This trope tends to play out in one of two ways; either the Bob and Alice fall for each other with one or both of them not realizing that Bob is a vampire and Alice is a Vampire Hunter, or Bob and Alice already know they're sworn enemies but are either forced to work together for long enough, or have been fighting each other for so long, that they develop an Inconvenient Attraction. This obviously leads to much drama, as Alice and her friends might have killed Bob's vampire buddies, or vice-versa. If Bob turns out to be a pretty decent guy who acts nothing like what Alice has been lead to believe about vampires, she may come to question the morality of her past vampire slayings. If Alice was Dating Catwoman, Bob may begin to feel wrong about preying on people no different from his beloved and decide to become Friendly Neighbourhood Vampire or even a Hunter of His Own Kind. Grey-and-Grey Morality may come into play if both sides of the conflict have equally valid and/or invalid arguments.
Often leads to Defecting for Love, Heel–Face Turn, Love Redeems, and is almost guaranteed to accompany a boatload of Character Development. Subtrope of Forbidden Love and may lead to Maligned Mixed Marriage. Can overlap with Star-Crossed Lovers if their relationship is strained. Compare In Love with the Mark, Predator Turned Protector, Boy Meets Ghoul, Vampire-Werewolf Love Triangle, Interspecies Romance, Romantic Vampire Boy, and Angel/Devil Shipping.
Examples:
open/close all folders
Anime & Manga
- The Hero Forgot The Mission is about the titular heroine Hizumi's pursuit of the Demon Lord Nue, whom she has trained all her life to defeat. Unit she learns that Nue is a pacifistic leader who prohibits attacks on humans, and soon falls for him instead, with the series revolving around her pursing him romantically in spite of his polite indifference towards her.
- The backstory of Inuyasha. The titular character is a half demon who attempted to steal the Shikon Jewel but is thwarted by Kikyo, a priestess. The two ended up falling in love. Sadly, it doesn't end well.
- The manga Mr. Monster has the titular Mr. Monster
(possibly an oni living as a human) get into Oblivious to Love antics with various youkai (who he doesn't so much subdue as just be nice to), while a monster hunter named Oliver rescues an artificial angel who tries unsuccessfully to get him to go along with a Rescue Romance.
- Killing Me! revolves around the story of two classmates, Saki Fujimiya, an honors student, and the ubbly, cheerful Miyoko Kujou, who's playful nature belies the fact that she's a 150-year old vampire. She does so for two reasons. One, her sworn duty as a vmpire hunter. And two, because Saki herself has become Miyoko's favorite target in terms of sucking her blood 'and' pursuing her romantically.
- Natsuneko's Nightmare Syndrome, much like Killing Me, features a Tsundere Vampire Hunter named Elysia who seeks to slay Vega who slayed her father. Two problems exist: One, Vega is far more powerful than she is. Second, Vega is a Lesbian Vampire who's made her attraction to Elysia rather clear, and Elysia is struggling between her quest for revenge and reciprocating Vega's feelings.
- The Demon Lord Arata's Battle Harem in Trinity Seven has one of its girls become a Hero, a being destined to fight Demon Lords that threaten to destroy the world.
- Twin Star Exorcists has a complicated example. Exorcists are humans who use enchanted powers to exorcise monsters made of corrupt energy known as Impurities. The titular couple, Rokuro and Benio, are exorcists who must marry and give birth to a child who is destined to end the war between exorcists and Impurities. Later in the manga, Benio must undergo a ritual that transforms her into an Impurity because the prophesied child must inherit the powers of light from Rokuro and darkness from Benio. Rokuro and Benio still love each other despite her now being an Impurity, but both hide her transformation from other exorcists out of fear that Benio will be treated as yet another monster and hunted down.
- The protagonist of UQ Holder! is an artificially created immortal demon/pseudo vampire, and one of his love interests is a practitioner of the Shinmei-ryuu ("Gods' Cry School"), a sword style developed specifically to exorcise demons and handicap immortals.
