Chapter 153: 4

Chapter 153: 4

The coffin is really nice.

Actually, it was incredibly nice.

Soft interior, very plushy walls and an equally plush bedding floor lined with what felt like true silk velvet. Jia Hyson had only had the opportunity to touch pure silk velvet a few times before when he was Prince Farrell and in the last world as Jin Bao, and even in those worlds, it was incredibly rare and expensive.

However, it was undeniably such an exquisite fabric for a reason, as it's smooth and soft sensation caressed your hand the moment you touch it.

If Jia Hyson could describe what pure velvet silk was, it was like the Kobe beef of the velvet industry. And when he says kobe beef, he means the highest tier kobe beef, not that basic tier shit.

Jia Hyson felt that it could do with some pillows and plushies, and a thin blanket would be just perfect. But honestly, it was truly a luxury coffin that was simply wasted on the dead.

Feeling his teeth suddenly itch, Jia Hyson absentmindedly reaches up to touch the rather unpleasant sensation in his mouth and pricked his fingers on the sharp edge of what could only be a fang.

Interesting.

He had some suspicions given the whole coffin thing, and the fact he could clearly see so well despite being encased in the darkness of the coffin with no light in sight. However, from what he could tell, his clothing was fairly modern in style, not luxuriously medieval European at all.

"Let's see the story, Bebe," Jia Hyson closes his eyes and accepts the information sent to him.

The story is a modern fantasy campus drama called Miss Fang and her Vampire Boyfriend.

It was a tale of, well, Miss Jessica Fang and her vampire boyfriend, published on a rather famous Western site known as W*ttpad. It was actually quite popular for various reasons.

Jessica Fang is a completely average, supernormal high school girl who starts her second year in Middleton High by saving a handsome man that ends up being the second prince of the biggest vampire coven in America- Damien Rose of the Golden Rose Coven.

She hides him in her place because he's being attacked by the Eclipse Coven, a rival vampire community, which he suspects is being helped by his younger brother Prince Kieran.

Jia Hyson: '...I quite like the names.'

Bebe: 'That's all you could say?'

Jia Hyson: 'What else can I say? They're good names. A bit tacky but not too cringe. It's not too over the top you know?'

Jessica Fang is very edgy sounding, like a comic book character. Damien Rose... it's a bit too much of an erotica male lead name but it's still quite handsome.

He also liked that the coven name Golden Rose which isn't so on the nose about the vampire thing and Eclipse is a stereotypical but popular word for this theme. The basic story premise is so cliche that it couldn't be more cliche but if the names are not awful, people, especially young people, will inevitably be attracted to it. Writers need a decent sense of naming, if you don't have a balance between the fantastical and the mundane names in a story it can be a bit too hard to bear.

For example, naming the main character something like; Snow, Angel, Zero, Xypher, Dragon Jia Hyson apologises but if he sees that in the synopsis he will automatically assume it as garbage and move on.

Maybe he's wrong, but he rather be wrong than risk being caught reading some shitty story about the love between the plain average girl Anastasia 'Angel' Heartstone and the brooding mysterious man Novae Nightingale, with her childhood friend Xavier Knight* that also holds a dark secret

*I just want people to know, I had to go to wattpad to find the cringe names I desired, and while the Anastasia one I made up, the other two are real names of characters of popular books there.

Anyway, after a period of recuperation and living together where the pair cultivated good feelings, Damien Rose leaves Jessica Fang without a word.

It was for the typical reasons of him fully recovering but being torn to leave this warm environment he had grown fond of with Jessica. Yet at the same time, he had his responsibilities and his problems wouldn't go away just by ignoring them.

The trigger for him to decisively leave was because Jessica accidentally cuts herself while trying to make a meal for the two. Damien, who has both, not drunk any blood recently and was attracted to Jessica, pushed her down like a hungry beast. Of course, he didn't do anything but he scared her quite a bit, and he too had become shocked and appalled at himself, apologising profusely.

The pair make up and they have a sweet scene of him taking care of her cut and helping clumsily make dinner with her. Then during the night, like a total gentleman, he stared at Jessica while she slept, and reluctantly left when the sun started to rise.

