Invented Original Characters: Mosquito 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 mosquito themed vampires.

In line with my other vampire related characters Mosquito Vampires descend from a race of blood consuming magic users who realized that modelling their culture after blood drinking animals made their magic more potent. This group that is regionally tied to Africa took its inspiration from the buzzing, biting and disease spreading mosquitos.

Despite being inspired by mosquitoes they are one of the most humanoid looking vampires as they largely favour mosquito themed magic over the physiological change that other vampire types have embraced. Generally for example at first sight they lack the long blood drinking mouth of a mosquito until it's time to feed, at which time their jaws horribly and supernaturally extend forward sipping blood from their victims. Similarly their flight elicits a peculiar buzzing noise yet is magic rather than biological. Like other insect based vampire types they are weaker in cold and in the daytime but none have been known to burn in sunlight like some bat based vampires.

Prior to Dracula's era most mosquito vampires lived in plain sight among African communities and fed at opportune times. Over time some members began to question the brutality in which humans were hunted and a splinter group evolved into a spider like race of vampires who hunted the mosquito type.

When the bat based European vampires emerged around the 1500s and thrived during European colonialism the mosquito and spider vampires were hunted almost to extinction and fled villages to live in the wilderness. At this time Mosquito vampires conserving their energy were only rarely emerging to feed and a small number of spider vampires were hunting them. This is also when both groups were cursed to be weak to gold and African lavender.

In modern times successful vampire hunters have greatly weakened the empires of the bat vampires and their potential to attack other vampire groups. This lead to a greater reemergence of mosquito vampires eager to build empires of their own. To do this they come out to feed more often and deliberately spread sickness in order to destabilize human communities in secret. Sometimes when feeding they will let the victim live but infect them with a virus that yellows their skin and make them go rabid. These infected victims wreak havoc in towns until they are killed or drop dead from the virus hours later. At this time there is only one known spider vampire left and he does his best to hunt mosquito vampires and teach humans how to defend against them. Dispute the fact that mosquito vampires are typically the one most human looking of the vampire species, hunters have not seen mosquito sect leaders in a very long time. It is suspected that these leaders who stick to the wilderness may be far stronger and more grotesque.