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In my world, vampires are living, breathing creatures that once were human. There's no magic, curse, or anything remotely supernatural involved. I'd like my vampires to be as 'realistic', or 'science-based', as possible. But I don't like the idea of a virus, because of the implication of vampirism being a disease.

These are some aspects in which vampires are different from humans:

  • They're noctural, but don't burn in the sun.
  • They drink blood, but can also eat/drink some other stuff, like hypercarnivores can.
  • They live a very long time, but are sterile (natures way of compensating?) and mortal.
  • They're stronger and faster than humans, but obey the laws of physics.
  • Like many other apex predators, they live solitary, though some may form pairs.
  • Numbers are extremely low, as vampire are generally not interested in increasing their numbers. After all, it would only increase chances of being discovered while increasing competition for food.

So I've sort of figured out how my vampires work, but I struggle with the part of how new vampires are made.

In my opinion, a vampire bite alone does not change a human into a vampire. After all, the world would be overrun by them in no-time.

Now, drinking vampire blood (whether or not combined with the human being drained beforehand or afterward) is a very popular 'method' of changing a human into a vampire. I'd like that method to work, somehow, but can't figure out the biological process behind it. How COULD it work?

Would vampire blood need to have certain properties? Would the human stomach even be able to process the blood (fast enough) to trigger change without rejecting the overload of iron? Why would a 'drained' human body be more open to change than a human body without blood loss?

Any thoughts would be much appreciated.

Sigrid
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    Sorry, but almost by definition if it spreads and is contagious, it's a disease or a parasite. If it's considered beneficial (and I now of know contagious real life examples since we've been around long enough that they are just not part of us and is in everyone) it still doesn't change that it was a virus. – DKNguyen Nov 20 '20 at 21:25
  • English is not my first language: what is 'venues of infection'? And instead or a virus or parasite, couldn't it be a mutation or something? – Sigrid Nov 20 '20 at 21:31
  • Venue might not be the best word. I mean the "path" of infection. Like direct blood transmission vs ingestion vs breathing. A mutation means a rather random change in DNA and random means most of the time you get cancer rather than vampires. If you want a change in DNA that does the same effect all the time, then that's a virus. Viruses systematically change DNA by definition. – DKNguyen Nov 20 '20 at 21:33
  • Additionally, prion diseases are contagious, but are without exception pathological (they cause one specific protein to misfold). Worse in general, the mechanism by which their blood is drank causing vampirism means that the original vampire will tend to die (not always but often enough). This is a condition which is inclined to extinction, especially in a pre-modern era. It might be more interesting to explain vampirism in a supernatural way, since so few attempt to do that (they rely on going over all the same old tropes). – John O Nov 20 '20 at 21:34
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    @DKNguyen The word you're looking for is "vector". – John O Nov 20 '20 at 21:34
  • @JohnO Yes, that's the word that wasn't coming to mind. – DKNguyen Nov 20 '20 at 21:34
  • Wow. I flubbed hard. "I now of know [...] examples"?! Obviously I meant "I know of no [...] examples". – DKNguyen Nov 20 '20 at 21:39
  • Any mutation is per definition random? And I don't understand how the original vampire would die by sharing his or her blood. Finally, isn't the supernatural explanation overdone? – Sigrid Nov 20 '20 at 21:41
  • @Sigrid Yeah, mutation pretty much means random. Both supernatural and scientific vampires are overdone. From viruses to nanites, to deals with the devil to magic, to just being a different species, to just being completely unexplained. Nowadays, it's actually more common to find scientific vampires than supernatural ones. – DKNguyen Nov 20 '20 at 21:47
  • Well. That's depressing! Might as well drop the subject then xD Maybe looking into the virus explanation deserves some extra research on my part. Thanks for taking the time and effort to reply. – Sigrid Nov 20 '20 at 21:51
  • @Sigrid I suggest the face hugger route. It's not quite as common and I've never seen it put into the context of vampures. – DKNguyen Nov 20 '20 at 21:52
  • The whatnow? xD Googling it certainly gives interesting images. – Sigrid Nov 20 '20 at 21:53
  • It originates from the movie Alien which is popular in North America. It is popular enough to be overdone in a sense, and the face hugger aspect of it has been re-used in some other works but never in the form of vampires as far as I know. Usually the thing that comes out doesn't resemble anything human very much. The only one I am aware that even remotely does is the Gene splicer from Warhammer 40K and that's doesn't behave like your typical chest bursting face hugger either. – DKNguyen Nov 20 '20 at 21:55
  • 10 points for originality – Sigrid Nov 20 '20 at 21:57
  • Hello Sigrid, welcome to [worldbuilding.se]. I apologize for closing your question, but it's been asked several times and I don't see any fundamental differences between this and what's been asked before. While you'll get a diversity of questions, you might want to search "is:question vampire virus" and look through what's there. Keep in mind the SE method is to improve existing questions or seek more answers to existing questions, not ask duplicate questions. Please read the first two bullets in our [help] to better understand the process. Thanks. – JBH Nov 21 '20 at 04:08

2 Answers2

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Blood drinking is a ritual, initiating the person into the society of vampires.

Your vampires obey the laws of physics. They don't turn into bats. They are strong and fast and they eat humans. But they are themselves humans.
Becoming a vampire is a socio-cultural phenomenon, not a biological one.

They belong to a secret society and drinking the blood of one who already is a vampire is part of the ritual bringing them in. In the society they adhere to their special diet and other practices that give them strength and agility and contribute to health. They kill people and drink blood because that (among other things) is what vampires do.

Drinking the blood of an initiate is a well established ritual for certain widespread and popular religions. Given that blood is central to vampire society it makes sense that it would be part of the initiation. If you want to have the vampire whose blood it is die in the process, that would make ritual sense too: a sacrifice. Side benefit: limits the number of vampires!

It occurs to me that vampires are long lived because the new vampire who has its blood drunk and dies has its place in vampire society taken by the new vampire. The new vampire takes the place of the old, and its vampire identity. Thus in the society of vampires, each vampire is very old though different individuals have been this vampire over the ages.

Willk
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Vampire Blood is normal human blood that has gone through a phase change.

Haemoglobin is very complex, including many strands of coiled molecular chains. A more stable (vampiric) ground state that requires an larger activation energy than is normally available to transition to the vampiric form. Once converted to the vampiric form, this form is stable and remains the dominant form.

Chemical concentration affect reaction speed, and a higher concentration is faster (true of some chemical reactions), thus a drained human would be more susceptible to undergo the change.

Though marrow produces the normal form, the existing vampiric form will also convert the new blood to the vampiric form, thus vampirism is permanent.

If you drink vampire blood, enough vampire blood will enter the bloodstream to begin the phase change. The side effects of this phase change are well documented in the literature, though some reputed effects are no more than folklore.

Gary Walker
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