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Dead Apostles (死徒, Shito?) are humans that became vampires either by the use of Magecraft (like Nrvnqsr Chaos, though this kind is rare) or by the actions of another vampire of similar nature (in this case, either a True Ancestor or another Dead Apostle). Among the creatures that fall under the vampire category, they are the most numerous. The main targets of the Executors of the Burial Agency, an organization created for the purpose of stopping the spreading of the heresy known as vampires by exterminating the Dead Apostles and sealing The Twenty-seven Dead Apostle Ancestors.[1][2]

Origin

The original members of this kind of vampire were created to act as counter-measures in the case of a True Ancestor being overwhelmed by his or her thirst for blood. In exchange for losing their free will and becoming a tool to relieve the vampiric impulses of the True Ancestors, these individuals were granted powers and longevity similar to their masters. However, what they received was still a flawed form of immortality and it was soon discovered that they needed to suck the blood of others to survive. Then just like the True Ancestors, have these vampires the instinct known as Vampiric Impulses (吸血衝動, kyuuketsu shoudou?)[3], which pushes them to suck the blood of others. But differently than the vampirc impulses of the True Ancestors, these vampires have the physical need to suck the blood of others in order to maintain their own bodies. For those Dead Apostles who used to be human, it is something not entirely dissimilar from an expression of love.

The result of repeatedly sucking the blood of humans was the emergence of a sense of superiority in the heart of the servants of the True Ancestors. Such a thing eventually gave birth to a feeling of rebellion towards their masters, which then lead the servants to find ways of strengthening their mental control and escaping from the domain of the True Ancestors. After the rebellion, these blood-sucking humans became known as the Dead Apostles.

Although the Dead Apostles are maverick and individualistic by nature, there is a form of ruling body among them: The Twenty-seven Dead Apostle Ancestors. At first a group formed only by the original Dead Apostles who escaped from the True Ancestors, today however it is more of a collection of very odd, but powerful bloodsucking characters who are divided into multiple rival factions. Most of the original Dead Apostles were destroyed along the generations or sealed away by the Church. Afterward, their seats among the 27 Ancestors were either left empty or filled by somewhat suitable replacements. On a side note, those sealed away are actually just placed into eternal imprisonment inside special coffins, for the Church lacks the means to definitely destroy them. Meanwhile, some of the factions of minions of those sealed Ancestors still remain and are slowly gaining power to either free their masters or destroy them. There are two primary factions that divide the Apostles, there are those who follow the formal King of the Dead Apostles, Trhvmn Ortenrosse, and those who follow the Princess of the Dead Apostles, Altrouge Brunestud.

Society

For the Apostles amusement is the same as breathing. For those who were once human and achieved imperfect immortality, boredom is their greatest enemy. As soon as someone realizes they have no value---that their life is stopped, then their meaning of existence disappears too. So they started to wear down and to counter this they started to create their own amusement.

The Apostles began a game of conquest and saw themselves as lords of a castle expanding their territories. Additionally, Ortenrosse suggested a game of hunting the remaining True Ancestors. The Apostles find territorial wars and power struggles within their own factions entertaining and, for their own enjoyment, they place their own blood inside the humans they preyed upon. These corpses go through the Growth Process to become Vampires and eventually kill their parent Vampire in order to become new Dead Apostles themselves. For the Dead Apostles, killing another Dead Apostle isn't something, for the overall number of vampires doesn't change. However, those Apostles, like Enhance who want to destroy the existence of all vampires, in a manner similar to vampire hunters, become unforgivable traitors. Should a Dead Apostle be killed then all of his children vampires should die as well, but those who are treated as successors can live on even after the parent's death. The area needs investigation even after the parent is exterminated, and the real job of purification only begins after that point.