Yes. He just left. No note, or anything. Why? For plot reasons. Why did he stare at her while she slept? ...Plot reasons.

This sudden departure, causes Jessica to worry as well as gives her the opportunity to perform all the emotions of an angsty teenager in love really. However, she doesn't indulge in her complicated emotional monologues for long as he is revealed to be a new transfer student at her high school a week later!

This is because when Damien came back to the Golden Rose Coven, his younger brother Kieran had already done a lot of things in his absence. Using Damian's death as an excuse, he had swayed many of Damien's allies, corrupted others in Damien's name, and presented 'evidence' that implicated that Damien was the one who had connections with the Eclipse Coven.

To be honest, Damien had only been with Jessica for like two weeks. So this was really quite impressive.

However, just because vampires lived long it didn't mean they all treated time as a thing to waste. Kieran had done a lot of groundwork beforehand, he had the status of the third prince, and as the person who was actually guilting of making deals with the Eclipse Coven, he had a lot of dirt to plant on people. So while still impressive, it was not completely hard to believe.

Kieran had actually expected Damien to die, the injuries were incredibly severe after all, even by vampire standards. Not to mention he had also been poisoned because Kieran was nothing but a thorough brother-murderer. Jia Hyson respected that sort of work attitude a lot. After all, if you're going to kill someone, you gotta really make sure you succeed or else what's the point? ()

Bebe: '...' _ The worst part is he's not wrong.

Therefore, Damien coming back from the brink of death after two weeks was truly unprecedentedly fast.

Spoilers for the last book, the recovery speed was because Jessica Fang is the bullshit incarnation of a goddess or something- it's really not that important right now- but hey, the foreshadowing was quite good and made it seem like it was simply the male lead's superior abilities for now. Jia Hyson admittedly thought that was quite well done.

Still, him recovering so quickly was actually another nail in his coffin. The other Golden Rose members who were present at the time witnessed the brutal injuries and also reluctantly admitted that it should be impossible for Damien to survive unscathed in just a fortnight unless he developed super healing.

In the story, they explain this was unlikely as he already had his own unique power and generally vampires don't dual wield, and if they do, the powers will manifest at the same time. Alternatively, he was faking, and it was all a scheme made by him and the Eclipse coven in order to establish his prestige in Golden Rose, cementing his persona as a loyal prince.

Jia Hyson who had read this silently dissed the logical loophole. After all healing abilities were not flashy, it is totally possible the male lead did manifest these powers at the same time as his main power, and there was just never any opportunity to show itself. Yet everyone seemed to feel like the convoluted and elaborate plan that was the second option was more legitimate.

Damien and Kieran's older brother, the first prince Silas, was not a fool but his biggest flaw was he was unambitious and lazy. If he wasn't incredibly powerful, everyone would be more than eager to kick him from his eligibility as the King of Golden Rose.

It was also because of Prince Silas' lazy attitude, that it allowed the ambitious Kieran to grow a wolf's heart and dog's lungs*, ready to destroy his older brother for the sake of having a chance at the crown.

*Refers to "(lngxngufi) the heart of wolf and lungs of dog." Its meaning is derived from the characters that it uses: cruel and unscrupulous; be brutal and cold-blooded; ungrateful and heartless.

Essentially, Silas played the important supporting character who was powerful and wise enough to give Damian the backup he needs, but also his character flaw he had provided the legitimate reason for letting a lot of stupid shit happen under his nose in order for Damien and Jessica to solve it.

In this situation, Silas knew Damien was innocent and suspected Kieran. However, while he was powerful, he was not as popular as Damien and not manipulative and active in making connections as Kieran, therefore his ability to uncover the truth was limited, not to mention the evidence was really damning.

Therefore he had 'banished' Damien to live in the mortal world, limiting his powers almost completely. Silas, like a good supporting lead, had also secretly passed Damien an item that can bypass his restrictions a certain number of times which was an incredibly useful and convenient plot device.

Of course, nobody else knew about Silas' show of nepotism, and everyone thought it was a fair judgement, after all, vampires loved their bloodline the most, especially the pure noble and royal bloodlines. Nobody but Kieran was really interested in killing Damien, and they felt such a punishment was humiliating and fitting enough. This approval for his unbiased judgements stabilised Silas' problematic reputation, for now, allowing him to investigate the situation more easily while also making it hard for Kieran to make any big moves.

