Thousands of years in the future, in an alternate version of Earth's timeline, the surface of the planet was covered in a chemical slime caused by massive pollution. In this future, homo sapiens evolved into haemovores, creatures with a great thirst for blood. The last living creature on Earth, one of these haemovores, watched its planet die from the pervasive contamination. Before it died as well, a powerful entity named Fenric carried it back in time to Transylvania in the ninth century AD. Knowing that only Fenric could return it to its own time, it followed the flask in which Fenric was trapped. A merchant bought the flask in Constantinople and took it to Europe, where it was stolen by Viking pirates who carried it to Maiden's Point on the eastern coast of England. The haemovore - known as the Ancient One - followed the flask the entire way, leaving in its wake legends of vampirism supported by the haemovores it had spawned. It settled down in Maiden's Bay until the twentieth century, when an ancient inscription was translated, freeing Fenric from the flask and causing the other haemovores to rise from the sea.
The haemovores created by the Ancient One stayed dormant on the sea bed for hundreds of years, welding chain mail suits from coral and iron with their bare hands. Bits of welded coral and iron sometimes turn up on local beaches, and are imbued with a kind of electrical tingling. Their presence in the water - at least when they are roused - seems to be signalled by a thick, sometimes black, fog on the surface and the water becoming pleasantly warm. The haemovores are led by the Ancient One, who has been around longer than the others and possesses greater psychic powers. All haemovores communicate telepathically, and they can be repelled by a barrier of faith, which seems to cause them a considerable amount of pain.
Haemovores who have spent their lives under the sea are blue and barnacle-covered, with decaying clothing slowly giving way to the hand-welded chain-mail. They have suckered mouths and long, razor-sharp talons which they use to slice open the neck of the people on whom they intend to feed. People attacked by haemovores can become haemovores, probably much like traditional vampirism, although exactly how this happens is not clear. Newly-formed haemovores look mostly human, with deathly-white skin, bright red lips and long, razor-sharp fingernails.
As with most vampires, haemovores are impervious to bullets, though presumably they can be killed with a wooden stake through the heart. They can also be killed en masse by a telepathic signal from the Ancient One. When they die, they quickly rot away into dust.
