Invented Original Characters: Lamprey Vampires

Growing up my dream job was to be a comic book artist/writer. But with very little artistic talent that dream died pretty quickly. Now I do my best to bring my characters to life using apps like factory of heroes, swordmaker, armormaker, you doodle and photo cutout. They don't always turn out looking very good but I get more excited about the concepts and stories behind the characters than how well I can make the character look good. Sometimes my characters are from cultures I am not a part of because I think it fits their story or other aspects about them. I am not a cultural expert but at the very least I hope no one is upset by me using aspects of cultures I'm not a part of and find interesting. That said below is my idea for Lamprey themed vampires.

By comparison to the other sects, lamprey vampires are generally considered the least human and most cowardly. This European sect of blood drinkers originally balked at the idea of their rivals claiming to become more powerful by emulating blood drinking bats. Yet it soon became undeniable that the European sects who adapted their culture to mirror the blood drinking bats of the new world become exponentially more powerful sorcerers rapidly. Eventually the last known cult of blood drinkers who had not taken animal effigies were located in Greece. But as bat vampirism spread through Europe they were finally convinced they needed to adapt or die. Fearing they could not learn bat vampire magic well enough to defend themselves from seasoned bat vampires they modelled their society after sea lamprey. For a time these lamprey vampires were semi aquatic but as the threat of violence from bat vampires increased their magic forced a quick evolution allowing them to live entirely in the seas only emerging briefly when hunting. If not for this adaptation they would have likely been extinct long ago.

In modern times lamprey vampires have an entire aquatic culture under the sea and mostly only emerge to hunt. They specialize in spells that deceive human victims before devouring them. This can look like a person in a trancelike state wandering too close to the shore, ship captains crashing their own ships or even men swimming far too far thinking they've seen the women of their dreams out on the water. Like their bat counterparts most vampire lamprey are nocturnal, weak to fire and will disintegrate in the sunlight. Additionally they can't survive on land long even at night. The curse of two (a curse that tried to make sure that all vampires would be weak to two things their region's people have access to) made lamprey vampires weak to silver and the death of there own kind. Silver was chosen because of it was relatively common in Europe and valuable enough that vampires could never hoard it all. The second cursed item for each vampire type is usually an abundant plant or substance but dead lamprey was chosen in this case because the curse is more powerful when applied to a thing the animal effigies are averse to and because the underwater nature of lamprey make it harder to bring a plant or substance to them without it being destroyed. So in most cases bands of lamprey vampires can be warded off by skilled warriors since as soon as one of them is killed the rest will flee in terror.

However, the lamprey vampires have had limited success in nullifying the curse that makes them fear death by breeding "leviathans". Leviathans are lamprey vampires that have been selectively bred by lamprey vampire royalty to be huge, strong obedient and stupid. This was done through pitting lamprey vampires against one another in a form of gladiatorial combat, having the fiercest warriors and those least averse to the pheromones of dead lamprey vampires breed for generations until they had lamprey so vicious that they were spurred on by the pheromones of dead lamprey instead of terrified by them. Thus the lamprey sect has a small population of vicious leviathans that are far more powerful physically than the rest of there species. However they are mentally weak enough to typically stay subservient to the leaders of their underwater kingdom. Even though the leviathan are the only lamprey vampires to commonly brandish weapons they are not typically a threat to the ruling class as they can be telepathically "reeducated" if deemed necessary by lamprey sect rulers.