The scream tore through, swallowed by the storm before it could echo beyond the ruined walls.
Seraphina clawed at the damp stone, her nails splitting against the rough surface.
The infection burned beneath her skin—veins black and shimmering faintly like liquid mercury. The pain had changed now; it pulsed in rhythm with the rain, as though the storm itself fed her suffering.
She collapsed against the cold floor of what used to be the asylum's chapel.
Moonlight filtered through the shattered ceiling, silver and pitiless.
The frescoes on the walls were half-burned, angels without wings staring down like mourners who had long abandoned faith.
Her breathing rattled. "You said… you'd never come back here, Lorenzo."
But his voice haunted every shadow.
In her delirium, she could still see him—Lorenzo —standing before her with that calm, cruel smile. "Perfection demands sacrifice," he used to say. "And you, my dear Seraphina, were always willing to bleed for power."
