[Brașov — 18 years ago]
Diana woke me from my slumber while I struggled to shake off the monumental laziness that always hit me on weekends.
The TikTok job became the longest-running chapter of my career, and after a while, the daily commute started to wear me down. If anything, I missed working from home, the way I used to.
However, I wasn't in that house in Săcele anymore. Not since I met her.
After one month of relationship, we moved together in an apartment in the Tractoru district of Brașov.
"Mihaiii, breakfast's ready!" she called from the kitchen.
"Yeah, yeah, I'm coming," I muttered, stretching.
I dragged myself down the hall and into the kitchen. Diana stood by the counter, washing dishes, her sleeves rolled up, hair slightly messy from the morning.
I slipped in behind her, wrapped an arm around her waist, and kissed her cheek.
"Morning, honey," she said casually, turning just enough to brush a soft kiss against my lips.
"Morning, sweetheart," I said with a yawn and she giggled at my sleepiness.
We took our place at the table, plates and coffee mugs stretched before us. Some scrambled eggs with sausages, pickles, cheese, tomatoes.
Nothing too big. Just enough for two.
I sipped my coffee, just watching her as she ate. Just wondering how am I this lucky. Just wondering if this is all a dream and I'll wake up lonely again.
"So," Diana said between bites, "guess who tried to send me a follow request again? Alina from accounting."
She rolled her eyes. "She's obsessed with proving she's funnier than me. I swear, her memes are worse than dad jokes."
I chuckled, shaking my head. "Your memes aren't that bad."
"Please," she said, smirking. "You only say that because you're scared I'll start a meme war and drag you in."
She waved a fork at me. "And speaking of, Andrei texted me last night—he's trying to get everyone to join this weekend's karaoke. You're not allowed to bail."
I grinned. "Karaoke, huh? I'll think about it."
Diana laughed softly, tilting her head. "You always say that. But you always come anyway. Admit it—you like seeing me embarrass myself on purpose."
"Oh, please," I said, faking exasperation. "If my rapping were half as good as your singing, I'd be as famous as Tzanca Uraganu."
Not that I was a real manele fan, but… that's what everyone else seemed to listen to.
She laughed — the loud, infectious sound ringing in my ears.
"Only you would compare rap to manele like they're the same genre," she giggled.
"They both brag about how cool I am versus how lame my enemies are," I shrugged, bored. "Beats and delivery are the only thing that's different."
She pinched my nose between her fingers and laughed again.
"Come on, your rap isn't that bad," she said softly. "Just needs a little polish."
Way to tell me I suck in the nicest way.
"And your singing's actually good," I said, changing the subject.
We shared a laugh.
Then my phone rang. Marius.
Diana rolled her eyes, but said nothing.
"Yo," I said when the line connected.
"Salut, Mihai!" he replied in his usual overly enthusiastic tone. "What's good, fra?"
"Just trying to shake off the sleepiness," I said, a yawn slipping out. "You?"
"Well, I got into a fight with Ana and… yeah, whatever, I'm fine. Wanna play some football? Y'know, the good kind."
Yeah. I knew what "playing football" meant.
Smoking weed.
And I'd been trying to stay sober lately.
I sighed.
"Truth is, me and Dia are going to Sibiu," I said. "We've got the train at 11:30."
"Can't you just come down to the bloc for, like, fifteen minutes?" he insisted. "I'm already near your place."
Diana sighed softly and whispered, "Tell him he can come up."
"Actually, you can come up," I said, repeating her words like a parrot.
"Nice. See you in a minute," he said.
The line went dead.
I sighed, unable to suppress the dread crawling inside me.
Diana is my first girlfriend in six years. Marius is the first friend I made after coming back to Brașov from Hungary.
Why is this so fucking hard?
I used to be a bullied loser. A loner. Invisible.
Now I finally have people in my life, and somehow I'm stuck choosing between them.
Give me a break.
"I get why Ana feels that way," Diana sighed, rubbing her temples. "Marius has two big kids and he's still doing drugs… I would have left him by now if I was her."
I couldn't say she was wrong. Not really.
But the way she said it sounded less like sympathy and more like a question you didn't ask out loud.
