She walked barefoot through a long corridor of red velvet walls.
There were no windows. No sound. Only the soft squelch of wet paint beneath her feet. Each step left a bare footprint. Each breath felt like it might stain the silence.
Portraits lined the walls. All of her.
Her crying. Her laughing. Her naked. Her dying.
Some were torn. Some were bleeding. One canvas showed her mouth open in a moan—but the moan came from the frame itself, like it was alive and hungry.
And then she saw him.
Heian stood at the end of the corridor, shirtless, his hands dripping with crimson—not blood. Not paint. Something in between. The scent was sharp, erotic, like iron kissed with rosewater.
He said nothing.
Just lifted a brush from a jar of red and pointed to the wall beside him—a blank canvas, pulsing like skin.
"You haven't painted me yet," she whispered.
"Because I haven't broken you yet," he replied.
She stepped closer.
With every step, her clothes fell away like ash. By the time she reached him, she was completely bare. Exposed. Her body pale against the screaming red around her.
He dipped the brush again.
Instead of painting the canvas, he dragged it across her thigh. The bristles left a wet trail along her skin, warm and trembling.
She gasped.
Then he painted her shoulder, her breast, her lips. Each stroke was tender. Violent. Holy.
"What are you doing to me?" she breathed.
"I'm making you permanent."
She tilted her head back. Her skin glowed like lacquer. Her breath came in trembles. Her thighs slick with unnamed desire.
The last thing she saw before she woke was the new canvas:
Her own body crucified in color, head thrown back, eyes wild with ecstasy—
and in the corner, the title written in smeared red:
"Even Her Death Is Me."
—