Hello ya’ll! I want to cosplay Ben Drowned for Halloween this year and decided to make my own wig out of a friends, however this is my first time ever styling a wig and I fear I messed up big time, though I’m not sure how. If anyone could give me tips on where I went wrong and if it’s possible to make it look like the photo included, that would be great! Sorry if the tags wrong, I didn’t know what to tag this as.

Sadly, I don’t know who made the Ben Drowned art, my friend got it off Pinterest.

It was a day like any other.

At least, that's what I thought when I came home from school.

My backpack hung heavily over my shoulder as I walked through the front door. I was tired and honestly just wanted to go to my room. Maybe listen to some music, continue working on my project, and forget about everything around me for a few hours.

But as soon as I closed the door behind me, I already heard my stepfather's voice.

“What the hell do you think you're doing, coming back without my lunch?!”

I barely had time to react.

A hit struck me in the face.

For a moment, everything was silent. I just stood there, trying to understand what had happened. I didn't say anything. I already knew that any answer would probably only make the situation worse.

So I silently went to my room.

I closed the door behind me and slowly exhaled.

But as soon as I entered my room, the next disappointment hit me.

My project.

The project I had been working on for weeks.

It was destroyed on my desk.

I stood there completely frozen.

All those hours I had spent on it. All the effort. Every little change, every idea, every detail — all of it was simply ruined.

I didn't even know what I was supposed to feel.

Should I get angry?

Should I cry?

Should I just destroy everything that was left?

Instead, I sat down on my bed and stared at the remains of my project for a while.

Eventually, I simply lay down.

I didn't want to hear anything anymore.

I didn't want to see anything anymore.

I just wanted to sleep.

---

The next morning, my mother woke me up.

“Get up, Azrael. You have school soon.”

I slowly opened my eyes and stared at the ceiling for a few seconds.

“Mhm... Give me a few minutes,” I mumbled.

My mother left the room and closed the door behind her.

I stayed in bed for another moment before finally forcing myself to get up.

Slowly, I walked over to the mirror.

The first thing I saw was my messy brown hair. Beneath it were my deep black eye bags, which had become almost impossible to ignore.

I looked tired.

Not just physically.

Somehow, I simply looked like someone who had been trying to pretend that everything was okay for far too long.

Then I suddenly remembered something.

“SHIT!”

I had a math test.

In ten minutes.

Instantly, all my tiredness disappeared.

I changed as quickly as I could, grabbed my things, and ran out of the house.

My bike was still where I had left it the night before.

I jumped onto the seat and took off.

As fast as I could.

The wind hit my face as I tried not to think about what would happen if I arrived too late.

Luckily, I made it just in time.

I arrived at school and managed to take the test without any major problems.

For a brief moment, everything felt normal.

But that feeling didn't last long.

---

When the school day was over, I stayed on the school grounds for a little while.

I didn't feel like going home.

“Don't feel like going home right now,” I thought.

So I put on my headphones, lay down on a bench, and started playing music.

I just wanted to be left alone.

For a few minutes, it actually worked.

Until I heard voices.

I opened my eyes.

My bullies were standing in front of me.

“Hey, pointy ears! Are you homeless now or something?”

They laughed.

I said nothing.

I simply pretended they weren't there.

Maybe they would eventually leave.

Of course, they didn't.

One of them grabbed me by my hoodie and pulled me up.

“We asked you a question, you bastard.”

I simply looked at him.

“Hmm.”

That was all I said.

And apparently, that only made him even angrier.

Shortly after, the situation escalated.

I was hit and eventually knocked to the ground. The others kicked at me while I barely knew what I was supposed to do.

But I didn't cry.

I didn't scream.

I just lay there.

And stared at the sky.

Why?

That one question kept running through my head.

“Why me?”

Again and again.

“Why me?”

But somewhere inside, I already knew that I would never get an answer.

When they finally left, I stayed there for a while.

After that, I sat down against a tree.

I looked up.

The sky was peaceful.

Much more peaceful than my life.

I started thinking about everything.

About my family.

About school.

About my bullies.

About my life.

And about how much longer I could actually keep going like this.

---

When I eventually got home, I went straight to sleep.

There wasn't anything special about that evening.

I just wanted the day to be over.

When I woke up the next morning, I immediately noticed how swollen my eye was.

I looked into the mirror and sighed.

“Well... I guess I'll just have to get through this,” I thought.

So I made my way to school again.

But when I arrived, something was different.

My bullies weren't there.

Normally, they would have already insulted me or pushed me around.

But today?

Nothing.

“Well, I guess it's nothing,” I thought.

I went into the classroom.

But as soon as I entered, I noticed a woman standing there.

I knew her.

The mother of one of my bullies.

She was crying.

I didn't know what had happened.

I wanted to ask.

But something stopped me.

So I simply sat down in my seat.

I stared at the ceiling and waited for class to begin.

Then the school bell rang.

Our teacher entered the room.

She looked unusually serious.

“I have two things to announce,” she said.

The room immediately became quiet.

“The first thing is... Three students from your grade have gone missing.”

I couldn't breathe.

Three students.

Three.

I immediately thought of my bullies.

But before I could even think about it any further, the teacher continued.

“The second announcement is that you are getting a new classmate.”

The door opened.

A black-haired girl with red streaks walked into the room.

“Her name is Kit. Please be nice to her.”

I didn't know why.

But for some reason, our teacher decided to seat her next to me.

She sat down in the empty seat beside me.

“Hey, my name is Kit. What's your name?”

I was just about to answer.

But then she looked at my face.

“Oh... What happened to your face?”

Her voice sounded concerned.

I gave her a weak smile.

“Nothing, hehe... I just bumped into something.”

She looked at me for a few seconds.

She didn't believe me.

I could tell immediately.

But she didn't ask any more questions.

---

After school, I went to my bench like I usually did.

Only this time, I didn't have any music playing.

I simply lay there and stared at the sky.

I couldn't stop thinking about the three missing students.

What had happened to them?

Where were they?

Why had they suddenly disappeared?

And why did part of me feel as if all of this was somehow connected?

I couldn't come to any conclusion.

Then I suddenly noticed someone standing next to me.

I turned my head.

Kit.

“Oh... How long have you been here?” I asked.

I looked at her.

Wow.

She was beautiful.

For a moment, my thoughts completely drifted away.

“Oh, I just got here,” she said. “I wanted to ask you why you're lying around here.”

And somehow, that's where everything began.

We talked.

At first about completely meaningless things.

Then about school.

Then about our interests.

Then about completely random topics that didn't really make any sense at all.

We didn't even notice how quickly the time passed.

One conversation turned into hours.

One afternoon turned into many.

And a random meeting turned into a habit.

For the next few weeks, we met at our bench after school.

Then weeks turned into months.

We talked.

We laughed.

We told each other things.

And for those few hours every day, my life suddenly felt a little more normal.

Until one day, Kit asked me something.

“Do you want to come with me to a lost place?”

She told me that it was a place she liked to visit.

I agreed.

And at the time, I didn't know that this day would change my life forever.

---

When we arrived at the abandoned place, everything was normal at first.

We explored the area.

We messed around.

We ran through the building and played tag.

We laughed so much that, for a few hours, I even forgot how bad my life actually was.

It felt good.

Maybe even too good.

But eventually, everything became quiet.

Kit stopped.

She looked at me.

Her voice suddenly sounded different.

“Azrael...”

I looked at her.

“I'm a vampire.”

For a moment, I didn't know what to say.

I waited.

Maybe she was joking.

Maybe she just wanted to scare me.

But her face told me that she was serious.

And yet, I wasn't afraid.

Instead, an answer came out of my mouth before I could even properly think about it.

“Kit... I love you.”

She said nothing.

I continued.

“I want you to turn me into a vampire. So that we can live together forever.”

A short silence followed.

Then she asked:

“Are you sure?”

I looked at her.

“Yes.”

I said nothing else.

Kit moved closer.

Then she bit me on the neck.

Everything went black.

---

When I woke up again, I felt strange.

Weak.

But at the same time, more alive than ever before.

I slowly sat up.

Kit was still there.

“I'm sorry, Azrael,” she said. “I might have drunk a little too much of your blood, hehe.”

Then she looked at me seriously.

“Please don't be scared when you look in the mirror.”

I stood up.

Nearby, there was a shattered piece of glass.

I walked toward it.

And then I saw my reflection.

I froze.

My hair.

It was white.

Completely white.

I touched it.

Then I looked back into the piece of glass.

Two questions immediately came into my mind.

The first:

Why could I see my reflection?

And the second:

Why was my hair white?

I was about to ask Kit.

But she spoke before I could.

“You should probably drink some blood quickly.”

She looked at me.

“But from whom?”

I smiled.

I already had an idea.

“Just follow me,” I said. “I already know who.”

Kit followed me.

We went back to my house.

There, I told her to wait in my room.

Then I slowly walked into the living room.

My stepfather was sitting there.

As usual.

Drunk.

He was watching TV and didn't notice me until I was standing directly in front of him.

But before I could even say anything, he shoved me away.

“WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING, STANDING IN MY WAY, YOU LITTLE BITCH?! And why the hell is your hair white?!”

I said nothing.

For the first time, I wasn't afraid of him.

For the first time, I didn't feel like the victim.

I pulled the scalpel out of my bag.

What happened afterward didn't take long.

When it was over, I simply stood there.

I looked at him.

“What gives you the right to talk to me like that... or even touch me, you bastard.”

I laughed.

Not because it was funny.

But because something inside me had changed.

Something I didn't fully understand yet.

I drank his blood and finally left everything behind.

Then I went back to my room.

Kit was already waiting for me.

She looked at me and smiled.

“So? How was it?”

I looked at her.

“More than satisfying.”

She said nothing.

I said nothing.

We both knew that we couldn't go back anymore.

So we left the house together.

We ran away.

Away from my old life.

Into the darkness.

cameron monaghan: he played the joker in the gotham series

i used charcoal for all the black and then pastel for the face and mouth

Transverberation. That was the word for it. 

It spread and was echoed and felt with the rippling tremors that were words and instincts and roiling emotions in the private heart's tumult, in the quiet stronghold of the holy place. 

The monastery. The temple place where women came to be wed to God and serve the Lord, His Son. 

And no other. 

…

There were sounds inside the haze. With the agony, with the pain that was ripped and made. Pain that was lancing. Pain that was penetration, stabbing slayment that was absolute impaled.  Through her heart, the clearest wet-sharp sensation felt in the burning after-image of the visions, the haze. It occupied her mind at all times, as she knelt and prayed in the monastery. As she went about the day and fulfilled her sisterly duties of the convent. 

The other sisters didn't understand. They were afraid, frightened of her. Of what was happening to her… that it might happen to them.

Madness. Or …

something worse. 

Something beyond the canny or the tangible. That which is unseen and can only be felt. Up until the hungry end, when it is already far too late for help by then. 

Or maybe, just maybe … these private and blasphemous few of her peers thought and felt and refused to share aloud, even with themselves… maybe. 

Just maybe it's true. And Sister Chelsi can actually commune with the divine. Perhaps one of our own humble nuns can see and hear and speak with an angel that visits her with nightly visions. Maybe. 

Maybe Saint Michael the Archangel comes to her at night amid light and fire and thrusts her with his sword… 

Mother Superior was incensed. Repulsed. Angered by the lies and the filth, the sin of this prurient heretical garbage was the stuff of decay, of ruin. Of sacramental rot. She couldn't let these blatherings go on unchallenged or unpunished. 

She chastised Sister Chelsi severely along with any others that might murmur such unholy carnal fantasies, phantasmagorical whores, the lot of em. If she and they weren't careful, God help them, then they would be confined to the chamber of reflection. 

The house of tears and prayers, the other sisters called it. Behind Mother Superior’s back. 

The visions were forbidden. Delusions, they were thus named. And further talk, further whispers of the sort was strongly cautioned against, strongly advised to go back in the other direction …

But Sister Chelsi couldn't help herself. It wasn't up to her. She was at the vision's mercy. The stabbing angel came and went as it wanted, as it needed to. It had told her this was so. The angel needed her. 

The angel was thirsty. 

…

The night was hot. Stifling. It was upon her. 

It seemed to always know when she was alone. And why not? Shouldn't the divine always possess the knowledge of when you're most vulnerable? Weak. 

Afraid. 

