Beneath the bloody red remnants of sunset, a bird with pure white wings soared across the sky.

Within the supposedly empty changing room of Chromwell Academy, lingered muffled, chaotic breaths.

Accompanied by the rustling of fabric, the sounds stood out starkly in the quiet atmosphere.

Feeling the struggle of the delicate girl in her embrace, the golden-haired, arrogant-eyed Celeste frowned slightly, pausing her “tasting.”

She tightened her grip on the girl’s slender, snow-white wrists, pinning them forcefully against the storage cabinet behind her with a “bang!”

“If you behave, perhaps it won’t hurt so much!”

Celeste issued her warning. Her fangs had elongated from tasting the delectable fresh blood, her originally azure pupils now tinged crimson.

Before her was a frail girl, raven locks cascading like tassels, shoulders and knees trembling uncontrollably.

As a Sequence Two student, suppressing the mind of this Sequence Five girl was child’s play for Celeste.

Yet despite Celeste’s oppression causing her body to cower in fear, legs growing too weak to stand, the girl’s rose-quartz eyes, gorgeous yet dim, still burned with a flame that could be called “indignation” or “defiance.”

How vexing…
Apart from the fresh bite marks Celeste had just made on the girl’s snowy neck and dainty collarbones, there were already many overlapping wounds left by those Sequence One elites.

Adele, you’re not a doll for anyone to defile, are you?

So why resist me in particular?

“Do you act this stubborn when under them too?”

“Or is it that because I’m just a lowly Sequence Two, I’m not allowed to taste you like the Sequence Ones?”

“What’s with that…you mixed-blood disgrace, only your skin and blood are sweet.”

The more the blonde Celeste thought about it, the more indignant she became. She forcefully gripped Adele’s face, forcing her to look at her own.

Her sharp nails, enhanced by her loss of control, left several red marks on Adele’s fair, porcelain skin – one of which oozed sweet-smelling blood.

Someone once said Adele’s blood was irresistibly sweet to any vampire.

Celeste’s breathing grew more ragged as her fangs extended to their Sequence Two limit.

Then, meeting Adele’s increasingly feeble gaze, she plunged her fangs viciously into the pale neck and began drinking greedily, venting her frustrations.

The already frail girl gradually lost her voice under Celeste’s unchecked indulgence, her pallid face draining of all color.

She just wanted to sleep…

To escape this hell of unending torment and violation, not just from Celeste but from all of them.

Perhaps she wasn’t as strong as she imagined…

Adele’s consciousness faded, a single teardrop rolling down her cheek to shatter like a translucent flower upon hitting the floor.

Someone, anyone…

Please save her.

Or…

Take her place…

These were Adele’s last thoughts before her world went black.

……………………
Celeste panicked.

Before her eyes, Adele’s body slid limply down the storage cabinet, a discarded doll.

Only her glassy, rose-colored eyes stared ahead vacantly, devoid of life, her once radiant beauty now ash-pale death.

Celeste had only wanted what the Sequence Ones had…

To savor the sweet fragrance of the academy’s most beautiful girl, the one she fell for at first sight.

Yet she could only watch as those elites summoned Adele at their whim, making her their plaything, their living blood source.

Too weak to stop them, too unworthy even to join their ranks and be allowed a taste, mocked as unfit to partake of Adele.

But then this chance arose, and she took it – confessing her feelings only to be rejected, those proud eyes looking down on her.

So Celeste lost herself to rage and envy, asserting her higher Sequence to overpower Adele and finally taste that long-coveted blood.

The vampire rules dictated lower Sequences must submit to higher ones, unable to resist that dominance of bloodline.

As a human-vampire halfling, Adele too could not defy this principle.

But Celeste never intended this outcome from her brief indulgence, her greed causing her to take just a bit too much…

Celeste fell to her knees before Adele, trembling shoulders curved as she sobbed silently into her hands, fat teardrops rolling down to speckle Adele’s fair legs and skirt.

It was then that Adele’s vacant rose-colored eyes began to refocus.

The girl had merely fainted – an unsurprising occurrence for one so frequently drained by the Sequence Ones.

Realizing she had overreacted, all thoughts of her actions and Adele’s perception of her fled Celeste’s mind as she flung herself into a desperate embrace, cradling the still form tenderly.

“Adele…thank goodness you’re okay!” she wept, apologies spilling forth over and over.
“I’m so sorry, so sorry!”

What Celeste failed to notice was the decidedly puzzled “Adele Question” expression dawning across the girl’s features as she began surveying her surroundings in confusion.

Adele? Who was that?

Such a familiar name…

And where was this place?

Hadn’t she just been reading a novel – some kind of Tangerine(GL)-themed revenge story with an abused female lead?