And so, this brought the romantic subplot between Damien and Jessica back to the forefront.

Yay.

Damien has to get used to not being a vampire while trying to find ways to prove his innocence. Silas brought in a vampire with powers of foresight, who directed Damien to find what he seeks in Middleton High where Jessica is. He slowly assimilates into human school and life, Jessica of course is the one who helps him with her own 'outcast' friend group, and she also discovers he's a vampire in the process after he fights off one of Kieran's hired assassins who found him.

Then comes the plot of there's actually a big secret to Middleton High, where the school was once a school for vampire hunters and there were a lot of hidden tunnels and other bullshit. But the main thing is, there is a magical artefact called the Pearl of Past Truths. This is the item that would prove Damien's innocence.

In the end, Kieran will also find out about this, which will increase the urgency for both parties and provide a sufficiently climatic atmosphere. Many battles and fights will happen between the humans and the vampires Kieran sent out which was generally shown in a comedic light or showcasing the ingenuity of humans fighting back. In fairness some of it was a very 'convenient coincidence' but overall it was rather praiseworthy.

Finally, the group discovered the wherabouts of the pearl- it was the centrepiece of the trophy for the year-end talent show.

Jia Hyson: '' Why.

It was also discovered the headmaster who had always known the value of the pearl and is also an ex-hunter, carefully protected this pearl which could be said to be the heirloom passed on from headmaster to headmaster, all of who were retired hunters. Therefore for the rather mediocre group of vicious vampires that Kieran could only find the opportunity to hire as assassins, they could not fight back at all against this headmaster, and desperately chose the only alternative option.

To compete fairly (completely sabotage) the talent competition and win the trophy.

This is possible as one of the vampires had the power to switch bodies. They replaced the most popular girl- who was also a typical bully character to Jessica- and the rest of the vampires just went around being dicks essentially.

In the end, Jessica and Damien win the talent competition through their moving love song where they finally confess their feelings, gain the pearl, defeat Kieran's goons, and finally wash Damien's reputation white.

Kieran is sentenced to the same sentence as Damien, except Silas was far less kind and didn't give Kieran any way to temporarily bypass his restrictions nor did he give a timeframe to when his exile will be lifted.

The story ends with Damien and Jessica holding hands as they walk to Middleton High affectionately surrounded by their friends.

Overall, the reviews for this were good. Jia Hyson also could not find much fault with it. It was a cheesy teen drama. There wasn't much he could say really, It targeted the demographic well, the plot was fairly consistent, the mystery was a bit simple but that was a good thing, the characters were decent albeit very cliche, there were quite a few funny quips and the world-building was solid.

If Jia Hyson was only handed this he would be very puzzled about what he was doing here.

But Jia Hyson wasn't handed just this.

No.

Because this was a series.

Miss Fang and her Vampire Boyfriend.

Miss Fang and the Vampire Academy.

Miss Fang and the Rise of the Vampire Emperor.

Miss Fang and her Vampire Husband.

Jia Hyson who was forced to take in all of this: ""

"Oh dear god," Jia Hyson sighs, "It feels worse than sitting in a car for a day trip up the mountains, I'm really going to puke."

Miss Fang and Her Vampire Boyfriend series could be summarised like this-

Miss Fang and her Vampire Boyfriend:

Jessica sees and rescues Damien after the attack during summer vacation. Damien leaves, and they meet in the human Middleton high school. Various things happen, they get together. The main villain, third brother Prince Kieran gets exiled.

Miss Fang and the Vampire Academy:

Damien brings Jessica to the vampire academy for her last two years of high school. This vampire academy obviously isn't advertised as such and is most of the student population is made up of humans, but they're either young geniuses who the government believes should be 'preserved' relations of vampires or very powerful and rich people who come through the back door. Some know about vampires, some don't.

"Seriously, ah," Jia Hyson sighs heavily, "I know my three views are a bit skewed but I rather not help a bigot if I don't have to. Especially not a stupid self-righteous one."