Why are you still hanging with this guy?
Maybe because this guy was in my life before you?
I sighed.
"We finished high school together, y'know. He was there when no one else was."
Diana raised an eyebrow.
"And he got you into drugs," she said flatly.
"Yeah," I admitted, my voice quieter than I wanted it to be. "He did."
I looked away.
"And I'm really not in the mood for this conversation right now."
Diana kissed my forehead softly, like she was afraid that if her lips lingered a second longer, I might break.
"Sorry…," she whispered. "I trust you. I really do. It's just—"
The intercom buzzed, cutting her off.
"I know," I said, forcing a half-smile. "One day we'll move out of here and leave all this shit behind."
I said it like saying it out loud might make it real.
I got up and answered the intercom.
Less than three minutes later, Marius pushed open the apartment door.
"Yo, Mihai, Dia, what's good?" he asked casually.
I shook his hand.
"Hi," Dia said, forcing her voice into something neutral.
"Sorry to disturb you two. I know you're going on a trip and all. Hope you enjoy it," he added quickly, then hesitated.
"Truth is…" He turned to me. "I went to slots again. And lost. I made 15 million* out of 200 lei, and then I played it all back. Ana got so mad she kicked me out."
[*A/N: He made 1500 lei — "15 million" in old Romanian money, a habit of speech that refused to die with the currency.]
Me and Diana exchanged a glance.
The kind that said: this is the guy we just let into our home.
He scratched the back of his neck.
"I had like 120 lei left, so I bought this. Lemon haze. Shit's pretty strong."
He pulled a rolled joint from his jacket.
"…Let's just go to the balcony," I said flatly.
Dear Watcher.
What the hell did I do to You?
Why do You hate me so much?
As Diana and Marius followed me to the balcony, I found myself suppressing the urge to jump right off of it. Even the asphalt five floors looked soft enough to mock me, as if telling me:
Come on, you fucking pussy—it won't even hurt that much.
I found myself asking the same question my 15 years old self once screamed at a world that wouldn't let me breathe.
Why don't you all just go to hell?
Oblivious to the storm in my head, Marius lit the joint. The smell of weed spread across the balcony.
"Man, I already told you a hundred times," I sighed. "You should quit slots."
I didn't want to trauma dump, but… my dad coming home empty-handed because he gambled everything away? Peak. The hunger we had to live with after? Double peak.
Marius took a drag, then glanced at me.
"Yeah… that's the part I never seem to get," he muttered.
He passed the joint. I took three drags, feeling the familiar buzz crawl up my spine.
Great.
"At least Ana has her own money," I said quietly. "My dad took my mom's money too when he played slots."
I barely whispered it.
They both heard it anyway.
Marius looked away.
Dia looked at me—eyes soft, heavy with something like sadness.
Then she reached out.
"Give me that."
Me and Marius exchanged a glance.
Damn. She's really doing this.
I handed her the joint. Diana took a long drag.
Too long.
She started coughing, violently, her body bending forward.
I stepped in instantly, wrapping my arms around her.
"You okay?" I asked, my voice low.
She coughed a few more times, then raised a hand, signaling she was fine.
"I'm okay," she said hoarsely, waving off my worry. "Damn… that shit hits harder than I thought."
Marius let out a small laugh.
"Told you. Lemon haze."
Diana shot him a look.
"Yeah, yeah, very funny," she muttered, then turned to me.
She glanced at Marius, then back at me.
For a moment, it looked like she wanted to say something else.
But she didn't.
Instead, she forced a small smile.
"I'm not trying to turn you into some saint," she said lightly. "Don't get me wrong. I know you're not a monk."
Marius snorted.
She ignored him.
"I just…" she hesitated, searching for the right words. "I don't like seeing you tired all the time. That's all."
It sounded harmless.
But I knew better.
It was a warning dressed as kindness.
"Yeah," I replied, flatly. "Nothing me not being born in the first place wouldn't have solved."
"Shut the fuck up!," Diana and Marius said at the exact same time.
They froze, looked at each other — first time they ever agreed on anything — then turned back to me in perfect sync.
