A new house, just moved into. New—though the building itself is quite old. It shows its age, but it's well-maintained. It's a very ordinary detached house standing in a quiet location.

At least, that's what I thought until yesterday.

While organizing luggage, I found a strange gap in the basement storage room. When I moved the furniture and investigated, a staircase I didn't recognize continued beyond it.

It's not on the house floor plan. Further down, below the basement.

That place alone was clearly older than this house.

Exposed stone walls. Doors that haven't rotted despite the passage of many years. On the floor, complex patterns are carved, the meaning of which I don't even know.

And, at the very end.

There was a strange room there.

It wasn't an altar, nor a catacomb.

—It was a bedroom. Old furniture. Faded curtains. And a large canopy bed placed in the center of the room. Someone is sleeping on it.

Translucent silver hair. White skin. On the head, a crown so small it looks out of place.

From the gaps in the blanket, even wings like a small bat were peeking out.

It's a figure I've seen somewhere. In a movie, a game, or perhaps an illustration in a story I read long ago.

"The Night Queen Eustia."

The legendary vampire everyone knows—said to have tried to cover humanity in eternal night seven hundred years ago and was sealed by a thousand knights and thirteen saints.

Of course, there's no way she actually existed.

The one in front of me is just someone who looks very similar. Thinking that way was still more realistic.

Eventually, the girl on the bed stirred. She gave a small wiggle inside the blanket.

Silver eyelashes fluttered—and just one red eye slowly opened.