Prologue Part 1
Victor Brandt sometimes looks back on his days working at the University. He was happy there, but he always knew he was destined for more. Or at least, wished he was. A talented and well-respected academic, he was a Professor of Ancient History teaching at Cambridge University. However, his extra-curricular activities were his real love. He collected many antiquities and curios from around the world, specialising in objects thought to have a paranormal or particularly mysterious past. Many people felt his studying of exact dates and hard facts of history contradicted with an interest in items relating to such things as the occult, but he knew this wasn't the case. It was only a side-interest, and besides, as much as he wished it were so, history can't record everything. Besides, these were the old days. He now goes by a different name.
Victor Cronqvist-Brandt.
This was not by choice, however, but by a set of circumstances that he could not have foreseen. In hindsight, he would have chosen his current path even if he was given the choice. The path of a crusader against evil and darkness, against forces which most people could never dream of. But these forces exist. Demons, the undead, foul creatures from other dimensions, and the people that would use these evils to their own ends.
"Victor! Victor, are you in your study? There is someone on the phone for you. They say it's urgent, I think it might be another job".
Ah, the voice of Grace, his wife and for the want of a better word, secretary.
"Transfer the call up here, thanks dear". He was too weary from his studies to face walking the long flight of stairs leading to the lounge.
Victor spends a lot of time in his study. Though his life has changed almost indistinguishably since his days in the University, he still had a keen interest in researching all things relating to the past. He is always surrounded by a large amount of old leather-bound books and faded parchments. The only difference is, it is Ancient History that is now his hobby, and his dealings in the Occult and Dark Arts is where he makes his living. This was the way he always wanted it to be, but without being a charlatan or an actor, he never thought he would be able to make an honest living out of the Paranormal.
As he sat waiting for the call to come through, he wondered what kind of new dark threat may have emerged. It had been nearly three months since the poor misguided soul who thought he could summon the demon Dungenmire and have it do his bidding. Of course his body was torn asunder the instant Dungenmire laid eyes on it, and it was only the work of Victor and his partner that prevented him from feasting on more innocents. For not only was Victor now an investigator and expert in darkness, he battled it. Being a warrior was never in his life plan. He was never a prime physical specimen, far from it. He never had the time to stay in shape, or anything resembling it. Now he had to find the time. You can't battle decaying hell spawn with a scrawny frame; they would never take you seriously.
In truth, it is his partner to whom Victor owes his current career. His career, as well as his recent name change. For his partner is a name you may recognise. The name of Mathias Cronqvist. The mortal soul who was to become the Lord of Vampires himself, Count Dracula. It is more than ironic that his name is now so synonymous with the destruction of evil, rather the reign over it. How, you may ask, can a man whose mortal self has not existed since the year 1094 be the current partner of Victor? It is exactly 1000 years since the events that led Mathias to absorb the soul of a Vampire using the Crimson Stone, thus becoming Dracula. What history never told is that this was not a conscious decision by Mathias. The betrayal of his friend Leon Belmont and his desire to become the Lord of the Vampires were not his actions. They were the actions of a malevolent spirit who has possessed him in order to gain the power of a Vampire for his own ends.
No one could have known this other than Mathias Cronqvist himself. The true story of the events of 1094 died along with his mortal soul. Or, so you would think. For his mortal soul was never vanquished. It was merged in a trinity with the soul of the Vampire and the malevolent spirit. These three souls combined to form Dracula. Each time Dracula was defeated and these souls were absorbed back into the Crimson Stone to be resurrected as Dracula, Cronqvist's soul longed to escape, struggling and clawing as though buried alive, but it was always trapped along with the other two.
The story of the Trinity of Souls that comprised Dracula did not end with the eventual defeat of the Lord of Vampires. Though the loop of his continuing resurrection using the Crimson Stone was finally broken, his soul was later to be reincarnated into Soma Cruz. This led to a long internal struggle inside the young man, who could have very easily succumbed to the evil within him. However, he was eventually able to overcome any desires to tread the same path as his previous incarnation, and so the Trinity of Souls was finally at rest. Or so it seemed. The Crimson Stone still had a part to play in the story of Mathias Cronqvist.