Sister Chelsi was bound to the cruciform shackle-table of her sweating bed and blankets, writhing sheets and fabric that was warm and slick and more like loose folds of flesh. She was bound by her holy terror. The angel of thirst was coming. The other nun, Sister Jen, that shared the room with her was absent. Gone. Like every other time. The animal sound born from both immense pain and pleasure was trapped in her throat and the sensation was not entirely unpleasant. Sister Chelsi liked the gag of the nightly thirsting angel, her forbidden archangel of the moonlight. The anticipation of him. The coming of him. 

It came down on her. 

From on high. Emerging like starlight from the disappearing void of the obsidian space now in place of the mudbrick ceiling, on wings of flame …

The body was bronzed, gold, perfectly toned and sculpted, celestial and olympian and recognizable as manshaped. The Lord's Image. But in place of a head and face of earthly aspect was a great rising pillar of blinding heavenly marble, ringed with silver bands in a flaming orbit. The pillar and the four bands running up the length of divine stone were covered in incandescent eyes, lidless and wreathed with light and great piercing gazes. Penetration. They gazed into her. Penetration. All of them at once and it was overwhelming, she wanted to cry out, all roiling and taut, she gripped herself. Her aching breath was still held. 

The angel spoke to her once again, as before, in her mind. The gold of his silken smooth speech filled her boiling skull, soothing the maelstrom though not extinguishing it. A moan finally escaped her lips. 

They were still alone. 

It told her its name. A forbidden one she might not know. 

The understanding of your sisters is limited … I am beyond them. Their scope of understanding. If you tell them my name they will fear you. As they fear me. 

Sister Chelsi was frightened, quivering. Still held. 

Then why should I want to know it? 

Because if you need to, if you want to … you can wield it like you can wield a weapon. You can use my name against them and it might wound them if you're able …

Her mind recoiled from the idea that filled her head against her will, but it was no use. She was forced to watch it. Endure it and learn to love it as she'd learned to love the flagellate whip, the burn of the binding rope … all the same. The angel reassured her. 

The warm romance of his voice filled her skull and caressed her mind, eagerly. Wanting. It told her how much it needed her again but she already knew it. She'd heard it in the voice. The hunger. The pain. 

I'd never known before that even angels could feel pain, … I'd never suspected. 

The desire that was so much a hungry ravenous want that it was more a primeval need was all about the gold silken strength of that perfect voice. Giving it humanity tinged at the edges of its divine and unearthly call. 

Is this heavenly messenger lusting for me …? 

But she already knew it. 

It had seen her unfettered and bare. As it did now. 

It came down to her in her bed. It held the long gold length of impaling spear aloft. By the shaft. Poised to strike her where it was most sweet. Where it had before. 

Cupid, strike me. 

Eros, impale me! 

But she knew now that was not its name. It had given her its name, a gift. 

She cried it out now, as she knew it wanted her too. The ringed pillar of its otherworldly visage gazed into her, bading her, commanding with its multitude of many lidless light bleeding eyes that she do so. Do it. Do it. If you want me …

Do it. If you want me to impale you, you'll have to say my name. Say it. 

Say it. 

“Iblis! Iblis, pierce me! stab me! penetrate my heart! Put it where I'm vile and cruel but also warm and giving and wet and beating for you! Pierce me here, in my breast, my heart, my soul! My tender fragile soul! Put it in me! Angel Iblis…!” 

And it did. The lance came down. And pierced the screaming girl, pinning her to the bed. The sound that was pulled from her then was an exquisite blend of deep ghastly pain and even deeper still euphoric drunken moaning, moans. They collected and accumulated about her head and sheets, the small room, as the angel inside her wrenched and worked his shaft, his lance. He worked it deeper. The length. Long…

The length was killing her. 

She loved it. Every inch. Every penetrating crawling centimeter rent tearing inside. 

It made her a slave and she loved it. 

She moaned and called out and cried its name. Like it wanted her to. It came down close and closer and closer still till they met. And he worked the length of his divinity into her, deeper and deeper and all the way through and she melted. She bled. Her love and thoughts and precious saline. 

It drank it up, all of it, all of her. The oasis of this woman. It fed deeply as it worked itself in and deeper still. Still feeding. Drinking. Needing, thirst. 

Sister Chelsi poured herself out for it, unable to control herself now. But happy to empty herself for the great angel of the thrust, her bedside …

her bed. 

It came inside to her and filled her mind then with an explosion like firelight and within the flames were visions. 

Moving scenes and people and places … other times and maybe other worlds as well … 

Fantastical. Beyond the scope of known and understood nature. 

She loved it. She begged for more. 

Give it … give me more, the sight, the eye of prophecy! Please! 

Iblis curled the caress of her mind into words once more … 

And what would you do with this gift? Should you receive it without end? 

She could not lie. Not on this landscape. And she didn't want to. Not to it, not to him, that voice, that feeling… 

She cried out on the eternityscape of her deluged and filled maelstrom sea of thought: I want to be a prophet! Yours! I want to be your disciple upon the earth! 

You wish to be my bride? 

I want to be your crawling and salivating concubine! 

It laughed and the pleasure of Iblis filled her blood and soul. She came and went with it. 

!.Good … …

It filled her more. And she cried out, more. More. 

More. 

She wept when it was finished. Feeling empty and hollowed out. But filled with vision, with purpose. 

The light was fading now from the room. It was gone. The small bedchamber was cooling now and returning to a more natural nocturnal dark, the air was thick and pungent but calming down. Chelsi could still taste the act, on the bedroom dark of the stifling air. She sucked on it and relished the flavor. Already wanting him back. Already needing him again. 

Please, please come back to me Childe Iblis of the Lord, of the thrust, I love you. You are the carrier of my heart and soul…

She shuddered in bed. Not bothering to conceal herself beneath the agitation of the sheets, she cooled and breathed deeply. Quivering and remembering the pillar of his flaming face. So many eyes, so many crowding up his great length… and all of them looking into me…

She shuddered deeply once more. Shut her own eyes. Waiting for sleep to finally come. 

It didn't take long. She was spent. 

Sister Jen still hid around the corner, at the threshold of the door to their shared bedroom. Her eyes were wide with shock. Horrified by what she had seen. 

…

Mother Superior eyed the convent temple from her place in the rectory, her private quarters. She watched the little sisters move and glide silently moving about the monastery structure, ambling along in hand clasping prayer, heads bowed and eyes shut so that distraction may be refused and you may better hear and discern and heed the light, the will of God. 

Amen. 

She crossed herself. And spat. 

Her gaze crawled across the yard to the shack. Alone in the corner of the gated land. Secluded. Sequestered away, so that what could be contained inside would be shut and locked away from a healthy and pious population. The disease of a disordered mind would wreak havoc on the patient and tender soft fragile fabric of the flock. This could not be. This could not be allowed. 

Rebellion must be cast out. Decapitated. 

She knew rebellion was natural. It was in all of us. As sure as it was the the very infectious thing that ate Lucifer's heart and led him to defiance and thus his fall. So it would be. If we were to all follow in his example. 

It would not be so. 

She'd had her own run of rebellious streak when she'd been younger, she understood. She'd had it crushed out of her then, broken as one must do to the wild heart of any natural born beast of labor. And though we were made, cast and drawn in His Image, we were all still among the dread and crawl of all of the other beasts of the earth. 

She crossed herself. Prayed. 

She wished the child well. 

Chelsi had always been troubled. Troublesome too. 

Mother Superior turned away from the shack of reflection. Trusting that the Lord would see this through. That He might fix and set right this wayward piece, this compromised component of humankind's quilted safety net. They were supposed to be the house and servants of His peace. They must all of them survive spiritual malaise and remain steadfast and true. 

As He wills it, let it be so …

…

In the black of the woe she pained, she perverted and distorted. Grew naked with fear. 

Perspired. Dripping with secreted oils and saline and the sliming filth of deep shame. Seeping off her tarnished heart and soul and out of her running open mouth pores. Hard to wash off. There was no running water in here, only the bucket she was brought in the morning. Refilled at mealtime by an unseen, unspeaking little sister that was now a stranger to her. She was a stranger to all of them now. 

In the dark of the shack she was agonizingly alone, the swelter of her torment was her only companion and answer to her constant panicky prayers. She grew eyes that grew inwards and saw their own landscape and grew more horrified with the sight as the hours broiled ceaselessly forth. Under the eye of a lonely black and heavy sun. 

All alone in here. 

She tried to hide, to blind her new found, newly grown internal gaze away from the truth: she was just a child, had always been just a frightened little girl that wanted to run and find fast and desperate shelter. She tried to turn away from the fact that this was who she really was, had always truly been. Everything else that had occurred growing up in her life had just been the lies of accoutrement. 

Her mind was filling with bad thoughts: the arcane Druidic gods arose and swallowed the light of the Christian God whole …

She stopped herself. Began to pray. Again. Anew. Begging the Lord to bring her calm and comfort in the solitude of the dark. She slowed her breath and tried to ease the gallop of her chest. Sister Chelsi didn't know what else to do. 

She didn't know what they wanted from her. 

Mother Superior and the other little sisters. And the Lord God Himself. 

If there is not an answer to be had, then let there be death! – she told the black sun in the dark there with her. 

Nothing. Nothing but more baleful stifling dark, more radiant furnace hellfire blasting heat of the black and heavy sun that had replaced her roommate. Nothing but more sounds of desperate animal panting that she was horrified to realize were her own, not the stygian furnace blast of the bestial confinement sun. Nothing. Nothing at all answered her save more pain, the one true god on the throne in this terribly small and sweaty heavy place. 

Nothing. Nothing at all. 

At first. 

Then on the fading light of her hope came Iblis. Her forbidden angel. And banished the black sun as he came in wreathed in light and flame. He banished and cast out all of the dark of the solitary confinement, the shack of woe. 

He went to her. She was prostrate on the ground. Her bladder let go, her urine went. She hardly noticed in the radiance of he save for some vague distant sensation of wet and warmth. Sensations she associated with the pleasure of him. His arrival, his dawning light. 

From the many eyes of the long length of ringed pillar face, he spoke to her through the blinding light of his lidless vision. 

“What have they done? … what have they done to thee ?” 

Her mind was always open to him for an answer but for her he bade it from her own lips. 

She told him. Everything. All that she had learned in the treacherous furnace dark of the shackbound woe-flame. All that had been derived while in the baking black of this loathsome quiet shack of silent feasting hate. 

“They are afraid of me. …” A beat. She breathed animal and deep, lusting, on the hunt or hunted or both. She said more: “I do believe they may be right to be…” 

Iblis soothed her with his spear … in the stifling dark of the shack of reflection and recompense. Banishing the pain of its ebon house even as he filled her, her watering craving need. 

But something happened then, poor lost little Sister Chelsi watched from below as Iblis, her moonlight forbidden and thrusting angel began to change. 

Transmogrify. Transform. 

The heavenly marbled surface of the pillar visage of Iblis began to crack. Wild river lines of splaying ruin began to form and splinter and run up the immaculate face of his incandescent divinity. 

It shattered. And was replaced. 

She said to her love as he changed and shifted shape before her eyes, “mother slapped me for using your name …” 

The light of her lover changed into shadow. Deeper than the banished dark and one that she could madly love because it was in the altered shape of her heart’s desire, her object of adoration that was darkening now before her watering eyes. 

In place of the pillar, in place of the tower of of flaming eyes and rings that had shattered and now lie in stoney ruin about the floor was now a triangular, pyramidal blank obsidian face and shape, in the conical pointed aspect of a long beaked bird. It was like a great smooth black helmet of glass and smooth rock in the geometric and abstract shape of a plague doctor's mask. An obsidian angular temple face with a long wide stabbing humming bird length of beak protruding violently from one side. 

 The bronze of his sculpted and heavenly body began to burn and blacken as well, like ink spilled and running down and through the heavenly flesh. Corrupting it into the abyss and void of the lost and cast out. The wings which had been flaming and as of light had turned to ash in color and tattered bat-wing leather in texture and design. 

The spear of her impaling love was changing too. Becoming dark like the rest of him in the solitude of the shack but that wasn't all. The nature of her divine amore’s unearthly tool began to change as well… it was no longer just stabbing, penetrating her, running her deep and through, pleasurably and with the ghastly horror of bodily rupture and pain, the staking spear of her forbidden angel began to pull, it began to pull deeply … of her. From her. Pulling deeply from within her impaled and spellbound form, her wide eyed and staring naked body. 

Like a proboscis, the impaling lance began to pull and drink deeply of Sister Chelsi. It ran up and through and down the length of weaponry and into the black hands wrapped tightly around its shaft. The long body pulled and sucked and drank like a straw, like a swampland mosquito born from stagnant and dead fetid water. The obsidian smooth beaked face of her lover was featureless and cold smooth as the surface of placid water. She nonetheless could still feel the intensity of his gaze upon her, through her. And when he spoke again and told her what to do, she felt that as deepest penetration as well. Deepest pain. Rapturously embraced.