The Apostles, however, try to maintain the balance between society and themselves. They exploit humans in secret, for no other reason than self-preservation. They don't want it to be known that vampires exist at all and to protect their own lives, they hide the bodies of their victims, expand their territory and use various magical techniques to make things appear not out of the ordinary. But there were also Dead Apostles, like Einnashe, with values unchanged since the Middle Ages and sucked blood with reckless abundance. Then Aged Apostles set their own rules and by abiding by them enjoy bloodsucking as entertainment. Most of the long-lived Apostles don't use their names from their human lives anymore. And they don't make up a new name for themselves, but the Church assigns them one. They add on names as they find new, special characteristics of the vampire so some of them have names as long as spells.

The common goal of all Dead Apostles is to achieve perfect immortality, who does not rely on the ingestion of blood. There exist a variety of approaches of Apostles who tried to achieve it but no one has succeeded yet. It could be said that another goal of all Dead Apostles is becoming an Ancestor. Even those Dead Apostles at the very bottom, who were changed into vampires by lowly Dead Apostles with no standing or reputation, dream of one day being able to gather enough power to become one of the 27 themselves.

Characteristics

Dead

The Dead

Although they appear to have capacities beyond human limitations, most vampires actually acquired their powers by constantly refining human-inherent abilities throughout their extended lives. In other words, anyone with a similarly long lifespan has the potential to reach a level comparable to the Dead Apostles. Also, contrary to popular belief, vampires can be killed with conventional weaponry. However, that is a feat near impossible to accomplish since their superior reflexes and physical abilities allow them to see and dodge a bullet after it has been shot. They can gain these inhuman physical abilities because their hands and feet are not connected by nerves, as the only thing that connects a vampires body together is the blood of others. They also gain vampire claws with senses keener than those of a human. Then as long as you are human, you can't deceive the vampires sense of smell or their sense of taste who can even detect alcohol in the blood of their victims. They are also able, through their long life and training their abilities or finishing their magical research, to develop their own 'special abilities'. An example would be that some vampires can change their bodies freely so that you cannot rely on appearance to identify them. Gransurg Blackmore has the ability to change his shape into a large bird several kilometers in size and transforming his minions into hybrids with the heads and wings of birds or Michael Roa Valdamjong who altered his soul and attained the Magecraft of reincarnation. Incidentally, the 10 strongest of the Dead Apostle Ancestors can no longer be killed by ordinary means. That is because after dwelling so deep into the supernatural, their existences became something similar to high-level mysteries: a fantasy that can only be suppressed by an even greater fantasy.

However, the downside of acquiring a power that humans originally would not have is that the bodies of the Dead Apostles are constantly degenerating and once they die they won't leave a trace as their bodies turn into ash. The only way to interrupt and reverse this degeneration, even if just temporarily, is by regularly ingesting the blood of living creatures. On that note, even though human blood and especially the blood of virgins, because one's blood cells are more pure before one has exchanged bodily fluids with others, are the most suited to the needs of the vampires, the blood of animals is a viable alternative. Due to their advanced age, Dead Apostles that have lived for at least one thousand years require enormous amounts of energy. Rather than a measure of their power, it is instead because compensation is needed for the maintenance of such a long-lived existence. One such Dead Apostle, Nrvnqsr Chaos, has colossal meals including over one hundred people in ten minutes.[4] Basically, there are two "weaknesses" common to all Dead Apostles which are sunlight that greatly hastens their bodies degeneration and bodies of water which they are unable to cross. But powerful Apostles are capable of conquering the sunlight and move around during the day and use the advances of technology like a plane or a ship for their advantage.

On the issue of the actual bloodsucking process, a vampire can either hunt prey himself or acquire the blood indirectly through the use of familiars. The actual bloodsucking process is described as if, all the life in the body is liquified and sucked out, the consciousness of the victim is being destroyed. A victim thats gets all of his blood sucked, becomes all shriveled up like a mummy. A vampire can so intentionally skip the process of becoming a vampire by controlling the dead body. Although The Dead are the traditional familiars of the vampires, few actually use them today since their presence will alert vampire hunters such as the Burial Agency. Thus, the use of familiars from different species is somewhat more widespread. These familiars are created when a vampire feeds his blood to a living creature. These creatures cannot disobey their master and nor can they hide their thoughts, as the vampire can now read their mind. For a Dead Apostle living a long time and stabilizing his body with normal lives is not sufficient, so it's more effective to repair one's body by absorbing beasts, as they surpass the human species in this respect. By pushing his capacities to their limits, a Dead Apostle can possess either about 30 animals of the same species or one member of the Phantasmal Species that belongs to the Monstrous Beast or Phantasmal Beast-class as familiars. Stronger Dead Apostles were known to have used familiars of different animal species simultaneously, showing that the strength of the user's willpower is apart from others. Those Apostles who repair their own bodies with beasts can return them to their previous forms and use them as familiars when they need to.

