Chapter 8: Grudges from the past.  

Luan Davis, the captain of my high school basketball team, if you asked me which person I hate the most, I would name this man.

Because of my illness, I was always in an anemic state, but that doesn't mean I couldn't do physical activities; in the past, when I was 20 years old, I was supervised by a physical educator who was my friend and, with his help, I could do light exercise. I've always had a craving since I was a teenager... I wanted to play sports.

Do you know what it feels like to want to swim, play basketball, run, exercise, and not be able to? Because of my illness, I couldn't exert myself too much because if I tried too hard, I would pass out. In some of the worst cases, if I tried too hard, I would spend a week in bed at the hospital.

But, despite that, my doctor said I could do light exercise, and for me, that was enough; I just wanted to get a basketball and play a little, even if I was alone.

But this man... Luan Davis, he wouldn't leave me alone. Every time I trained, every time I tried hard at something, he would come towards me and say:

"This is pathetic; Why is a loser like you striving for something useless? You should just stay in a hospital bed!" And, right after that, he hit me and threw me to the ground while saying that I shouldn't have been born, that I was just a burden to my mother.

The classic bullying that you can see in any American movie, he didn't hurt me too much, he just pushed me and told me I was useless while also saying that my mother shouldn't have given birth to me. But, I still wouldn't give up; I wasn't doing it for him, I was doing it for me.

However ... With time, I started to hate him. I accepted him talking about myself, it doesn't affect me so much, but my mother!? That is unforgivable. I knew that what I was doing was useless and that my condition didn't allow me to exercise, but he was the person who kept reminding me of how useless I was.

If there's one good thing about this situation, it's that I never cried or showed any weakness. I can be physically weak, but I refused to cry in front of anyone, I refused to show weakness; there's a glaring difference between being bullied and accepting bullying. I never accepted what happened to me, but unfortunately, I couldn't do anything.

One day I tried to report this to the director, but the director just ignored it, so I did what any sane person would do; I gave up practicing and waited for an opportunity to get revenge. Unfortunately, that opportunity never came; someone was supporting Luan Davis and I didn't know who it was, I didn't want to tell my parents either.

After all, that was my problem, it was about my pride, I had to solve it myself. Looking at Luan, I can see the vampire mark with my vision that I call 'vampiric vision'.

When I saw that brand, I understood everything; he had support, precisely speaking the support was from the master of this man. A noble vampire...

Why did I deduct this? Luan was just a boy who suffered from a disease that made his muscles weak, but, for some reason, everyone forgot about it, and he got better all of a sudden. I had forgotten about it too...

Wrong, it would be wiser to say that Luan's support was none other than a Vampire, and I, as an ordinary human, couldn't do anything against that force, but now?

Now things were different.

I see the basketball bouncing and stopping in front of me.

"Hey, you! Throw the ball over here!" Someone yelled at me.

I look at the ball and a smile appears on my face, I catch the ball in my hand and I start to bounce the ball on the ground as I walk slowly towards the court.

When I get close to the court, I position myself for a toss and I throw the ball like an experienced basketball player, the ball travels across the court and lands directly in the basket.

Everyone who saw this display of precision looked at me with disbelieving looks. What I did was impossible for the average human, but it's not totally impossible. NBA players can do it with a lot of practice, but I just used my vision combined with my vampire senses and for me, that was pretty easy. To be honest, I didn't need to position myself to throw the basketball, but if I didn't it would be pretty weird, right?

"Victor...?" I heard a voice in disbelief.

I look at the man, he is 190 cm tall with light brown hair and brown eyes, he had a delinquent rebel look boasting a muscular body and a sharp look.

"Hey, Luan... Did you miss me?"

"Is that Victor? The skinny one? What happened to him!?" A player standing next to Luan asked out loud.

I flashed a smile that for a moment showed my sharp fangs, those with low senses couldn't see it but, Luan, I'm sure he did.

I walk calmly towards Luan. "379 days…" I spoke with an irritated growl, "It's been 379 days since the moment you decided I was a good punching bag."

As I walked towards Luan, the players on the court started to get out of my way, they felt an invisible pressure forcing them to move, it was like if they didn't get out of the way something really bad would happen to them: "I'm a very mean person, you know? I can't let grudges be washed away by the river of time."

As my father always said, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, punch for punch. And, now it would be something like blood for blood.

I stopped in front of Luan and looked up slightly, he was a little taller than me, and, as always, he had that cocky look on his face like he was superior to everyone, I don't like that.

"Heh, what do you intend to do? You're just a humble —" Luan tried to say something.

I gently place a hand on Luan's shoulder, and with a forceful gesture, I bring him to his knees.

Crack!

The ground around him broke like a spider's web.

Ahh~! Yes, that's the vision I wanted, that look of disbelief, that look of someone who thought he was on top only to be taken off his imaginary throne, but that's not enough.

My smile starts to grow, I lower my head and approach Luan. Slowly, my smile starts to grow erratically. Slowly, my teeth, like shark fangs, start to show. And, slowly, with a ragged smile that almost borders on insanity, I say,

"You had fun, right? Treating me like crap. Hitting me, saying I was useless. Badmouthing my mom. It was fun, right? I bet it was, after all, you always had a smile while doing it, right? It was like you were playing with an insect that could break at any moment, right?"

I put some strength in my hand and I felt his shoulder break, "But I ask you, now what?"

I must give Luan credit, he didn't show any expression when he felt his shoulder being broken.

Looking at my fangs and my bloodshot eyes, he understood that I was just like him and soon an angry growl came out of him, "You're just a newborn!"

