The Rotting Cathedral pulsed with malignant energy. The air itself had grown sentient, thick with whispers and phantom caresses, drawn from the countless voices trapped in Selene's ever-growing web of undeath. The Pale Widow stood at the altar, her new Dark Arms twisting like living shadows, their hunger barely restrained.
Her congregation of Laughing Dead stood below, their bodies twitching in euphoric decay, their laughter now a soft, unsettling drone. Yet tonight, there was something new.
A lone figure stood at the entrance of the cathedral, draped in tattered robes, his face hidden beneath a plague mask adorned with rusted nails. The stench of medicinal herbs clashed against the suffocating aroma of rot that filled the hall.
Selene tilted her head, a grin spreading across her bloodstained lips. A physician? No… A fool.
"You dare enter my cathedral reeking of false salvation?" she purred, descending from the altar. The Dark Arms behind her writhed in anticipation.
The masked figure did not flinch. His voice, though muffled, carried the weight of someone who had witnessed horrors and survived them.
"Selene Nocturna… The Plague Saint. The Widow of Black Hollow. The Harbinger of Rot. I have come not to fight you…" He lifted a vial from his sleeve, the liquid inside glowing with unnatural red light. "But to offer you something greater."
Selene's grin faltered for a fraction of a second. She knew that glow.
The Laughing Dead snarled at the sight of it, their decayed forms instinctively recoiling. Selene, however, merely stalked forward, intrigued.
"And what gift do you bring me, physician?" she asked, her voice dripping with amusement.
The masked man raised the vial. "A cure."
Then, Selene laughed—long, cruel, venomous.
"A cure?" she echoed mockingly. "For what? Myself? My beautiful, rotting children?" Her Dark Arms stretched outward, embracing the cathedral, her congregation moaning in delight at her touch. "I do not suffer from disease, little healer—I am its mother."
The masked man uncorked the vial and hurled it to the ground.
The liquid burst upon impact, spreading outward in veins of crimson light. The moment it touched the stones, a pulse of unnatural energy erupted through the cathedral—a force that unraveled decay.
The Laughing Dead screamed.
Selene's eyes narrowed. Her Dark Arms convulsed, sensing something wrong. The power in the vial was not healing—no, it was something worse.
Selene's amusement vanished. With a single, fluid motion, she lunged forward, her Dark Arms striking in unison—but the masked man was already gone, his form dissolving into a red mist.
Only his final words lingered.
"Your reign will not last, Pale Widow. Even rot can be undone."
Selene snarled, her fingers clenching into fists.