Dead Apostles have regenerative powers which do not simply heal, but cause their bodies to turn their time backwards to a point in which they were unharmed; thus, you cannot cause wounds greater than the speed of their recovery. Most of the older and more powerful Dead Apostles possess the Mystic Eyes of Enchantment, which are capable of high-level hypnosis. People are enchanted when they look at the vampire's eyes at the time this ability is executed. Yet there are many Apostles who possess other types of Mystic Eyes or use words in order to enchant others. Some Dead Apostles are also known for transferring their consciousness into from them created spare bodies or into The Dead to acquire information from a different perspective. Once it has served its purpose, they cut the magical energy flow and it returns to dust, which gives them the impression of turning into mist. The powers of the blood, shared by relatives of Dead Apostles, would exponentially increase when fighting together, since their powers are not calculated by addition but by multiplication. Additionally, since they're related with the moon, the lunar cycle over the Earth has effects on them. Granting to them more power than their normal estate is depending on the lunar cycle.

When creating their lairs, they make layers of Bounded Fields to form Dead Apostle Territorial Fields (死徒領地田畑, Shito ryoudo tahata?). This invisible protection is similar to the ones that hide away the world of the fairies, which fool even nature itself. The lair is accessible only by those who are invited in, and they are difficult to invade, taking even the trained magi of the Mage Association several years to find one. These lairs are enshrouded by darkness, by shadows, by longing for rationally, and by fear towards the taboo, so they cannot be found by humans.

Growth Process

If a vampire injects some of its own black blood into a human victim’s bloodstream, the said victim will be infused with some of the vampire’s own power and their body becomes unable to completely die. The black blood violates and burns the whole body from the inside. But in most cases however, the body dies and with it, the soul of the victim. The final result would be a mindless undead familiar known as The Dead. But in the rare occurence of the said victim possessing an above-average life force, he will become a Ghoul and embark on climbing the ladder to becoming a full-fledged Dead Apostle. The extent in which the newly created Ghoul will progress is decided by their magical potential of the body, which is stored inside the soul. Furthermore, the extension of its powers is dependent on the abilities and amount of minions pertaining to its parent vampire, whom it is bound, both mentally and spiritually.

Ghoul

屍食鬼 - Shishokuki

Corpse Eating Demon. They are born, when the brain of a vampire's victim is unable to completely die, after several years in the grave, the brain will rot and the human soul will be freed from the cage of the body. The decayed corpses now begin activity as Ghouls and their transformed souls, have now bypassed the necessity of the brain to hold the soul, as the soul is now separate from the body. They have mental capacities pretty much equivalent to that of a savage beast and they must devour other corpses to reconstruct their own degenerated flesh. 1 out of 100 individuals has the potential to become a Ghoul.

Living Dead

リビングデッド - Ribingu Deddo

The result of a Ghoul that successfully reconstructed its own body and thus, their brain. They are inferior to The Dead in terms of raw strength but the fact that it regained its own will, a full fledged ego and that it can maintain its own soul now puts it on a different standing than a mere puppet. The Living Dead have very limited to no intellect and to restore their intellect and memories, they need to suck the blood of humans. 1 out of a 1000 individuals has the potential to become a Living Dead.