He tried to get up but he just stayed where he was; he didn't expect me to have that much strength.

"Who gave you permission to get up?"

He looked at me with a shocked face that made my smile grow wider and wider.

"Luan, is everything okay there?" someone asked.

"Y-Yes, we're just talking"

Hearing the students' murmurs, I click my tongue, annoyed, and release Luan. My expression is back to normal, my teeth back to normal, and my eyes back to their bright blue.

Now that I am calmer, I thought: This place has a lot of people.

I walk over to the basketball and pick it up.

"Let's settle this the old-fashioned way, after all, we're not barbarians, right?" I commented with a small smile, I notice his shoulder has already healed, as expected from vampire regeneration.

I threw the ball to Luan, when Luan caught it the force of the ball made him slide away from where he was; it just demonstrated once again how much stronger I was, even for a vampire who has been transformed for more than 1 year like Luan. I think my blood has given me some unexpected benefits, huh.

"1 on 1," I said while holding up my finger, "Whoever scores 7 points wins, each ball in the basket is worth 1 point. In case of a tie, we continue to play until a player has 2 points more than the opponent"

"Simple, right?" I spoke with a small innocent smile.

"Huh? Why are you coming in here and treating it like the court is yours?" A player spoke.

I just looked at the player with a disinterested look, he was 160CM and looked like a very active teenager.

The player started to boil with anger when he saw my gaze, when he was going to start screaming again, Luan said:

"Okay, let's play." Luan gets up and that arrogance that I had eliminated in the previous conflict comes back stronger.

Heh, yes! That's how it's supposed to be! He has to act! It can't break that easily! I won't be satisfied otherwise!

...

It was decided that the judge would be a player who was too small to play on the basketball team. The two opponents used the entire court, on one side was Victor, a former aspiring basketball player, and on the other side was Luan, the captain of the basketball team.

"What is happening?" asked a red-haired woman.

Hearing the woman's question, a man quickly turned around and replied, "Apparently, the captain of the basketball team is going 1-on-1 with an aspiring basketball player."

"They seem to have a history together." Said another woman who was nearby.

"What do you mean? What happened?" Asked the redheaded woman.

"When that man arrived" The woman pointed at Victor. "He immediately got into conflict with the captain of the basketball team, it looks like the captain of the basketball team was bullying, or something, that man with the blue eyes"

"Oh?" The red-haired woman looks at the captain of the basketball team with a dangerous look; Isn't he that idiot's servant? The red-haired woman thought.

"But what are you doing here, Ruby? Shouldn't you be in med school on the other side of the building?" Answers the woman while looking at Ruby.

Ruby is a redheaded woman, she has long red hair that reaches her waist, green eyes, and pale skin like she's running out of blood. She's wearing a red sweatshirt with black jeans and athletic sneakers. She is a little shorter than the girl who was talking to her, around 175 CM tall. Ruby has a curvy body that can't be hidden by the baggy clothes she was wearing, and what's most impressive about Ruby's appearance is her breasts, which appear to be too big. This is also one of the reasons why she wears baggy clothes, she doesn't like people looking at her breasts.

"Oh, I heard a commotion and I came here to see what was going on," Ruby said as she went up the bleachers, she looked at Victor for a long time until she unconsciously grabbed her neck.

"Who do you think will win?" The woman next to Ruby asked.

Ruby lets go of her neck and sits down calmly. "I don't know." She spoke honestly

They won't use their powers here, right? Ruby suddenly looks at a spot and sees that spot is broken into a cobweb shape.

She felt her eyes twitch when she saw that little wreckage, which was obviously done by the two newborns on the basketball court.

"Miss Ruby, it's a surprise to see you here." Suddenly a blond man with green eyes appeared.

Coincidence? Of course, it wasn't a coincidence, she thought disdainfully, but nothing showed on her expressionless face.

Ruby looked at the blond man, he looked like a typical middle-aged nobleman, tall, with blond hair and green eyes.

Ruby points to the place that was destroyed, the man follows Ruby's finger and watches it for a moment: "I'll take care of it." he said in an annoyed tone.

Who was the fool who caused this? Tsk, it was probably my idiot of a dog. The blond-haired man thought with annoyance.

The man looks at Victor and Luan who have started to approach each other from the court.

The man sits down next to Ruby. "Whose newborn is this?" He spoke while looking at Victor with a haughty look, but he had a feeling he'd already seen Victor somewhere.

Ruby snorts in disdain when she sees the man's gaze, but she doesn't let it show on her face, she just responds in a neutral tone: "He is the husband of the princess of the Snow Clan."

Crack!

Ruby looked at the spot and saw that the man had broken the bleachers a bit, she just looked at the man with a 'are you serious' look? She had just suggested not to attract attention and he did.

I guess the apple doesn't fall far from the rotten tree, huh? Ruby thought as she associated the destruction on the court with the blonde man's subordinate.

"Hahahaha, you have got to be kidding, right? A plebeian with the princess of Clan Snow? Has hell frozen over and I didn't know about it? Hahahaha"

Ruby was tempted to further tease this man by saying that the Snow Clan princess wasn't the only one, but she was silent: "Corneliu, I hope you punish your subordinate after this event, you know we don't like attention."

"Yes, of course... He will definitely be punished." the now-known man Corneliu spoke up.

Ruby looked at Corneliu and saw that the expression was distorted with hatred.

Heh, did just learning that Violet has a husband cause him to go crazy like that? Men and their inflated egos, ridiculous. Ruby thought in disdain.

As soon as the whistle blows, Ruby loses interest in Corneliu and looks at the court with neutral eyes.