The shattered vial hissed as its contents seeped into the cathedral floor, tendrils of sickly green mist twisting like grasping fingers. The air thickened, heavy with the scent of rot and something far worse—a plague not yet given form, but eager to be born.
Selene Nocturna stood motionless, her lips curling as the mist slithered up her boots, weaving around her legs like a starving serpent recognizing its master. She inhaled deeply, allowing the fumes to enter her lungs.
Power. Pure, unshackled power.
She exhaled, her breath blackened with decay, and stepped forward.
"Now," she whispered, her voice laced with a venomous thrill, "let us see how deep Kruger's faith truly runs."
The phantom priest, lingering in the shadows, tilted its hollowed head. Its skeletal hands twitched as if eager to conduct some long-forgotten ritual.
"You risk much, Selene," it intoned, its voice an echo of ages long buried. "This strain... it does not differentiate. Not even for you."
Selene's smirk widened, her blackened teeth gleaming in the candlelight.
"Who said I wanted it to?"
The mist pulsed, and from the far end of the cathedral, a groan rumbled through the ancient stone. The corpses lining the pews—her congregation of the dead—began to stir.
One by one, rotting eyes fluttered open, milky and unfocused. Jaws unhinged, gurgling as lungs long collapsed sought breath that would never come.
Selene's gaze swept over them. Her children. Her choir of the damned.
Not of the dead, but of the living.
The iron doors at the cathedral's entrance groaned, straining against something desperate. The unmistakable scent of sweat, steel, and righteous fear tainted the plague-thick air.
Selene turned slowly.
The doors burst open.
Kruger stood at the threshold, clad in battered armor, his blade glistening with silver filigree. Behind him, a handful of soldiers—the last remnants of his dying faith.
His eyes locked onto Selene's. Fury. Hatred. And something deeper—something fragile.
"You took everything from me."
Selene exhaled a breath of black mist.
"And yet you still stand."
Kruger raised his sword. A silver cross burned against his chest, warding off the sickness swirling around him. His men coughed, struggling against the taint.
Selene tilted her head, amused.
"You are running out of lambs, Kruger. Soon, there will be no flock left to shepherd."
Kruger did not waver.
"Then I will be the wolf."
And with that, he charged.
Selene's laughter echoed through the cathedral as the dead rose to greet him.