So I don’t get a castle? I thought it’d be my chance to get on the property ladder now I’m all Nosferatu living in a sewer eating rats like all the other millennials.
Vampires don’t live in castles either
I’m an amateur writer. One of the worldbuilding things I wanted to explore for my fantasy/steampunk word was the fact that the life of vampires who originate from commoner class must really suck, pun very much intended. You’d end up as a “high functioning” undead who gets even the few rights you previously had stripped from you. Fertile ground for social commentary.
So in this setting there’s an autonomous vampire state that’s essentially communist. In other nations, vampires are, if not persecuted outright, at least constantly struggling for recognition, and are exploited as night shift workers in the emerging industry.
I wish I could find the urban fantasy story that inspired me to explore this. It was also based on the “hey, not all vampires live glorious lifestyles” premise. I think this was in some Humble Bundle.
Sounds like “Anno Dracula” by Kim Newman.
Dracula managed to kill Van Helsing and then married Queen Victoria. AS Prince Consort he’s brought the undead to the Empire. There are vampire trollops who live no better than their ‘warm’ sisters, and great Lords.
Fun book, and first of a series.
When you’re immortal, compound interest really does become miraculous.
I dunno. I feel if you live long enough you’d eventually become wealthy. If not you’re just incompetent
I’m 1000 years old but I still don’t have my shit together
Especially if you regularly murder people.
I too have some similar concept, but for a Metal Gear (the 2D ones) clone in an Urban Fantasy setting, with the vampires primarily being a stand-in for autistic people, and the vampire myth being adjusted accordingly, with the whole “virality” thing mostly relegated to genetics, but present as a commonly held myth, alongside with power-scaling adjustments (especially due to the protagonist being a vampire), with also its own myth that make the common people afraid of them…
at least constantly struggling for recognition, and are exploited as night shift workers in the emerging industry.
This reminds me a bit of Reg Shoe, leading dead rights activist in Ankh-Morpork.
Of course the Discworld is more funny, less grimdark, compared to your ideas.Or the vampire in Feet of Clay who gets jobs in a pencil factory, as a sunglasses tester, making holy water, etc.
Oh yeah, and wasn’t there a Vampire who became crime scene photographer but had a vial of blood in his chest pocket. Just in case the flash would kill him, the vial would break when his clothing drops and blood would instantly drip onto his ashes and revive him. (Could be the same vampire, not sure)
That was Otto Chriek from The Truth.
If you want to future-proof your social commentary, the tech broligarch version of non-geographic nations that overlay existing nations are called Decentralized Autonomous Organizations.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decentralized_autonomous_organization
So even if you wanted to merge this into a magic/etheric style framework, it would be easy. Offshore DAO registered far far away meant to be egalitarian representation with a maguffin talisman that a big bad wants to get from vamps to consolidate power and upend the non-exploitative organic system.
Imagine living for centuries and still not having any money saved up.
That absolutely would be me as a vampire.
Bob, I’ve been asking for a raise for 175 years now, this is not cool.
I would be the reason the abandoned looking house in town is believed to be haunted. I would sustain myself on curious children and authority figures searching for said children.
I’m in the middle of reading Dracula for the first time right now and while the count part makes it seem normal for Dracula to be living in the castle, the castle is absolutely a vampire stronghold that has been in the dracula family for centuries because they are vampires.
Like I’m sure the count thing is a good excuse but it’s implied that they’ve been around and probably in the castle since before “counts” were a thing.
Its also probably fairly easy to become an aristocrat if you are immortal. You start as a mercenary to earn money, then you win a decisive battle for your lord and he gives you a noble title and lands.
On the other hand, if you’re immortal and you can’t manage to build a fair bit of wealth, what are you even doing with your time?
“You had a balance of 93 cents. At an average of 2 1/4% interest over a period of 1,000 years, that comes to…$4.3 billion.”
Even Fry could manage this shit backwards….
Kinda like if trump just shut his mouth and sat in his dad’s wealth he’d be rich yet here we are…
i mean he is rich, and also the POTUS. sure he’s also a horrible person and hated by everyone left of mussolini, but that’s less of an issue.
Fry had no expenses for 1000 years though.
They just ned to sell their crypto.
If I had a nickle for every time I offended a vampire in the workplace…
At least they’re happy to give up the desk by the window.
One nickel … Two nickel …
Ah hah hah
You would have two nickel. Which isn’t a lot, but since vampire doesn’t exists so i want my nickel back
I’m offended that this is how you remind me
Everyone knows that vampires live in a detached single family home on Staten Island.
