"Hah…Hah…Hah!"
Harsh, ragged breaths echoed through the narrow alleys, barely audible over the pounding footsteps.
A girl ran, her short black and crimson hair matted with filth and blood.
She looked ragged, her face smeared with dirt, her limbs trembling with exhaustion, but she didn't stop.
She couldn't stop.
In her arms, another girl of a similar age, hung limply, unconscious.
Blood and mud caked her frail form, but the worst of it was far more gruesome. One of her arms was missing, torn clean off at the shoulder.
Among the gashes and bruises that marred her body, one wound stood out than others, it was a gory wound carved into her belly, still oozing thick streams of blood.
The girl holding her gritted her teeth, tightening her grip. Her voice came out hoarse, desperate.
"JJ-ust hold out a little, Sera. Please, please, just hold out a little more. Y-You have to stay alive."
Her breath hitched.
Suddenly, a sharp whistle sliced through the air.
She jerked to the side on instinct.
*Swishh*
Something blurred past her, something fast, a force she couldn't even register before.
*CRASH!*
A streetlight exploded in front of her. The thick metal pole snapped like brittle wood, its top half sent spinning through the air before slamming into a nearby wall with a screech of twisted metal.
Sparks rained down, hissing against the wet pavement. The impact left a deep, jagged trench in the concrete where it had landed, the pathway split open from the sheer force.
The girl didn't look back.
Didn't dare to.
Cursing under her breath she ran harder, ignoring the fire in her legs, the sting of the cold night air against her wounds.
Finally, the alley opened up.
A deserted lot stretched before her, empty and silent, save for the flickering of a single dying streetlamp.
And there, at the very end of it, stood a massive, rusting gate. Its iron bars were sealed shut, chained and bolted, left untouched for years.
She barely hesitated.
Without breaking stride, she launched herself into the air.
With inhuman strength, she cleared the towering gate in one bound, still clutching Sera in her arms. Her feet barely hit the ground before she pushed forward again, sprinting.
Then—
*BOOM.*
The gate behind her exploded.
A deafening blast sent metal shrapnel flying in all directions. The ground shook beneath her feet as the shattered remains of the gate hurtled toward her.
Her breath caught.
She twisted her body, just barely dodging as the warped iron bars crashed behind her, demolishing the pavement where she had stood moments before.
The shockwave sent dust and debris billowing into the air, momentarily blinding her.
But she had no time to recover.
A sharp whistle rang out again-
This time, from the front.
Her ruby colored eyes widened.
A figure stood before her.
It remained hunched and rigid. Wrapped in torn patchwork garments made from so many different fabrics that it barely resembled a person.
The cowl obscured the majority of its face, but she could see its breath—ragged, sluggish, a sound too deep, too strange.
Its stance was awkward, with arms dangling at an odd, unnatural angle and fingers twitching.
It had not been there a moment ago.
She didn't get a chance to move.
A crushing force crashed into her.
Her world blurred—
Then she was airborne.
Walls shattered around her as she crashed through the abandoned building, her body colliding with one, two, three layers of solid concrete before finally coming to a brutal halt.
*Swoshh*
The impact sent a wave of dust and rubble cascading around her.
The lifeless girl in her arms was ripped from her grasp as they tumbled into the wreckage.
—----
For a moment, there was total stillness.
But soon it was broken by heavy footfalls that emerged from beyond the morbid destruction.
A shadow appeared from the dust and debris, advancing slowly and deliberately towards the broken part of the building wall.
The being's face was covered under a hideous crimson mask that appeared to be carved from crusted blood.
The unnerving mask's texture looked uneven, with thick layers of coagulated red fused together, creating the illusion of solid flesh that still seeped at the edges.
Its surface moved, almost as if breathing, and veins pulsed as the monstrous being inhaled deeply.
It tore through heavy debris with effortless strength, clearing its path until its gaze fell on the unconscious girl laying broken amidst the rubble.
Blood pooled beneath her, her body battered and coated in a layer of dust and grime.
The figure's dreadful scarlet irises shone with insanity, fixated on the exposed, ripped flesh of its victim. Its hands trembled and twitched uncontrollably.
Saliva leaked through the holes of its mask, dripping into the earth beneath as its breathing became uneven.
Hunger twisted its movements, slow at first, savouring the moment before squatted low, head dropping forward like a beast about to eat.
Then, without hesitation, it ripped into her flesh.
The horrible sound of shredding muscle and cracking sinew filled the air.
The thing shuddered in excitement, letting out a guttural sound as the taste of warm, raw flesh and blood filled its tongue.
It savoured the feeling of pure, unadulterated bliss rushing through its perverse veins.
And then—
*BOOOMMM!!*
A destructive force smashed into its cranium.
