Chapter 6
619words
Anna appeared again, wiser now—hidden within a thick black veil, only her eyes visible.
But the greed and vanity etched into her bones couldn't be concealed.
I helped Grandfather sell herbs from our market stall.
Grandfather was in high spirits and gifted me a high-level Sacred Light Amulet he'd brought from the Vatican in his youth.
"Try it on," he said casually, hanging the softly glowing amulet around my neck. "Keeps evil at bay."
The amulet was stunning—pure silver inlaid with Holy Crystal that caught sunlight in rainbow prisms.
Anna spotted it immediately.
Her eyes locked onto it like a predator.
In her mind, anything beautiful rightfully belonged to her.
Just like that adoption opportunity before.
While Grandfather went for wine, she approached with her tall coachman.
"Sister, that trinket's too fine for someone as common as you." Anna reached for my amulet. "Give it to me, and I'll let you touch my ruby necklace."
I didn't pull away.
I even leaned forward slightly, offering the amulet to her grasp.
"You want it? Take it." A smile played at the corner of my mouth.
Anna snatched it, face alight with greedy triumph. "Smart girl to know your place—AHHH!"
Her triumph instantly transformed into twisted agony.
The moment her fingers touched the Holy Crystal, white smoke erupted from her palm with a sizzle like meat on hot coals.
The instinctive rejection of high-level holy light against a creature of darkness.
"It burns! IT BURNS!" Anna screamed, trying to shake off the amulet that seemed fused to her flesh, scorching deeper by the second.
"You poisoned me! You witch!" She writhed on the ground in agony.
I crouched down, retrieved the fallen amulet, and wiped charred skin from it with my handkerchief. "This is a holy relic blessed by the Pope himself. Only those harboring darkness within are burned by its touch."
I leaned close to her ear and whispered: "You're straying further from humanity with each passing day."
Anna clutched her scorched palm, staring at me in terror. This time, she saw in my eyes the same predatory gleam she'd seen in the Countess's—a hunter spotting prey.
Anna fell ill.
Her porcelain skin—once her greatest pride—erupted with coin-sized ulcers that reeked of rotting fruit.
Heavily veiled, she dared not visit proper hospitals, instead knocking at the black market doctor's door in the dead of night.
I sat in the clinic's shadowy corner, idly turning a scalpel between my fingers.
The doctor nervously sliced open her sleeve. Pus-filled blood immediately gushed forth.
"Ah!" Anna shrieked. "Careful! This hand will wear diamond bracelets someday!"
The doctor's hand trembled as his tweezers extracted a chunk of necrotic flesh.
His face turned paler than Anna's as he looked at me, trembling: "Miss... Miss Eileen, this blood..."
The blood wasn't red.
It was black as tar, flowing coldly into the tray, bubbling with frigid vapor.
"This is Necromorphosis," I said coldly, my voice bouncing off the clinic walls. "Long-term consumption of cold-natured toxins transforms the living into the walking dead. In a week, your heart will stop, but your mind will remain aware—conscious as you watch yourself rot to bone."
Anna's head snapped up, bloodshot eyes boring into mine. "Liar! This is noble transformation! The Countess called it blood exchange! Once complete, I'll be immortal!"
She shoved the doctor aside and grabbed painkillers from the table, pouring them down her throat. "What do common rats like you know? This is the price of evolution!"
I watched her gulp down pills like a turkey basting itself for the oven.
"It is indeed a price," I said, driving the scalpel into the wooden table. "Not for evolution—for decay."
