Elena's lantern was gone, shattered on the floor. Only the faint red glow from the priest's eyes lit the nave now. It painted the corpses in the pews like figures bathed in hellfire.
The choir had fallen silent, kneeling, their heads bowed toward the figure at the altar. Only their ragged, wet breathing filled the church, every inhale and exhale like air forced through torn flesh.
Elena pressed herself against the pulpit, her heart hammering. Her skin crawled as the priest approached. His footsteps made no sound, though his body dragged as if bones ground against each other inside.
When he spoke, his voice wasn't a single tone. It was hundreds—men, women, children—all screaming and whispering at once.
"You disturbed the hymn," he rasped. "You bled upon the book. You are bound to it now."
Elena shook her head. "I don't belong here. I'm just—"
His face twisted into something like a smile, though his lips tore as he did. Black worms spilled from the cracks, writhing down his chin.
"You are chosen," the voices chorused. "You will drink, and you will sing."
From beneath his robes, he pulled a chalice. Its silver was tarnished black, its rim lined with jagged cracks. It was filled with a thick, bubbling liquid that steamed as if boiling, though no heat rose from it. The smell made Elena gag—copper and rot, like old blood left in a grave.
The priest lifted it toward her.
"One sip," he said, "and you will join the choir. Your voice will echo for eternity. No pain. No fear. Only song."
She backed away. "And if I refuse?"
The priest's many voices rose into a hiss. "Then you will scream. And your screams will feed Him."
The ground shuddered beneath her feet.
From the cracks in the stone floor, hands erupted—gray, skeletal hands, their nails long and jagged. They clawed their way upward, dragging broken bodies with them.
The congregation beneath the church.
They crawled forward on shattered limbs, ribs splitting as they bent unnaturally. Their jaws hung open, some with tongues missing, others with throats slit wide. One dragged itself by its spine, the rest of its body flopping behind like a puppet without strings.
The priest extended the chalice again.
"Drink… or feed Him."
Elena's hands trembled. She felt the weight of the church pressing in, the corpses closing around her, the hymn building again in their throats.
Her eyes darted upward.
There—in the shadows of the roof—the rope.
The bell rope, dangling down from the tower.
She remembered the villagers' words: The bells ring to call Him. The bells bind Him.
Her only chance.
The priest followed her gaze.
His voices broke into laughter—hundreds of voices, shrill and guttural at once. "Ah… you think the bell will save you? Foolish child. The bell does not save. The bell feeds."
The choir lurched to their feet, their mouths opening, throats tearing as the hymn returned—louder, sharper, blood spraying from their lips.
The priest's voice thundered above it all:
"Ring the bell, and you will not silence us. You will awaken Him!"
Elena turned, running for the stairs that spiraled upward into the tower.
The priest's laughter chased her.The corpses followed.And with each step, the ground shook harder, as if something monstrous beneath the church was already stirring.