AN: I'm sorry this took so long. I was distracted by my other stories and other things I was doing. But the next chapter is here at last and I hope you enjoy it.

The "Human" Village

Unknown to anyone at the hotel, Dracula had slipped away into the night when no-one else was looking and was flying in bat form through the woods, secretly following his daughter. Stopping to catch his breath, the Count checked around for signs of Mavis in hopes of already being ahead of her. Pretty soon he saw Mavis finally catch up.

"Whoo-hoo! This is awesome!" she said joyfully, transforming to vampire form for a brief moment to do an aerial flip and transform back into a bat. "There's the cemetery, just like dad said." she said flying off.

Feeling pressed for time, Dracula tried to hurry by dashing through the trees with long and hard flaps of his wings. It wasn't long until he came upon the village he told Mavis about, which was currently lit with streetlights. Coming in for a landing, Dracula transformed back and looked around anxiously to make sure all was quiet, before hearing his daughter's joyful cheering and hiding away in an alley.

Dracula and Mavis weren't the only ones out tonight. Also in the woods, Johnny and Mina were hiking out, Johnny wanting to see what cool things could be found here, and Mina wanting the same but also to keep Johnny out of trouble.

"Man, is this place cool or what, Mina?" Johnny asked, sounding like he was having the time of his life.

"I'm kinda leaning towards 'or what', Johnny." Mina answered. So far, she had seen nothing that caught her interest. Ever since she moved here to Transylvania, her aunt and uncle have told her many different stories about this forest, all of them giving her a sense of curiosity about which of them are true. So far, everything they've encountered has not lived up to her expectations.

Something then caught Johnny's attention. "Whoa, check that out." Mina looked in the direction and saw a cemetery that was clouded in mist. This was seen as a surprise to her.

"A cemetery?" she said in awe. "That feels a bit odd." For as long as she's lived here, her aunt and uncle always told her this forest is no place for humans for any reason. Seeing this feels like a sign that someone does live here if they have a place to bury their dead. Of course, this once again raised the question: Who does live here?

Johnny however, didn't see anything wrong and just took a picture with his phone. Afterwards he noticed something else he thought was cool. "Whoa, check out those crows in that dead tree." he said with interest and walked over to get a better look.

"Johnny!" Mina called out with concern, having had to keep him out of trouble three times already. She was about to go after him again when she heard the faint cry of someone cheering "Whoo-hoo!" and wondered where it came from. She looked around in all directions before noticing a little black dot in the sky. Squinting her eyes, Mina could see that it was a little bat flying this way. But she received an unexpected surprise then it turned into a teenage girl in a puff of blue mist in midair.

"This is awesome! Whoo-hoo!" she heard the girl cry joyfully before going in freefall and changing back into a bat. "There's the cemetery, just like Dad said." she said before flying off.

Mina felt nothing but awe from what she just saw: a girl turning into a bat. She knows full well that no human being is even capable of doing something like that. The only thing she can assume is that girl is anything but human... she's a vampire. Mina had been curious about what could be found here, now it seems she's got her wish. This then made her wonder; if one vampire lives here, then are there others? Maybe even a multitude of different monsters? Coming to a decision, Mina decided to follow that little vampire girl and find out everything she can about her.

"Hey Johnny, I'm gonna investigate something." she called to her friend. "Can I trust you to stay out of trouble 'til I get back?"

Johnny just scoffed at her words. "Don't worry, Mina. I'm a grown man. I can handle myself."

"Right." Mina replied sarcastically, thinking back to all the time she had to save him from getting hurt because he was distracted. With that said, Mina then went off into the forest after the little vampire girl.

Mavis had finally arrived at the village, flying behind a clock tower and changing to her vampire form behind it. She then came out from behind to get a good look at the village, which was currently deserted and quiet for some reason. Of course that didn't ruin Mavis's excitement from being here. Quietly, she walked down the wall, secretly watched by Dracula, and stepped out the shadows and called out to anyone who may be here. "Uh, hello?"