- In Yuuna and the Haunted Hot Springs, the protagonist Kogarashi is an exorcist who arrives at the Yuragi Inn to get rid of the ghost haunting the place. Said ghost turns out to not only be friendly, but a pretty girl named Yuuna. Since Kogarashi doesn't hit women, he decides he will help Yuuna clear her regrets before she becomes an evil spirit. Kogarashi and Yuuna end up falling in love and both stop wanting her to go to the afterlife so they don't have to be separated.
Film — Animation
- In Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation, Drac falls in love with Ericka who is a Van Helsing. While at first she wants to kill him and the other monsters on the cruise ship, she too falls in love with him.
Film — Live-Action
- Blade II has a more subtle example in the form of Ship Tease and Unresolved Sexual Tension between Blade, a dhampir vampire hunter, and Nyssa, a pureborn vampire. They develop a close bond after teaming up to stop the Reaper vampires, but they never get to have a proper romance because Nyssa is infected with the Reaper virus; at her request Blade carries her out into the sunlight so she can die before she turns and they embrace as she dies.
- Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters: Hansel and Gretel have vowed to hunt down all of witchkind to avenge the death of their parents, but Hansel later falls in love with Mina, who's a White Witch. As it turns out, so are the two leads—their mother was a White Witch as well. Mina is eventually murdered in the climax by Muriel, the Grand Black Witch, for "betraying her kind".
- Subverted in The Last Witch Hunter. There were plans to have the witch Chloe fall in love with Kaulder, the eponymous Witch Hunter, but this was rejected because the age gap between themnote was seen as too large and Kaulder still being haunted by the death of his wife made it seem inappropriate.
- Lucien and Sonja in Underworld: Rise of the Lycans. Sonja, the daughter of the powerful vampire elder Viktor, regularly hunts down and kills feral Lycans despite being in love with Lucien, an enslaved Lycan.
Literature
- Anita Blake Vampire Hunter does this a lot (starting with werewolf Richard before moving on to vampire Jean-Claude and escalating from there to many other vampires and supernatural creatures). "I don't date vampires. I kill them" our collective ass.
- In Carpe Jugulum, young vampyr Vlad de Magpyr becomes infatuated with Witch Agnes Nitt. This is despite knowing right from the start that the Lancre witches see the Vampyrs note who have usurped the kingdom as an infestation to be wiped out, and Agnes has several times expressed her own desire to kill Vlad. Right at the end, while Agnes does not kill him, she says she'd gladly hold somebody's coat while they get a hammer and stake together. Nevertheless, she effectively "dates" him on the advice of the older and wiser witch Nanny Ogg, who points out this makes men of any sort easier to manipulate.
- The Chosen (1997) revolves around Vampire Hunter Rashel Jordan realizing that her soulmate is none other than Romantic Vampire Boy John Quinn.
- Cruel Illusions: Roman is a vampire and ends up in a romantic relationship with Ava, a member of the vampire slaying group of magicans called the Society. Played with in that Roman hides the fact that he's a vampire from the rest of the Society and they think he's just a normal member of their magician organisation and are unaware of his true nature as one of their enemies.
- A Deal with a Demon: In The Gargoyle's Captive, Grace is a monster hunter who falls in love with and begins a relationship with the Gargoyle King Bram.
- Den of Shadows features a romance between Sarah Vida and Christopher. Christopher is a Friendly Neighbourhood Vampire who doesn't kill humans while Sarah Vida is part of a witch line which famously hunts and destroys vampires.
- The plot of Evernight revolves around Bianca, a half-vampire raised by loving vampire parents, falling in love with Lucas, a vampire hunter who was raised in Black Cross (an ancient order of vampire hunters). Their romance leads them to discover Both Sides Have a Point; Lucas realizes that Black Cross is wrong about all vampires being evil monsters, while Bianca realizes her parents have sheltered her from the darker side of the vampire world.