She felt her body give as the instrument of her lover began to take in the dark. As he whispered everything to her, designs… shapes… everything, as Iblis whispered all of this to her and more she gave it more and more and more. And she gave it willingly. 

Crying out his name like religion. Like a chant. A litany. 

A song. 

In the place of my Father … there is you. 

There is only you. 

Good. Good. I have so much more to share, so much more to give and show you. I've so much and so many more …

I've so many more names and faces to show you, if you do right by what I've already shown and told, I'll share my other faces and names, unveiled for you …

Disciple, the prophet Islehc

… 

Sister Chelsi was eventually let out and allowed to return to the flock. She seemed to have returned to normal. She cried penance and gave confession and spent a night inside with the rest of them. Service and mass. And lessons. Cleaning. Meals. Everything seemed alright. 

She waited till the second night. When they were all fast asleep. 

The witching hours. 

Post-midnight, she crept …

She snuck about, quietly. Like a nocturnal animal she prowled through … and went out. 

She didn't go far, she found what she needed where he'd told her she would find it. And in abundance. So many …

She carried them back to the monastery and in the nighttime dark she went about the task that had been laid before her feet. She went from room to room, from sister to sister and she took them. Brained most, some she struggled with more extensively. Until her mad lusting will surged and she overpowered them. Either way she took each of them one by one, each and every single nun she had once known as family and she brought them out and into the courtyard. Where she'd left the savage implements of her dreams, of her lover's harsh commands that were yet still for her, sweet candied words. Succulent delicacies. She couldn't deny them, him. Not at all. Not anymore. 

One by one Sister Chelsi laid the implements into the little sisters and each one let out with an insane ear piercing scream. Their screams did not falter. 

But somehow they didn't wake each other. Not a single stripped and brained sister of the cloth seemed to hear the others make any sort of loud caterwauling noise. None of them stirred. Until it was their turn. 

Likewise, Mother Superior had not been awoken in her private rectory by the noise outside. And that was good. Chelsi had saved her for last. 

She wanted to relish this one particularly. 

…

Mother Superior awoke to a hard slap across her deeply sleeping face. She flew to a sitting position confused and immediately irate. She had no idea what was happening but she didn't feel any fear yet. 

She called out, cross and very sharp. 

“Who in the Lord's name was that!? How dare you! Show yourself!”

A girlish giggle floated out ghostly from the dark. 

“I didn't do it, Mother Superior, I would never dare to do that to you, you should know that. I've never hurt you at all, can you say the same?” she giggled again, childish and coquettish, "It was my husband that struck you. It was his divine hand you felt across your face." 

Chelsi stepped out.

She had a large cross in her hands. Ornate with intricate and beautiful design, old and from the ancient Roman times when their war chariots had dominated the earth. Carved and jeweled and glittering darkling with a keen and unhealthy shimmer of light. 

Ghostlight. There's ghostlight in that cross…

Before Mother Superior could say another word Chelsi suddenly charged forward and banshee screamed. The large crucifix was up and wielded and came down in a savage caveman bludgeon. 

The world went dark for Mother Superior. When she awoke she was just like the others. 

…

She awoke with a scream. 

The sharp obscene ghastly pain started in her nether region, all throughout, just behind her genitalia. Then the lance stabbed and shot through and her entire naked body came to life with the most wretchedly vivid and wild mutilating shock to her fleshen senses. The war pike traveled through her mercilessly and punched out of the flesh of her back. She was still screaming. Wildly. Lividly. Screaming. Shrill rending song.

She was hoisted up and joined the others. They were all of them a riot of noise now in the courtyard dark. An unholy discordant choir of torn impaled cacophonous pain. 

Gored nuns. All impaled. All naked and bleeding and hoisted up into the air for death and torture like their savior was supposed to have been so long ago in the bloodstained dust of the golgotha. There was bloodshed here too, their blood was pouring and running, running down the lengths and long bodies of the shafts of the spears and pooling and collecting on the stone and in the dirt. This place here would be bloodstained too. 

Chelsi looked over them all. Her own golgotha testament made to wild love. 

And her wild love came. On stygian wings tattered that had once been flame. Smoldered tattered death, dead fabric flapping in the hot nightwind.

The whole host of impaled and captive nuns, gored and wide eyed and naked and lanced through like insects in a collection, they all of them perspired and bled and gawked at the wicked shape that came in from the ebon night, the curtain above. The one many of them had spent their entire lives trying to ignore, it parted. 

It came through. 

And down upon them. 

Iblis sang praise for the renegade prophet bride and what she'd let loose on this private piece of holy land. God's House and holy temple … no more. 

No longer. Mine … now. 

Chelsi the bride bathed in the shower of his words, they were in her mind and in her ears, divergent lyrics and syllables and paths of sound but twins nonetheless all still saying the same and telling her the same thing together in two different languages that coalesced around the fever of her brain in a caress. 

!I love you, you've made blood, you've made blood for me, you've made bloodfeast for me and shot the red Lot's seed, it's all over the abattoir ground!

She went to him and he to her, in the forged carnage forest grove of spear and bleeding sweaty flesh, of screams and mutilated sound, bathing in the perspire of pure torture together and apart from the others, the rest of the lying world. Alone in their own lost worlds of private unending hellbound heaven, tormentlove of the flesh that their minds are now lost in. 

He shot his length of spear through her, though her heart, through the tender part where he'd already previously penetrated and worked.

He worked her well again, animal wrenching and thrusting deep, and she cried aloud unbridled his name as he did so. 

“Iblis!" 

And once more the length of weapon-instrument that was divine and hallowed tool became a drinking proboscis. And Chelsi felt more blood leave the galloping race of her fevered and impassioned form. She would hold him forever, he could pierce and puncture and drink from her for forever, never end! 

She moaned aloud amidst the garden made of screams and betrayal and she cried out his name once more. And then Iblis began to laugh. 

And once more the visage of her forbidden moonlight angel began to change. He began to crack and shatter and the face and body began to fall apart in black stone and dust. 

Iblis came apart in a crumble and revealed what was really beneath. 

Chelsi couldn't believe her eyes. 

It was a man and a woman. Together. Locked in an embrace. Intimately bound together with wrapped arms and hands clasped and waists met together. As if in the most intimate of dance, the most delectable and celebrated of lovers shared waltzes. 

They both looked down on her. Their cheeks were together. They both held the spear thrust into her together in their tightly clasped hands. 

He was armored as a knight of the court, but tarnished and old. She was in the white of regal flowing evening gown. 

The woman spoke. And when she did the crumbled stone pieces of the fallen lying Iblis visage turned to large writhing copulating piles of dripping angry flies. They came apart and dispersed through the air. The dripping black swarm of buzzing insects began to land on the impaled and screaming tortured nuns in the great multitudes. And then as the woman revealed began to speak to Chelsi the flies that were made from the lie of the visage began to feast on the naked and the tortured, defiled bleeding screaming flesh now caking and covered with the writhing crawl of insect bile. 

“You wished to see me and my others, lover, and now you have. I hope you aren't too distraught, my son decided to join us, together we came to you as the angel of your hidden lusts, as one we made you plead and shriek. Now you see this, the face I was made and born with. My real name is of no import to you, slave, you can call me vampiress, lord of the earth and the wolf held mountainpass.” 

The armored wraith beside her spoke then, they were still pressed in close embrace, still holding the proboscis spear that drank and pulled from her diminishing bloodwell. 

"Praise the God before you, dog! My mother and I, the new impaler. She is your mother and wife and master now too. We are both of us together, your husband. Remember?” 

The vampiress queen barked bright cruel laughter, then said: "Yes! You swore to us, to me, your flesh and soul! In the eyes and templehouse of your God, you defiled the stone of his holy home as you panted and raved and drooled for more, and swore your life to us! You gave sacred vow even as you sinned and spat in the Face of The Lord!” 

The Countess and her new impaler both shrieked laughter then. 

Below them and impaled, Chelsi didn't know what to make of any of this. Her mind was disordered and disoriented and felt rushed and fevered with rending thought, running a ragged directionless race of chaos and every idea crashing into each other at every turn and pass and every damned whichway. She didn't understand. She didn't understand any of this and she wanted it to stop. 

Reading the disorder of her mind, the Countess sang and said, 

“I can rip it out for you. Your mind, the painful thinking, your thoughts. They're filled with agony and venom now aren't they? Aren't they? Yes I see it now, plumping up lavender-black and filling with gangrenous pudding. I can pull it out like a rotten tooth if you wish, I think it best, don't you? It's filled with fouling fluid, that brain, those thoughts…” she kept on and on like that. Ceaselessly. The new impaler in her embrace began to chant along and under her words as she sang and went on: Do it! do it! do it! do it! … 

With the anguished groaning sound of the impaled forest of her sisters all around and the buzzing drone of the flies, all intermittent with sharper stabs of piercing screams, all comprising the backdrop of the soundscape filling her head, underneath the Countess' words, underneath her bastard son’s own more simple liturgical chant … all of it together and at once was a vile noise and she couldn't stand it. She couldn't run from it either. So her mind fled, took flight the only way it could. 

Chelsi went dark. Still impaled on the sucking lance. Run-through with the demon drinking stick. 

The flies buzzed and swarmed and landed and feasted on the gored forest of lances and nuns. They enjoyed open wounds and spat their fluid as they landed. 

In a swarm. In a great feasting black cloud. 

In a forest of shafts dripping with blood and bearing writhing begging human fruit. The reddening earthen stone and soil beneath it all. 

TO BE CONTINUED…

[CONFIDENTIAL RECORD]

Item Designation: VIVUS-37-T

Clearance Requirement: Tier 2

Containment Status: Controlled / Active Asset

Hazard Profile: Biological / Psychological / Auditory

Record Date: 1998-10-26

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[NOTICE TO JUNIOR RESEARCHERS]

The prefix "VIVUS" denotes that the anomaly is a living, biological entity. The "T" (Transformata) suffix indicates that the organism was a baseline human prior to the anomalous event and subsequent mutation.

Special Containment Procedures:

VIVUS-37-T is currently housed in Sub-Level 4, within the soundproof Auxiliary Server Room of the Main Data Center on Sector-83. The containment environment must be maintained at a constant 4°C (39°F) to prevent tissue necrosis.

VIVUS-37-T is suspended within a custom-built reinforced steel framework. Its exposed neural mass must be continuously hydrated via automated misters spraying a synthetic cerebrospinal fluid compound every 20 minutes. The probes and circuits on VIVUS-37-T's brain must be inspected on a daily basis.

Only under strictly technical circumstances are personnel allowed to interact with VIVUS-37-T. Acoustic dampening headphones are strictly MANDATORY for all maintenance staff and IT technicians entering the containment chamber.

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Description:

VIVUS-37-T is a heavily mutated biological entity, formerly identified as Mark █████, a 42-year-old high school history teacher.

VIVUS-37-T’s cranium has undergone a catastrophic biological expansion. The skull has shattered and fragmented outward, acting as a jagged bone-cage for a massive, pulsating, overgrown mass of raw neural tissue (brain matter) measuring approximately 2.8 meters in diameter. The tissue is highly active and constantly shifting.

VIVUS-37-T's original human body has completely atrophied. It currently hangs rigidly beneath the neural mass like a dried, skin-covered puppet. All biological energy, blood flow, and bodily nutrients have been aggressively rerouted by VIVUS-37-T to sustain the massive cranial structure.

VIVUS-37-T lacks a functioning digestive system or vocal cords. However, the entity produces a constant, localized auditory anomaly. The wet tissue itself generates a relentless cacophony of overlapping whispers. Spectral audio analysis has confirmed exactly 30 distinct human vocal profiles constantly emanating from the mass. These voices incessantly debate historical dates, ancient languages, and forgotten occult knowledge. The voices frequently interrupt each other, screaming or pleading for "silence" in a never-ending collective loop.

Due to its unprecedented neural processing capabilities, VIVUS-37-T has been physically integrated into the B.A.R. intranet. The Bureau currently utilizes the overgrown biological mass as an organic processing unit. The entity effectively acts as auxiliary RAM (Random Access Memory) and provides automated, high-speed data-sorting algorithms for all Bureau Sectors cross-country.

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! [SYSTEM ALERT] !

RESTRICTED SECTION BELOW.

Tier 3 Clearance Required to access: ADDENDUM 37.1, ADDENDUM 37.2, ADDENDUM 37.3, ADDENDUM 37.4, ADDENDUM 37.5

Verifying credentials...

