The Rotting Cathedral stood in eerie silence, its candlelit corridors casting grotesque shadows on the stone walls. The scent of death and decay mixed with something sweeter—a lingering perfume of rot and alchemy.
Kruger stumbled forward, his body still reeling from the venom Selene had injected into his veins. His vision blurred. The world twisted at unnatural angles, but he couldn't stop. Not now. Not here.
Behind him, a slow, mocking clap echoed through the chamber.
"Still breathing, General?"
Selene Nocturna stepped into view, her lips twisted into a wicked grin. Blood stained her mouth, trailing down her pale throat like an artist's brushstroke. The black veins across her skin pulsed, flickering with unnatural energy.
"You should be honored," she purred, stepping closer. "Not many get to witness my work this intimately."
Kruger raised his gun, but his arm trembled. Too weak.
Selene chuckled, shaking her head. "Pathetic. You should've accepted my gift, Kruger."
She extended her hand, and the candles flickered violently.
From the darkness, they emerged.
Bodies—shambling, stitched, and rotting—yet alive. Selene's newest creations. Their eyes, hollow and lifeless, were trained on Kruger. Their jaws slack, waiting.
"Do you like them?" Selene's voice dripped with delight. "I made them just for you."
The undead swarmed forward.
The first corpse collapsed, a hole between its eyes. Another surged in its place. Too many.
His body screamed for relief, but he refused to fall.
Selene sighed, stepping through the carnage.
"Fighting is pointless, Kruger." She crouched beside him as he fell to one knee, her blackened fingers trailing along his cheek.
"You should rest. Let me take care of you."
Kruger spat blood at her feet.
Selene smirked. "Still defiant."
With a sudden, sharp motion, she drove her clawed fingers into his shoulder. Kruger roared in agony as her venom burned through him, spreading like wildfire.
She leaned in, lips near his ear.
"Soon, you'll understand, Kruger. This world doesn't belong to the living anymore. It belongs to me."
She withdrew her hand, watching as he collapsed to the floor, his breath ragged, his skin growing cold.
Selene stood, eyes gleaming with victory.
"Take him to the dungeon," she commanded.
The undead obeyed, dragging Kruger's barely conscious form into the abyss beneath the cathedral.
Selene turned back to the altar, where a fresh corpse lay upon the stone. A new experiment. A new servant.
She licked the blood from her lips.