2025 Jun 10: Vampires Pt. 1.

 Vampires don't exist. Alternatively, many types of vampires exist that are so different from each other, that lumping them under the same umbrella term isn't all that useful, as all of them have different habits, strengths, weaknesses, origins, and lifecycles. So here are some creatures that can be called vampires:

 The Kirki-Turo are a species of remora-like creatures, which can inhabit a humanoid's body, eat the organs inside, then take control of the husk, puppeting it around, occasionally emerging from its mouth to garb onto new prey, and suck its blood. By devouring the brain, they can gain access to the memories and intellect of their host, but concepts like compassion and love are alien to them. They will always view themselves as predators, and humanoids their prey.

The Laernians, are a people cursed by the gods for long-forgotten sins. While humanoid, they take on the aspect of giant ticks, their bellies swollen and red with blood, their mouths elongated and hardened into a proboscis-like organ. They do their best to hide their true nature, playing at being nobles of dwindling wealth, living in slowly rotting villas and palaces, only communicating with the outside world through unquestioningly loyal servants who would never utter a word about what they saw inside the dilapidated walls.

Barouleans are huge batlike predatory animals, related to the Chiropterans (kind of like the relationship between humans and gorillas). They have long terrorized humanoid tribes, and they have, in most places, been hunted near to extinction after the discovery of spears, bows and arrows. That said, they can be encountered deep within the wilderness, especially around tall mountains, which allow them to roost unmolested in places that are too difficult for normal humanoids to reach. They have a sort of animal cunning that makes them difficult to hunt, and which aids them well in their hunts of both humanoid and animal prey.