[hr][hr][center][img]https://s3.postimg.org/y967jpxf7/alucard.png[/img][hr][img]https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/originals/00/ea/7e/00ea7ef1b53b93b216d5b54436d8f154.gif[/img][/center][hr][i]It was a dark and stormy night...[/i]

That's how these sort of things are supposed to begin, aren't they? The scene is set with a grey and sorrowful sky, without a single patch of blue shining through the clouds. The air is chilled, and goosebumps run up and down the skin of our protagonist. Perhaps there is a flash of lightning, a witch's chuckle, the scream of a cat--anything to set the mood, of course? Now, perhaps we want to be original. Perhaps we open with... 

[i]It was a gorgeous day, with the sun shining and the birds singing, but then the murders began...[/i]

But that isn't quite right either, now is it? Which is better: the acknowledged cliché or the desperate attempt to reverse it, to come up with its exact opposite, yet produce something just as cheesy in the end? Will either of them truly cause a heart to falter these days? Which one whispers of gore and horror, of unknown secrets and mysteries waiting behind a closed curtain? 

Does it even matter, though, whether or not you feel fear? For this story may just be a myth, or perhaps, perhaps it is true. Perhaps blood will have blood. Perhaps more will perish than survive. Perhaps, just perhaps...Perhaps this will be a story that no one dares to repeat. But do our protagonists care if fear is inspired from their story? Personally, I think they are more concerned with surviving. 

The cliché it is then. Now, let us begin...

It was a dark and stormy night at the Alucard Institute for Peculiar Youth, nicknamed simply the Institute. The school's headmaster, Faust as he was called, stood at the window with an eerie smile on his face. Thirty students had been invited to the Institute's first class, divided evenly among the three houses. Each house had its own wing of the institute, with five rooms for the students. 

[color=red]"And so it begins,"[/color] Faust, though that was not his real name, whispered. Lightning, as if on cue, flashed in the sky, illuminating the children's faces. When darkness fell again, one face remained in the darkness. It was a young girl, with pale skin and blonde locks, a flame illuminating her path. Yet she carried no torch, instead carrying an orb of fire in the palm of her hand. 

October Crypt, of course, couldn't help but enjoy the atmosphere. With the flashes of lightning and the gloomy sky, it reminded her of her uncle's home. She grinned slightly, looking at the other children. Beyond family members, she hadn't had too many encounters with other necromantic children. The rain was falling softly on them, and one boy wasn't being hit with a single drop. Another student had scaly skin, shifting colors like a kaleidoscope. The oddness was thrilling. 

[color=fdc68a]"You need a light?"[/color] October offered a girl next to her, her roommate in Absinthe house. She produced another ball of flame in her hands, grinning rather strangely, like the cat that ate the canary.