"Please, sir. Don't kill me..." The stranger pleaded, kneeling before him —the once weak and unimportant teacher. "I—I didn't mean to rob the old lady."
The teacher tilted his head, He looked down at the kneeling man quietly.
The stranger was shaking. His hands were raised, palms pressed together as if praying. There was a small knife lying on the ground beside him. Blood dripped slowly from a cut on his arm, staining the pavement.
The smell hit him instantly.
His stomach clenched.
The hunger surged, sharp and violent, like a living thing twisting inside him. His vision blurred for a second. The world narrowed until only the man in front of him remained.
"I—I didn't mean to rob her," the stranger continued, his voice breaking. "She screamed and I panicked. I swear I didn't hurt her badly. Please… please don't kill me."
The teacher's gaze fixed on the blood.
Each drop felt loud.
His heart raced, but beneath it, that slow and heavy rhythm pulsed steadily.
He swallowed hard.
"I didn't ask," he said.
The sound of his own voice startled him because it was deeper than usual. .
The stranger flinched and lowered his head, pressing his forehead to the ground. "I'll turn myself in. I'll do anything. Just let me go."
The teacher took a step forward.
The man whimpered.
His body moved on its own. His thoughts felt distant, pushed aside by the hunger clawing at his insides. The smell of blood filled his lungs with every breath.
He tried to stop himself because he knew that everything was wrong with him.
But his feet kept moving.
He stood right in front of the kneeling man now. He could see the terror in his eyes clearly. He could hear the frantic beating of his heart. But in his eyes, there was no pity for the man — only hunger.
He grabbed the man's arm, reopening the wound more. The man shook violently, clawing at him but the teacher wasn't affected. He brought the arm close to his lips and without thinking, he opened his mouth.
The moment his mouth met the wound, something inside him broke.
The warmth flooded his senses.
His hands locked onto the man's shoulders, fingers digging in as the stranger convulsed beneath him. The man screamed, thrashed, clawed at his arms, but it was useless. The teacher's grip did not loosen. It only tightened.
Each swallow dulled the pain in his stomach, each breath pulled more of that iron-rich warmth into him. His chest burned. The slow rhythm inside him thundered, it was no longer calm.
The man's screams soon turned into choking sobs, from it, turned into weak gasps. Until there was no sound again. Even at that, the teacher did not stop.
He couldn't.
His body refused to listen. His mind faded, pushed aside by instinct. He drank until the trembling beneath his hands slowed. Until the frantic heartbeat he could hear so clearly began to stutter.
And then…
Everything stopped.
Only then did the hunger finally release him.
He pulled back suddenly, gasping for air as if surfacing from deep water. His hands slipped free. The body collapsed to the ground with a dull sound.
He gazed at the unmoving body on the ground. It had turned pale, drained of its blood. The teacher did not move, just stood there, trying to process everything because a lot had happened just in one night.
First, he was returning from school, then he tried to separate a fight, and then got injured instead. Instead of dying, here he is, stronger than before. Not just stronger... He felt so much strange. Like he had become a stranger of his own self. Indeed, a lot had happened in just one night.
Standing there for who-knows how long, his sanity began to return. He suddenly remembered his mother and immediately turned to head back home.
-------
He returned home long after midnight.
The street in front of the house was lit by several phones and a few dim bulbs. People had gathered outside, whispering among themselves. The front door was open.
His heart sank as he stepped inside.
The smell of blood was faint now, mixed with disinfectant and fear. His mother's room was crowded. A few neighbors stood close together, murmuring. Someone had called for help too late.
A woman turned when she saw him.
"Where have you been?" she demanded sharply. "You left your sick mother alone the whole day. Do you even care?"
He did not answer.
He tried to move past her but she stepped in front of him.
"I'm talking to you," she said loudly. "People like you shouldn't—"
Something snapped.
His hand shot out and before he knew it, he grabbed her by the neck and shoved her backward. She gasped as her back struck the wall. The sound echoed through the room. Conversations died instantly.
"Stop," he growled, his voice not sounding like his own.
The woman clawed at his wrist, eyes wide with terror. His vision darkened at the edges. Heat rushed through his body. The slow pulse in his chest surged violently.
"Shut up," he said, each word trembling with barely restrained fury. "Or I'll make you shut up forever."
His eyes burned and someone seeing it, screamed.
He released her suddenly and she stumbled forward, coughing, and shaking. But instead of stopping, she pointed at him, voice breaking into hysterics.
"Monster!" she screamed. "You're a monster!"
The word hit him harder than anything else that night.
His head rang. "No…" he whispered.
She opened her mouth again, unfortunately, his control shattered. He grabbed her head and slammed it against the wall.
Only once. The sound was dull, that was all it took him.
Silence swallowed the room next.
He stood there, frozen, chest heaving, staring at what he had done.
The slow pulse inside him throbbed wildly for a while before dying down completely. And reality came crashing down all at once.
People around screamed, some began to run. Someone shouted his name.
His hands trembled as he slowly stepped back.
"I didn't…" he muttered. "I didn't mean to…"
But no one listened.
They had all seen what he did, there was no denying that he had killed someone in their presence, not just the killing... But the manner. No same person would think of killing someone in that manner. As such, he was a monster. An evil one.
"You are a monster, Karl. And there is no denying to it!" Someone said.
"You also kiled your mother, didn't you?" Another asked.
"My mother?" Karl mumbled. "How could I have killed my own mother?"
Then the memories of him kneeling beside his dead mother surfaced. The blood. The urge to feed on her blood. He remembered them all.
He grabbed his head as if in pain and growled.
"Argh!" His eyes suddenly turned dark.
"A monster! Run!"
"No..." He stammered, still holding his head. "I am n-not a mon-monster!" With that last sentence, he fell to the ground and lost consciousness.