the tantō buried in the marble floor and launches himself straight at Seonghwa. A karambit flicked open in his palm and sliced the air. Strands of Seonghwa's hair fluttered loose, and a thin red line cut across his face, beading with blood. Seonghwa's eyes sharpenes. Before Hongjoong can even catch his breath, Seonghwa is on him, one hand wrapped around Hongjoong's throat.
"Ngh…" Hongjoong's feet left the ground. For every bit of strength he had gained, the vampire had become an even more horrifying monster. Seonghwa hurled him into the marble statue of a saint standing in the corner of the chapel. The statue collides around him, and Hongjoong was flung to the floor amid the wreckage. Before he reckons, Seonghwa is straddling him. He pins Hongjoong's shoulder with his left hand and strokes Hongjoong's cheek with his right hand fingers.
"Hongjoong-ah… imagine how sad the kids would be if they saw us fighting."
Seonghwa's tender, gentle voice seeps into Hongjoong's skin like venom.
"Did you know?" he whispers. “San is the biggest of us all now? Our San, who was wasting away, starving to death… Yeosang can walk now. Wooyoung sees the world with both his eyes, and Jongho talks. You've never heard Jongho's voice, have you?"
Hongjoong desperately wants to cover his ears. Seonghwa's venom keeps welling up like water in a well.
"Jongho even sings now. You wouldn't believe how beautiful his voice is. He sings us hymns when we go to sleep."
“Fuck… you…” Hongjoong heavily breathes. He is all of sudden out of breath. Blood fills his vein with those words of the vampire.
"Yunho and Mingi are together now." Seonghwa brushed his lips over Hongjoong's ear, his jaw, the nape of his neck.
"And you know what? Mingi was the one who begged. He begged Yunho to make him one of us… so they could be together forever…"
“No!” Hongjoong denies, but he knows. Oh, he KNOWS.
"Our little brothers are so much happier now, Hongjoong-ah."
"Shut…"
"All we need is you, and we'll finally be a family, a complete one!"
Tears welled in Hongjoong's eyes. Because he knew every word out of that devil's mouth was true. The little brothers he'd failed to protect had only found happiness after becoming the monsters he was sworn to kill. That truth shredded his soul like a blade.
"Don't cry." Seonghwa looked genuinely pained as he pressed his lips to Hongjoong's cheek. Hongjoong flinched at the touch, a searing brand to his yet recoupable soul.
Unable to hold back any longer, Seonghwa sank his fangs into Hongjoong's neck. Warm red blood welled from the skin the sharp teeth had pierced, and Seonghwa sealed his lips over it greedily, drinking. "Hngh… ah…" Hongjoong moaned beneath him. Pleasure shot from the crown of his head straight down his spine. Ecstasy. The harder Seonghwa's wet lips sucked the skin of his throat, the more he felt his strength draining away along with it.
"Haah…"
Seonghwa closed his eyes. "I've drunk more half-blood than I can count, but yours is so exceptional, Hongjoong-ah…” The vampire kept drinking and drinking as the blood seeped out, running his tongue along Hongjoong's jaw. Hongjoong squeezed his eyes shut. He gave up trying to control his body as it squirmed beneath Seonghwa, his hips rolling up against Seonghwa's of their own accord. Instead, trembling, he managed to close his hand around the small revolver hidden behind his belt. It held the last bullet His Holiness had blessed before these monsters murdered him. San and Yeosang had killed the Pope, they said. Hongjoong thought of little Kang Yeosang, with a face and a heart you'd swear belonged to an angel incarnate. His family — poor, orphaned, broken and damaged — no longer exists. All that remains are bloodsuckers who's joined the very monsters that stole their parents, friends, and their souls. Bloodsuckers that Kim Hongjoong, the hunter, is destined to put down.
“Nng, Hongjoong-ah… Hongjoong-ah…" Seonghwa kept breathing hot against his neck, tongue still working over the wound, and Hongjoong caught his jaw with his left hand. Lips and chin drenched in Hongjoong's blood, Park Seonghwa gazed up at him as if he were looking at the most precious thing in the world. A hateful face. A beautiful face. A face he hadn't forgotten for a single day in the last hundred years of his existence.
