The cathedral was silent.
Eron leaned against a broken pillar, trying to steady his breathing.
The pain from the contract had faded, but something else lingered beneath his shadow, a strange presence that felt alive.
He looked down, at first his shadow seemed normal, then its edges stretched past the torchlight, two faint red points glowed within it before fading.
His breath caught, hand moved to his bag as the shadow twisted unnaturally across the stone floor.
A low laugh came from below.
"You'd better start getting used to it, mortal," Valerica's amused voice came from his shadow. "Your face says everything."
Eron gripped his bag tighter. "No one gets used to their shadow talking."
"Oh, don't sulk," she said. "You'll never be alone now. Wherever you go, I follow. Where your fire burns, my darkness trails behind."
"Great," he muttered. "A vampire queen stuck in my shadow."
Her laughter filled the chamber. "Better than dying alone down here, don't you think?"
Eron didn't answer. He pushed off the pillar and started walking slowly.
The cathedral stretched endlessly before him, rows of broken paintings lined both sides, blackened with age, faceless statues stood in the dark, hands raised in forgotten gestures. Some held swords. Others clutched nothing but air.
His boots scraped against stone, each step echoing through the vast hall. Alcoves along the walls held rusted armor, corroded weapons, and bones carefully arranged as if laid to rest long ago.
"Your kind always leaves traces," Valerica said quietly. "Even in death."
"These aren't human," Eron replied, eyeing a skull twice the size of his own.
"No. They walked like you once, spoke and dreamed, but the dungeon takes all kinds."
Eron's jacket hung loose, torn fabric catching with every movement, sweat had dried on his shirt. His legs ached with each step. The pact with Valerica had drained more than he wanted to admit.
He needed rest, or at least somewhere that didn't feel like a grave.
"You don't know this place very well, do you?" he asked suddenly.
"Excuse me?"
"You've been here for centuries. Shouldn't you know every corner of your own domain?"
Valerica sighed, a faint sound through the empty hall. "I was asleep most of the time."
"Asleep?" Eron asked.
"What else is there to do when no one visits?" Her voice softened, distant. "Decades pass, sometimes centuries. No adventurers come, nothing stirs, not even a whisper. So I sleep… and wait."
"For how long?"
"Does it matter?" she answered, her voice calm but distant. "Time doesn't move here. I wake when someone enters my domain, play with them for a while, then sleep again once they're gone."
Eron slowed his pace. "So you don't actually explore?"
"Why would I?" she replied. "The dungeon shifts, rooms appear and vanish. What's the point of memorizing walls that refuse to stay still?"
"That's… unsettling."
"Welcome to the deeper floors, mortal. Nothing here stays the same."
He glanced at the corridor. The thought of the place being alive made his skin crawl.
"Then how do you know where we're going?"
"I don't," she admitted. "But I can feel things, currents of magic, air, movement. It's instinct."
"So we could be walking in circles."
"We could be," she said cheerfully. "But we're not. I've been lost before. This isn't it."
The corridor narrowed until he could touch the ceiling, red veins pulsed faintly along the walls. The air grew stale.
"There," Valerica said suddenly.
"Where?"
"Left. A small opening."
He almost missed it, a gap in the wall barely wide enough for his shoulders, no door, only darkness.
"What's in there?"
"How would I know? I'm tied to your shadow, not all-knowing, but the mana here... it doesn't feel as lifeless."
"Yet you claim you can sense things."
"I can tell clean mana from corrupted mana, nothing more. Could be riches, could be a trap. We won't know unless we look."
"Less dead" wasn't comforting, but it was better than nothing. He squeezed through the gap.
The narrow passage opened into a small corridor lined with old sconces, torches were long dead, torn tapestries hung in tatters. His footsteps sounded too loud in the tight space.
"This place feels different," he muttered.
"Private quarters," Valerica said. "When the cathedral lived, servants used these to move unseen."
"So this was a palace before your time?"
"A temple, a fortress, a palace. The dungeon remembers them all."
At the end stood a small iron door, half-buried in fallen stone. The handle was shaped like a serpent. Eron pulled it open. Rust cracked and dust poured out, forcing him to cough and wave the air clear before stepping inside.
The room was small and heavy with age. Shelves sagged under rotted books, a desk slumped in one corner, covered in cobwebs. Dust coated everything, but at the far wall stood a mannequin untouched by decay.
