The underground chapel reeked of melted wax, wet stone, and old blood.
Dozens of hooded figures knelt beneath towering black pillars, their surfaces carved with twisted, agonized faces that seemed to squirm under the flickering candlelight.
A low, rhythmic murmur rolled through the chamber—a sound like insects crawling inside a rotting corpse.
“Velthar… grah neth… Velthar…”
At the center stood a massive stone altar, stained dark by centuries of sacrifice.
Looming behind it was a gargantuan statue: six arms, a horned beast’s head, and hollow eyes that pulsed with a faint, malevolent crimson.
A young woman struggled against the ropes binding her wrists.
“Please… someone, help me…” Her voice cracked into desperate sobs, but the cultists didn’t even twitch.
The chanting grew, swelling in volume and frantic intensity.
“VELTHAR… GRAH NETH… VELTHAR…”
A hulking figure stepped forward from the throng.
Unlike the others, his robes were lined with thick, matted animal fur clotted with dried gore.
In his calloused hands, he hoisted a massive executioner’s axe, its rusted edge etched with glowing red runes.
He climbed the altar steps—heavy, deliberate, and final.
The captive woman thrashed, her eyes wide with terror as the axe began its ascent.
“VELTHAR!
GRAH NETH!
VELTHAR!”
The executioner raised the blade high.
The chanting hit a fever pitch.
The woman squeezed her eyes shut.
“Ahh… tchh!”
The sneeze echoed through the hollow chamber like a gunshot.
Silence.
The chanting died instantly.
The executioner froze mid-swing, the blade trembling above his head.
In the back row, a lone cultist sat cross-legged, long dark hair spilling from beneath a heavy hood.
She reached out, casually grabbed the sleeve of the cultist beside her, and gave her nose a vigorous, unbothered wipe.
The neighboring cultist stared, motionless.
The woman looked up, meeting the gaze of a hundred hollow eyes.
She offered a crooked, awkward little smile.
“Oh.
Sorry.
Allergy season, right?”
The atmosphere shattered.
The hooded figures didn’t look human anymore.
Their robes shredded with a sickening, wet crack as thin, grey limbs tore through the fabric.
Skeletal arms sprouted, wrapped in rotted bandages, and their faces pulled back into impossible, jaw-stretching grins.
They weren’t just cultists; they were reapers of the abyss.
One by one, jagged black scythes unfolded from the folds of their clothing.
The executioner’s body swelled, his spine snapping into a grotesque arch as curved, ivory horns burst through his hood.
His rusted axe dissolved into a massive, weeping cleaver of black glass.
The demons lunged as one, a hurricane of screeching metal and fluttering rags.
And cut through empty air.
The demons skidded to a halt, confused.
One turned toward the altar.
Diana sat casually on the edge of the stone slab, one leg crossed over the other, completely at ease.
A white trench coat draped over her shoulders like moonlight, stark against the filth of the chapel.
Resting against her shoulder was a sword so massive it looked like a slab of iron torn from a castle gate.
“W-who are you?” the captive stammered.
Diana didn’t answer.
She ignored the demons, focusing instead on the frayed ropes at the captive’s wrists.
With a quick, precise flick of her blade, the ropes fell away.
She glanced at the horde.
Her eyes locked onto the executioner, and she tilted her head, unimpressed.
“Good lord,” she drawled.
“They’re ugly.” She pointed at a snarling creature with her thumb.
“Seriously?
You look like a filtered influencer without the filter.”
The executioner’s voice rumbled, vibrating the stone floor.
“…White Requiem.”
The smaller demons flinched.
One took a step back.
Diana sighed, looking genuinely bored.
“Ah, great.
Another fan club.”
She stood up, dusting off her sleeves as if she’d just been served cold coffee.
The candlelight glinted off the massive blade at her shoulder.
When a demon tightened its grip on its scythe, she tutted.
“Easy there, sweetheart.
You’ll wrinkle the coat.”
She swept her collar back with the grace of a noblewoman at a gala.
“The name’s Diana.”
She gripped the hilt of her blade, her grin widening.
“And tonight, it’s my absolute pleasure to send you bastards back to hell.”
The demons surged.
Diana didn’t wait.
She shifted her weight and shoved the massive sword.
It didn’t just fall; it flew, spinning like a turbine with a violent whistle before burying itself deep into the stone floor.
BOOM.
The impact cracked the altar, sending a shockwave of dust across the chamber.
The demons scrambled back, expecting an explosion—but there was only silence.
One demon looked up.
“What—?”
Diana was already above them, hanging in the air like a bird of prey.
A pistol was already in each hand, silver barrels glinting in the dark.
“Bang.”
The chapel erupted.
Gunfire roared, a symphony of thunder and flashes.
She spun through the air, every shot a death sentence.
A demon’s head vanished into black mist; another was blasted through a pillar.
Diana landed lightly atop the hilt of her embedded sword, one foot balanced perfectly.
She let a wisp of smoke curl from her pistol barrel, her grin daring them to try again.
“Let’s get this party started.”
She fired a single shot toward the ceiling.
The sound rang out like a bell.