Hongjoong let go of Seonghwa and ripped the crucifix from his own neck. All his life, Kim Hongjoong had been taught never to use the vampire side of him. Until now, no leech he'd faced had required anything more than his human side strength. That was what had made Kim Hongjoong the greatest hunter of all. But none of that mattered anymore. To fight a monster, you had to be willing to become one. Even if it meant tumbling down into hell with it.
The moment the silver chain left his body, Hongjoong's eyes turned red. In one motion he seized Park Seonghwa by the collar and slammed him into the floor, his right hand still locked around the revolver. "Ngh." Park Seonghwa thrashed, but Hongjoong's hold didn't budge. Hongjoong's head spun. With the necklace gone, the scent of blood that had only faintly tempted him before now crashed into every one of his senses like a blow to the skull. That vivid, sweet, velvety smell... promising to sate his hunger in an instant... Hongjoong let out a long breath, struggling to keep hold of himself.
The vampire before him smells sweeter than anything he had ever known or imagined. Hongjoong gritted his teeth to hold back, but his fangs slid down all the same. The long, sharp fangs of a half-blood. Seonghwa laughed at the sight. "That's it." Hongjoong growled.
"Isn't it funny, Hongjoong-ah?"
At some point Park Seonghwa had picked up Hongjoong's cigarette, and now he brought it to his own lips. He took a long drag and let the smoke out, eyes closed, savoring it as if tasting Hongjoong's breath. "If half-bloods are so vile and filthy as the great church proclaims, why are they so strong? So beautiful?"
Humans despises half-bloods, yet brainwashes them from childhood into vampire hunters and use them for all they were worth. That always makes Park Seonghwa so angry.
Click.
Hongjoong pressed the muzzle of the revolver, loaded with its silver bullet, to Seonghwa's forehead. "It's over." Hongjoong drew a breath. Park Seonghwa's expression doesn't change. The monster doesn’t even flinch a bit.
"Shoot," he sneers. "Dying by your hand is the second thing on my prayer list."
Hongjoong's grip tightened. How dare he. How dare he. A monster, talking about prayer. A monster who had taken everything from him, left him to endure a hundred years of solitude, and in the end corrupted even his soul. Hongjoong's hand shook. Hatred. A hundred years of hatred. A century spent chasing nothing but Park Seonghwa had eaten away at Hongjoong's soul, his existence and his everything. Kim Hongjoong could no longer tell whether he wanted to kill Park Seonghwa or be killed by him.
Is it the same for you?
He looked down again at the beautiful creature pinned beneath him. The cut he'd left had already healed, leaving only a faint trace of blood. The blood at the corner of his mouth. Lips slightly parted. Soft, shallow breaths. Those damned lips. Those damned—— "Fuuuck——" Hongjoong flung the revolver aside, grabbed Park Seonghwa's jaw, and crushed their mouths together. Seonghwa went rigid for a moment, then melted. His eyes crinkled, a smile curving his lips, and he wrapped his arms fervently around Hongjoong's neck. Tears pooled in his eyes. A monster's tears—the first in a hundred years.
Hongjoong's clumsy fangs split Seonghwa's lip. Blood welled, and Hongjoong tasts it. Sweeter and more fragrant than anything he'd ever tasted in his life. Hongjoong's eyes roll back. "Hongjoong-ah, Hongjoong-ah…" Beneath him, Seonghwa rolls his hips against Hongjoong’s. Only then did Hongjoong realize how painfully hard he was. “Fuck…” He refuses to take his mouth away. He licked Seonghwa’s blood again and again, chasing every drop as he tore open the button of Seonghwa’s trousers. Seonghwa was already fully hard. Hongjoong wrapped a hand around him and stroked. Seonghwa twisted beneath him with a moan. That voice. The voice Hongjoong had dreamed about. For a hundred years. The sin he had never once managed to confess, not even inside the darkness of a confessional, was right here beneath his hands.