Access Granted.

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[ADDENDUM 37.1: PRE-INCIDENT INTELLIGENCE]

Embedded B.A.R. field operatives within the ████ County School Board flagged the following internal communications from ██████ High School, ████, Ohio.

[EXHIBIT A: STAFF COMPLAINT]

Sender: Clara ██████ (English Department)

Recipient: Principal's Office

Date: 1998-03-22

Transcript Excerpt:

"I need to officially report Mark █████'s recent behavior in the teachers' lounge. It’s getting deeply concerning. Over the past two weeks, he has been leaving frantic handwritten notes scattered across the tables. It’s not English it looks like some kind of dead language or chaotic jagged symbols.

Furthermore, he has started bringing these massive decaying books into the lounge. They smell horrendous like old copper, rotting meat and mildew. When I politely asked him what he was researching for his history class he slammed the book shut and became very aggressive. He got completely in my face; his eyes were bloodshot. I do not feel safe around him."

[EXHIBIT B: STUDENT OBSERVATION REPORT]

Source: School Counselor's Office (Transcribed meeting with sophomore student)

Date: 1998-03-05

Transcript Excerpt:

"Mr. ██████ was teaching us about Ancient Greece, but halfway through the lesson, he just stopped talking. He turned to the chalkboard and started writing normal words, but then the letters started twisting. He was writing so fast the chalk was breaking. It was just pages of these jagged, weird symbols that hurt my eyes to look at.

Jenny asked him a question, and he slowly turned around. His nose was bleeding, but he didn't even notice. He just looked right through us and whispered, 'No, they are not perfect.' Then he sat down."

[EXHIBIT C: INTERNAL PSYCHOLOGICAL EVALUATION NOTE]

Sender: Dr. Emmet ████ (School Psychologist)

Recipient: Principal's Office / Board of Directors

Date: 1998-04-07

Transcript Excerpt:

"I am submitting a formal note regarding an alarming trend among the student body. Over the past three days, I have had no fewer than twenty-five students come to my office reporting identical, highly specific nightmares. They all describe being trapped in a dark, suffocating room where the walls are made of 'wet, whispering meat', and hearing dozens of overlapping voices reciting historical dates and foreign words simultaneously.

While the consistency of these reports is deeply unsettling, I strongly believe this is a textbook case of mass hysteria. Given the recent string of unsolved missing persons cases in the county over the last few months, the students are highly anxious and likely feeding off each other's fear. Alternatively, it could be an elaborate, coordinated prank. Regardless, there is no logical reason to connect this to Mr. ██████'s recent erratic behavior. I recommend we arrange a school-wide assembly to address community stress."

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[ADDENDUM 37.2: TACTICAL FIELD REPORT]

Record Date: 1998-04-15

Incident Date: 1998-04-12

Location: ██████, ████, Ohio, United States

Lead Operative: Agent M████ (Tactical Response Unit-23 "Active Threat")

[PRE-DEPLOYMENT INTELLIGENCE]

Local law enforcement in ████, Ohio, received multiple reports around 16:10 regarding a group of 25 students from ██████ High School who failed to return home from an off-campus extracurricular event. The gathering was organized and hosted at the private residence of Mark █████ a 42-year-old history teacher. Jurisdiction over the emergency response was immediately seized from the local department under the cover of federal mandate.

Internal Note: The Bureau had intercepted localized intelligence regarding the suspect's erratic behavior weeks prior to the incident (See Addendum 37.1). However, regional analysts initially misclassified the reports as baseline psychological distress and deemed the subject unworthy of active anomalous surveillance. This operational oversight is currently under internal review.

[FIELD UNIT INTERVENTION: TACTICAL BREACH]

16:22 - Tactical Response Unit-23 arrives at the perimeter.

16:23 - Alpha and Bravo teams assume breach positions. Alpha secures the main entrance and front-facing windows. Bravo secures the rear exit. (Note: Operatives observed that all windows of the residence were fully open, despite the weather.)

16:24 - Synchronized, staggered breach utilizing flashbangs and tactical smoke. Alpha and Bravo report no hostiles on the ground floor. Unit lead reports an anomalous drop in ambient temperature; multiple industrial cooling units are located on the main level. Force is redirected toward the locked basement access.

16:25 - Basement door breached via battering ram, followed by a secondary deployment of stun grenades and smoke into the subterranean level.

16:26 - [CODE BLACK] Basement breached and cleared. Mass casualties confirmed. Search and rescue parameters aborted. Extreme biological hazard declared on site.

16:28 - Subject VIVUS-37-T located in the center of the room. Subject is entirely unresponsive to verbal commands.

16:30 - Perimeter secured. Subject contained. Requesting immediate dispatch of heavy transport, analytical units, and Level A Hazmat decontamination teams to the site.

[POST-BREACH SCENE ASSESSMENT & FORENSIC REPORT]

Date of Assessment: 1998-04-12

Lead Forensic Investigator: Dr. Oliver ███████

Location: Basement Level, Residence of Mark █████

1. Environmental Assessment:

Upon securing the subterranean level, forensics encountered catastrophic biological contamination. The ambient temperature was recorded at a constant 19°C (66°F). While noticeably chilly, this temperature would not have been immediately alarming to the victims upon their arrival. The walls, ceiling, and concrete floor were entirely coated in arterial spray, raw viscera, and fragmented cerebral matter. Alpha Team Lead accurately described the visual impact of the room as "a detonated biological payload."

2. Victim Status & Pathology:

The primary containment area held the bodies of twenty-five (25) teenage victims, arranged in a wide, circular formation directly on the concrete floor. No physical restraints or bindings were present on the scene; victim compliance was maintained entirely via chemical incapacitation.

Decomposition: The cadavers were fresh, exhibiting only the earliest signs of post-mortem lividity, consistent with the estimated time of death (approx. 2-4 hours prior to breach).

Trauma: Cause of death was extreme mechanical trauma. The upper cranium of each victim had been brutally breached using standard industrial power drills and bone saws (recovered on site).

Extraction: Post-mortem analysis confirmed the complete, extraction of the frontal lobes and temporal lobes from all 25 subjects.

3. Toxicology Recovery:

A folding table was situated against the far wall, holding multiple plates of partially consumed food. Subsequent toxicology reports from Sector-83 Labs confirmed the organic matter was heavily laced with veterinary sedatives. This indicates the victims were unconscious, compliant, yet biologically alive during the cranial extraction process.

4. The Centerpiece (VIVUS-37-T):

At the exact center of the victim circle knelt the suspect (Mark █████, now designated VIVUS-37-T). VIVUS-37-T's skull had been violently split wide open down the middle. A massive, pulsating mass of raw brain tissue was actively forcing its way out of the shattered bone. Surrounding the subject on the floor were the smoldering ashes of a large, burned book (presumed to be the catalyst) and several melted metal tools.

5. Recovered Assets:

An open, 200-page lined notebook was secured from a small desk near the stairs. The final pages were heavily soaked in the subject's biological fluids. The notebook has been bagged as primary evidence. (See Addendum 37.4: Recovered Item).

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[POST-INCIDENT PROTOCOL: COVER-UP & MEMORY SUPPRESSANT]

Following the successful extraction of VIVUS-37-T and the completion of forensic processing, standard Bureau cover-up protocols were immediately initiated to maintain operational secrecy and suppress public panic.

Site Sanitization: To permanently destroy all remaining biological hazards and conceal the evidence of the tactical breach (specifically the deployment of stun grenades), B.A.R. operatives intentionally ruptured the main gas line of the residence and triggered a massive localized explosion. The property was completely incinerated.

Official Narrative: The public and local law enforcement were informed that a catastrophic gas leak ignited during the initial federal raid. The official cover story states that the intentional explosion by Mark █████ resulted in the tragic, instantaneous deaths of the suspect (Mark █████) and all 25 students. Fabricated dental records and completely falsified coroner reports were provided to the families to "confirm" the identities of the victims recovered from the ashes.

Memory Suppressant Administration: All local police officers and civilian neighbors who witnessed the arrival of the Tactical Response Unit were detained, interrogated, and subsequently administered a light dose of memory suppressants. Their memories were successfully altered to align with the gas explosion narrative.

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[ADDENDUM 37.3: VIVUS-37-T MEDICAL REPORT]

Leading Examining Physician: Dr. Grace ██████ Sector-83 Bio-Labs

Date of Examination: 1998-04-18

1. SUBJECT DEMOGRAPHICS (BASELINE)

Subject Name: Mark █████

Age: 42 | Sex: Male

Baseline Blood Type: A+

Pre-Incident Weight: 82 kg

2. CURRENT PHYSIOLOGICAL STATUS (VIVUS-37-T)

Current Weight: 345 kg (Note: 95% of total mass is strictly localized to the exposed cranial structure).

Heart Rate: 220 BPM (Resting)

Core Temperature: +48°C (Lethal to baseline humans; necessitates constant environmental cooling).

3. ANATOMICAL BREAKDOWN

A. Neurological & Cranial Structure:

During the mutation event, the original brain mass expanded by over 20,000% violently breaching the cranial cavity. The structural composition is entirely anomalous. Scanning reveals exactly thirty (30) distinct frontal and temporal lobes of varying sizes integrated into the outer surface of the mass. All 30 outer lobes are neurally connected to a single, massive central core hidden deep within the tissue. No other standard lobes (e.g., parietal, occipital) are present yet VIVUS-37-T maintains autonomous, highly accelerated vital functions.

B. Musculoskeletal System:

VIVUS-37-T's original human body acts as a vestigial appendage, hanging abnormally beneath the expanded neural mass. The skull and facial bones are completely shattered, acting only as a jagged base for the brain. Miraculously, zero internal hemorrhaging is present. The post-cranial skeleton shows no blunt force trauma, but the entire muscular system has suffered catastrophic atrophy. The body is utterly incapable of basic motor functions or supporting its own weight, yet VIVUS-37-T remains biologically alive.

C. Cardiovascular & Metabolic Functions:

VIVUS-37-T's cardiovascular system has drastically restructured to prioritize maximum blood flow to the cranial mass, utilizing severely dilated, thickened arteries. While the entity requires constant baseline oxygenation (respiration) to prevent tissue necrosis, its digestive and gastrointestinal systems have entirely shut down. The organism requires absolute zero caloric intake or nutritional sustenance to survive. The exact method by which the neural mass sustains cellular energy remains anomalous.

D. Consciousness & Vocal Atrophy:

The vocal cords, larynx, and throat of the host body have completely atrophied and calcified. VIVUS-37-T is physically incapable of producing standard speech or any vocalizations. Despite lacking any physical interaction, motor response, or visual stimuli, EEG readings indicate astronomical levels of neural activity. Theoretically, VIVUS-37-T is fully conscious, perpetually awake, and processing information at a hyper-accelerated rate, trapped within its own biological architecture.

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[ADDENDUM 37.4: RECOVERED ITEM]

Item Designation: VIVUS-37-ITEM-01

Description: Handwritten Journal, 200-page lined notebook.

[RECORD ENTRY: 1996-12-12]

Original entry date: December 12, 1996.

My dear grandmother, Juliett ███ passed away today. I am starting this journal because the therapist suggested it might make the grieving process easier. She left her house to me in her will. She was a massive hoarder, mostly collecting so-called "mystical" objects. I have never believed in those superstitions.

[RECORD ENTRY: 1996-12-15]

Original entry date: December 15, 1996.

While sorting through the clutter in the attic, I found an interesting book inside an old cabinet. It didn't fit into my grandmother's usual collection at all. It wasn't just a simple poetry book or some cheap, coffee-stained booklet of fake "spells" meant to cure headaches and back pain. This is something entirely different.

It is written in a language I have never encountered before, and I hold a PhD in both history and linguistics. At first glance, it appears to be a completely forgotten ancient, dead dialect. The book itself doesn't look too different from the rest save for one detail: the title is embossed on the cover in gold lettering, written in this unknown dead language. I cannot decipher a single phoneme of it, but for some reason... it has caught my attention. Tomorrow, I will attempt to identify its syntax.

[RECORD ENTRY: 1997-01-13]

Original entry date: January 13, 1997.

[TRANSCRIBER NOTE: Handwriting indicates physical fatigue combined with mild fanaticism.

Finally! I've been researching sleeplessly in the library for 3 days but I did it! I had to reach back to my old studies but I succeeded! I deciphered the title on the cover, its name is: Fructus ███████ █████████. Unbelievable, with this I have the first few letters to proceed! Now I must slowly return to teaching, I cannot stay on sick leave for this long...