Dracula felt much relief about this until he heard something that wasn't from either him or his daughter. "Hello?" Alarmed, the Count turned to the other side of the alley where it came from and saw the bushed part, revealing a young human girl come out of the woods. The Count could only feel horror with seeing this, and had brief flashes of angry villagers with pitchforks and torches screaming "Vampire! Vampire!"

"A human!"

The Count briefly turned around and saw Mavis coming this way, having heard Mina's voice calling out. Panicked, the vampire dashed over to where Mina was and grabbed the human girl and pulled her behind the building, just before Mavis could see and only looked at an empty alleyway.

"Anybody out there?"

Dracula could only sit and worry as he hid from his daughter while holding a human girl tightly and keeping her quiet. Mina could only struggle to free herself from her captor's grasp. Pretty soon she was able to wiggle out and turned to confront the man and give him a piece of her mind. But just as the two locked eyes with each other, they suddenly froze. The two felt something as they looked in each other's eyes, almost like they were seeing into their souls. And for a moment, there was a flash of purple that shined in them.

Mina then shook her head to brush off the moment so she could get back to the issue. "Hey you, whats the big-" She was cut off when Dracula cupped her mouth with his hand.

"Shh." he told her. He then glanced back to the alley to see Mavis still looking this way, shortly before giving up and going off to explore the village some more. The Count breathed a sigh of relief to keeping his cover, then scooped up Mina and dashed through the forest while she struggled in her arms. They then came to a lone cabin in the woods, where Dracula tossed Mina inside and shut the door and locked it. "I'll deal with you later." he said frantically and sped back to the village, leaving Mina pounding on the door to get out.

Hurrying back to the alley, Dracula saw her daughter still looking around, wondering why she hasn't seen any humans. Mavis soon saw what looked like a clothing store and, feeling lucky, went over and looked through the window with a smile full of enthusiasm. She could see a bunch on mannequins dressed in fancy women's clothes and all looked quiet and peaceful. Suddenly, the curtain was parted by a human villager who waved a torch at Mavis and one of the mannequins revealed itself as another in disguise, both of them wearing angry snarls while grunting "Vampire! Bite toes!"

Mavis jumped back in surprise. "Oh!" But tried to still be polite. "Hi humans."

Dracula then secretly used his powers to make all the streetlights go dark so to darken the mood.

"Everything okay?" Mavis asked before deciding to introduce herself. "My name is Mavis Dracula, and I..." Her train of thought was stopped when one of the villagers stepped out of the store and pointed his pitchfork at her menacingly.

"Vampire! Burn clothes!"

"Burn my clothes? Really? Um..." Mavis felt worried before being alerted to more villages appearing with torches and grumbling "Vampire! We take your candy!"

"I'm friendly. I really am." Mavis tried to defend herself. But it seemed like the villager were just ignoring her pleas and continued advancing on her. "Calm down now. I just wanted to say hi."

Behind her one villager was lumbering menacingly toward her until he suddenly tripped and landed on his face, knocking his head off and his face, revealing himself to be one of the zombie bellhops. This accident revealed that this whole village and angry mob was one big hoax, most likely made by Dracula to try and scare his daughter into not leaving the hotel. Unfortunately Mavis had yet to see this.

While Mavis was trying to calm everyone down, the zombie's body stood back up behind her, now without his head. Dracula gasped in shock to this, as it could expose his deception. He quickly used his speed to zip between the disguised zombies and grab the disembodied head and dart behind his body. Dracula briefly peeked over to see if Mavis saw before screwing the zombie's head and putting his mask back on before slipping back to the alley, all without Mavis seeing him and leaving her none the wiser.

"Please! I've never hurt anyone. I'm home-schooled." Mavis continued trying to make nice, but then saw something that worried her. "Is that garlic?" One villager held out a piece of bread with garlic on it while another waved a torch at her and a third branded a pitchfork, only to end up piercing another through the head with it. Mavis could only stare in shock. Dracula however, only looked with disbelief and facepalmed. He was certain that his plan is now exposed due to the zombies' incompetence.

