The full moon bathed Gensokyo in an eerie light, illuminating the hills and tree tops. Shadows of youkai could be seen flitting here and there, adding to the otherwise motionless night. Remilia sobbed in Reimu's arms, her tears leaving dark spots on the miko's dress.

Reimu tugged Remilia away and said, "I need to know more about this. Come into my home and we can talk about it more."

The young vampire nodded shakily and followed Reimu. Once inside, she sat down on a floor cushion without asking and wiped her tears. Remilia composed herself and was straightening up as Reimu walked in with two cups of tea.

She sat next to Remilia and handed her a cup. "Tell me what happened."

Remilia took the cup of tea and held it in her hand, looking at a sideways tea stalk. She slowly took a sip and then began to tell her story.

"It happened a few days after Sakuya and I visited you last month. Do you remember?"

Reimu nodded and waited for her to continue.

"You see, the reason we were interested is because Sakuya began to show symptoms of vampirism. She didn't have much energy and her focus was dulling. Whenever I called for Sakuya, she didn't come quickly and had a hard time paying attention. Aside from that, she would hesitate to go outside into the sun, even if her intention was to punish Meiling." Remilia paused before continuing. "I knew from the beginning what was wrong and asked her about it. She wouldn't admit anything to me and… and then one day I caught her in the basement feeding on the bodies of rats to sate her hunger."

Reimu felt her stomach twist slightly after picturing that in her head, but quickly got over it.

"Remilia, can't you do anything to help Sakuya? You are a powerful vampire, so it shouldn't be hard to fix her, right?"

Remilia sighed and said, "It would be wonderful if things were as simple as that, but they're not. Only Patchouli and myself know what I'm about to tell you." A stern look came over her face as she continued, "Sakuya has the blood of a vampire in her already. Long ago, she fought a powerful vampire lord and almost lost her life. In the final moments of the battle, the vampire lord saw potential in Sakuya and chose to spare her. He gave Sakuya his blood to make her into his slave. However, she managed to resist his spell and defeated him, but not without having some of the effects take their toll."

Reimu was shocked and asked, "Then, how did she come to meet you?"

Remilia continued, "I knew who she was going to attack that night and made my way over to the castle to watch the battle. Sakuya was very well known then as a powerful vampire hunter, so naturally I was interested in seeing her."

"Just how long ago was this exactly?"

Remilia thought for a second. "Well, maybe eight centuries ago? I'm not sure. It might have even been a millennium."

Dear god, thought Reimu to herself.

"Anyway, Sakuya barely managed to stand herself up after the battle and when she saw me emerge from the shadows," Remilia looked away, "she desperately tried to kill me. It was easy to dodge her and eventually she stopped and collapsed on the ground. The vampire blood was beginning to take over and she didn't have much time. When it took over completely, Sakuya would have lost all her memories and everything that made her herself and instead, she would have become a reincarnation of the vampire lord. So I made a deal with her. If she became my slave, I would seal the vampire blood so she could remain the way she was."

"I see how that worked out."

Remilia nodded and continued, "And now something has caused the seal I placed on her to break, releasing the vampiric powers that were sleeping."

Reimu was still a little confused about Sakuya's vampire side. "Hold on, why don't you just seal her again like you did last time? The same thing doesn't work twice or what?"

"Because Reimu, the vampire was stronger than I. The first time I was able to do it because the blood was weak, but now that it has had time to gather and grow stronger, it is beyond my capabilities."

Reimu couldn't understand how any vampire could be stronger than Remilia, so she had to ask. "Remilia, who was that vampire, and how could he have been stronger than you?"

Remilia looked up to the ceiling and then sipped her tea. She smiled slightly as if remembering something nostalgic and continued, "the vampire's name was Vlad Tepes, or Dracula as the outside world likes to call him now."

Remilia looked Reimu in the eye and said sternly, "He was my father."

A loud crash came from outside, followed by a low growl.

"S-Sakuya?!" Remilia stammered. Her eyes were wide with fear and her lips trembled slightly.

Reimu jumped up alarmed and quickly pulled aside the sliding door.

Outside, a shadowy figure lurched about, tearing up patches of ground and knocking over trees. It stopped and glared at Reimu with feral red eyes that seemed a bit like Reisen Udonge's lunatic eyes.

Remilia slowly edged behind Reimu and murmured, "That's not Sakuya."

Without warning, the shadow or rather the feral youkai, lunged at Reimu with claws outstretched, aiming to tear open her throat.

She reacted quickly and pulled a talisman out of her sleeve, repelling the attack with a shield. "Remilia, this youkai isn't itself. Could this be the work of Sakuya?"

The youkai stumbled about clumsily in a rigid manner. It prepared to lunge again, but Reimu dashed towards it and knocked it over with a powerful kick to the abdomen. She then pulled out another talisman and began chanting a sutra to purge the youkai.

There was a bright flash of light and the youkai stopped moving. A dark shadowy mist rose up from its body and dissipated into the night air.

Remilia ran up to Reimu and looked at the unconscious heap on the ground. "Hey, isn't that…"

The unconscious youkai opened its eyes and looked at the two girls standing over it. "… Huh? What am I doing over here?"

Reimu spoke up, "Yoshika, do you remember what happened to you at all?"

The Chinese vampire appeared confused. "What do you mean? I was just chasing a few humans for fun when next thing I know, I'm here talking to you."

"Can you move?"

"Well, I feel pretty stiff, but yeah. I can move enough to get up." Yoshika's entire body made sickening cracks and snaps as she slowly stood up.

Remilia was covering her ears, "That was… disturbing."

"So… what's going on, Reimu?" Asked Yoshika.

Reimu replied, "It appears we have quite an incident on our hands again and you got caught up in it by accident."

"Really? Neat!"

"It's not something you should get excited over, you know…"

Remilia had been deep in thought and looked up at Yoshika. This idiot couldn't possibly have done this on purpose. But then, what was that dark mist? As she pondered it, a thought came. "Reimu, it's quite possible that Sakuya's power has grown to such an extent that youkai are falling under her spell without actually being in direct contact with her."

Reimu turned to face Remilia. "Is that possible? Well, I guess it makes sense… sorta."

"We need to get back to my mansion and put a stop to this. However, it will not be easy. No doubt just the two of us will not be able to stop Sakuya. At this rate, we need help."

Yoshika bounced up and down, "Hey, I'll help if that's okay!" She had no fear or common sense.

Reimu nodded and asked Remilia, "So what do we do now?"

Remilia pointed in a direction beyond the shrine gates and said, "Let's go to Eientei. Perhaps they can help us with a potion to defeat Sakuya."

The moon moved across the night sky and with it, three new vampire hunters - with two actual vampires amongst them, heading to the bamboo forest.