If you are new
Five files compiled into five books. What you have here is the public desk — covers, drawings, a few sample pages. The books themselves are not yet released. Start with Book 1, Vampires in Theory.
Read twelve minutes of Book 1. If the claim holds, the printed volume is the rest of the file. The shop is not open yet — leave an address and you will be told when it is.
Fig. 0 · desk
Plate 0 · first picture
What the files actually say
You already know the folklore.
They drink blood to live.
Blood is not a meal. It is electrolyte and iron. The host’s fat is the fuel.
They become wolves.
The body does not grow a wolf. Blood is pumped into muscle on a human skeleton. No mass is created.
Silver kills them.
Silver shorts the vampire’s iron drive and poisons the werewolf’s mitochondria. Same metal, two chemistries.
Hunters knew.
They were a profession with a specified kit, not chosen ones. The work went quiet. It did not end.
Dwarfs under the mountain.
A manufactured population with a clean genome. They run geothermal cities. They manage the surface war; they do not hunt in it.
You came in asking
- The fangs. — Display. A tube under the tongue does the drinking.
- Garlic. — Whole bulbs do nothing. Crush it.
- Sunlight. — Porphyrin waste in the skin catching one colour of sunlight and burning.
- A bite converts you. — No. Drain, then a transplant.
- No reflection. — Only old silvered mirrors. Modern ones show them.
The five books
Each stands alone. Read them in order and the argument comes into focus. Start with Vampires.
Book 01 · Vampires in Theory
Why every culture kept the same creature, and why blood — a terrible fuel — would be the diet.
About seven hours to read.
Book 02 · Werewolves in Theory
How the moon does it, and how a body changes without creating mass.
About seven hours to read.
Book 03 · Hunters in Theory
Why the hunters left almost no archive, and how they knew the quarry.
About ten and a half hours to read.
Book 04 · Joint Threat Assessment and Containment Protocols
What happens when both predator biologies occupy the same century, and why one metal kills both.
About nine hours to read.
Book 05 · Dwarfs in Theory
The first four volumes described a three-body problem on the surface. They were incomplete.
About six and a half hours to read.
The first letter
When Vampires is for sale
The shop is not open. Leave an address for the first letter — it comes only to this desk. The field packet is already here: a short field packet from Book 1. You can also write [email protected]. Addresses are kept only to send that letter. Privacy.
The names the files use
Four populations, then the engines they run on. You do not need these to start Chapter 1.
- haemophage
- The vampire of these files: a human host, a lentivirus, and a nematode colony in the spine. It drinks blood as salt-water and iron, not as food.
- lycian
- The werewolf of these files. The change is a human body pumped full of its own blood on a human skeleton. It is not a four-legged wolf, and no mass is created.
- vigilans
- The hunter caste. A trained profession with a kit specified by the quarry, not chosen ones. After 1755 the work went quiet. It did not end.
- faber
- The dwarf of these files. A manufactured subterranean population with a clean genome. They run geothermal cities and manage the surface war. They do not hunt in it.
- bio-voltaic drive
- The vampire’s metabolism. Iron shuttles charge; host fat is the fuel; blood is the spark. That is why a pint is not a meal.
- hydraulic engine
- The werewolf shift. Blood leaves the viscera and fills muscle. Mass is conserved. The coat is hair, for one night.
- Archon
- Vermiculus archonis: a nematode colony in the haemophage brainstem and spinal canal. A third genome, not a symbol.
- LERV
- The werewolf key. An endogenous retrovirus already in the human germline for about eight hundred thousand years. Moonlight turns it on.
- Ignore Protocol
- The faber operational close: do not engage the surface war. It is not theirs to win.
What this is not
Not romance, not camp, and not lore used as atmosphere.
- The books treat folklore as field data, and they do not wink.
- If you want the organisms real enough to think with, you are the reader.
- The shop is not open. Leave an address if you want the first letter.
Things people ask first
- What is this website?
The public desk for a printed series: covers, drawings, a glossary, sample pages. The full texts are the five books, and they are not in shops yet. Leave an address if you want the first letter when Book 1 is for sale.
- Is this fiction?
Yes. Speculative theoretical biology, presented as declassified investigative documents. The historical events named are real. The organisms are not recognised in the scientific literature. The compilers observe that this consensus is itself one of the documents' predictions.
- Where do I start?
Twelve minutes inside Book 1, in the reading room. Then the printed file. You do not need the others first.
- How long is it?
Five volumes; 476,572 words on the printed extents. Book 1, Vampires in Theory (HHDRV), is about eighty-four thousand — about seven hours at a careful pace. Each volume lists its own extent on the volume page.
- Is it paranormal romance?
No. The register is clinical and forensic. If you want the mechanisms real enough to think with, you are the reader. It is not camp, not spice, and not a thriller that treats lore as atmosphere.
- Can I test this?
Yes. The volumes publish the conditions under which they would be wrong. Path Four-A is a patterned background and a telephone camera. File a result with the desk. Attempted, on the printed roadmap, is still no.
- Where do I get the books?
Independently published, first edition 2026. Leave an address on this desk and you will hear when Book 1 is for sale. The shop links will be added when there is a shop.
- Can I use the frameworks?
Ask. Most reasonable requests get a yes.
The texts, plates, and terminology are © 2026 Z. Reynolds, all rights reserved. Reproduction, adaptation, and commercial use need written permission — write to [email protected] and say what you want to do.
Discussion, review, criticism, and quotation need no permission at all.
Preview hosts that once carried a Creative Commons line are not authorised texts. The only authorised public desk is thetheoryseries.com.