The "injured villager" stumbled and fell, his torch setting the other townsfolk ablaze, the light being bright enough to be considered a bonfire.

"Holy rabies, You're on fire!" Mavis said with concern. "Can I do anything? Can I help you?" she tried to offer. Sadly, the villagers ignored her pleas and continued menacing her. This made the young vampiress feel so dishearted that she came to a sad conclusion. "...Dad was right."

Dracula opened his eyes in surprise, not believing what he just heard.

"Dad was right." Mavis dishearteningly changed into her bat form and flew off back to the hotel. As soon as she was gone, a fog of violet mist moved to the middle of the crowd and Dracula appeared from within it and watched her disappear into the night, staring in awe at the fact his plan actually succeeded despite the few bumps it had.

"It worked." Dracula said with a smile. "Now my baby will be safe...forever." He felt like he finally put a stop to Mavis's dreams of seeing the outside world that he had been trying to protect her from. The Count then turned to the still-moaning zombies. "Alright, everybody, get back to work."

The zombies all took off their costumes and masks, although not bothering to put out the fires. The Count then noticed that one of them was dragging one of the mannequins out of the clothing store. "Hey, you don't need a mannequin." The zombie groaned in disappointment. "Leave the mannequin here. Come on." The zombie reluctantly did as he was told and put the mannequin down.

All the other zombies started working to dismantle the village now that it served its purpose. It wasn't really hard, since most of them were just walls and ceilings put together with almost no interior design. One group of zombies were crushed by a falling wall, but they managed to carry it off like a group of ants.

As the Count turned to leave, something in his mind made him stop. "Hmm, I can't help but feel like there's something else I need to take care of." he said to himself, but in the end decided to brush it off. "Bah, it's probably not important." He was too happy with the success of his plan to bother remembering what it was. He then changed into his bat form and quickly flew off into the night.

Elsewhere in the woods, Johnny was wandering around and stopped to photograph a spider spinning its web on his phone. He then turned to leave, only to stumble off a small hill when he didn't look where he was going. Of course, Johnny being Johnny, he merely brushed it off with a light chuckle.

"Awesome."

His phone suddenly rung, and he looked at it to see he got a text from Mina. Answering, he looked and saw the message read, "Johnny, I'm kinda stuck in an old cabin not too far from the cemetery and can't get out. Could you come over and help me if it's not too much trouble?"

"Sure thing." he said as he texted back. Johnny then went out to find the cabin. Of course, it wasn't considered easy, if Johnny's constant bumping into trees every time he changed direction, his backpack getting snagged on branches and tripping over logs was anything to go by. After going through all that, he finally found the cabin Mina told him she was in and used a bobby pin to undo the lock. Opening the door, he was met with Mina body-slamming into him in her attempts to get out.

"Oh, sorry, Johnny." Mina apologized.

"It's cool." Johnny brushed off. "If I was in your pickle, I would've tried the same thing. How'd you end up in there anyway?" he then asked.

"Well, I was following something interesting when some jerk tossed me in there and locked the door." Mina replied, still feeling sour about it.

"Well that's just rude." Johnny grumbled with his arms crossed, finding the situation disrespectful. He then turned his thoughts back to something. "So what interesting thing were you following?"

"Eh, it doesn't matter now. It's probably gone by this point." Mina said with sadness and disappointment.

Johnny was feeling a little disappointed himself, wanting to see what Mina saw, but then noticed something down the ridge. "Hey, check that out." He and Mina looked over and saw a large crowd of zombies in bellhop outfits moving away.

"Just look at those goofy-looking dudes." Johnny said with interest. "Is it just my imagination or do they look like they're on fire?" he asked Mina after noticing the flames. He didn't seem to be aware they were real zombies.