It wore a black coat stitched with silver thread, a deep crimson sash, and polished boots. Even the gloves looked soft, as if waiting for someone to claim them.
"Couldn't you have cleaned this place?" Eron muttered. "This is disgusting."
Valerica laughed. "Clean? I'm far too noble for that, dusting and scrubbing are for servants."
"You lived alone."
"Irrelevant. A queen doesn't do housework, even without servants."
"That explains the mess."
"Mock me all you want human. At least I still have dignity."
"Buried under three centuries of dust."
"Still more intact than your jacket."
He couldn't stop the small smirk. Her arrogance was still perfectly intact.
"So these clothes are for me?"
"How convenient, isn't it? My kind's formal wear has been waiting all this time for you."
He looked down at his torn jacket and boots splitting at the seams. He really did look like someone who'd crawled out of a grave.
"I'm not wearing vampire clothes."
"Then keep your rags. Monsters respect confidence, not pity. Wear them long enough, and they'll start seeing you as one of their own."
"You're enjoying this."
"Immensely."
He sighed and took the coat, dust spiraled into the air, but the fabric was smooth and intact, preserved by magic. He stripped his ruined clothes and slipped into the new set.
"The coat first," Valerica instructed. "Then the sash. Gloves last."
"I don't need fashion advice from my shadow."
"You clearly do."
Eron followed anyway. The coat fit perfectly, sash rested neatly at his waist, mantle draped across his shoulders, and the gloves molded to his hands like a second skin.
He caught his reflection in a cracked mirror leaning against the wall.
The tired, ragged explorer was gone. In his place stood someone sharper and colder, dressed in noble attire, expression harder, posture steadier. He didn't look like himself anymore.
"Fitting," Valerica murmured. "My shadow dressed like my own kind."
"They're just clothes."
"These aren't ordinary clothes. Clothes change perception. Even the dungeon can be fooled. There's a magic woven into every thread. You look like you belong here now."
Valerica smirked, mysterious and calm. "Wait and see."
He adjusted the mantle and It felt natural.
"And what do you see?"
"A mortal who dared face me, now clad in the garment of the undead." Valerica's lips curved into a faint smirk. "What irony."
"I hate this already."
"You'll learn to appreciate it. You look dashing, until they smell your blood."
"That's not comforting." Eron frowned. "What's wrong with my blood?"
Valerica only smiled, a faint curve of amusement on her lips. "You'll figure it out soon."
"Why not say it now? Jeez, you're making it more mysterious."
Her smirk deepened, eyes glinting. "Good. Curiosity keeps mortals alive."
"It wasn't meant to be."
Eron left the room and returned to the corridor. His new boots echoed sharply against the stone floor, the coat moving easily with his steps. The hall grew darker as he descended, crimson veins running through the walls, flickering weakly like a dying pulse.
What a creepy place, he thought, eyes narrowing as the dim light shivered across the stone.
His shadow trailed behind, sometimes moving on its own. Neither of them spoke for a while.
At the bottom of the stairway, a round chamber waited. Its floor was covered in glowing runes, the walls lined with cracked crystal lamps scattering red light across the ceiling.
Eron stopped, staring.
"A waypoint array," Valerica said softly. "Ancient magic. It sends those who go too deep back to the first floor."
The runes shifted when he looked away, rearranging themselves into new patterns.
"So this is my way out."
"Perhaps. Or perhaps it will be your grave. Old magic doesn't care."
"Reassuring."
"I'm not here to reassure you. I'm here because I'm bound to you now."
He studied the floor, runes spiraled inward like machinery.
"Has anyone reached this deep before?"
"Yes, but not from your entrance. Dungeons connect, many doors, one core. Descend far enough and paths cross."
"So I've been walking beside others all along."
"Exactly. You're the first from your entrance, but not the first the dungeon has swallowed."
"What happened to them?"
"Some escaped. Most didn't. The dungeon keeps what it catches."
Eron gripped his bag tighter, reflection in a crystal lamp looked stronger than he felt. He stepped forward.
The runes brightened, light crawling up his boots and spreading across the coat like living fire.
"Be careful," Valerica said. "Overconfidence kills faster than monsters."
"Standing still kills too," Eron replied.
The light flared, red and white.
Then the world twisted, and he was gone.