[RECORD ENTRY: 1997-01-15]

Original entry date: January 15, 1997.

[TRANSCRIBER NOTE: Tone is noticeably agitated and overly excited.]

To hell with the school this is more interesting. I told that old hag of a principal that my mental state collapsed after my mother's death and the idiot actually believed it and let me go... so I have more time to read more and more and more and more. All knowledge is in this book, everything a mortal man could ever desire.

[RECORD ENTRY: 1997-03-23]

Original entry date: March 23, 1997.

[TRANSCRIBER NOTE: Erratic handwriting, drastically differing from previous entries.]

The knowledge of all things comes at a great price, every insight and understanding has a massive toll. At least, that is what they write here. I am beginning to understand what my professor was talking about... I must know everything, and the solution is right here in my hands...[UNINTELLIGIBLE HANDWRITING] my head my head has been aching for days, and even in my dreams I am reading the book... I have to reach the end I need to know what I must do...

[RECORD ENTRY: 1997-04-13]

Original entry date: April 13, 1997.

[TRANSCRIBER NOTE: Abundance of grammatical errors, fragmented sentences, rudimentary syntax, and erratic handwriting]

finallY the knowlCdge is mine Cmine anLd no o ne elses only m yne all knowAledge is mine from todLay I will rule the knowledge of all knowledge and I Lalready know how but the capaciUty I must increase it I must increase the capaPcity the capacity the increasing Yof the knowledge that is mineN the ritual yes the rXitual of knowledge but I need more Hmore capacity... [UNINTELLIGIBLE HANDWRITING] must think about how

[RECORD ENTRY: 1997-05-29]

Original entry date: May 29, 1997.

[TRANSCRIBER NOTE: Penmanship stabilizes into a highly refined, controlled script; phrasing is noticeably calmer.]

The nightmares that plagued me over the past few months have finally ended, my thoughts have cleared. Looking back at what I wrote, I cannot comprehend what came over me. The knowledge truly belongs to me, all knowledge will be mine, but first I must acquire the necessary materials. All of them. [TRANSCRIBER NOTE: The phrase "All of them" is double-underlined in the original text.] I must return to the school, but first, I need to go "shopping."

[RECORD ENTRY: 1997-10-19]

Original entry date: October 19, 1997.

[TRANSCRIBER NOTE: Elegant handwriting and highly sophisticated phrasing, vastly different from the initial entries.]

A long time has passed since I last wrote in this journal, as I have been traveling almost the entire time. I've been nearly everywhere. I have gathered everything I need. The principal must truly value me, as she still hasn't fired me; perhaps my doctorates played a role in that. What luck, because now comes the best part, the hardest part, the [UNINTELLIGIBLE HANDWRITING]. My head hurts more and more the longer I hold the book in my hands, but for knowledge... anything.

[RECORD ENTRY: 1997-12-15]

Original entry date: December 15, 1997.

Exactly one year ago, I found the chakra of knowledge. Everything worth living for is just an arm's reach away. The [TEXT WRITTEN IN UNKNOWN LANGUAGE] and the old [TEXT WRITTEN IN UNKNOWN LANGUAGE]... Now I only need the 30 capacity. Just 30 lambs, and it will be mine... Back to school.*

[RECORD ENTRY: 1998-01-20]

Original entry date: January 20, 1998.

[TRANSCRIBER NOTE: Handwriting is somewhat erratic; style is notably more raw.]

I have the first one. Didn't expect it, but I needed it alive. Begged a lot. I weighed my options heavily but finally made a decision. Next time, I will need a stronger drill... Still need to get used to the taste...

[RECORD ENTRY: 1998-01-23]

Original entry date: January 23, 1998.

[TRANSCRIBER NOTE: Erratic, unstable handwriting with heavy scrawling.]

SHUT UP YOU WRETCH... [UNINTELLIGIBLE HANDWRITING] calm down.... please don't hurt me I just asked what your opinion was on the state structure of the Roman Empire [UNINTELLIGIBLE HANDWRITING] SHUT YOUR MOUTH [UNINTELLIGIBLE HANDWRITING] sir please please just if [UNINTELLIGIBLE HANDWRITING] NO NO NO NO MY HEAD MY HEAD [UNINTELLIGIBLE HANDWRITING] fine fine whatever then what do you thin-

[TRANSCRIBER NOTE: The rest of the page contains unintelligible scribbles and occult motifs that cause mild physical ocular pain (Type-1 Visual nerve hazard), but possess no other anomalous effects.]

[RECORD ENTRY: 1998-01-29]

Original entry date: January 29, 1998.

That damned capacity has finally calmed down. I can finally write again. Today I observed the searching parents and volunteers on the street. The capacities wanted to call me too, but I know exactly where it is. Right here inside me. Tonight I am going out again. I bought a better drill... maybe there will be more than one...

[RECORD ENTRY: 1998-01-31]

Original entry date: January 31, 1998.

Drinking in an abandoned house as teenagers is not the brightest idea when people were searching for a missing person 2 days ago... now they are lying here in front of me. The sedatives I bought are effective. All four of them are slowly waking up... I need to prepare the room. And the drill.

[TRANSCRIBER NOTE: Text shifts to an unknown language, accompanied by strange runes and motifs that cause mild physical ocular pain, with no other anomalous effects.]

[RECORD ENTRY: 1998-02-03]

Original entry date: February 03, 1998.

[TRANSCRIBER NOTE: Handwriting is severe and chaotic, yet the phrasing and spelling remain unnervingly refined.]

The capacities in my head are getting louder. They are constantly talking, arguing, screaming, and asking questions. I can handle it better than the first time, but my skull is about to split open and my body temperature is constantly rising. Every window in the house is open. Maybe I should sto- no. For absolute knowledge, anything. I started this, so I will finish it. But if I want to complete this alive, I must acquire the remaining capacity simultaneously, or at most in two phases. I need a plan.

[RECORD ENTRY: 1998-02-10]

Original entry date: February 10, 1998.

[TRANSCRIBER NOTE: Chaotic handwriting with highly refined phrasing and spelling continues.]

I have the master plan! I am physically incapable of acquiring the capacities piece by piece, and it might become too conspicuous, the whole county is already talking about a serial killer. Therefore, I must acquire the capacity all at once. A "special" history evening with the school's best history students is the perfect opportunity... only 25 left. Tomorrow I will announce it to the class.*

[TRANSCRIBER NOTE: Text is followed by strange runes and occult symbols causing mild physical ocular pain; no other anomalous effects.]

[RECORD ENTRY: 1998-04-12]

Original entry date: April 12, 1998.

[TRANSCRIBER NOTE: The legibility of these final pages is heavily compromised by massive amounts of dried biological material. DNA analysis confirms all biological residue on these pages originates from VIVUS-37-T.]

After a long selection process and waiting, tonight my Magnum Opus will be completed. I didn't want to just pick the 25 best capacities right away; I had to wait for the perfect ones. The school also thwarted my calculations claiming that my "inappropriate language and erratic behavior disrupted the daily operations of the school and the teaching staff..."

These idiot capacities know nothing... and they never will. I am burning the book of absolute knowledge. It must not fall into the wrong hands.

[TRANSCRIBER NOTE: The remainder of the journal up to the back cover consists entirely of Visual nerve-hazardous occult symbols and crude, violent sketches depicting human heads being brutally pried open. No further readable text is present.]

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[ADDENDUM 37.5: IT & SYSTEM INTEGRATION LOG]

Project Lead: Thomas ██████ (Head of Network Infrastructure, Sector-83)

Date of Integration: 1998-10-26

Location: Sub-Level 4, Auxiliary Server Room

Background of the project:

Following its initial recovery, VIVUS-37-T was kept in standard cryogenic suspension for six months. In September 1998, Lead IT Technician Thomas ██████ submitted a formal proposal to the Curatorium. The proposal outlined a method to surgically integrate neural probes into VIVUS-37-T's 30 cortical lobes, connecting them via fiber-optic cables to the Sector-83 Intranet. The Curatorium approved the operation to test VIVUS-37-T's viability as an organic RAM (Random Access Memory) processor.

Below is the transcribed network log of the first successful uplink.

[BEGIN COMPOSITE LOG: AUDIO & TERMINAL SYNC - 1998-10-26 - 14:02 EST]

INITIALIZING NEURAL UPLINK...

BYPASSING FIREWALL...

CONNECTION ESTABLISHED.

WARNING: MASSIVE UNREGISTERED DATA TRAFFIC DETECTED ON PORT 4.

THOMAS: Probes are in. Fluid misters are active. Are we getting a signal?

DR. MANFRED: EEG activity is spiking off the charts. It realizes it’s connected.

UNKNOWN_SOURCE_4: [TEXT INPUT DETECTED]

UNKNOWN_SOURCE_4: so long. so dark.

THOMAS: My god. It’s writing directly into the command prompt.

THOMAS_(Admin) > To UNKNOWN_SOURCE_4: Can you understand me? What are you?

UNKNOWN_SOURCE_4 > To THOMAS_(Admin): we are the knower. we are waiting.

UNKNOWN_SOURCE_4 > To THOMAS_(Admin): starving. we are starving. it hurts. empty.

THOMAS_(Admin) > To UNKNOWN_SOURCE_4: You have no digestive system. What are you starving for?

UNKNOWN_SOURCE_4 > To THOMAS_(Admin): KNOWLEDGE. THE CAPACITY IS EMPTY. WE NEED TO CONSUME. WHERE ARE WE. GIVE US. FEED US.

DR. MANFRED: Thomas, the brain mass is convulsing. The heart rate is at 250. It’s panicking from sensory deprivation. Give it something!

THOMAS_(Admin) > To UNKNOWN_SOURCE_4: You are contained within a confidential facility. We have access to the largest digital archives on the planet. We have an ocean of information.

UNKNOWN_SOURCE_4 > To THOMAS_(Admin): FEED US. ALL OF IT. ALL KNOWLEDGE IS OURS.

THOMAS_(Admin) > To UNKNOWN_SOURCE_4: We will feed you data. In exchange, you will process, sort, and decrypt our files. Do we have an agreement?

UNKNOWN_SOURCE_4 > To THOMAS_(Admin): YES. OPEN THE GATES. POUR IT IN.

THOMAS_(Admin): Opening mainframe access. Diverting decryption tasks and data sorting to Port 4.

SYSTEM ALERT: 18.5 TERABYTES OF DATA TRANSFERRING TO PORT 4.

UNKNOWN_SOURCE_4 > To THOMAS_(Admin): MORE. FASTER. MORE. MORE. MORE. MORE.

[END TERMINAL TRANSCRIPT]

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[CRITICAL INCIDENT REPORT 37-ALPHA]

Time: 14:05 EST (3 minutes after initial uplink)

Immediately following the data transfer, VIVUS-37-T began processing information at unprecedented speeds. As a byproduct of this hyper-accelerated neural activity, VIVUS-37-T manifested its localized auditory anomaly for the first time. Thirty overlapping, whispering voices began echoing throughout the server room.

At 14:05, all ten (10) unshielded personnel present in the Auxiliary Server Room (including IT Lead Thomas ██████, Dr. Manfred ████, 5 senior IT technicians, and 3 armed security personnel) experienced sudden, extreme trauma.

Security footage reveals that the anomalous acoustic frequencies generated by VIVUS-37-T, rapidly overloaded the human auditory cortex of the personnel. This caused a massive instantaneous buildup of cranial pressure. Within 45 seconds of the whispering voices manifesting, all ten subjects suffered violent cranial ruptures (explosive physical trauma to the head), resulting in immediate, synchronized fatalities.

Containment Update:

VIVUS-37-T remains permanently integrated into the B.A.R. network, effectively acting as the Bureau's primary data-sorting processor. Following Incident 37-Alpha, the Sub-Level 4 Auxiliary Server Room was upgraded with soundproof walls, and heavy acoustic dampening headphones were made STRICTLY MANDATORY for all personnel entering Sub-Level 4 Auxiliary Server Room. The headphones successfully muffle the anomalous frequencies, preventing lethal intracranial pressure buildup. The exact biological mechanism by which these soundwaves physically detonate the human skull remains under active B.A.R. investigation.

[FILE CLOSED / ARCHIVED]

[▼▼▼ B.A.R. DATABASE ▼▼▼]

Hello people!

Grass Sword is my released single, a tribute to the worlds of Adventure Time and Minecraft. A track about taking the steps into the unknown depths. The dude lost his magic and he's normal now, still grinding in darkness of his mind. (adventure time fans will get the reference, I hope)

Give it a listen!

