Chapter 9
The humans Gamal had met until now never looked at her so directly. Even when they did, they were fearful and uneasy.
To humans, she was one of two things:
A god or a monster.
But to this man, she was...
Well, not quite human—more like a dog, really.
Doyoung would be surprised to learn this, but Gamal was unexpectedly perceptive.
“All done?”
Doyoung asked.
“Yeah.”
Gamal tied the final knot and reached out to help Doyoung up. Already accustomed to this routine, Doyoung took her hand and stood.
But the uneven rock surface made him stumble slightly. Gamal quickly steadied him, their shoulders and armpits interlocking like puzzle pieces.
Their eyes met at this sudden closeness.
Gamal’s eyes widened slightly in surprise.
Doyoung lifted his arm from around Gamal’s shoulder.
“Let’s go.”
He needed to remember: this was survival, not some romance comic.
Morning came, and once again Gamal was curled up behind him. Doyoung studied her face.
Why does something inhuman have to look like this?
Statistically, those with better physical constitutions had higher chances of surviving infection to become Luaas, so many Luaas were attractive—but Gamal was easily in the top 1%.
Had she lived in civilization, she might have maintained a harem. Even if she refused, men would have clung to her relentlessly.
Gamal slowly opened her eyes. The way her lashes lifted to reveal crimson irises seemed almost miraculous.
She simply stared back at Doyoung without speaking. Sunlight filtered through the trees, dancing across their faces as they gazed at each other.
The distant sound of waves reached them,
making their blood pulse with each ebb and flow.
“Captain...”
Gamal’s low, husky voice sent faint shivers down his spine as she asked:
“Hungry?”
Watching Gamal arrange pottery, Doyoung asked what he’d been wondering:
“Who taught you French?”
While she could communicate basics, some phrases sounded archaic and her pronunciation was odd. Probably not learned from a native speaker.
“Johannes.”
“Johannes?”
An actual name surprised him.
Gamal nodded. “Drifted here. Stomach growled.”
Meaning his ship sank. Doyoung pressed: “When?”
“Long ago.”
“How long exactly?”
Gamal stared blankly. “Captain asks too much.”
“Look, I’m stranded here too—technically jumped from a plane and swam—but my family doesn’t know if I’m dead or alive. Can’t you humor my questions?”
Reluctantly, Gamal conceded: “Don’t know exact time. Didn’t count. Very long ago.”
The name Johannes suggested... “German?”
“Dutch.”
Probably Dutch East India Company then—meaning at least two hundred years ago.
“Johannes spoke little French. Taught me,” Gamal added brightly. “Oh! I speak good Dutch from Johannes!”
“I don’t.”
As a French-Korean mixed-race individual, Doyoung possessed decent language skills—native fluency in French and Korean, intermediate English and Spanish, basic Russian—but Dutch eluded him.
A translator might have helped, but such luxuries from the civilized world were unavailable here.
At least his curiosity was satisfied. Doyoung pressed further:
“What happened to Johannes?”
“Died.”
Doyoung froze. Gamal’s innocent expression made the statement surreal.
“How?”
“Got old. Died in sleep.”
The absurdity struck him, but Doyoung suddenly realized the beautiful creature before him was fundamentally different—a stone-like being untouched by time’s decay.
Even after shipwrecked humans aged and died, Gamal remained.
Doyoung forcibly shook off the chill creeping down his spine. He’d find a way back.
“Any others who drifted here?”
“All gone.”
Gamal stood with her basket of pottery, clearly done talking. Doyoung confronted her retreating back:
“Don’t you want to leave this island?”
Gamal turned as if hearing a foreign word.
“Leave?”
“Yes. The outside world.”
With her vampire strength, escaping via swimming or raft would be trivial. But Gamal shook her head.
“No.”
Doyoung bit back Why? and asked calmly:
“Why?”
“Like here.”
“The outside has electricity and conveniences. You weren’t born in the stone age—doesn’t this primitive life bother you?”
“Doesn’t bother.”
As Gamal tried to leave again, Doyoung persisted:
“Even if you left decades ago, ten years would’ve changed everything. It’s a whole new world. Don’t you want to see?”
Gamal turned, answering like a teen annoyed by adults:
“Captain’s annoying. I stay.”
She walked away. Doyoung sighed.
“That stone-headed... Why’s she so stubborn?”
Gamal glanced back after a few steps. Doyoung remained rooted, shadows from the trees pooling at his feet.
Night fell with no sign of Gamal returning. Doyoung peered outside to find her sitting on the wooden stairs like a runaway teen.
“Why aren’t you coming in?”
“Want to go outside, Captain?”
Gamal countered instead of answering.
“Home.”
Doyoung corrected: “You want to go home.”
Gamal hugged her knees, lost in thought. Doyoung’s hopes rose—this seemed like the prelude to Let’s leave.
Gamal gazed at the distant sky.
“I had home. Mati. Tawa.”
Unfamiliar words, but he guessed they meant mother and father.
“Adawi too.”
“Adawi?”
Gamal answered flatly: “Married Adawi.”
Doyoung’s jaw tightened. Given historical child marriage practices, it wasn’t shocking—a twenty-five-year-old then might’ve had three children.
Yet inexplicably, it felt like a punch to the solar plexus.
Crunch.
Gamal turned at the sound as Doyoung sat beside her. He asked casually:
“Any children?”
She shook her head.
“Adawi died. Wedding day.”
Doyoung frowned.
“How?”
“Accident.”
Gamal changed the subject: “My homeland had blooming trees. Many. Sweet fruits. Still remember.”
“What kind?”
She shook her head again.
“Gone now. Haven’t seen anywhere.”
“Extinct?”
“Extinct?”
“All vanished.”
Gamal nodded. “Yes. All vanished.”
Most Earth’s species disappeared naturally—food scarcity, climate, predators. This tree merely followed nature’s course.
Yet Gamal’s calm tone felt achingly sad. Perhaps because she herself defied that natural order, watching everything fade while she remained.
“Not just the trees. Nothing remains of my homeland.”
Suddenly, Gamal spoke in perfect grammar:
“Mati. Tawa. Adawi’s grave.”
A cold wind swept her bangs aside, revealing a forehead glowing with faint starlight.
Doyoung asked softly:
“So you live here alone?”
“I...”
Gamal swallowed her words. “People came sometimes. Stomach growled.”
“Johannes?”
Doyoung wanted to ask what she’d withheld but tread carefully.
Gamal nodded. “Others before. Rodriguez sprained ankle. Thought minor. Swelled. Died days later. Bill died from wound too. Couldn’t heal.”
Even vampires couldn’t treat injuries without medical knowledge. Though Gamal had patched Doyoung’s leg, her skills remained folk remedies.
“Mila couldn’t accept being here alone. Jumped when I blinked.”
Gamal looked genuinely sorrowful.
“Soya...”
She listed others—more drifters than expected, but fewer than ten survivors. Or rather, those she’d met.
People likely arrived during her hibernations too. Some died from injuries, some by suicide, maybe a lucky few rescued—though this treacherous archipelago made rescue improbable.
A sad island indeed.
“Graves there.”
Gamal pointed uphill.
“Buried all. Don’t want more.”
Her glistening eyes threatened to overflow.
Doyoung realized something—despite being a vampire, Gamal retained startling kindness. Her humanity occasionally overrode vampiric nature.
He’d initially thought it an act, but even cunning vampires couldn’t fake such vulnerability.
“Humans weak. Die fast.”
Gamal murmured mournfully.
“No.”
Doyoung interjected.