The impact was lethal, a devastating explosion of pain and force, as if a wrecking ball had smashed into its entire skull.
The thing's world twisted.
Its vision clouded.
And its body was tossed like a ragdoll, slamming through many walls and cracking concrete with each impact.
"..."
A moment of quiet settled all over.
But as the dust dispersed, she appeared.
Her red-black hair whipped in the air, strands tangled with blood and grime. Her face, distorted veins pulsing through her torn features, held no trace of fear, only something far darker.
She moved, focussing exclusively on the unconscious girl in front of her.
The demonic being she had just sent flying was no longer present in her consciousness.
She knelt alongside her, scrutinising the jagged, ripped area of her shoulder where the creature had feasted.
Blood saturated her shredded garments, and the cut was raw and deep.
She slowly and gently carried the unconscious girl in her arms, taking her to a more stable area of the wrecked edifice. She leaned her against the wall, her breathing irregular, as she watched her chest rise and fall slowly and unsteadily.
Unexpectedly, she heard a faint murmur.
It was soft and weak.
"Nyx…"
Her breath hitched.
Sera's fingers twitched, barely lifting before falling limply against the debris-strewn ground.
A quiet plea left her lips.
"Run...away..."
Nyx stilled.
For a moment, she simply stared.
Then, she let out a soft chuckle. Not out of amusement, but something far more bitter.
"We should have listened to our mother, Sera." She muttered.
Her trembling fingers brushed against her sister's dirt-streaked cheek, a fleeting touch, as if to reassure her.
"But, don't worry,… I'll be back."
She rose to her feet.
And then—
The warmth in her eyes curdled into something else.
Then-
Her eyes changed.
Her irises flared into a sharp, unnatural red.
The whites darkened to black, and thin crimson veins crept outward, branching into the skin around them like cracks in glass.
An iciness spread through her veins as the realization settled in.
That thing had eaten her sister's flesh.
Nyx's fingers clenched into a fist.
"How... dare you sink your filthy fangs into my sister?"
The words barely escaped her lips, yet it was laced with pure, undiluted hatred.
Her expression twisted.
Then, her gaze snapped toward the ruined wall where the creature had been flung.
The rubble shifted and a deep, eerie chuckle echoed.
"Hahh… So the other also bites back…. How adorable, little ghoul."
The voice was guttural, something not meant to be spoken by anything human.
As the dust cleared, its form slowly came into view.
And for the first time, Nyx saw it.
Its tattered clothing had been shredded from the impact, revealing its bare, grotesque visage.
Its face was a nightmare.
Skin stretched and warped, as if multiple mouths had fused together into one horrifying grimace.
Rows of jagged teeth jutted out at unnatural angles, grinding together in a sickening symphony of clacks and clicks.
Its elongated arms twitched, clawed fingers flexing, their blackened veins pulsating with something deeply, unnervingly wrong.
A sickly stench of blood and rot clung to its form.
It was a corrupted being.
A monster beyond reason.
And yet, despite its nightmarish form—
Despite the way it licked its fractured lips, savoring the taste of her sister's blood—
Nyx's fingers trembled as they curled inward, trembling, until her nails dug into her own palm.
Tighter.
Blood seeped between her clenched fingers.
She didn't step back.
Instead, she took a step forward.
Her back quivered.
A faint tremor ran through her body, muscles tensing as something began to stir beneath her skin.
Then, a gradual trickle of dark, thick blood seeped from underneath her shoulder blades, coating the shredded pieces of her clothes.
The flow increased.
Her ripped shirt clung to her skin for a brief period before becoming soaked, the fibres darkening as something beneath shifted.
The flesh rippled abnormally, as if something within was crawling forward.
Then it surfaced.
Dark crimson tendrils slithered outward, emanating from flesh rather than bone or metal.
A dreadful yet mesmerising, moving mass, viscous in form, as if her own blood had begun to solidify, taking shape at her whim.
The writhing mass wrapped around her right arm and blended with her skin, becoming a natural extension of her body rather than a distinct entity.
It pulsed, it expanded and then it took form.
The amorphous flesh twisted and formed into something more definite, wrapping around her arm and fingers in a hideous, thorn-covered armour.
Thick bloody spines jutted forward, their tips glistening wet and sharp, as if they were designed to easily cut through flesh.
Nyx lifted her arm, fingers stretching, feeling the odd weight and raw strength rushing through her veins.
Then she tightened her fist.
The thorny mass tightened around her, shifting in reaction—alive, waiting, and hungry.
She stretched her arm towards the demonic being and motioned.
"Come here bastard."
—--
A/N: Oh God, everytime, I write scenarios like these with good music, it excites me.