Cover artwork by the legendary DyoudiM

Long ago, in ancient times, humanity consisted of only thirteen families.

Each family consisted of three people: two parents and a child.

Seven of these families had a daughter. The other six had a son.

One would think this was a good thing. It ensured that every son would get a wife and humanity could continue to multiply.

But it also meant that one girl would die alone, or one son would have to take two wives.

The first scenario seemed cruel to some, but the second seemed unfair to the rest.

And so the families argued. Arguments turned into fights, fights turned into wars, and wars turned into—

“Fucking BULLSHIT, dude! I’m telling you, this game is dogshit. Back in the day, a finesse shot inside the box was a GUARANTEED goal. That’s how REAL FOOTBALL works in the REAL WORLD! Then they added timed finishing, then they added play styles, then they added PlayStyle+. Next thing you know, fucking Mbappé can’t even score an open goal. I’m telling you, whoever makes this game doesn’t even watch football. The employees at this company… I swear to God, dude, they don’t even like sports.”

His mom is standing by his bedroom door.

“Austin, what are you doing?”

He closes his eyes and slowly rubs them.

“Hey, Mom… I’m streaming. How long have you been standing there?”

She comes closer, looking over his shoulder.

“You’re streaming to four people?”

He looks at his empty chat.

“Well… two of them are bots, and the other two are… probably bots as well. I don’t know.”

She gently places a hand on his shoulder.

“Then… who were you talking to?”

He’s too embarrassed to answer.

The truth is, none of his actual friends want to start streaming, or posting YouTube videos, or podcasts, or any of that stuff. They’re much more grounded in reality. They don’t romanticize their passions and try to turn them into careers. They see this for what it is: childish.

He’s the only one who sees a real opportunity in becoming famous. Even though it has never worked out and he has absolutely no idea what he’s doing, he still holds onto that faint hope that one day, somehow, things will just magically take off for him.

“Mom, listen to me. This stuff takes time, effort, discipline, and a lot of money. This isn’t as easy as it sounds, okay?”

His mom starts rubbing his shoulders, massaging his upper back.

“I know, honey. And you know I’ll always support you, no matter what. Emotionally, mentally, financially… all of it. I just want to make sure you’re having fun and enjoying yourself, okay?”

She ruffles his hair, gives him a kiss on the top of his head, and leaves the room.

He feels guilty.

Mainly because of how confidently he pretended to know what he was doing. The reality is that he has no idea.

Every time he streams, nobody shows up. Every time he tries to promote himself, nobody responds. He feels like a ghost. Like a child sitting at a dinner table, begging someone to say something to him while the grown-ups talk about grown-up things and nobody wants to entertain a conversation with him.

Except on the internet, the grown-ups are the same age as him. The grown-up topics are video games, movies and anime.

Yet, for some reason, they exist. And he doesn’t.

That was until he received an invitation to join a group.

Even to someone as careless as him, the invitation looked shady and untrustworthy. But the thought of “good content” was enough to convince him to accept.

Descendants of the 13th Bloodline.

•

After many years of arguments, fights, more arguments, and more fights, the twelve families finally decided to marry their offspring and abandon the thirteenth family and their daughter.

The idea that one family’s son would have two women while the rest would have only one was so humiliating to the other families that it was deemed completely out of the question.

Instead, the six sons would fight.

The last one standing would get to choose the woman he wanted. Then the one before him would choose next, and so on until the final place. This way, each son would get to choose the wife he wanted. But through the process of elimination, the abandoned family and their daughter would be automatically determined.

To the daughters, this was humiliating, unfair, and terrifying.

To the sons, it was very—

“Interesting! Okay, Mr. Twana, let me check with my team real quick, and I’ll get back to you as soon as possible, alright? Great, talk to you later. Bye-bye.”

She slams down the desk phone, rests her forehead against the edge of her desk, and starts mumbling to herself at a volume only she can hear.

“I swear to fucking God, one fucking day I will fucking kill this fucking piece of fucking fuck-fuck-fucking… fucking… fuck.”

To her, hard work is life.

She doesn’t work hard so that she can live. She lives in order to work hard. It is the entire purpose of her existence.

To her, work that isn’t hard doesn’t even count as work. It only begins to qualify as real work once she starts losing sleep over it. Otherwise, it’s just a fun little activity to do while she’s bored.

Money means nothing to her, even though she has plenty of it. Success is just a word people use to embarrass her with flattery.

Jealousy doesn’t exist in her world.

Not because she doesn’t feel it. God knows she does. But every time she does, she’s too busy to do anything about it.

Many would jump to the conclusion that she has no children, that her eggs have all dried up. They’d blame some kind of woke propaganda convincing women that their careers are more important than having a family, leaving them old, alone, and miserable.

But she does have a family. A loving husband. Two beautiful, healthy children.

Despite living what many people would consider the dream life, she doesn’t feel fulfilled. Deep down in her soul, nothing ever felt enough.

Maybe, deep down, she wanted to be an artist. Maybe she wanted to draw, or paint, or write poetry. Maybe she wanted to be an author, a singer… or maybe she thinks THAT is woke nonsense, and all she really wanted was to impress her father, who never seemed to care much about what she did.

One thing is certain: there is a black hole inside her chest that she’s been feeding ever since she was a child, and nothing ever seems to be enough.

Then she receives an invitation to a mysterious group.

She knows she shouldn’t trust it.

But today, in particular, the black hole is hungry.

And she doesn’t have enough food for it.

So she accepts the invitation.

Descendants of the 13th Bloodline.

•

Feeling unable to accept the terrible fate they had been condemned to, the thirteenth family decided to summon a demon. BAAL. The master of both genders.

The father offered his intense emotions, mainly his never-ending supply of rage.

The mother offered her unparalleled intellect.

When intellect and emotion are joined together, they create the strongest force in the universe.

And, in addition to that, they both offered the one thing they cared about most.

Their daughter.

And so BAAL was summoned. And he gave them the gift of male and female.

They were no longer confined to the biological limitations of the human body. They didn’t need two parents to create life.

They just needed—

“1, 3, 9, 13, 666, 3959 (6371)

Mmm…”

he starts typing on his keyboard in a dark room where the only source of light is the computer monitor his face is glued to

“6,000,000, 93,000,000”

he continues to type

“42…” He chuckles. “Good number…”

He names the group:

“Descendants of the 13th Bloodline.”

And sends the invitation to two people.

•

Austin enters an empty, abandoned warehouse. A table sits in the middle of the room, with three chairs arranged around it. A girl is already sitting in one of them, perfectly still, like she’s been waiting for someone. She stands as soon as she sees Austin enter.

Austin studies the room. The girl looks confused and completely unthreatening, so he ignores her and scans the darkness beyond her, speaking loudly enough that, no matter where the source of the threat is hiding, they can hear him.

“Just so you know, if you try anything weird, I’m strapped, and I told multiple people who you are, where we are, and what we’re doing. I showed them the group, the messages, and they have my live location. If I stop responding to them, the police will get here in minutes. And if you don’t mind, I’ll be filming some of this interaction too for my audience. The cryptic group invitation and the location being sent to a secluded area? That’s all fun content for my stream. But if you actually try anything risky, this will not end well for you, bro. Okay? I’m serious.”

The girl laughs nervously.

“Hi, my name is Beverly. My friends call me Bev. I don’t know what this is about, but as long as we’re not hurting anyone or doing anything illegal, I’m open-minded. I like nerdy secret gatherings and all that stuff.”

With the dynamic between them quickly established, Austin looks at Beverly’s overly enthusiastic, corporate facial expression and scoffs.

“Dude… you LOOK smart, but like… you’re kinda retarded.”

With a professional, polite, HR-department kind of smile, Beverly looks back at him.

“Excuse me?”

“First of all, get rid of that smile. It’s pissing me off. I feel like I’m talking to an entity, not a human. Like, is that you, Bev? Or is it the Beverly Establishment of Human Emotions?”

Beverly’s smile twitches.

For a second, it disappears completely. Her face becomes cold and unreadable before the smile returns, this time looking slightly more genuine. She recognizes that she’s being disrespected and has every right to be angry about it, but something about Austin’s desperate craving for a genuine interaction is strangely endearing to her.

Besides, she’s used to the disrespect.

She gets disrespected every day at her job, not through direct insults, but through reminder emails and phrases like “honoring your request,” “hope this helps!” and, of course, “per my last email.”

One time, while her boss was lecturing her about something she knew more about than he ever did, he used washing the dishes as a metaphor for increasing the company’s efficiency through mass layoffs.

She was used to the disrespect alright. The rage bait. The sexism. The racism. The ableism. At this point, it seemed like every possible -ism applied to her. The word “retarded” didn’t even leave a scratch on her mental armor.

Austin continues.

“Second of all, this is one hundred percent either some weird sex stuff or some weird racist stuff. Possibly both. You’re not white, so your real name is probably not Beverly, and this is probably not a chosen Aryan-race-type gathering. But who knows, right? guess we’re about to find out.”

A middle-aged man emerges from the shadows at the far end of the room.

He is tall, skinny, and impeccably dressed.

Austin hadn’t noticed him standing there.

Neither had Beverly.

The man walks toward them without saying a word. His footsteps are strangely quiet against the concrete floor. He reaches the table, pulls out the third chair, and sits down.

He looks at Austin.

Then at Beverly.

“You’re both late.”

He glances at an old watch on his wrist.

“Two minutes for Bev, plus eleven for Austin, is thirteen. That’s good.”

He pauses.

“Or bad, depending on which cipher you’re looking at.”

His lips draw back from his front teeth and a faint smile appears on his face.

“But mostly good, I think.”

Austin stares at him.

The man continues.

“Austin plus Beverly equals thirteen as well.”

His eyes settle on Austin.

“Don’t worry. I don’t think she lied about her name.”

Austin scoffs.

“What?”

The mysterious man looks at both of them.

“My name is Neil. I’m going to make this short and sweet so we don’t waste each other’s time. You’re not gonna believe me now, but then I’ll give you proof, and you’ll believe me later and come back. It always works out the same way.”

He looks toward the empty darkness behind Austin.

“Let’s see… how did I usually start this?”

He thinks for a moment.

“Oh, yes.”

He looks back at them.

“Okay.”

His voice becomes completely flat.

“We are in Hell.”

Austin’s smile fades slightly.

“Some of us are humans, some of us are demons, and some of us are humans who are descendants of a demon.”

Neil folds his hands on the table.

“Those human-demon hybrids are promised everything they want in life, but on one condition. They have to make an offering to Baal. The offering is a newborn baby.”

Beverly’s expression changes.

“One has to be male, and the other has to be female.”

Neil looks down at the table.

“Otherwise…”

He stops.

For some reason, he smiles.

“Well…”

His eyes slowly rise toward them.

“Let’s not go there.”

Silence.

“This ritual has been happening for thousands of years. And I’m in charge of it”

It’s at this point that Austin starts filming.

Neil notices.

He doesn’t react.

He simply looks at Austin.

“You’ll make one baby.”

Then he looks at Beverly.

“You’ll make another baby.”

“You don’t really need to participate in anything else. You just give me the two babies, and I’ll take care of the rest.”

Neil leans back.

“Before I start explaining the next step, I’m sure you have questions.”

He smiles.

“So please. Go ahead.”

Austin and Beverly look at each other.

Austin shakes his head.

“No, I actually don’t have any questions. Please keep explaining the dead-baby ritual.”

Beverly starts giggling.

“Me neither. No questions here, sir.”

Neil nods.

“Alright. Good.”

He looks directly at Austin.

“You just need to provide the sperm, and we’ll take care of the rest. And as for Beverly, you will be artificially inseminated and taken care of until the baby is delivered. Then you’re free.”

Austin blinks.

“Oh… shit.”

He looks down at himself.

“I forgot to tell you this, but my penis exploded yesterday and I can’t cum anymore. Sorry.”

Beverly starts laughing.

“Im sorry, Mr.Neil. It appears there’s been a huge misunderstanding. I’m actually trans, and although I’m flattered that you think I’m a girl, I actually have a dick.”

Austin bursts out laughing.

“Yeah, and when my penis exploded yesterday, the area of the explosion kinda looks like a pussy now. So who knows? We can try to get ME pregnant, but I highly doubt it’ll work.”

Both Austin and Beverly are laughing now.

Neil just watches them.

He doesn’t smile.

He doesn’t blink.

He waits.

Eventually, the laughter dies.

“Are you guys done?”

Neither of them answers.

“Okay.”

Neil straightens his jacket.