Seonghwa fumbled frantically with Hongjoong’s trousers and dragged them down. Hongjoong was so hard that precum had already begun to spill from him. He pressed himself against Seonghwa and began grinding them together. Both of them groaned like animals. “Ngh… hh.” “Haa—ah, ah—Hong… Hongjoong-ah—your blood… blood, please… Hongjoong-ah…” At Seonghwa’s pleading, Hongjoong spat out a curse and offered his throat again. This time Seonghwa bit without hesitation. He knew. Half-bloods tasted better. Half-bloods were stronger. And among them all, Kim Hongjoong was the sweetest. The most beautiful. The strongest. Without the leash humans had fastened around his throat, Kim Hongjoong was practically immortal.
The flesh Seonghwa tore open was already beginning to close. Before it could heal completely, Seonghwa drank greedily from the wound, sucking up the fresh blood and licking at every drop. “Ah… fuck…” Hongjoong squeezed his eyes shut at the pleasure of being fed from. He spat into his palm and stroked himself. Precum, saliva, and blood slicked his cock. Then, without preparation, he shoved himself inside Seonghwa. “AAH—!” Seonghwa arched violently beneath him. Pain flashed white behind his eyes. Then it turned into pleasure. Overwhelmed by it, Seonghwa came almost immediately.
Hongjoong stared at the white fluid splashed across clothes and skin and licked the taste of Seonghwa from his skin.
“So eager.” Hongjoong lets out a low laugh but he doesn’t stop. He drove into him again. And again. And again. Seonghwa’s eyes rolled back again. His gaze had gone loose and unfocused, tears gathered at the corners of his eyes. Blood coated his lips. Those lips remained open, spilling nothing but broken, filthy little moans and whimpers. “Ah… ah—ngh… ha…” Hongjoong thought that if this was what Hell looked like, perhaps Hell wouldn’t be so terrible after all. His head spun. Blood filled the air. Seonghwa’s scent filled his lungs. The body around his cock clenched so tightly it felt as though Seonghwa meant to bite it off. Blood and come lingered salty and metallic on his tongue. “Fuck… fuck… Park Seonghwa…” Hongjoong kept thrusting. The rhythm grew faster. Harder. Until there was nothing controlled about it anymore. The obscene slap of flesh against flesh echoed between the enormous walls of the chapel, and Seonghwa’s beautiful moans rose with it like harmony. Hongjoong couldn’t take it anymore. He stripped the trousers tangled around Seonghwa’s knees away completely. Then he lifted Seonghwa’s long legs over his shoulders. His fangs extended fully. And he buried them in Seonghwa’s thigh. “Nngh, ahh—!” Seonghwa arched again, crying out at the mingled pain and pleasure. Blood surged from the artery. Hongjoong drank. No. He practically bathed in it. Seonghwa had fed well tonight, and the blood inside him was plentiful, hot, fragrant. Sweet as honey. After one hundred and twenty years, the prey drinks from the predator and vice versa. The impossibly sweet vampire blood that had tormented Hongjoong even in his dreams. The vampire hunter drank like a mad man. His eyes deepened from red to something nearly black. Half his face was soaked in Seonghwa’s blood. Still he licked and licked, and drank.
Nectar. He could drink forever and never have enough. “Nnngh… ah—hongjoong---” Seonghwa came again from the feeding. Hongjoong, his face drenched in blood, drove himself back inside him. Seonghwa’s thighs and groin were a mess of blood and sweat and come. Hongjoong thrust tirelessly. He bent over Seonghwa, licking his throat like an animal. His mouth moved lower. Chest. Nipples. Skin. Then back to Seonghwa’s lips. Hongjoong forced his tongue into his mouth and tasted everything he could reach. Seonghwa met his tongue with his own eagerly, licking his own blood from Hongjoong’s face. It felt like Heaven. “Nn… Hongjoong-ah…” “Park Seonghwa—here.” Hongjoong’s voice was ragged. “Here. Bite me.” Still thrusting, he offered the untouched side of his throat. Seonghwa bit happily. “Ah—” Hongjoong came with Seonghwa’s fangs buried in his neck and his cock buried as deep inside Seonghwa as it could go. His whole body shook. He filled him. And kept filling him. Seonghwa purred with satisfaction, drunk on Hongjoong’s blood and the pleasure of Hongjoong feeding from him in return. “Good…” He rolled his hips. “Feels good… ah…”
Again. And again. As though determined to milk every last drop from Hongjoong. Hongjoong buried his face against Seonghwa’s throat and groaned. Seonghwa came for the third time. By the end, only thin, clear fluid spilled from him. Then the vampire body finally went limp. Hongjoong slowly descends from an orgasm that seems to have lasted forever. For a long time, he didn’t move. He kept his nose buried against the vampire’s throat, breathing in his scent as though oxygen alone could no longer keep him alive. Red had spread even into the whites of his eyes. From a distance, they looked almost entirely black.