Vampire

吸血鬼 – Kyuuketsuki

Blood Sucking Demon. After several years of development, the Living Dead regains all of its memories and a full human intellect, it now attains power of his own and becomes a mature Vampire, capable of creating other vampires and having his own minions. The new born Vampire gains the necessary knowledge to understand the changes of its body and quickly grows accustomed to living as a vampire. However, he is still bound to the will of his parent vampire and forced to supply him with blood. A vampire can only become a full-fledged Dead Apostle after breaking free from the control of his parent vampire.[5]

1 out of a 10,000 individuals has the potential to achieve this level but it takes at least a hundred years of development. Satsuki Yumizuka was a rare case among rare cases, for she had enough magical potential to skip the first two steps and become a vampire from the beginning.

References

  1. [v] Tsukihime Dokuhon PlusPeriod - TSUKIHIME Dictionary: Dead Apostles [Term], p.180

    Dead Apostles [Term]
    The bloodsuckers that make up the vast majority of the subcategory of bloodsuckers known as vampires.
    Originally they were meals for the True Ancestors, who would prepare humans in advance for the times when their vampiric impulse became impossible to control. Of course, to keep them from escaping, the True Ancestors sucked their blood and brought them under their control.
    These humans who had their blood sucked by the True Ancestors in turn became bloodsuckers themselves. Though, in their case it was mostly as a means of survival. After all, it stands to reason that the apostles serving the extremely long-lived True Ancestors must be possessed of similarly long lives as well.
    However. At some point, after sucking the blood of others for such a long time, they began to feel a sense of superiority from the very act of sucking blood itself. They strengthened their abilities, their will, and eventually escaped from the control of the True Ancestors into the world of man, where they repeated the act of drinking blood over and over again to maintain their existences.
    This is the origin of the bloodsuckers formed from humans, the Dead Apostles.
    The Dead Apostles that escaped the True Ancestors the earliest are known as the 27 Ancestors. Though some of those 27 have been replaced over the generations, there are also those that still reign as Ancestors even now.
    In the main story of Tsukihime, not only was Yumizuka Satsuki's transformation into a vampire caused by having her blood sucked by Roa, but she was also lucky (?) enough to have a body blessed with excellent potential, allowing her to complete her rebirth into a bloodsucker in under half a day. It wouldn't be wrong to say her potential as a vampire is close to that of the 27 Dead Apostle Ancestors of old.

    死徒【用語】

  2. [v] Melty Blood Act Cadenza PS2 Manual - Dictionary: Dead Apostle [Term], p.055

    Dead Apostle [Term]
    Vampires. Basically, humans that have by some means or another been transformed into bloodsuckers.
    Originally they were emergency meals prepared by the True Ancestors, to use when they became unable to control their vampiric impulse. In a sense, you could say they were a type of pain-killer.
    Humans who had their blood sucked by the True Ancestors would in turn be transfigured into similar bloodsuckers themselves, and forced to spend their now immortal lives serving as the True Ancestors' emergency rations. Without a doubt, they were a "company of the dead".
    However, whereas the True Ancestors' desire to drink blood is purely mental, the Dead Apostles need to drink blood to maintain their bodies. Or to put it another way, for the True Ancestors it is merely entertainment, while for the Dead Apostles it is a fundamental aspect of their survival similar to breathing.
    At some point, after sucking the blood of others for such a long time, the Dead Apostles began to feel a sense of superiority from the very act of sucking blood itself.
    They strengthened their abilities, their will, and eventually escaped from the control of the True Ancestors into the world of man, where they repeated the act of drinking blood over and over again to maintain their existences.
    This is the origin of the bloodsuckers formed from humans, the Dead Apostles.
    The Dead Apostles that escaped the True Ancestors the earliest are known as the 27 Ancestors. Though some of those 27 have been replaced over the generations, there are also those that still reign as Ancestors even now.

