The novel opens with a soliloquy about the "eucharist sun" . It's a symbol of misery and sorrow, a "living piece of metal" , a piece of the universe that's been "adrift in the universe howling in its eternal sorrow . . Sometimes, the sun crosses the sky of a "one of the innumerable inhabited planets" and "shares its sorrow" with a "conscious being . " The sun is described as a living, breathing thing . The narrator tells us that the sun is like a living thing that has been destroyed by the "madness" of the inhabitants of the world many years ago. The sun, he tells us, is a symbol for the "infinite sorrow" of humankind . He also tells us how the sun can be crossed by "a conscious being ." The narrator then tells us about the story of the "draculas" who hide beneath the castle ruins. He asks the painter, Joseph balmes, if he can tell him what he finds interesting in the ruins. The painter tells him that he is a "vampireologist," a term used to describe a person who studies vampirism. He says that he's surprised to find that there are no such people in the world. He tells the painter that the "last descendent" of Dracula was the one who set the castle on fire, so it must be a vampire who brought the story to an end. He wants to know if he'll be able to "put the sun out" one day, and the painter promises that he will one day. The father of the vampire