"What the fuck, man? You wanna jump? If you die, what the hell do I do? Who's gonna have my back? Shut your mouth with that bullshit or I'll drag you back myself!" Marius snapped, his anger cracking under the weight of something else.
"Don't say that," Diana said quietly. Her voice wasn't loud, just firm. "You don't get to talk like that. Not with me here. Not after everything."
She looked at me like she was scared I might actually go through with it.
"You matter. Whether you like it or not."
They both stared at me, waiting for me to say something that wasn't another goodbye.
"I'd like it if y'all didn't take me so seriously every time I said some dark shit," I said, voice flat.
The joint was on Marius now.
I took it back, pulled four hard drags in one go, held the smoke deep in my chest like I wanted the high to crush me flat.
Unbidden, the thought that always tore at me clawed its way up again.
You'd appreciate me more if I was dead, you dumbfucks.
I knew it wasn't fair.
But I'm tired.
After that, Marius went home. Me and Dia took the train to Sibiu.
And I was torn between these people, thinking they might be better off without me.
____
One day, during a one-on-one with Lavinia, she finally dropped the truth.
"I'm sorry, Mihai," she said, her voice softer than usual. "The project is ending. Your contract won't be extended."
The words hit me like a truck.
So… this is it.
A year and a half at TikTok, just like that—over.
And in the Romania of Nicușor Dan and Ilie Bolojan, where the job market was basically frozen, the conclusion was obvious.
I'm cooked.
They cut our meal tickets to five lei right before the project ended. 5 lei—an afterthought, a quiet insult wrapped in paperwork.
Over 1k people, all of us watching the same slow-motion dismissal unfold, too big to ignore and too normalized to matter.
Teleperformance became a joke by then. Everyone knew it, nobody said it loud enough to change anything
When I came home that day, I found Diana in the kitchen. The faint scent of sarmale hit me first, making my stomach twist just a little.
She was standing by the stove, sleeves rolled up, hair tied in a messy knot, scrolling on her phone while stirring the pot with slow, distracted movements.
"Hey," she said the moment she noticed me. "You're home early."
"Yeah," I replied, dropping my backpack near the door.
She looked at my face for a second longer than necessary, like she was trying to read me.
"How was your day?" she asked.
I thought about it. It wasn't like I liked this job. I hated it.
But it offered me stability. A paycheck every month. I accomplished things I couldn't before.
"Extraordinary," I replied, unable to stop the sarcasm dripping from my voice. "The best day of my life."
She didn't laugh.
"Did something happen?"
"Can you… just let me calm down a little, please?," I asked, my voice cracking.
Her eyes softened. She turned the stove down a little and stepped closer, rising on her tiptoes to plant a kiss on my cheek.
I ruffled her hair, gently, as if she was the only thing still holding me together.
"You hungry?" she asked, softer now.
"Always," I said.
Dinner passed quietly. Sarmale, mamaliga, a little too much garlic — the kind of meal that usually made me kiss her forehead and compliment her cooking. Tonight it just sat heavy.
After the plates were cleared and the kitchen light dimmed to one bulb, Diana leaned against the counter, arms crossed.
I dried my hands slowly, stalling for time. Mentally preparing myself to tell her the truth.
She didn't push. She never did when she knew I was about to drop a bombshell.
I turned off the tap and shifted to face her.
"I got fired," I said, flat. "Well, we all got fired. The project ends in a month, and they're not renewing our contracts."
She gazed at me, her eyes soft.
"I'm sorry," she said quietly. Then her voice steadied, warmer.
"Mihai… one job doesn't define you. You'll find something else. I know you will. You always do."
She stepped closer, rested her palm lightly on my arm.
"We'll figure it out. Together."
She met me halfway — tongue soft, urgent, answering like she'd been waiting for this exact second to breathe again.
For that moment, I let myself dissolve into it — her warmth, her taste, the faint salt of worry on her lips.
Everything else faded to background.
Nothing warned what came next.
______________
[București — Present timeline]
I woke up in my București flat. Suzuka and Haruka were asleep on either side of me, oblivious to the mess of a life I'd dragged behind me. I ran my fingers along their arms, careful not to wake them—because some part of me still knew I didn't deserve to touch anything that pure.