    死徒【用語】
    吸血鬼。基本的に、人間が何らかの過程を経て変貌したもの。
    元々は真祖が用意した緊急用の食事。真祖が吸血衝動を抑えきれなくなった時の為の、一種の痛み止めと言える。
    真祖に血を吸われた人間は同じように吸血種に変貌し、不老不死のまま真祖の非常食として使役される。まさに“死した徒”と言えるだろう。
    しかし、真祖にとっての吸血が“精神の安定”を計る為のものであるのに対し、死徒の吸血は“肉体の保存”の為に必要なものだった。真祖のそれが娯楽であるのなら、死徒のそれは生存に必要不可欠な呼吸と同義、という事である。
    他者の血を吸うようになった死徒はいつからか吸血行為そのものに優越性を感じ始め、能力を強化していく。そうして自己の意志を強化し、真祖の支配を逃れた死徒は人間の世界に逃げこみ、自らを保存する為に吸血行為を繰り返す。
    これが死徒の始まり、人間から成ってしまった吸血種の馴れ初めである。
    この、最も古い時期に真祖の支配から逃れた死徒を二十七祖といい、以来、その二十七つはあるものは世代交代をし、あるものはいまだ祖として君臨している。

  3. [v] Melty Blood Act Cadenza PS2 Manual - Dictionary: Vampiric Impulses [Term], p.057

    Vampiric Impulses [Term]
    The base desire possessed by both True Ancestors and Dead Apostles.
    In True Ancestors it is merely a bad habit, but in Dead Apostles it is a means of staying alive.
    For those Dead Apostles who used to be human, it is something not entirely dissimilar from an expression of love.

    吸血衝動【用語】
    真祖、死徒が持つ行動原理。
    真祖のそれは病であり、死徒のそれは生存手段である。人間から死徒になったものは、それが人間でいうところの愛情表現に近いのだと論じている。

  4. [v] Melty Blood Act Cadenza PS2 Manual - Dictionary: Nrvnqsr Chaos [Person's name • Dead Apostle], p.050

    Nrvnqsr Chaos [Person's name • Dead Apostle]
    One of the 27 Dead Apostle Ancestors. Alias, Chaos. He uses all the creatures of the earth as familiars. Because of the fact that he is preserving even extinct species, he is also sometimes called Dr. Beast.
    Though he had no business in Japan, he was selected as the executor of the True Ancestor hunt proposed by the White Wing Lord, and followed Arcueid to the island nation in order to defeat her.
    Dead Apostles who can measure their lives in millennia require a colossal amount of energy. This has nothing to do with their strength – it is merely the compensation required to maintain such a long-lived existence.
    Because he is one of these millennium-class Dead Apostles himself, Nrvnqsr's appetite is voracious. It took devouring every single person in a ten story hotel just to satisfy him.
    The factors of 666 beasts are swirling around within his body, but it's probably alright just to think of it as him being equipped with 666 familiars. Because this is essentially like having 666 lives, properly speaking he's a Dead Apostle that even a serious Arcueid wouldn't be able to kill.
    As one who became a Dead Apostle through sorcery, he has absolutely no interest in territory or building a faction. The only thing he cares about is completing his thesis.
    When he was still a human, his name was Fabro Rowan. He was a magus hailing from the Wandering Tomb, located in the northern Sea of Estray, one of the three main branches of the Association.

    ネロ·カオス【人名·死徒】
    死徒二十七祖の一人。通り名は混沌。地球上のあらゆる動物を使い魔として作り出す。絶滅した種すら保存している事から獸博士とも呼ばれる。
    日本にはまったく目的のなかった祖ではあるが、白翼公の提案した真祖狩りの実行者に抜擢され、アルクェイドを討つ為に彼女を追い、日本にて対決する事になる。
    千年単位の死徒は莫大なエネルギーを必要とする。力が強いからではなく、長く生きるほど存在の維持に代償を必要とするからだ。千年単位の死徒であるネロの食事量は膨大で、十階建てのホテル内全ての人間を十分ほどで完食するほどである。
    体内に六百六十六の獣の因子を渦巻かせているが、六百六十六匹の使い魔で武装している、というのが正しい認識であろう。六百六十六もの命を持っているようなもので、本来ならば本気になったアルクェイドですら殺しきれない死徒。
    魔術を極め死徒になったタイプで、領地や派閥作りに興味を持たない。彼に有るのは、ただ自らの命題の解決のみである。
    人間だった頃の名前をフォアブロ·ロワイン。魔術協会は三大部門の一つ、移動石柩こと北の彷徨海出身の魔術師だった。

