The candlelight flickered in The Rotting Cathedral, casting grotesque shadows along its decayed walls. The scent of old blood and dried herbs lingered in the air—a perfume of death, carefully cultivated.
Selene Nocturna stood before the stone altar, her golden eyes glinting like molten honey beneath the hood of her tattered cloak. Her lips, smeared in fresh blood, curled into a wicked grin.
"Come closer, little moth," she whispered.
Seraphine, still trembling from the night before, took a slow, hesitant step forward. Something inside her felt wrong. Twisted. Changed.
Selene tilted her head. She could smell it on her— the sickness, the hunger, the creeping decay that had begun to settle into her bones.
"Do you feel it yet?" Selene purred, reaching out. Her fingers, cold and delicate, traced Seraphine's jaw.
Seraphine swallowed hard, her pulse erratic. "What… what did you do to me?"
Selene let out a low, velvety laugh. "Oh, my sweet thing… I merely opened the door. You stepped through it on your own."
Seraphine clenched her fists. Her nails had grown longer—sharper. Her veins pulsed with a darkness she could not name.
The whispers had not stopped since last night.
"Take. Consume. Become."
Selene leaned in, her breath icy against Seraphine's cheek.
"You belong to me now. To the rot. To the unmaking of all things."
Seraphine felt her stomach twist, her mind screaming at her to fight back, to run, to reject the sickness spreading within her.
Selene's fingers ghosted along her throat, tilting her chin up. "You don't need to be afraid, my dear."
Her voice was soothing. Hypnotic. Deadly.
Selene's lips brushed against Seraphine's, soft yet cold as the grave. A rush of something—**black, thick, hungry—**coiled around Seraphine's very essence, sinking its claws into the remnants of her soul.
She gasped, her body convulsing. Her lungs burned, her mind reeled. A thousand voices screamed in unison.
Seraphine staggered back, her breathing ragged. She touched her lips, her fingers trembling. Her heart no longer raced. It barely beat at all.
Selene smiled, golden eyes gleaming.
"Now you understand," she whispered. "You are no longer just Seraphine. You are more."
Seraphine's reflection in the broken mirror nearby shifted. Her once bright eyes had turned—dark, void-touched, tinged with gold and black.
She looked at Selene.