Kim Hongjoong — panting, fanged, covered in blood. Had humans seen him now, they would have called him the closest thing to a demon sprung out of hell. Eventually, with a low groan, Hongjoong pulls himself out. He stared blankly at the white fluid slowly leaking from the seemingly unconscious vampire. Not a bad sight, he thinks to. himself. He wanted to keep it inside Seonghwa forever.
Hongjoong lets out a humorless laugh that sound more like a sobbing. So, it takes hell of a fucking to beat down a vampire that can’t be killed. “Ha…" Hongjoong pulls his trousers back on. Dry, crooked laughter keep scraping out of his throat. Carefully, he wipes the unconscious vampire clean with a rough handkerchief, and when he sees that the wound on the vampire's thigh had closed, a sigh of relief escapes before he can stop it. He strokes the vampire’s cheek a few more times, brushing lightly with the back of his palm. He dresses the vampire, smiling thinly. Tears well in his black eyes and drops onto the vampire's body.
Beside the softly breathing, sleeping vampire lay the silver revolver. It had landed in a pool of blood, but when he checked the round and cocked it, it seemed to work well enough. Hongjoong picked up the revolver and looked at Park Seonghwa. A last tear fell from his eye.
"…Fuck."
Slumped on the floor, Hongjoong ran his fingers through the hair of the vampire lying beside him. And he realized that for nearly a hundred years, he had wanted to touch him like this. Hongjoong buried his head in his hands. Then he lifted his gaze to the tall stained-glass window high on the cathedral's central wall. Moonlight streamed through it, and the colors of the glass warped and rippled across the sea of blood.
Time to go to hell.
The moment Hongjoong finally understood he could never send Park Seonghwa to hell — the moment he cast off God's leash and bared his throat to the devil— Kim Hongjoong's fate had been sealed. Slowly, but without hesitation, Hongjoong placed the muzzle of the revolver in his mouth. He could still taste Park Seonghwa's sweet blood. One last time, he savored it on his tongue. Maybe they'd meet again someday, in hell. Strangely, the thought brought him a kind of peace. That vampire's face, his voice, his scent kept rising in his mind, and something thick welled up in his throat. Hongjoong closed his eyes, and just as he was about to pull the trigger—
"—"
A heavy blow struck his head, and Hongjoong crumpled where he sat.
"Mingi-ya."
Seonghwa, somehow already awake, scolds the tall, buff vampire quietly.
“You’ll hurt him if you hit that hard."
"He'll heal anyway, hyung."
Behind Mingi's hulking frame, five more pairs of red eyes emerged from the darkness. "Hongjoong-hyung…" San approached the fallen Hongjoong and lifted his face, smiling with an expression on the verge of tears.
“He has't changed a bit since a hundred years ago." The rest of the vampires gathered quietly, gazing with overwhelmed eyes at the hunter who had once saved them.
Their father.
Their brother.
The man who then wandered for a hundred years seeking to kill them. To get him back, they had killed even the Pope. Seonghwa rose to his feet. The wound on his left thigh made him stagger slightly, but he soon regained his strength. His eyes caught the glint of the crucifix, lying soaked in blood on the floor. Smiling, he picked it up.
Silver coated in blood fails to burn the vampire's skin.
Quiet chuckle escapes him. Then Park Seonghwa turns gently to his children.
“Maybe God really does exist, kids."
Seonghwa kissed the cross.
“After all, He answered our prayers, Didn't He?"
Yunho, listening, smiled. "Let's go, hyung. The family's finally together."
Seonghwa nodds and walked out of the chapel. Cradling Hongjoong carefully in both arms, he melts into the darkness with his family.
Clang.
The silver cross hits the marble floor.Still drenched in blood.