WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for Episode 10 of The Vampire Dies in No Time, currently streaming on Funimation.
In The Vampire Dies in No Time Episode 10, vampire hunter Ronaldo, his vampire roommate Draluc and Vampire Control agent Hinaichi investigate a festival for vampire disturbances. After vampire empress Maremi Gekkoin convinces the vampires and humans to enjoy the festival together, Hinaichi explores and ends up walking down a path of torii gates. What she finds on the other side is an unusually striking scene, as Hinaichi comes face to face with a swath of glowing white figures.
Hinaichi's strange odyssey is suitably creepy for the vampire anime. Its grainy style resembles a horror movie, and the white figures have an uncanny appearance. When Hinaichi returns to the festival though, she discovers that she may not have been as alone as she thought. What was the nature of Hinaichi's experience, and why does Draluc seem to know more than he lets on?
Hinaichi's journey begins when she sees a descending path of torii gates and wonders if there are more festival stalls in this direction. Real-life torii gates serve as the threshold of shrines, but these gates present another kind of threshold for Hinaichi. With every passing gate, Hinaichi gets smaller, until she emerges on the other side as a young girl. The scene gains a grainy texture, giving it the appearance of a found footage horror movie, or the iconic tape from Ring. The usually competent and capable Hinaichi's increased vulnerability as a child, as well as the recognizable horror aesthetic, makes it clear that she is in danger in this strange new place.
Hinaichi looks out on a row of lanky, white, glowing silhouettes attending what looks like another festival. One of the silhouettes immediately asks the child Hinaichi whether she's alone, and tells Hinachi to come with her. Hinaichi starts to follow, as if under a spell. One of the figure's creepiest details only appears for a split second and can be easily missed on first viewing: when the figure reaches her hand towards Hinaichi, tiny mouths with vampire fangs appear on its fingers, ready to bite her.
The figures' vampiric nature could provide a clue as to why Hinaichi's world seems to have changed around her. In The Vampire Dies in No Time, vampires can take any number of forms, from the gaunt, pallid, but still very humanoid Draluc, to the abstract-looking Odd Creature and even vampire vegetables. The witches in Puella Magi Madoka Magica, and certain Stands from JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, are beings and yet locations at the same time. Perhaps not only are the glowing figures vampires, but the strange realm where they reside is a kind of vampire as well, with the power to trap unsuspecting festival-goers in its world.
There might be a tragic element to this white figure, as she talks to Hinaichi as if she were a lost child. Perhaps she is a vampire who lost a child and wants to turn Hinaichi as a replacement. Luckily for Hinaichi, another hand bats away the vampire hand. An equally slender black silhouetted figure stands between Hinaichi and the ghostly vampire, escorting her away from the twisted festival. An army of white hands reach for the girl, and one of them gets as far as to snatch a shoe from her mysterious protector.
Hinaichi is suddenly back to her normal self in the festival proper. Draluc asks why she is spacing out, and Hinaichi decides that what she experienced was a just dream. She gets Draluc's attention to talk about her dream, to which he responds with an uncharacteristically knowledgeable look, but Hinaichi drops the issue. The three go to watch one last festival performance, which prompts Hinaichi to look down and laugh. There, she sees that Draluc is missing a shoe -- just like her mystery protector.
Draluc is a relatively good vampire, refraining from killing humans and helping the Guild when he can, but he isn't particularly good at it. He is notoriously weak, and his greatest victory over Nagiri Tsujigiri happened by complete accident. If Draluc did indeed become Hinaichi's mystery protector, this would be one of his most unambiguously heroic deeds yet. In Episode 2, Draluc tells Ronaldo that he wants to befriend Hinaichi and convince her to let him consensually drink some of her blood. This makes his stoic refusal to brag or even tell Hinaichi about his saving her even more surprisingly heroic.
In Episode 3, Hinaichi saw Draluc die after an encounter with the neighborhood kids and charitably assumed that he died simply to protect them from his power. Draluc's protection of Hinaichi in Episode 10 shows that he might one day become the noble figure she originally hoped he was. Fortunately, Draluc's pretend radio show at the end of the episode shows that he is also still the same quirky, playful vampire that series fans have come to love.