"No, Johnny, it's not your imagination. They definitely look like they're on fire." Mina told him. Unlike Johnny, she suspected that they really were zombies. After all, she just saw a vampire girl earlier and believed there were other non-human things in this forest. Seeing this has certainly confirmed that.

"Hey, why don't we follow them and see where they're going?" Johnny suggested.

"Somehow, that strikes me as a bad idea." Mina said, feeling a little hesitant to be following zombies. "But on the other hand, it could be a great way to finding out what hides here."

"So that's a yes? Great!" Johnny said excited and went down the hill to follow the zombies. Mina put her hands on her hips and shook her head in amusement before joining him.

At the hotel, the shadow of a bat appeared on Mavis's door and turned into a vampire. The Count had returned. "Where you been?" the shrunken head asked annoyed. "Why you sneakin' around?"

"Shh, quiet." Drac told her. He then calmly knocked on the door and talked in a fatherly manner. "Sweetheart, have you returned so soon?"

"Oh, um. Come in, Dad." he heard Mavis say, though with the sound of depression in her voice. Opening the door, the Count saw his daughter sitting on the bed, with a look of sadness on her face. "How'd it go? How was the big world? How was it out there?" he asked her as he came over and sat down with her.

"It was okay, Dad." Mavis told him, though Dracula could tell that something was bothering her. "What? What's the matter?"

"Dad, you were right!" Humans are awful!" Mavis confessed. "They were everything you said." She then buried her face in her arms in a fetal position. "They wanted to bit my toes."

"Your toes."

"And they had garlic, on bread." Mavis then told him and got up and walked off.

"What?!" Dracula said in shock. "Look at me. I'm getting goosebumps. I'm so scared." He wrapped his arms around himself in a frightened tone. Though it was clear he was faking it. Mavis could only look out the window, the feeling of sadness not leaving her eyes. To her, it seemed like her dreams of seeing the outside world and hopes that the humans have changed their ways were both crushed.

"I'm so sorry, Sweetheart." Dracula said coming over to comfort her with a hug. "I hate that you had to see that."

"I'm so sorry that I doubted you." Mavis said trying to hold her sadness. "I'll never leave here again."

Outside if her field of vision, Drac's eyes lit up as a smile formed on his face, telling he was happy to hear her say that. Though he kept his joy contained and talked with an understanding tone. "O-oh, okay. Okay." He then tried to lift her spirits by bringing up her birthday. "Look, Daddy's gonna make you the bestest birthday ever." he told her. Look what I brought you, your worm-cakes!" he said pulling out a plate of said dish, which was a stack of pancakes with worms on then.

"Don't be said anymore." Drac said to his daughter in a comforting voice. "Remember, this is the year we open Mommy's present for you."

"What did she get me?"

"We'll see." Drac replied with a shrug. "She said never to open until you're one hundred and eighteen. We've waited this long. You eat your worm-cakes and come down whenever you're ready, honey." he said as he left the room so Mavis could have some alone time. Once the door was shut, Dracula let out a sigh of relief, thinking that talk went smoothly. Of course, this didn't go unnoticed by the shrunken head and made her suspect he did something.

"Ooh. What did you do?"

"What I had to." the Count said in a serious voice, though the head remained unconvinced. "Mm-hmm."

"She'll thank me one day."

"Yeah. That's what the guy who shrunk my head said." the head said in disagreement. Dracula of course, didn't want to put up with this, or risk her ratting his deception out to Mavis, and quickly gagged her and glided off, ignoring her muffled protests.

The Count reached the elevator just in time for it to open, with Hank, Pedro, and Wendy emerging from it. "Hey, Uncle Drac." Hank greeted.

"Ah, hello kids." Drac said politely.

"Is Mavis back?' Wendy asked.

"Of course. She's in her room enjoying some worm-cakes." Drac told her.

"Ooh, I'll have some of those." Pedro said excited and bolted towards the young vampire's door. Hank didn't like the idea of him doing that and quickly took off after him, with Wendy bouncing along with a fun giggle, while Dracula smiled and went into the elevator to go down to the lobby.