"It's not really..." Bebe hesitates, it also understands what Jia Hyson is uncomfortable with. "If you improve the position of Alaric into something less... demeaning, then the systems who try implement the process to get the author to rewrite the story will do their best to subtly convince the author and change their mindset to fit the story's views."

Jia Hyson was surprised, "You guys are willing to brainwash authors?"

"What part of subtly do you fail to comprehend?" Bebe snaps, "There are various ways we can help open up someone's mindset that doesn't include non-consensual mind alteration ah! The systems can do something to the school the author goes to and introduce LGBT+ awareness or maybe they'll go teach a creative writing course and tell people to write something supporting such themes.

We can also use subliminal messaging like in ads, and internet recommendations. Some more extreme methods can be inserting a system acting as a gay person to befriend the author in order for the author to humanize them better, or hiring a host of the same sex into seducing the author." Bebe pauses as if thinking of something before coughing and muttering quietly, "...But if all else fails, then yeah brainwashing isn't necessarily off the table."

Author Jia Hyson shivers.

He didn't really pay attention to what the systems did in order to convince the authors to improve their stories to such specific specifications, but now that he hears a few listed out he's a bit perturbed. He's sure that most of the easier less extreme methods worked harmlessly and successfully but some of the more radical methods are very sci-fi horror-esque ah.

Of course, even though he was disturbed it was only a fleeting emotion. People were naturally like that. When it doesn't directly affect you, the attitude toward tragedy is more like a melon eater*. Jia Hyson was naturally even more apathetic than most people so how can such a thing really bring him down ah.

*bystander watching big gossip. Typically, people crack melon seeds as their snack while watching a good show.

Besides, Jia Hyson never had much patience for bigots. Nor hypersensitive people to be honest. Though they were both extreme opposites on the political correctness scale, he had to admit he disliked them both equally as their attitudes were honestly quite similar.

For example, an author can make a mistake about Canada being in America. It's a very silly mistake and most readers will laugh and point it out with good humour and some lighthearted ridicule.

However, bigots toward America may say something like, 'As if Canada can be the same as America, are you dumb, America has x and Canada has y, y is clearly better than x. It's incredibly disgusting that you would even bala bala bala.'

Conversely, an oversensitive reader may notice the mistake and say 'As a Canadian, I am sorry to tell you Canada is not in America and I'm deeply offended that you would think this way. I'm sure that you just didn't do your research, or just didn't think about how this affects Canadians who see this but I can't just sit by and let you think this is okay when it's clearly hurting so many people and bala bala bala.'

In short, for things most people will not feel very concerned about, and even feel like it's a stupid mistake that needed a gentle reminder at best, these two extremists will act like the author had personally come into their houses, spat in their faces, slapped their mothers and singlehandedly offended an entire group, race or country. Most of the time their views are polar opposites but sometimes they become surprisingly similar.

The topic of whitewashing in a way could be construed as a good example of that overlap. A bigot could say, why should white people write people of colour. An over-sensitive person will say they don't agree with the bigot's opinion, but they will still happily criticise a person who writes other races in a way they aren't happy with.

Maybe they will snidely comment along the lines of 'clearly this author isn't from X race or they would've known better,' 'How can this white man talk about non-white women issues? How could Asians understand the racism of Africans?'. And it's true that nobody can fully understand the plights of someone else. But then again, Jia Hyson has never experienced what it's like to be a horse, does that mean he is inept to write about the problems of horses even if he does the research as best he can?

In this way, they may not be for whitewashing but indirectly they are promoting writer discrimination and a narrower worldview. White people should only write about white people and draw western comics. Asians are best in writing asian themes and drawing manga aesthetics. The only difference in Jia Hyson's opinion is that between a bigot and an oversensitive politically correct social justice warrior in this matter is one acts more pretentiously than the other.

Bebe: '....Those are some very specific examples.'

Jia Hyson: 'Tsk. Obviously, I've had personal experience ah, If not I wouldn't be so worked up about it.'

Which writer hasn't written a character and commented on their skin colour? Many people will say this girl's skin is as white as snow or pale like jade. This young man was tanned like healthy wheat.

