Children ran around in the center of the village playing tag with one another while the adults stood around talking with each other, just waiting for nighttime to fall so that they could start lighting off their fireworks. It was a celebration that night - a young couple had just gotten married and they were going to be celebrating with the entire village that night. A very typical thing within their village. The wedding was during the day with family and friends - then when night came around was when the entire village would celebrate with them. Food, fireworks, dancing, and just having an overall amazing time with everybody. A girl about ten years old with jet black hair and startling blue eyes ran throughout the village with the other children. Her attention was going towards the man that seemed to be calling her name which had her running over towards the man with same matching green eyes and the woman that walked up next to him, her jet black hair pulled up into a tight ponytail. "Raphaelle, can you gather the children in the center so that we can start the fireworks?" the man was questioning the girl, who was smiling and speaking, "Yes, daddy!" With that she was giving them both hugs before she was running off so that she could gather all of the other children.
The night was enjoyed by everybody but just as the night started - eventually it had to come to an end. Everybody was wishing each other all a good night and returning to their homes to rest up and be ready for the day that was to come. But what they hadn't realized was the morning would never come for many of them. The light of day was something that they wouldn't ever see again. Vampires had attacked the village a few hours after everybody had retreated to their homes - and nobody had been prepared for the attack. Yet this was a small village at the base of a mountain - a place that not many people passed through and they kept to themselves - they were a bit oblivious to the dangers of the outside world.
Raphaelle had been asleep in her bed when her older brother was all of a sudden bursting into her room, which had her waking up, yet before she could even say anything he was putting a hand over her mouth and shaking his head, his finger going to his lips in a shushing motion. He was motioning for her to crawl under her bed, and he was soon following after her, the pair of them just hiding. Yet it wasn't long before they heard the screams of their parents, and while Raphaelle wanted to cry out - Alryn wasn't allowing her to make a sound. He kept a hand over his own mouth along with hers, keeping either of them from making a sound at all.
Noises could be heard from downstairs, stuff being knocked over and the screaming - while the screaming lasted anyways. But it wasn't long until it went dead quiet and then they could hear footsteps walking up the stairs, and soon could see unfamiliar boots in the doorway of the bedroom.
"I know you are here.... You can't hide for long." a voice hummed. A rather musical voice, almost intoxicating but there was a terrible sense of danger from the person that was standing in the doorway. But it wasn't long before the person seemed to be leaving. The siblings remained under the bed for a while longer, hoping that they had given it enough time before they ventured out of the room to try and leave the house. But going downstairs... neither of them had been expecting the sight that they came across. Their parents looked as though they had been ripped apart - blood everywhere. Raphaelle had to cover her mouth to stop herself from screaming in horror, tears falling down her cheeks. Neither of them knew that one of the attackers was still in the house, they were clueless until Alryn was being ripped away from his younger sister and a pair of sharp teeth were tearing violently into his neck. The last thing that he said to his sister was to run, before his world went dark and he was forever closing his eyes.
Raphaelle could only watch in horror as this happened, being rooted in spot at the time - paralyzed with fear as she watched her brother's lifeless body drop to the ground before her, and it wasn't long before that man was approaching her and something sharp was sinking into her neck, which had her giving a scream of pain. But...while the pain had been sharp it had been brief, that strange pressure all of a sudden being ripped away and she saw another person there. They gave off the same sense as the man before her... yet there was something a bit calmer about it. The last thing that she heard the newcomer saying was that they needed to be going - that hunters were close - before her world when dark and she was passing out, her hand pressed tightly to her still bleeding neck.
Nineteen year old Raphaelle was waking with a start as the memory replayed in her head.... memory more like a nightmare. And one of the few memories that she had of her childhood. Hunters had shown up at the village that same night, and Raphaelle had been the only one that they had found alive but just barely. She had been taken back to the hunter's society to receive treatment - although many had thought that she wouldn't awaken. For almost two years Raphaelle had been in a coma - but during those two years there had been an S-Rank huntress by the name of Chrissanth that had stayed at her side; holding her hand, speaking to her, even in that comatose state she had been aware that there was somebody there. When she did finally wake up, two years later, Raphaelle entered a catatonic state - not reacting or really responding to anybody or anything around her - except when Chrissanth would speak to her. It was a familiar voice, a familiar prescence, and this is what helped draw her out of that catatonic state - but it still took almost a year.
When she turned fourteen, and only after Chrissanth felt that she was better, she was brought before the hunters so that she could tell her story about what had happened that day. But the details had been vague - and this is when it was discovered that she was suffering from amnesia - she had no memory of her childhood at all other than what she knew from that dream. Her name was Raphaelle, she had lived in a small village at the base of a mountain, she seemingly had a good relationship with her parents, and she had once had an older brother named Alryn. But other than that she didn't recall anything - the actual names of her parents, the location of where she had been born, how much older her brother was. At first the society had wanted to send her away - stating that at fourteen she was far too old to be able to train to be a hunter - as all of the other hunters within the society started at the young age of ten - if they were recruited from outside of the society, or younger if they were the children of former or current hunters. Yet it had been Chrissanth who stepped up and vouched for Raphaelle, taking over as being her teacher and her mentor.
Raphaelle had started late in her training as a huntress, she had risen far above what everybody thought she would. She quickly gained ranks within the hunter society, and soon enough found herself becoming one of the rare S-Rank huntresses at the age of seventeen, having only taken three years to rise up in the ranks - yet it helped that she had been under the teachings of Chrissanth - who had been one of the top huntresses. Although as a year ago she had ended up passing away, she had been on a hunt and ended up getting herself killed while protecting some innocents. The five innocents that she had been protecting had managed to all escape with minimal injuries, and were able to continue on with their lives thanks to Chrissanth. She was pulling her black hair up into a tight ponytail after getting dressed in her usual black corset top, skinny jeans, and black combat boots then she was leaving her room so that she could head to the training grounds, her hair swishing behind her as she walked. No she knew why she had had that nightmare. This was the day that it had happened nine years ago - the day when the attack had happened and her life had forever been changed. The young woman still had the scar on her neck from the vampire biting her. She was walking into the training room just as the instructor was telling them how to kill a vampire - more like giving them terrible advice on how to get killed by the vampires in the end.
Some of the trainees did find themselves turning their attention towards the two woman that were in the room - one of them being Rose, whom a lot of them were actually use to seeing around the place. Although it was a different story with Raphaelle - as the young woman had typically isolated herself away from everybody. She had undergone a lot of training with Chrissanth outside of the prying eyes of everybody else, and even after becoming an S-Rank huntress, she had tended to just keep to herself. It was pretty rare that people ever actually saw her - typically she was away doing solo missions or she was training on her own. But now she was just needing a distraction, to break herself out of the terrible memory that she felt like she was locked in.
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