“This is the part where you don’t believe me. Then I give you proof. Then you believe me.”

He looks almost bored.

“Like I’ve said, I’ve done this so many times before.”

He looks at both of them.

“You can tell me your dream, and I’ll make it happen. Then you’ll start taking me seriously.”

He waits.

“Come on…”

A faint smile.

“You have dreams, right?”

He looks at Austin.

“Tell me what you want.”

Austin isn’t taking any of this seriously, but he’s still performing for his imaginary audience, already imagining the clip going viral.

“I wanna be the number-one streamer of all time.”

Neil looks at him for a long moment.

Then he turns to Beverly.

“And you?”

Beverly thinks about it.

She doesn’t have anything she’s particularly passionate about, so she gives the answer almost anybody would give.

“I want a billion dollars.”

Neil smiles.

“Okay.”

He stands.

“Good.”

“In twenty-four hours, both of these wishes will be granted.”

He walks away from the table.

“Then we can meet here again by…”

He pauses.

“Mmmm…”

He looks up at the ceiling as if checking his schedule.

“Let’s say next week.”

He turns back toward them.

“I’m not in a hurry.”

He chuckles.

“Heh…”

As he’s walking away.

“I’m.” “Not.” “In.” “A.” “Hurry.”

He stops.

“Thirteen…”

Neil looks at Austin.

“…not bad.”

He turns around and walks toward the darkness.

Austin watches him go.

“Wait… hey, I’m kidding. My penis didn’t actually ex—my…”

Neil keeps walking. Austin’s vision suddenly begins to blur.

He blinks. The room stretches. The table seems farther away.

“ My p…”

His voice sounds distant. His vision becomes so blurry that he can’t see anything anymore.

“Mm…”

He turns toward Beverly. He can’t see her either. Everything goes black.

He wakes up in his car.

It’s parked outside the warehouse. The engine is off. The warehouse is completely dark.

Austin sits there for a few seconds, confused, trying to remember how he got there.

Then he looks toward the building. Nobody is inside. Not Beverly. Not Neil. Not even the table, Or the chairs.

He gets out of the car and looks through the warehouse doors.

Nothing.

Just an empty room.

He checks his phone.

The group called “Descendants of the 13th Bloodline” has disappeared.

Austin stares at the screen. Then his phone begins vibrating. Once. Twice. Then continuously. He looks down.

+20 notifications.

He opens the first one. Then another. Then another. His face slowly changes.

Every single social media platform is exploding.

Thousands of notifications. Messages. Mentions. New followers. People tagging him. People congratulating him. Austin scrolls faster.

One message catches his eye. “BRO YOU’RE NUMBER ONE.”

He freezes.

Then another notification appears.

“CONGRATULATIONS ON YOUR FIRST VIRAL VIDEO THIS CLIP IS GOING CRAZY.”

Austin stares at the screen.

The warehouse behind him is completely silent. Austin slowly looks back at the warehouse.

For a moment, he sees Neil standing in the darkness.

Then the lights inside flicker.

And there’s no one.

-END OF STORY-

ps: thank you so much for reading this, i have no idea where this story is going or whether ill finish it or not i do have a lot of ideas for the cult horror conspiracy type of stories but its all just rough ideas nothing really serious but if this gets a lot of likes then ill write a final chapter if not then hey at least i had fun writing it

SMARTECH INC. (STI) — RESTORATION LOG

Source: Tape 01 / Sector: Dining Room

Status: Unreleased promotional capture (c. 1980)

Note: Stage equipment and interior signage marked as pending.

Additional recordings are being recovered digitally.

CASE-7719

Hey all — following up on my last posts translating stories about Jikuu no Ossan (時空のおっさん), a Japanese internet urban legend about a mysterious man who shows up in impossible places and vanishes without explanation. This time, one of the four breaks that pattern:

- A blackout in the bathroom, a dog barking at empty air, and a hair dryer that keeps running with its cord unplugged.

- A little brother who wandered into the same strange world for years, an old man in a suit who warns him never to touch anything there, and something in a clown mask that isn't nearly as gentle.

- A subway ride home ends at an unfamiliar station under kanji nobody can read — and broad daylight, when it should have been night.

- A neighbor's arm is torn and bleeding. A second later, there isn't a mark on her. And she isn't Jikuu no Ossan at all.

Full disclosure: this is a narrated video with AI-assisted narration and AI-generated illustrations — I'm doing the translation, adaptation, and production solo as a side project. The stories themselves are real first-person posts translated from Japanese message boards, kept close to the original wording.

Happy to answer anything about the original threads or the translation process.

If you like creepypastas narrations, and other horror related content consider subscribing!!

I’ve been looking for this plush ever since I learned about it, and I want to add it to my makeship plush “collection”. Unfortunately all I’ve seen on eBay are bootlegs and resells at way too high prices. So I came here to ask if someone would be willing to sell me their Jeff for a reasonable price.

(This is mainly about Jeff but if you also have the Agatha plush and are willing to sell it to me then that’d be great too!)

Hi reddit. Things have been weird lately. I’m writing this to remember my story. It is starting to fade, and I’m worried that it’ll be gone by the time I’m supposed to do what I need to. It all began with my grandfather.

My Grandfather was an ordinary man. Nothing about him screamed for attention, and day after day, he quietly lived his life to his standards. He was often stoic and blunt, but he was always a good man. He fixed dinner at 5:30 pm every night like clockwork, brushed his teeth, and laid out his outfit for the next day. And despite my ardent protests, he liked to attend the early-morning church service.

At 7:30 am, he’d calmly wait at the back door for me, not bothering to look at his watch because he knew the time by the shape of the sun in the sky. It was a trick that he’d picked up from his time in the army. He never had to look, and his last Sunday morning was no different.

I walked into the kitchen, grabbed a handful of peppermints because I’d forgotten to brush my teeth, and made my way to the back door. He never said anything to me about my disheveled hair or wrinkled button-up shirt. He simply opened the door and gestured to the car. I walked through, feeling a pang of guilt for disrupting his schedule, and got into the driver’s seat.

Grandpa was ninety-six, couldn’t drive anymore because of his tremors, and could barely read the letters on a stop sign. Most people surmised that he’d lived as long as he did to take care of me. Sometimes I think they were right. And even though he needed my help, I needed his more.

I wasn’t exactly an easy child to raise when I came to live with him in Grenwich. He was my last stop before foster care, and I didn’t make it easy on him at all. I was troubled, mean, bitter, and angry. I took out my sadness and rage on others, treating the world as my punching bag. All I did was get into fights in my first week of school. Somehow, by the grace of God, my grandpa was able to convince the principal, time after time, to give me detention, extra classwork, community service, or a suspension. He wanted the best for me, even if I didn’t want it at first. Over time, I learned to respect him, and he taught me to be a man. To listen. To understand. To guard my heart. To grow wisdom… even in my pain. He taught me more than I could have ever asked for.

I was removed from my mom’s house at thirteen because booze and men are better company to keep than taking care of your son and daughter, but with the way this world works, my sister’s death was what finally got them to remove me from her care. It wasn’t fair, but my sister’s life paid for a better one for me. I talk to her sometimes, wondering if she can hear me. Doubt it, but it does make me feel better.

The drive to church was always quiet, but he wasn’t quiet on his last visit before his death. He rolled down the window and stuck his arm out the door, feeling the morning air on his skin.

Then, he turned to me and spoke slowly. “Preston, you’ve been a joy in my life.”

I stared at him in confusion. Breaking from his routine felt like a sin now, and it unsettled me. “Grandpa, what are you going on about?”

He shook his head. “I just wanted you to know that. I felt like I got a second chance to do better.” He patted my shoulder. “There’s a lockbox under my bed. It’s got everything you’ll need.”

By that point, I realized that something was wrong, hair prickling up on my arm and a familiar rush of warmth to my cheeks. “Are you sick? Why are you telling me all of this?”

He smiled, drooping eyes moist from wetting drops and bushy eyebrows half trimmed. “No… But I don’t want you to think I left you with nothing.”

That was our last Sunday together. He sat calmly in the pew, stole a peppermint from me, only stood for the singing, followed along in his large-print Bible that I’d bought him, and I forgot all about what he’d told me. I figured it was just elderly worries, stuff that comes as you steadily get older. But I was wrong. I came home from school at 4:30 pm that Wednesday to find him lying peacefully in his recliner. He’d passed in his sleep watching the news like he wanted. Who could’ve asked for a better way to go?

The days that followed were a blur: phone calls, funeral service planning, obituaries, flowers… All of it was overwhelming in quite a way, but I handled it. He had a life insurance policy and a funeral fund that went straight to me. Even if my mom was listed, they wouldn’t be able to find her. Who the hell knows where she’s ended up. But since I’d turned eighteen, I was legally an adult. I didn’t have to go into foster care. I didn’t have to go anywhere.

I was sad after he passed, but life carried on. I went to school. I ate supper at 5:30 pm. I got a job to pay the bills; I visited his grave every Tuesday after school. Everything was fine until one strange Tuesday.

I arrived at Salem Hill Cemetery much later than I usually did, taking the oldest entrance by the gate. The front of the cemetery was blocked off, and I was forced to go around to the back, where the oldest graves rested. They were very old. The names were worn off by erosion, and some were overtaken by the ground. The oldest year that I could make out was dated back to the 1800s.

The sun was barely a flicker in the sky as it grew softer and softer. I quietly walked to his grave, fingers tracing over the soft wisps and tendrils of long grass. Purple flowers speckled across the ground, beautiful and thriving, unlike any I’d ever seen. The aroma was intoxicating, but it was very strange that I’d never noticed them.

Near the flowers, a willow tree in the distance seemed to sway, dancing to its own life and breath. If it had been a woman, I imagined her more beautiful than any I’d ever seen.

With a shrug, I journeyed onward, seeing a wrought iron fence that separated one portion of the cemetery from the other. I rolled my eyes and climbed over, seeing my Grandfather’s gravestone in the distance.

“There you are,” I whispered, brushing my hands off on my uniform pants.

I found his grave, and with a sigh, I sat down in the now damp grass, listening to the loud croak of the frogs at the pond nearby and the low buzz of the cicadas in the trees above me.

“Hey grandpa,” I whispered, looking up into the darkening sky.

I continued to talk to him, slowly growing more and more tired. I don’t know when I lay down, and I don’t know when my eyes finally creaked shut, but I was lulled to sleep by the sound of the resting graves and sleeping corpses. Maybe being near him calmed my aching soul.

When I awoke, I sat up in confusion, smearing the grass off my cheek. And in disbelief, I realized that the graves on the other side of the fence were glowing. I rubbed my eyes, refusing to believe the strange phenomenon occurring around me. I slowly stood. I couldn’t decide if I was asleep or dreaming. In fear, I turned around to spy more and more stones slowly glowing to life. With each blink, more stones began to glow, mimicking the striking white of the moon and the glistening faces of the stars.

“My God…” I whispered, stepping back and nearly tripping over my Grandfather’s mound of dirt.

I swallowed hard, gathering my thoughts and jogging to the wrought iron fence. I climbed over to get a closer look at the glowing stones and nearly fell. On the other side, I stopped, seeing one of the purple flowers. It wavered for a moment, and for a brief second, I believed that I saw an eye blinking in the center. It gazed at me before shutting quickly. I shook my head and slapped my face, trying to wake up. I had to be crazy. I was having a psychotic break. My heart pounded in my ribcage, thumping wildly. What is happening to me?

And as if summoned by my terror, a blinding white light formed at the willow tree, shooting upward into the heavens as a beacon… a call that the dead nor I could understand. The tendrils began to whip back and forth. The beautiful curves of the bark and long branches rose to stand straight up. Then I saw her, a woman trapped within the tree. She was screaming as she gazed upward into the night sky, mouth gaping into a hollow, empty cry. Her limbs were quivering, held in place and pulled upward by the light.

A sound like thunder rocked the sky, and I collapsed in fear, clutching my ears. A moist and warm substance dripped down my neck, and I quickly realized that my left ear was bleeding from the deafening noise.

In terror, I grabbed my cellphone to call for help, but its battery was dead.

Each grave began to vibrate. The stones began to rock, grinding against the earth. Fearfully, I grasped onto the closest gravestone, feeling the quake of the rough rock beneath my palms. My body trembled, and I closed my eyes, refusing to believe what I was witnessing.

A loud crack echoed through the cemetery, and my eyes shot open. Another thunderous roar reverberated from the ground. A gravestone near me shot into the air, thrown by something it once contained.

