Chapter 192 - Ignorant Little Lives

It was easier said than done, of course. My current magic knowledge was rudimentary, and my magic learning priorities didn't lie in the realm of creating magic artifacts. But now I finally had time to make my first steps in both of these directions, and more. The disorder of the last few days went from open flames to a quiet, but not any less dreadful simmer, but while it didn't explode, things overall slowed down.

The vampires and shapeshifters were still very much in their quiet war, but from what I got from poking Avarice about it, it was bound to be over soon, with anyone who dared to attack a vampire and don't change their city of residence immediately after, dead, or worse. Avarice seemed thrilled about that part, while I was just happy that I wasn't on her bad side.

I finally visited my grandparents and Rita. The former grilled me about my wellbeing; the latter added to that grilling about my love life. But I asked for that when I mentioned it in the first place, so there was no surprise. Overall, everyone was tentatively hoping that the dark days of St. Petersburg were drawing to a close.

I did so, too, though a more cynical part of my mind added that while dark days of St. Petersburg were ending, dark days of the world only just began. There already were questions and discussions. Protests were happening in other cities—not in mine, where people were still shell-shocked by the demon's appearance—with people raising posters against everything and anything.

Really, despite all attempts of people like Prom Queen, most of the general populace (or at least the loudest part of it) seemed to have about zero understanding of what supernatural creatures even were. It's like they read to the word "vampire" and saw nothing after that. For them, vampires could be only either sparkling pretty boys and girls, or blood-thirsty horrendous creatures. No middle ground whatsoever.

Panda returned to her dormitory another day after I left Nightingale's headquarters, so now we again met mostly when it was her shift in my store, which I opened once again. With shorter hours, though—there weren't many people interested in antiquities at the moment. It wasn't all bad, though—there were plenty of people who came to sell something to me for quick cash on these rainy days, and some of that were even worthwhile items.

I went to Nightingale Coven every afternoon to see Ghost. My student status with him was now officially recorded in Elena's papers, though she didn't look entirely happy that I picked him as a teacher, and still offered me to see other people. I refused. Me and Ghost, we already had a camaraderie going.

And he was an amazing teacher, too, despite his eccentricities. He never lost his patience with me and was always full of enthusiasm to explain anything I could not understand. Under his tutelage, my knowledge of the art of restoring and healing (which were basically one and the same, only applied to different things) grew in leaps and bounds.

At least, it felt like it. When I asked Ghost how long it took him to learn one thing or another, his answers were vague at best and "I don't remember" at worst.

By the end of the first week of my studies, a week that besides studies was filled to the brim with mundane shop-related business and time well-spent together with JJ, I had enough of assurance in my abilities to begin to practice on my own. I used for that small items that were worthless despite their old age, and if I broke them, my heart won't bleed afterwards.

I had a goal for that practice in my mind. The sofa for Avarice was still lying at my place, waiting for me to repair it to the perfect state. I could've asked Ghost to do it, but since this could wait, I wanted a satisfaction of doing it myself.

My first attempts at restoring the old to the new weren't that great, but I progressed with each failure and had high hopes of getting to my main goal soon—and after that, hell, so many options would be open for me in business sense!

But of course, the quiet before the storm wouldn't last long enough to let me get to it. Instead, it lasted just long enough to let me feel like I was just a breath away from my goal, and then gave way to the hurricane.

It came through news. Lately I got a habit of watching them, not on a TV, but on my phone, scrolling through the social feeds with the brief summaries of what was happening over breakfast. The one that caught my attention had the preview shot from the country's news program in it. In that shot was a cut from what seemed to be news from some other channel, which in turn showed a vampire woman with a snarl on her lips that gave a superb view of her fangs.

When I dug in deeper, the shot came from Britain's news. It seemed that someone wasn't afraid to make a public statement on the news—and it was sure a shock to see that this someone was a vampire. Then I listened to the message itself, reading the helpfully provided subtitles, and my opinion about its sender turned upside down. The vampire lady wasn't happy about this world-wide breach of First Commandment, no.

"We hid from you for this long, humans," the word was said with such derision that I immediately inserted 'monkeys' instead, "for a reason, and it's not fear. You and your curiosity start to dig too deep. Yes, vampires exist! Yes, you should be scared about it. But if you want to keep living your happy, ignorant little lives, then close your eyes and forget everything you saw and heard. Make up whatever fairy tales you need to calm yourselves, and leave us alone before we will have to force you."