  5. [v] Tsukihime Dokuhon PlusPeriod - TSUKIHIME Dictionary: Vampire [Term], p.178

    Vampire [Term]
    A general term for those that suck human blood. Refers specifically to the Dead Apostles, or those that have become bloodsuckers because of them.
    The vampires in Tsukihime extract human blood to maintain their own flesh. If, during this process, the vampire injects their own blood into their human prey, that human will be unable to peacefully pass away. For a normal person, death will still find them before long regardless. However, on rare occasions, if the victim has high physical potential and the capacity of their soul is excellent, they will remain in the world of the living.
    Afterward, their corpse is interred, and left alone for several years. During this time their brain melts, their soul is liberated from the cage of the body, and finally they arise as a kind of living dead called a "ghoul".
    As a ghoul, they feed on the corpses sleeping in the graves around them to supplement their own missing flesh, restoring their physical body little by little. After many years of this, they will eventually regain their brain and intelligence. At this stage, they can finally be called a "vampire".
    However, although this new vampire can move by their own will, they cannot escape from the rule of their sire's blood. Finally, after spending decades acclimating to life in the darkness, the vampire will begin attacking humans to create servants of their very own, while remaining subservient to the vampire that made them.
    In order to obstruct this infinite cycle, the Church created the Burial Agency, Inquisitors that exist to slay Dead Apostles. The Burial Agency's goal is the utter eradication of all vampires, and the sealing of the 27 Ancestors that made them.

    吸血鬼【用語】

Vampires
Dead Apostles
Ciel (Remake) • Curry de MarcheJester KartureLord Rozay-enMaiko YamaseNoelOdd BorzakSatsuki YumizukaShiki Tohno (Remake) • SHIKI Tohno (Remake) • Sion Eltnam AtlasiaShirleyTarantellaThird Crusade Dead ApostleZepia Eltnam Atlasia
The Twenty-seven Dead Apostle Ancestors (Remake)
Primate MurderThe Dark SixBrunestud of the Crimson MoonKischur Zelretch SchweinorgORT (LostbeltXibalba) • Rizo-Waal StroutEinnasheForest of Einnashe (Remake) • Fina-blood SveltenAltrouge BrunestudNrvnqsr Chaos (Remake) • LouvreStanrobe CalhinTATARIDust of OsirisVan-FemRita Rozay-enGransurg Blackmore (Remake) • Trhvmn OrtenrosseEnhanceZaria OffenbaumVlov ArkhangelMerem SolomonSumireChromclay PetastructureEl NahatBe'zeCaubac Alcatraz
Michael Roa Valdamjong (Remake)
True Ancestors
Altrouge BrunestudArcueid Brunestud (Red ArcueidBerserkerRemake (Eco-ArcArchetype: Earth))
Lamyros
Wolfgang Faustus
Others
Akiha Tohno (Remake) • Hinako AkutaBaobhan SithCarmillaChild of EinnasheEuryaleMedusaSion Eltnam SokarisSthenoVlad III (EXTRAApocryphaBerserker)
Main works
TsukihimeTsukihime animeTsukihime PLUS-DISCKagetsu TohyaMelty BloodMelty Blood Re-ACTMelty Blood Act CadenzaMelty Blood Actress AgainHana no Miyako
Remake Works
Tsukihime -A piece of blue glass moon-Melty Blood: Type LuminaTsukihime -The other side of red garden-
Terms
AdvantageAge of GodsAhnenerbeBajiquanChurchDead ApostleDemonsDemon Hunter OrganizationFamiliarMagecraftMagical GirlMarble PhantasmMystic Eyes of Death PerceptionReality MarblePsychicTohnoTrue AncestorVampire
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