The air was thick with decay.
Selene Nocturna stood motionless, her golden eyes locked on the abomination that had once been the Harbinger. Its form rippled like a wound in reality, shifting between rotten flesh and something far worse—an amalgamation of the forgotten, a chorus of lost souls fused into one writhing mass.
For the first time in decades, Selene felt intrigued.
"You are no longer the Harbinger," she murmured, tilting her head. Her fingers traced the blood-crusted sigils on her collarbone, calculating the power radiating from the creature.
It did not speak—it howled.
A soundless wail tore through the cathedral, bending the walls inward. The very air grew sick with ruin, warping like flesh stretched too thin.
Selene merely laughed.
She raised a hand, and black fire erupted from her palm. The necrotic blaze shot forward, consuming the space between them in an instant. The fire was not meant to burn—it was meant to unravel, to peel away the layers of existence that held a being together.
The creature convulsed, its many mouths gaping in silent agony. The fire clung to its essence, pulling it apart, stripping it to the core.
Selene stepped forward, savoring the scent of charred corruption.
"All that power… and yet, you kneel before me."
But then—something shifted.
The flames did not consume.
Selene's smirk vanished. The creature was absorbing the fire, twisting it, bending it into its own will.
For the first time, it spoke in a voice stitched together from countless throats.
"You are not the only one who understands hunger."
Selene's pupils dilated. The black fire reversed, flowing back toward her, wrapping around her arms like sentient tendrils. It burned—not her flesh, but something deeper.
With a snarl, she severed the connection, dispersing the energy with a flick of her wrist. The air cracked.
The abomination surged forward.
Selene twisted, dodging its attack with an unnatural grace. She landed on a crumbling pillar, eyes narrowing.
"You've learned a trick or two, I see."
The creature lunged again. This time, she did not dodge.
Instead, she let it strike.
The moment its wretched mass touched her, she allowed it in.
Darkness poured over her, twisting, clawing, screaming. But Selene Nocturna was no ordinary vessel.
She was the plague itself.
A surge of sickly green light exploded from within her, an alchemical reaction so vile, so potent, that the very walls of the cathedral wept. The creature convulsed, its form betraying it, its essence being rewritten by something even older.
Selene grinned through bloodstained teeth.
"Hunger?" she whispered.
"Let me show you what true starvation feels like."