The dream lingered, sharp and bitter.
I slid out of bed, stepped onto the balcony.
The city smelled like exhaust and damp concrete. Perfect.
I rolled a joint and lit it, the familiar haze washing over me as my mind drifted back.
What happened next? I became a dropper for some Telegram bot. Chopped the drops, cooked crack—made classic Romanian "spice" that kids smoked when life offered nothing else.
And I sold it. To high schoolers.
That's why Diana left me.
That's why I'm so fucked up.
Anyway. That's in the past. Not the time to dwell on it now.
The conflict became known as Războiul Secuiesc in Romanian—the Szekler War. Hungarians, on the other hand, called it A Székely Szabadságharc: the Szekely Liberation War.
The truth? It was just LaVey doing what he always does.
For now, my future was tied to Hungary rather than Romania. To working with Count Szilárd and his Pannonia Order against the rise of LaVey.
So, yeah. I didn't really feel like seeing anyone before I left. Not after that… farce of a ceasefire the vampires agreed to.
Once the girls were up, we'd pack and move. That was the plan.
Naturally, that's when Elmenhilde's teleportation circle flared to life right in front of me, glowing red.
…Right. Of course.
Do I have a tracker on me or something?
"How did you pinpoint my location with that level of accuracy?" I asked, raising an eyebrow.
Elmenhilde didn't answer immediately. She simply stepped out of the circle, posture immaculate as always, eyes settling on me with that same measured composure.
"You misunderstand the nature of your condition," she said at last, tone even, almost clinical. "I am not 'tracking' you."
Her gaze narrowed slightly, as if weighing how much to indulge the question.
"You carry my blood. That alone establishes a connection. Under normal circumstances, distance dulls it to the point of irrelevance."
She turned her head slightly, as if sensing something beyond the balcony itself.
"However… here," she continued, voice lowering just a fraction, "in lands where our kind has endured, where that blood has taken root over centuries…"
Her eyes returned to mine.
"…your presence is not something I can simply ignore."
I stared at her for a second.
"So what, Romania just boosts your signal?"
A flicker of irritation crossed her expression.
"If you insist on reducing it to such crude terms, then yes," she replied coolly. "This land amplifies what already exists."
I exhaled through my nose.
Right.
No tracker.
Just ancient vampire Wi-Fi.
Silence lingered for a beat.
Then—
"You are leaving Romania," Elmenhilde said.
Not a question. A statement, like she already knew this was coming and she could do nothing about it.
I glanced at her. "Planning to."
Her gaze didn't waver.
"So it would seem," she replied calmly. "Your presence is already… receding."
I huffed lightly. "Didn't know I was that noticeable."
"To me, you are," she said, matter-of-fact.
A pause.
Then her expression sharpened just slightly.
"Before you go," she continued, tone tightening into something more deliberate, "there is a matter we have yet to settle."
I didn't respond. Didn't need to.
Her chin lifted a fraction.
"When I granted you my blood, we came to an understanding."
There it was.
"One favor," she said, voice precise. "A debt you have yet to repay."
I held her gaze, unimpressed on the surface.
"Yeah. I remember."
"Good," Elmenhilde replied softly. "Then allow me to clarify—I will not call upon it now."
Of course not.
Her eyes narrowed faintly.
"But when I do," she added, "you will answer."
She said it like it was set in stone.
I sighed quietly, taking a long drag from my joint.
"Do I even have a choice?" I asked flatly.
Elmenhilde's gaze dropped to the ember for half a second, then returned to my face without any visible change in expression.
"You always had a choice," she said calmly. "You simply made it long before you understood the consequences."
A brief pause.
Her voice stayed even—too even.
"And no," she added, "you do not have the luxury of pretending otherwise now."
I exhaled slowly, smoke curling between us.
"Yeah," I muttered. "Figured that's how you'd frame it."
Elmenhilde tilted her head slightly, as if I just confirmed something obvious rather than challenged it.
"It is not framing," she replied. "It is your debt and my authority to call upon it."
She stepped closer.