- In Sofie Jordan's Firelight series, Jacinda is a draki; dragon-like creatures that have a human form as well as a draconic form. She ends up falling for Will, whose family — not realizing that the draki are sentient people due to the Masquerade — hunts draki for sport and profit.
- In Hex Hall, Sophie is a half-demon who finds herself falling for her classmate Archer, who is secretly a demon-hunter.
- High School D×D has a harem example. One of Issei's, a reborn devil, haremettes is Irina who works for the church to exterminate demons and who later became a reborn angel. Though, by the time they get romantic, the relationship between heaven and hell are much better.
- The Max Gladstone story "A Kiss With Teeth" is about a formerly murderous vampire named Vlad (yes, that one), who in the backstory, fell in love with and married the Buffy-like vampire hunter who pursued him. When the story opens, he's become a Retired Monster and is living a normal suburban life with his wife and raising a child, and finding the situation kind of stifling, especially his son's seeming complete normality.
- Cat and Bones, the protagonists of the Night Huntress series start off their odd relationship when Cat, an erstwhile vampire hunter, stakes a vampire whom Bones, a vampire himself, had been stalking for information about a human trafficking syndicate who the latter intends on taking down.
- The primary love story in Psycho Killers in Love. William is a slasher (immortal serial killer) that is struggling against his urges to kill while Nancy is an "Artemis", a Final Girl who is empowered to kill slashers. They manage to make it work despite the odds.
- Secret Histories: The Drood family is an Ancient Tradition dedicated to protecting humanity from its enemies. Harry Drood is in a relationship with the half-demon Roger Morningstar, to the other Droods' deep disapproval, exacerbated by Roger's Heel–Face Revolving Door. Ultimately, Roger genuinely falls in love with Harry and pulls a Heroic Sacrifice for his sake.
- In The Serpent & Dove Trilogy, Lou (a witch) and Reid (a witch-hunter) end up in an Arranged Marriage and eventually fall in love. Lou knows that Reid is a witch-hunter, but Reid doesn't know that Lou is a witch. When Reid finds out about, he initially turns his back on her, but he changes his mind later and realizes that not all witches are evil.
- Strike the Blood has Kojou, the Fourth Progenitor vampire, and Yukina, a Sword Shaman sent to observe and potentially eliminate him should she deem him dangerous. Unbeknownst to Yukina, the Lion King Organization actually sent her so she would become Kojou's lover. Besides their obvious feelings, the appearance of their Kid from the Future clears any doubt that they eventually become a couple.
- In Alexandra Christo's To Kill a Kingdom, after being cursed by her mother to live as a human, siren princess Lira winds up on the ship of siren hunter Elian and they slowly end up falling for each other.
Live-Action TV
- In Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Fully Embraced Fiends-turned-Friendly Neighbourhood Vampires and Hunters Of Their Own Kind Angel and Spike both end up dating Buffy... the vampire slayer.
- It goes both ways with Spike, weirdly enough; he's a well-known Slayer killer, having tracked down and killed two others before meeting Buffy. After several failed efforts to make her the third notch on his belt, extenuating circumstances lead to him sticking around long enough to develop a crush on her—eventually leading to a full redemption arc, complete with him seeking out a soul and sacrificing himself the save the world.
- Charmed (1998): Cole Turner, the source of all evil, marries Phoebe Halliwell, a good witch who is tasked with fighting evil.
- Dracula (2013): Dracula seduces Lady Jayne, a skilled vampire hunter, and they have a sexual relationship though she's unaware of his true identity when it starts.
- First Kill focuses on a romance between vampire Juliette and vampire hunter Calliope.
- In Grimm, both Adalind Schade and Juliette Silverton end up doing this with protagonist Nick Burkhardt since he's a Grimm (a human being capable of seeing and hunting wesen), and both of them are hexenbiests (although only the former was born that way). And by the end of the series, Nick and Adalind end up the endgame official couple (to the point that they even have a son together).