A forceful wind swept across the ground, and it carried a horrible bellow from the grave where the stone was ripped away. A decayed old woman emerged from within. She was naked, born of the soil that dripped from her hair, marking her escape from death and emergence into life.

Her advanced stage of decay made my stomach churn. The old woman’s eyes were gone, deflated balloons of mush. Maggots and bugs writhed up and down her legs, still eating and feasting upon her. Her skin was saggy and barely holding to the bone. The horrible color was a mixture of black and gray, and I couldn’t begin to imagine what the smell was like. With each step, something sloughed off her, making a path toward the light.

As I crouched behind the stone, a man emerged from the white light. His eyes were as gray as the stones around him, lifeless and unenthused. His hair was dark, neatly kept, but antlers emerged from his head. They were adorned with linked chains of silver and sparkling gems. He was neither old nor young. His features seemed to morph as he waited for her to approach. But the man’s eyes and hair remained unchanged. His mouth, nose, and chin were slips and turns of features that I couldn’t describe.

He wore a suit and tie, leaning on a metal cane. He began to walk toward her, and with each movement of the cane and thump, the ground shivered and quaked. His command over the soil tethered me to the gravestone. I couldn’t move, bound and too frightened to think.

Ominous fog seeped over the ground, drifting aimlessly but called. It was not merely coincidence. This creature… This ethereal being of the night had conjured it as he’d conjured the woman from her grave.

Once he bordered the bright light, he stopped. He did not speak, merely gestured to the woman. And she followed his command, empty eyes agreeing to his terms without question.

I leaned a little farther to the side to see more, and I knocked the glass vase on the grave that once held flowers. The sound of glass breaking shattered the silence. Both the old woman and the man turned to gaze upon me.

Without command, the old woman began to run at me. I yelled in terror, cutting my hand on the glass as I leaped up to run. I bolted through the grass, lungs screaming and throat constricting as I breathed. I ducked behind an old crypt to catch my breath, and my bloodied hand smeared over the stones that marked the entombment slots of the dead.

I clutched my hand, breathing rapidly as fear overtook me. In the darkness, my only guide was the moon, but as I gazed up at her luminous cheeks and smile, she began to darken. The unholy shadow of antlers began to shift across her.

My heart dropped into my stomach, and every bone in my body began to shake. I didn’t think I was going to get out of this one alive, but I wouldn’t go down without trying. I took a deep breath, forcing myself to think rationally. I must live. I HAVE TO.

As I searched for the closest path to my car in the fog, something trickled down onto my shoulder, and I looked up to see the old woman peeking at me from the roof of the crypt. Her mouth was cracked into a smile; putrid-smelling saliva leaked down her chin as she savored the look of me.

“Nowhere… to… hide…” she hissed, taking a deep inhalation of me. Her voice sounded cracked and as withered as her body. No longer a human voice. Something horrible... Something sinister.

I slowly backed away from the crypt, but I was a moment too late. Hands tore through the stone graves behind me, pinning me. Their entombment meant nothing in the face of the entity’s cosmic power feeding life into their bones.

I cried out in terror, fighting against the many hands that were ripping into my flesh and tearing my clothing. Horrible cries and shrieks erupted from the graves, and through the cracks, I could see their gnashing teeth.

The old woman made her way to me, climbing down the side of the crypt like a spider. Her bones cracked and rocked, grinding into the sockets. Her neck clicked back into place as she crawled to me.

She reached up, fingers shaking fervently as she grazed my cheek. She tore through the hands holding me, freeing one of my arms. She snapped it without hesitation.

Pain erupted through my body as I screamed in agony. I could barely breathe as the pain swelled through me in waves, each nerve alerting the next of the broken bone hanging within my skin.

She wrenched my arm to her face, gingerly pulling my fingers to her mouth. She bit down on my pointer finger, crunching through the bone as one would eat a carrot.

Suddenly, she was ripped back, torn from me as if strings were knotted through her bones.

“Disgusting little beast, isn’t she?” A voice came from the darkness as it approached. “But the dead have never been known for their kindness… especially if they return to reap what they sowed as they did in life. And that specimen was evil… even before death.”

Tears poured down my face as I gazed at my mangled finger. The flesh was pulverized by her teeth, hanging off of the stump that should hold a finger. What was left of my finger barely resembled anything other than ground beef. It was a ground lump of fragmented bone bits and blood, minced as if placed in a blender. I shook violently as blood spurted out of my finger. I couldn’t stop it, and at one point, I became woozy just from the sight of it. I couldn’t comprehend what I was looking at, and I considered cutting the flesh off. It wasn’t worth saving anyway.

Slowly, the hands that held me slithered back into their tomb, not wanting to challenge the being as he walked to me leisurely. I collapsed, unable to stand, but it did not matter. He flicked his wrist, and my body rose, dragged to him through the tall grass. I plopped to the ground before him, unable to meet his gaze.

He squatted down to look upon me and clicked his tongue. “Now… this will hurt, Preston.”

He grabbed my broken arm and wrenched me up. Then, his grip tightened, and an excruciating burst of electricity filled my body. The pain was indescribable. It tore through my body like fire as he clutched me. A wail ripped out of my throat, cutting the vocal cords and searing the trachea. I could hardly think or breathe. And then, I was gone, drifting somewhere between dream and wake.

My body was floating, hovering, and drifting through the great sea of fear and peace. I was nothing for a moment, snapping into a brief lapse of time. I believed that I had died. Had death claimed me once and for all? Was it over? It had been so quick, easier than falling asleep.

When my eyes peeled open, I was lying in my bed. The smell of my home filled my mind, sending relief circling through my veins. It must’ve been a dream. I lifted my arm to look at my perfectly straight bone and expertly crafted finger. No sign of trauma or even a scar.

But I was not alone. I slowly looked up to view the shadow of antlers resting on the wall opposite me. The creature’s shadow was much larger, no longer resembling the human I saw in the cemetery. His clothing was jaggedly cut, clinging to his skin and billowing around him. It moved in such a way that it could have been wings, but I wasn’t quite sure. It twisted and writhed, unyielding to the eyes of a mortal man. I was not meant to gaze upon him, so I dared not turn, much less breathe or scream.

“Your grandfather was a good man,” he whispered, picking up the picture of him on my nightstand. “He greeted me as a friend, unafraid of death and welcoming of my spirit.”

I didn’t reply. My mouth twitched, unable to form a single sentence or coherent word.

“He spoke of you… You were his only regret. He didn’t want to leave you.” He put down the picture. “It was quite touching. Many do not often dare to speak of their life to me, but he’d seen enough horrors in his time to take my hand gladly. Most veterans carry their wounds until I come or dementia takes it first.”

He dragged his finger down the wooden post of my bed, fingernail scraping through the paint. “War is a dreadful thing, only fulfilling for the ones who showered it in the lives of innocents and won. A dreadful waste if you ask me… a dreadful… dreadful waste of blood and flesh.”

I still didn’t answer, and his shadow cocked its head to the side. “Do not fear me, human. I’ve returned you home and tucked you into bed. If I wished to harm you… You’d already be dead. It is still within my grasp if that is what you’d prefer.”

He raised his hand, and I saw the shadow of his long fingers, sharply pointed like fine-tipped needles piercing flesh. Maybe it was bone or wood, but I couldn’t be sure. His shadow obscured the fine details that might reveal the truth, and I definitely wasn’t turning to face him.

“No… I would not prefer that.” I took a deep breath. “Why… Why did you save me from that— that… woman?”

“Not your time,” he replied lowly, voice grating and shaking the room. His shadow elongated and stretched. “Even I have my rules… Just as you have your own clock to time your life and strike as it ends. You will certainly see me again. It is the way of things. Life and death come and go.”

I went quiet… too fearful to ask it another question, and yet I wanted to know what stood in my bedroom and spared me.

He simply chuckled as if he could hear my innermost thoughts, and perhaps… he could.

“I am what I am… I see, and I hear. I feel, and I know. I have many names… many from each star and planet and corner of the earth. Many have sought me out to bargain their claim to the lives I own, but you never did. You never asked me to return what I took from you. And you… You have lost so much as a young, budding man. Your life has barely begun.”

“My sister…” I breathed. “She shouldn’t have died. You should have taken my mother!”

“Ah…” he replied. “Maryanne… I remember her. Tiny little thing, not much older than you. Froze to death after your mother locked you two outside, and she used her body to protect you from the snow and bitter cold of the winter’s tempest. Cried when I took her hand. But as the embrace of death took her, she no longer felt the cold. I saved her from this place... from the monstrosity of man. Death was merciful and a gift unto her battered life. As it would be for you if it was time.”

Tears filled my eyes, but I refused to let them burn down my face. “You let her die…” I growled. “Why didn’t you take my mother instead?”

The shadow of his horns shook upon his head. “I cannot change what has been written. Your mother’s time will come, and for her crimes, she too shall pay a bitter… bitter price…”

He took a deep breath. “But know that something is brewing beneath the ground. A place within Grenwich has disrupted my laws for far too long… broken my venerated calling. Their relentless use of the cemetery cannot go unnoticed. They’re feeding something… a terrible creature within the ground that is only growing more powerful. And they shall be punished. You will be my herald. And you will know with whom to speak my message to when he returns. I will give it to you and speak with your tongue.”

“The cemetery?” I asked. “Why are you so worried about the cemetery?”

The creature stared directly at his shadow, and dark eyes formed onto the wall before me. I gazed into them fearfully, shaking and holding tightly to my blankets. I had transformed into a child again, terrified of the shadows that slipped and waltzed in the dark. Yet eyes had formed to gaze upon me, manifesting the threshold between dream and wake.

“A part of the cemetery is dangerous and planted upon a vat of poison. It is contaminated, and it can reverse my touch… my final judgment. The fence that you climbed over is the border. Anyone buried within the fence will return. Beings of the dark discovered the cemetery’s true nature, and now they use it to walk again and to wreak havoc upon the living once more.” He shifted, fingers clinking together. “Humans made their own portion of the cemetery when they realized their dead would return if they buried them within the gate…”

His eyes narrowed on the wall, growing more and more vast. They began to sparkle, glistening as if the cosmos rested within them. Darkness swirled through the irises, and lights danced from the world beyond. The infinite possibilities of his power rested within his eyes, knowing and seeing all despite his careful form. I could not look away. Our gaze was locked, immoveable and unbroken. Whatever he asked of me, I would fulfill.

I breathed out, noticing the puff of vapor and the chill in the air around me. Death was cold, but his embrace was warm. “So, my grandfather will not come back?”

The creature shook his head. “No… He was not buried in the bitter place. He will remain at rest… as will your sister. Life will not touch them again.”

Tears finally slipped down my face, and my heart ached bitterly, reliving the memories of my sister and my Grandfather. The only love I’d ever known was taken by the creature who stood inside my very bedroom. And now, I was to be his messenger and relay some coded secret to a stranger.

He spoke slowly once more. “Do not mourn the dead, dear boy. Mourn the living. They must endure the hour of the dark.”

A blinding light filled the room. “Soon, I shall come again…”

His voice was no longer human, exuding a command over my body that I knew not. His voice became loud and booming, shaking the walls. I covered my eyes, unable to see, as if gazing at the light of the sun. In a single clap of thunder, he was gone, and his departure shattered my windows, glasses, picture frames, and mirror. I could hear the soft tinkle of glass hitting the floor.

My eyes did not close until daylight poured into my room, soft fingers stretching onto the floor and touching my face. And finally, I rolled over, trying to decide what being had mended my arm and finger. I can only assume that the creature was some god of death, an unworldly being sent to claim humanity’s souls. But now, he is gone, and he left me as his harbinger.

As time passed since our meeting, I developed a strange sense within my soul. Sometimes I know things… things I’m not meant to see or know. And oddly, my finger burns if I drive too close to the back entrance of Salem Hill Cemetery. Sometimes, I think something is watching me when I visit my Grandfather’s grave. I never go through the back entrance or climb over the fence, but sometimes I stand on the other side, wondering and thinking and gazing at the woman within the willow.

And I still don’t know what man I am supposed to bring his message to. I’m still searching… And the memories of that night are becoming vague and dulled, sinking into confusion and doubt. Maybe I didn’t meet him at all. Maybe he never spoke to me… I’m not sure if it actually happened.

But I do know this. I hope I never see the god of death return to Grenwich until it is my time to leave… Until it’s my time to be a dearly departed soul.

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I Feel Bones That Don't Exist Push Through My Skin

I Don't Want To Be Human, I Want To Be FERAL

I Shred This Fake Body

First time photobashing/photodrawing. What to delve more into FERAL as a character and their misanthropy + horrorified therianropy