"In your language," she continued, "you would call it fairness."
I let out a short, humorless chuckle.
"Yeah, well, I got in a lot of debts in my past life. Funny definition of fairness, though."
Her eyes narrowed a fraction.
"Fairness rarely feels pleasant to the one who benefits from it the most."
Elmenhilde's gaze switched to the joint for a moment, before she moved to snatch it from my hand.
I blinked once. "Hey—"
She didn't acknowledge me. Just brought it to her lips and inhaled.
A second passed.
Then she exhaled slowly, expression unchanged—though the faintest crease formed between her brows.
"…It's still disgusting," she said simply.
I stared at her.
Elmenhilde turned the joint between her fingers like it was an object of mild academic interest, utterly unimpressed.
"This is what you concern yourself with?" she asked. "This faint, burnt herb?"
She took another, smaller inhale—more like testing a theory than indulging anything—then exhaled again, sharper this time.
"Trivial," she concluded. "Even by human standards."
Her gaze returned to me, cool and unamused.
"To you, it seems significant," she added. "To me, it is… noise."
I snorted. "Yeah, well, thanks for the review. Can I have it back now?"
Without a word, Elmenhilde returned the joint to my hand, as though the entire exchange was beneath consideration from the start.
Then she looked at me properly, for the last time. Her gaze held no warmth, just that annoying noble composure.
"…Until we meet again, Mihai," she said. "Do not mistake absence for dismissal."
Her eyes narrowed just a fraction, a judge delivering her sentence to a defendant.
"When I next require you," she continued calmly, "you will already know it."
Then she turned away, as if the conversation was over and nothing else was worth saying. Her circle flared red around her.
"Cya around, vampire princess," I shot back.
Elmenhilde paused for the briefest moment—just enough to acknowledge the words without granting them weight.
Her gaze flicked over her shoulder one last time, cool and unreadable, as if measuring me against some internal standard I wasn't privy to.
"…Tch," she murmured softly—more dismissal than reaction.
Then she stepped back into the circle.
The red light swallowed her without ceremony, the air tightening for an instant as the teleportation seal sealed itself shut.
And just like that, she was gone.
The very next moment, Haruka and Suzuka stepped out onto the balcony behind me.
Suzuka's gaze fell on the joint in my hand, her expression softening with a quiet, almost wistful sigh.
"…You haven't given that up, Kokonoe-kun," she said gently, a hint of concern laced beneath her calm tone. "Even now…"
Haruka leaned against the frame, peeking over my shoulder with a grin that spelled trouble.
"Oh, he did this in his past life too?" she said, amused. "Wow. Consistency. Gotta respect it."
Suzuka let out a small, breathy laugh, shaking her head.
"It's not something to admire…" she murmured, though there was no real judgment in her voice—only quiet understanding.
Haruka snorted. "Speak for yourself. Man survived death and reincarnation and still kept his bad habits. That's dedication."
I exhaled slowly, smoke drifting into the morning air.
"I relapse every time I'm back in this shitty country. If you care about me, you've gotta understand that," I said.
"I wasn't judging you," Suzuka said gently. "Not like that."
I shrugged.
"I know. It's just a reflex at this point. Come on, girls—let's pack up and get out of here."
Haruka raised an eyebrow.
"You're a vampire now. Can't you just teleport us home?"
"I could, but…" I smirked slightly. "I've got something planned. And we're not in a rush anyway. We'll go on Nelu's back like usual."
Haruka's grin stretched from ear to ear.
"Oh? A surprise."
Yeah. And it's a surprise for you.
"You're gonna see," I said, a faint smirk tugging at my lips. "Come on. Let's get moving."
They didn't press me further.
Good.
The morning air in Bucharest still carried that same weight I'd been trying to shake off—smoke, memories, habits that never really stayed buried. I exhaled once, slow, then turned my back on it.
No point lingering.
Nelu shifted beneath us as we climbed on, letting out a low rumble like he already knew the routine. The girls settled in without question, the familiar rhythm falling back into place like it always did.
One last glance over my shoulder.
Then I looked ahead.
Nelu launched forward.
And just like that, my country of birth faded behind us.