Blood Queen

Unlike Gu Yao who was drowsily sleeping on the sofa to pass time, Xia Yan had been continuously reading through a small notebook that never left his side, usually stuffed in his uniform pocket.

As if returning to the training center's study room, although he no longer had various official secret learning materials at hand, relying on the key study records in his notebook, Xia Yan was still working hard to recall and organize some details he might have previously overlooked.

Pheromones, or external hormones, had been proven to exist in the human body—a microscopic external manifestation of human physiological functions and metabolic cycles, uniquely reflecting changes in an individual's behavior, emotions, physiology, and even psychological state.

People first confirmed external hormones in insects like butterflies, then later investigated them in reptiles and mammals. In some species, external hormones even served to transmit information between individuals and communicate—hence the name "pheromones."

However, for normal humans, the vomeronasal organ used to perceive pheromones had long since degenerated, with only a few sensory cells remaining in the nasal cavity's upper epithelium.

Vampires, through another form of mutation, restored the vomeronasal organ's function of perceiving pheromones. For vampires, each individual's pheromone-contained scent content was like a fingerprint—a unique identity marker.

Since China developed tracking butterflies using genetic technology twenty years ago, the operational efficiency of hunting blood servants and attendant-level vampires had greatly improved, once achieving overwhelming advantage and being secretly adopted by various national agencies.

However, soon after, techniques began spreading within vampire communities to autonomously control and reduce their own pheromone overflow. China had even discovered through intelligence analysis that domestic vampires had begun taking a new type of drug to alter or even seal their pheromone release, greatly reducing the effectiveness of tracking butterflies.

...

Closing his notebook, Xia Yan rubbed his tired eyes, only then realizing it was nearly dark. Looking at Gu Yao curled up asleep on the sofa, Xia Yan planned to prepare some food in the kitchen while it wasn't completely dark, then leave by electric scooter under cover of night.

After all, electric scooters were highly prevalent transportation tools in China's countryside—there were several parked right in the first-floor courtyard.

Just as he approached the kitchen door, Xia Yan's consciousness suddenly exploded with an indescribable wave of perception, like a pile driver forcibly shoved into his brain, pounding with intense rhythm, making his head extremely uncomfortable.

"Old Yang's family really can't change their habits—the kitchen window is never locked tight, letting you two little ones slip inside."

In the dim light, a medium-built shadow emerged—it was the express delivery man who had appeared outside the small building at noon, the bearded middle-aged man.

A pair of gradually reddening pupils revealed meaningful gazes as the bearded man slowly paced toward Xia Yan.

As the figure gradually approached, the pile driver in Xia Yan's mind seemed to transform into a bulldozer, with wave-like intimidating aura pushing his consciousness back with overwhelming pressure.

Probably seeing deep wariness in his own grave expression, feeling his imposing entrance was worth the price of admission, the bearded man actually showed a satisfied expression.

Xia Yan's body also began to warm slightly—a natural reaction from not yet mastering controlled blood-boiling. While barely resisting the psychological pressure the other created, he slowly retreated from the corridor back to the living room.

Suddenly, Xia Yan felt an indescribable terrifying aura expand behind him, like a typhoon-stirred tsunami flooding the entire living room, instantly washing away the pressure the bearded man had created.

"Holy shit! It's actually an upper-tier attendant?"

The bearded man's complexion went through several color changes in one second, his body freezing in fright, actually standing stunned at the junction of living room and corridor.

A graceful black shadow rushed over with lightning speed—just one knee strike sent the bearded man's body flying into the air, crashing directly into the corridor's end and shattering a pile of rural household bottles and jars.

Immediately after, a gleaming silver dagger was raised high, viciously stabbing toward the bearded man's eye socket at rapid speed.

"Don't... don't... spare me... I... I have something to say..."

The bearded man's whole body exploded with an invisible air wave, his body temperature spiking, eyes turning pig-liver red. At death's door, both hands desperately gripped Gu Yao's knife-wielding arm while vomiting blood, showing fearful and pleading eyes.

The bearded man's current maxed-out blood-boiling state could only let him barely cling to life.

The blonde girl pinning down the bearded man with her knee turned a deaf ear, only showing a terrifyingly cold and murderous expression. Her raised dagger arm gradually overwhelmed the bearded man's final resistance, the silver blade slowly descending, nearly touching his eyeball.

"Xiao Yao, let him go first."

Xia Yan walked over and stopped Gu Yao's outburst.

...

In front of the sofa, the bearded man sat cross-legged on the living room floor, head down, occasionally shivering, looking as aggrieved as a 150-pound wife—completely opposite to his high spirits when first appearing.

The corner of his eye wandered left and right, inadvertently seeing a black combat uniform top piled in the corner of the living room. The arm patch pattern made the bearded man's pupils contract slightly.

"What do you want to say, and your identity..."

Xia Yan leaned against the sofa, wiping a handgun, legs crossed in a relaxed pose. Under the tight jeans, his long legs formed a pleasing angle, the rounded curves of his hips faintly visible. His black hair naturally cascaded over both shoulders, expression calm.

"I'm just a wandering vampire... just curious, that's all. Everyone here knows each other, I'm familiar with Yang Ping's family—they're good people. Naturally, when there are others of my kind in their house, I had to come see..."

The bearded man wiped the gradually drying blood from the corner of his mouth, speaking carefully.

"Heh, a vampire who can coexist peacefully with ordinary people?"

Gu Yao, standing by the floor-to-ceiling window with arms crossed, couldn't help muttering, her eyes—still faintly red after exiting blood-boiling state—showing disdain.

"Not everyone infected by blood becomes a real monster... In the thirty-plus years since becoming a vampire, I too abandoned wife and children, left my homeland, and finally managed to settle here with great difficulty..."

The bearded man kept his head down, throat choking with emotion, as if recalling some painful memories.

"Abandoned wife and children thirty-plus years ago? Doesn't look like it?"

Gu Yao showed surprised eyes, walking a few steps closer to carefully examine the bearded man's face: "You look like a forty-year-old uncle at most. How old were you when you got blood-infected?"

"That’s normal. After becoming a vampire, bodily functions and metabolic levels are different from ordinary people—vampire lifespans are longer."

Xia Yan didn't find anything wrong with this, uncrossing his legs and leaning forward to begin disassembling the handgun on the coffee table, lining up bullets in a neat row.

Answering the black-haired girl's questions intermittently, though the bearded man appeared frightened on the surface, inwardly he was growing suspicious. He felt these two seemingly lowest-tier kindred, no different from newborn blood servants, seemed to be hiding some incredible secret.

"Then how do you usually solve... well, the blood thirst problem? Since you've settled here, can you bring yourself to harm your neighbors? Even if you could, aren't you afraid of exposure?"

Xia Yan finally asked a heavyweight question—one that had long puzzled him and whose official explanations he couldn't accept.

"Huh?"

The bearded man was stunned, slowly raising his head to stare at Xia Yan as if looking at a complete novice.