However, once you write a black character and said they had skin like coffee, chocolate, and chestnut it becomes a hate crime in the eyes of some people. Jia Hyson has seen people blast him because their skin colour was not coffee coloured therefore he is racist, that they have never read anyone describe skin colour so he must be a bad writer, or even that it's okay to say a person is black but it's over the line to say the shade and tone of their skin.

He can only say one thing to those people.

Jia Hyson: '...Are you sick?'

What, your skin is different to the described person's skin? It's not like each race comes in one monotonous skin colour. Some people are just darker than others and some are lighter. As a writer with a specific image in mind one wants to most accurately convey this image to the audience.

If you've never read anyone who has mentioned skin colour in their story then aren't you just poorly read? It's not like you can imagine a person's appearance and race by costume and hair alone given this melting pot of society now ah.

And isn't not being able to specifically call out the type of skin colour and assume they're all the same, standard colouration, in fact, a form of generalisation and stereotyping in itself? Peh, isn't the implication of this more racist?

In short, no matter what's outside, aren't we all human beings? Why be so nitpicky? Describing skin colour should be like describing hair. There shouldn't be such a fuss. Unless you purposely described their skin with clearly negative words such as brown shit, yellow piss or white ejaculate, there's really no need to get upset.

Bebe: 'Are you done?' Also who would describe someone's skin as the last one?

Jia Hyson: 'I'm never done but probably yes.'

Anyway, the point is Alaric Rong was considered quite problematic. It's fine for minorities to be presented as villains or cannon fodder characters just as it's fine for them to be presented as heroes and supporting characters. However, it is how they are represented, and how the focus of their traits is handled.

Alaric Rong as a villain and red herring is fine. But it shouldn't be based solely on the fact he had an 'abnormal' interest. Unless that abnormal interest was like, killing people to wear their skin as an apron while cooking their organs for dinner. Because that was pretty suspicious.

Generally, as long as someone's interest or lack of interest in something doesn't harm society or pose a threat to others, Jia Hyson feels like it shouldn't be so difficult to accept. However, maybe he himself only felt that way because he was already somebody who harmed society and posed multiple threats to others. Like a leopard watching people be afraid of a black cat, he could only feel it was ridiculous.

Yet despite his own tendencies and messed up past, he didn't feel that his view was wrong or should be invalidated just because of it ah. Why attack people slightly different as if their very sexuality and choices in what they like were personally offending all nine generations of your family? It was really shameful.

Anyway, the problem with Alaric is indeed hard to handle. Jia Hyson didn't think there was actually an easy way to let him be accepted into the protagonist well given the strong bias against his interests. After all, if it was simple to change the mind of a racist or a homophobe then world peace would have been established years ago and slavery wouldn't exist.

The first idea is to become friends with the main character Jessica Fang. Once you become a good enough friend and confidant, after revealing your secret in a controlled environment, there is a good chance after a period of reconstructing their world views, they will slowly accept you.

However, that is deeply reliant on exactly how deep the prejudice is and how stubborn the person can be. There are many cases of not just friends but close relatives by blood disowning someone who they found to be 'abnormal'. Therefore this path is a path with uncertain success.

Another is simply to not do anything. Like the saying goes, if you only have mean things to say, then just don't say anything at all.

Take Alaric out of the story and put him in the background with minimal lines as a minor supporting background character and don't interact with Jessica Fang at all. This is the simplest and easiest way, as well as the safest, most assured path to success.

Jia Hyson is more inclined to be an opportunistic person who will only strike when he knows he has a very low chance of getting caught. The safe path of course is much more preferable to him than the uncertain path where he has to rely on not just others, but a bigot's ability to reform.

However, it wasn't that he didn't feel guilt for Alaric as well. The man was wronged in so many ways, it also didn't feel very good to silence him to appease a piece of shit.

The coffin was quite spacious, Jia Hyson could easily move his arms so they can massage his throbbing temples. "Bebe, does Alaric have any side missions?"

"Do you want to see the other side missions as well or-"

"No," Jia Hyson was fairly rich now, he could afford to be impetuous and fickle. Right now his current plan will be unfair to Alaric so if he could, he wants to help fulfil any of the vampire's requests. "Just show me Alaric's requests, I don't need to take on anything else."

Bebe does not protest. It was also not desperate for money either and after so many years more or less understood Jia Hyson's mentality. He wasn't completely apathetic and psychotic.