- Supernatural: Sam and his brother Dean are both hunters, but the former has had relationships with a werewolf, a kitsune, and a demon, and the latter with an amazon who used him as a Glorified Sperm Donor as well as an angel who later experienced a Face–Heel Turn and tried to kill both of the brothers before they were born. However, this is subverted when Sam has a fling with a female doctor who is suspected to be a siren, but turns out to be a Red Herring.
- Teen Wolf: A romance develops between Scott, who is a werewolf, and Allison, who comes from a family of werewolf hunters.
- In What We Do in the Shadows (2019), Guillermo is a modern-day descendant of the Van Helsing clan. He's also the long-suffering but devoted familiar of vampire Nandor the Relentless, for whom he is confirmed to have romantic feelings by Word of God.
- In Wizards of Waverly Place, Justin becomes a monster hunter while already dating Juliet (a vampire). There is even one episode where he accidentally turns her in to the monster hunter council when he detects three monsters in Waverly Place, forgetting that Juliet and her parents live there.
Video Games
- Divinity: Original Sin II: Mihaly, a Magister devoted to fighting demons and the Black Ring, and Almira, a succubus sworn to the Black Ring, had A Match Made in Stockholm while Almira is in Magister custody. They deserted their respective factions and ran away to be together.
Almira: Love will set you free.
- The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim's Dawnguard expansion introduces Friendly Neighbourhood Vampire Serana, who, while not marriageable, supplies copious amounts of Ship Tease with the Dragonborn. The Dragonborn originally meets her while a member of the titular vampire-hunting guild, the "Dawnguard".
- EXTRAPOWER: Attack of Darkforce: Meard is the Dream Demon King, a high ranking incubus. Kurogane is the 48th generation demon-hunting shinobi sworn to keep him sealed. Then she's bleeding out, he has the means to save her life; if only she'll say yes. The agreement has heavy marriage overtones, and her tone with him warms from antagonistic to amicable afterwards. They seem happy enough afterwards, as in the credits montage sharing afternoon tea with other heroes from the game.
Visual Novels
- Havenfall Is for Lovers has an organization of vampire hunters, the Helsing Order, with one of their members, Vanessa Helsing, being a potential love interest. On her route, the heroine, who is human when they first get together, is later turned into a vampire.
- The protagonist of Kisses And Curses is a witch, and one of the potential love interests, Anastasia, is a witch hunter who has been raised to think of her kind as evil.
- Monster Prom does this with Aaravi Mishra, A.K.A. the slayer. At first she merely shows up as a side character that frequently attempts to kill both the player and the romanceable characters (both of whom are monsters), but in the second term DLC she gets her own secret route where she can be taken to prom by the player character before becoming a fully-fledged love interest in the sequel Monster Camp where she learns to be a bit more amicable with her monstrous peers. It's also revealed that she's actually half-monster herself.
Web Comics
- Played with but never played straight in Charby the Vampirate. The hunter George was dating a human girl who was changed into a vampire by vamps seeking revenge against him, and she retained enough of her personality that they continued dating. Victor was courting a fellow hunter who was changed and who pretended to be into him in order to get close enough to try and kill him. At Samrick's party one of the members of the Vampire council is noticeably interested in Victor and flirts with him, but the chaos that soon unfolds prevents them from interacting again.
- Played with in El Goonish Shive. Nanase is unabashedly a protector of our heroes, complete with a spell that transforms her into an angelic form, and a history involving being tapped by a pair of immortals to kill a vampire. Her girlfriend, Ellen, is both a magically created construct (and previously a target of another slayer), and also as of late empowered by what might have been a dragon's scale. We did not see Ellen's form when empowered, but the silhouette suggested dragon wings and spines...
Western Animation
- In American Dragon: Jake Long, Jake, who has the ability to turn into a dragon, falls for a girl from school named Rose. She's later revealed to have been raised a member of the Huntsclan, who are an organization of ninja warriors specializing in the slaying of magical creatures, dragons included.
- In Extreme Ghostbusters, Roland falls in love with a ghost called Syren. The feeling is mutual, but sadly she ends up getting captured in a sort of Heroic Sacrifice to stop her evil sister.
