The scent of roasted meat, spiced wine, and perfume hung thick in the air, clinging to every silken curtain and velvet tapestry of Belladra's domain. Gluttora, capital of the Kingdom of Excess, writhed in celebration every night, but tonight the revelry surged like a tide swollen by blood. Beneath the golden domes and flesh-draped archways, desire had turned to decadence, and indulgence to rot.
Kael stepped from the Sinbound Path into a world unlike any he had seen.
A parade of pleasure-worshippers marched before him—painted bodies adorned with pearls and oil, their moans orchestrated like music. The streets were lined with open banquets and collapsed lovers, nobles too drunk to stand and servants too bewitched to stop.
"This is Gluttony's cradle?" Kael muttered.
Nyx appeared beside him, shadow-wrapped and wary.
"Cradle? No. This is her feast."
Above them loomed the Obsidian Grotto—a palace carved into a mountain of marble and bone, dripping with molten gold and perfumed oils. The entrance itself gaped like a mouth, hungry to swallow Kael whole.
"I come with you," Nyx said, and there was no question in it.
Kael nodded. "Then let's meet the Queen of Appetite."
Inside, the throne room was alive.
Not with courtiers or warriors, but with bodies. Dozens—entwined, feeding, sobbing in bliss. Music rose from instruments strung with sinew, played by hollow-eyed men whose fingers bled with devotion. At the center of it all reclined Belladra.
She was immense and divine.
Her curves spilled over silk cushions, adorned with chains of rubies and emeralds. Her skin gleamed like honey over bronze, and her golden eyes flickered with amusement and bottomless hunger. Hair the color of molten chocolate cascaded around her shoulders, and her lips—crimson and wet—smiled the moment Kael entered.
"Ahh... dessert."
Kael braced as she rose.
Belladra moved like smoke and sin, every step a ritual of desire. The crowd parted for her, intoxicated by her presence.
"You are Kael Draven," she purred, voice a melody of indulgence. "Bearer of the Mark. Conqueror of Lust, Wrath, Sloth, Greed, and Envy."
"And you are Belladra of Gluttony," Kael replied evenly.
She laughed, and the walls trembled. "Of Gluttony? No, love. I am Gluttony. And I've been starving for you."
The negotiations—if they could be called that—began at a feast.
Kael and Nyx sat across from Belladra on a low bed of silken furs. The table before them sagged under the weight of exotic fruits, steaming meats, and liquors that shimmered like liquid gems. Servants crawled on all fours to refill goblets. Some fed Belladra from their own mouths.
"Tell me," she said, eyes never leaving Kael, "what is it you hunger for, truly?"
Kael sipped the wine but did not answer.
"You wish to bind me? To add my sin to your collection?"
Nyx growled softly. "He doesn't collect us."
Belladra waved a hand. "Oh, darling shade. You already are his. I can see the tether. It pulses like a lover's vein."
Kael's patience frayed. "If you know why I'm here, then spare us the theatrics."
Belladra's smile turned cruel. "But theatrics are how we feed, Kael. Do you know how I survived the last Sin War? When Lust fell? When Wrath was chained? I devoured them."
Kael stood slowly.
"Then try to devour me."
The challenge landed like a thunderclap.
The feast froze.
Belladra's eyes darkened. Her hunger turned sharp.
"Very well, heir of Lust. Come. Let's see what flavor your soul bleeds."
The Chamber of Glut was not a bedchamber, but a living temple of craving.
Walls breathed. The air pulsed with chants, wordless but potent. Runes glowed beneath the skin of the floor, responding to Kael's presence. Belladra stripped her robes as if shedding pretense, revealing a body worshipped as a sacrament.
Kael felt the Sinbound Mark ignite.
This was not conquest. It was surrender. Battle. Seduction.
Belladra pressed him to the stone altar, lips trailing fire. Her magic coiled around him like serpents made of silk. Every touch demanded something—memory, desire, weakness. Kael resisted, then yielded, then resisted again.
Their ritual lasted through moonfall.
Pain laced with pleasure. Hunger with revelation.
Belladra was not simply gluttonous for food or flesh—she devoured connection. She drank his rage, his guilt, even his triumphs. And in doing so, Kael tasted her emptiness. Her unending void.
At the climax, when the bond sealed, Kael roared as Gluttony's mark carved itself into his flesh—an ouroboros of mouths.
Belladra lay beside him, panting, glowing.
"You are... exquisite," she whispered.
Kael, weak but aware, nodded.
"And you are mine now."
Her smile turned bittersweet.
"No, Kael. You are all of ours."
Outside the palace, Nyx waited.
Her eyes burned with jealousy and sorrow, but she said nothing as Kael emerged.
He took her hand.
"One more."
"Yes," she said. "One remains."
But neither of them spoke her name.
For even as the sixth mark cooled, the final one began to stir in a far darker place.
And Sloth had begun to dream of Death.
That night, Kael did not sleep. Gluttony's mark pulsed on his skin, a relentless beat like a second heart. He wandered the silent chambers of the Grotto, unable to shake Belladra's whispered truths.
In the Hall of Reflections, he found Nyx waiting, seated on a cushion of velvet, her eyes hidden behind a veil of shadow.
"She took more from you than the others, didn't she?" Nyx asked without looking at him.
Kael hesitated. "Yes."
"And she gave more, too."
He sat beside her, the quiet pressing around them like silk.
"She feeds on what we try to hide. She saw everything. My doubts. My fears. My need to be more than the boy who was cast out."
Nyx lifted her veil, her eyes unreadable. "You still think that's who you are?"
"Sometimes."
She leaned in, forehead touching his. "Then let me be your mirror. Because what I see... is a king. One worth envying."
He kissed her then—not out of ritual or passion, but because her belief had become his anchor.
At dawn, they left Gluttora. Belladra stood atop the palace steps, flanked by her priestesses. Her gaze was somber, though her lips curled in a knowing smile.
"You bear my hunger now," she said. "Feed it well, or it will consume you."
Kael bowed. "Thank you for the warning."
She reached out, brushing his cheek with fingers sticky from honey and blood. "And beware the last. Sloth is not simply sleep. She is the death of will. The end of striving."
Nyx's grip on his hand tightened.
As the Sinbound Path opened before them, Kael looked back once.
Gluttony watched him go with eyes that saw more than hunger. They saw the war to come.
And in the void between seconds, Kael felt it too.
The final mark waited. And she was already dreaming of him.