As long as his own interests weren't too affected he could be kind and generous. But even if his own interests were violated, if Jia Hyson felt that he owed something to the other person he will still do something if it was in his power. There is still a sense of guilt and obligation in him, as well a fairly strong sense of responsibility.

"There are two side missions made by Alaric," Bebe reports, "The first one is that he wants to find the true traitor who betrayed information to the hunters and, if possible, solve the problem quickly so fewer vampires become implicated. He is willing to give 12,000p and three vials of noble vampire blood."

"And the second one?"

Bebe fell silent for a minute, "This the second one Alaric wants to find people who will accept and praise him when he crossdresses. He is willing to give 2,000p."

Hearing this, Jia Hyson sighs heavily, "What an idiot."

You could tell Alaric really loves the Golden Rose coven. Whether it might just be because he was raised like this or he naturally has a very patriotic demeanour, it was undeniable that while the man's personality was not likeable and prejudiced about humans and blood purity, he did want the best for the coven.

Not to mention, that second side mission It was clear Alaric didn't put much stock into it when you compare the two rewards, but honestly if you really didn't mind then why put the request in the first place? It was a contradiction. Alaric wanted it but also felt guilty for wanting it at the same time.

"Accept it."

Bebe silently complies before asking curiously, "Host, how are you going to do this then? Accepting the second mission especially goes against your original plan to not let Alaric's secret out."

"Don't worry," Jia Hyson was already thinking of a few plans, "I have a certain direction I want to try. Besides, worst case scenario I'll go burn all of Alaric's secret clothes, murder a bunch of people and finding out whether I like to wear a skirt or not will be quite irrelevant."

Bebe: "Why is violence always the answer with you?"

Jia Hyson shrugs, "It's the best last case resort, sue me."_()_/

Now that he had most of everything in his head sorted out, he kicks open the lid of the coffin and sits up to stretch his sleepy muscles.

Jia Hyson is not someone who believes he can easily produce winds and waves, and he does not hold any delusions about reforming the system or having the ability to either. He can only think of doing small changes with the things he is capable of doing. Whether it can become big or not is out of his hands.

Still, that didn't mean there wasn't something he could do ah.

Maybe it would have an impact on the main characters of the story. Maybe it won't. But hey, if it makes an impact on someone, then his efforts won't be necessarily in vain.

...

....

..

Authors Note:

Hello hello~ I hope you like the premise ah~

So tbh I'm not 100% sure if I need to talk bout this but the lgbt+ community scares me a bit. So I figured I should clarify a bit. This arc has more on the theme of toxic masculinity and gender stereotypes than anything, and while it touches on maybe some other things like transgender, I'm pretty sure it doesn't count. It's like saying I touched a river and therefore I touched the ocean because eventually, the water I touched reached there. Like it kinda counts because it's all the same water but also no. I dunno this was written at midnight lmao.

Honestly, the issues aren't really going to taken apart in detail and stuff at all? I'm just a bit scared people may be upset that I've gone a bit serious but also never addressed transgender issues. Which exist. Obviously. Many issues. And honestly, I'm not obligated to address them either in this story, because obviously, this is an arc about crossdressing vampires in a story about fuckboy Hyson and his beta bitch Bebe.

Fuckboy Hyson and Beta Bitch Bebe: yo wtf

I am not denying transgender themes, I don't wanna invalidate or hurt so I don't wanna touch on it in detail or anything since I am not confident in writing it well enough.

If you're trans I hope you know that I don't mean anything for not like mentioning much about the subject. However, I hope that you take some of the acceptance of being ok to be yourself that I'm trying to convey instead (don't fucking take all of it, we need to share it with the other troubled people which is everyone here because you guys are all weirdos who shipped a chicken with a dragon).

Honestly, I think regardless, of everything, all of us can relate on some level to something here.

I love ya'll equally regardless of who you are. Hope you have a lovely day <3< p>

(That's not true, I'm a liar. I'll love you more if you review and donate >;3)

Oh fuck right. This arc will have some non con, dub con themes and scenes which I probs should have talked more about ah but yeah. Gonna get some blackmail, dub con etc hehe.