October never really sat well with you. While many leaned into the spooky spirit, you found Halloween to be a nuisance. The cheesy decorations—fake cobwebs, plastic skeletons, and repetitive pumpkins—made you groan. It wasn’t about fear or thrill. Just an excuse for kids in ridiculous costumes to beg for candy while adults pretended they were in on the fun.

Yet here you were, stuck in the middle of it all because life had handed you student loans and an empty wallet. Walmart wasn’t your dream job, but it paid the bills. Two weeks before Halloween, the store was packed. Parents and kids stocked up on cheap horrors, and you stood behind the register, drained from a long day of classes, counting down the minutes until your shift ended.

The customers blurred together—a parade of plastic spiders, ghoulish masks, and candy bags—until he walked in.

At first glance, you thought he was just another overzealous Halloween enthusiast. A tall guy, draped in medieval-style clothing. His pale skin contrasted sharply with the dark cloak hanging from his shoulders, his face hauntingly beautiful—sharp, regal features that didn’t belong to someone casually shopping in a Walmart. His cold, hypnotic eyes scanned the store in confusion, like he didn’t quite understand where he was.

What you didn’t know was that this wasn’t someone playing dress-up. His name was Heeseung Lee, and he wasn’t just another guy with a thing for vampires. He was an actual vampire, a prince no less. Cursed by a witch in medieval times, he had been in a 1500-year slumber and had only just awoken to find the world completely different.

The portal to his realm, once nestled at the Ravencrest Ruins, was now demolished. What had once been mystical power was now a shopping mall. Heeseung hadn’t realized this yet; he didn’t even know what a shopping mall was.

To him, you were just another human in this strange world. And you, unaware of the supernatural, had no clue that the man before you, fangs displayed, was anything but another customer.