Sorry to burst some peoples dreams.
The castle in the photo needs restoration, which is hugely expensive compared to restoring a house.
I don’t know about Romania, but in other European countries historic buildings are required to be maintained by the owner and it is restricted what they can do.
In Spain if the castle/palace is considered as a good of cultural interest, the restrictions are even higher. You cannot do activities that can damage it, like converting it into an hotel or restaurant. Also required to allow the public to visit it for free, at least four days each month.
There is a funny YouTuber with a series that compares Canadian (Vancouver?) real estate to literal European castles.
Yes, the comparison is not exactly “fair” because of upkeep and castles won’t appreciate in value, but it does highlight how big a problem owning property has become.
Buying that castle is probably cheaper than heating it
Vampires don’t need no warmth
Good news, everyone!
Vampires don’t need heating!
Or groceries.
They’d also be very happy to allow visitors.
I didn’t know they can’t freeze to death either
That which is dead can no longer die
Nevermind heating, it’s a ruin. How much is it gonna cost to rebuild?
Where’s Gizmo when you need him?
Mopping out Laszlo’s masturbatorium.
Ah the wanking shed that Gizmo eventually moves into :D
Before John Polidori—Lord Byron’s doctor—wrote The Vampyre (incidentally, it began at the same retreat where Mary Shelly conceived of Frankenstein), the idea of vampires as nobles who can pass among humans basically didn’t exist. They were more akin to zombies or werewolves, prior to that. Polidori’s Lord Ruthven was a British nobleman based in no small part on Lord Byron. Then a few decades later you get Carmilla, another upper class vampire, this time female. And then just a couple of decades after that, on the cusp of the 20th century, Bram Stoker writes Dracula, the first time we get a vampire who is not just noble but royal, and we get the full furnishings we associate with vampires today. The foreign accent, the castle, the wine (though interestingly, the wine Dracula serves is actually a white wine, not the blood-red we usually think of).
Also fun note: this Saturday marks the start date of Dracula. Over in !vampires@lemmy.zip I’m planning a read-through in real-time, if anyone wants to join me.
There’s also “Dracula Daily” which starts at the same time and is a great way to micro-dose the novel.
That’s what inspired me!
I decided to do that, and then when someone started the vampires community I thought…why not see if anyone wants to chat about it with me.
A count is just a title, nothing to do with royal blood. Anyone nobleman could be made a count, earl, baron, duke, etc. Right?
Yeh that’s right. But if we go off the idea that Dracula is meant to be Vlad III (which, I’ll admit, is actually something Stoker tacked on right before publication), well…he was royal.
Ok but that then begs the question, who are the king/queen?
Who are which King/Queen? Dracula is set mostly in England in 1897, so it would be Queen Victoria. But I’m guessing that might not be what you meant?
Around the time Victoria established Torchwood, but yes I meant the monarchs of Transylvania. Who bestows the title of Count upon him?
Transylvania at the time of Dracula? It was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, so it would be Franz Joseph I (yes, that Emperor Franz Joseph). Romania has a very tumultuous history, having been stuck on the frontier between Austria-Hungary and the Ottomans for most of the modern era. In Vlad III “Dracula” 's life alone it switched sides multiple times, and he was made Voivode of Wallachia and deposed at least 3 times. Voivode being roughly equivalent to Prince.
What was that post I kept seeing about vampires? If you’ve been living for centuries and you’re still broke just walk into the sunlight.
To be fair, the number of times entire villages, towns, cities, and even kingdoms were completely wiped off the map… I could see a vampire being forced to start over. A lot.
They can expect vampire hunters in their castle, but nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition.
I’m just imagining an ancient as shit vampire from Gobekli Tepe bitching about some long forgotten warlord who destroyed his horse meat business, and that he would’ve beaten Indo-Europeans to the taming of the horse of that hadn’t happened.
Fantastic! Who knows, maybe the guy Ea-Nasir pissed off was a vampire.
Here again, cropped for convenience.
What is the vampire opinion on the current state of tariffs, and global warming, and do they agree with evangelicals?
At this point in time the vampire community refuse to make any political statement. Meanwhile they find global warming rather concerning, what with the sun being stronger now. Evangelical blood is highly prized within the community.
We are gonna get a statement next from the werewolves community and the swamp things Coalition after a word from our sponsor, Count chocula.
