Deep within the forest, beneath the strangled roots of the ancient ceiba trees—where madness had devoured reason—something writhed.
Entombed in an egg of bloody flesh, Venemaris trembled violently.
The pulsing shrine around him throbbed like an exposed heart, built from the bodies of frenzied beasts whose minds had shattered under corrupted divinity. Their stolen essence coursed through swollen red-blue veins, twitching as if alive.
The land itself was sick.
Once-proud ceiba trees—giants that had stretched toward the heavens—now stood hollowed and skeletal. Their claw like branches scratched at the sky, their roots exuding a thick, tar-like ichor that seeped into cracked earth.
Above the shrine, a cloud of black swirled.
Drawn to the reeking gore, millions of flies beat against the silence in a maddening, droning hum. Their sound echoed through the dead forest like a chant of decay.
This place, once a sanctuary of life, had rotted into an open wound—an infected scar on the world. A place no sane creature dared approach. A realm where the air itself curdled.
The corruption spread outward in slow, creeping tendrils, suffocating everything it touched.
It was a venomous maw widening its bite—
a desecration so profound only the most deranged of the evil gods could have birthed it.
At its center, Venemaris shivered…
growing. A grotesque transformation was unfolding inside the pulsing mass.
Within, Tomás—the man who had willingly surrendered himself to this fate—began his final descent into the ravaged mind of Venemaris. Whatever remained of his humanity withered, peeling away beneath the cruelty of the evil god he worshiped.
Yet as his body twisted and his soul eroded, a dream—sweet and deceitful—wrapped around his breaking mind. It lulled him into a fragile, false hope.
There was only fog.
Swirling gray obscured everything except three figures seated around a wooden box, eating. The wet crunching of their food filled the silence, louder than the faint, muffled attempts at conversation. Their faces were blank—featureless skin stretched tight over skulls. Only a small ripple marked where a mouth ought to be.
The scene looped endlessly, bizarre and empty—
a painting left unfinished.
Then, the flesh over one "mouth" split with a sickening rip.
Green, slit pupils glared out from behind torn skin. Bloody, jagged teeth pushed through the shredded face, and leathery wings burst from a spine that cracked under the pressure. Its scream curdled the fog.
Pain.
Nothing but pain as the creature's body was ripped open and remade.
The two sitting across from it began to melt—faces sagging, bodies running like wax—until they reshaped into a young woman. Beautiful, familiar. Long brown hair streamed down her back, her honey-brown eyes full of mischief and warmth.
In her arms, she held a wailing infant tucked close to her breast.
A single, heart-rending cry tore through the dream, shaking its fragile reality.
Then silence.
Only the crunching continued—growing sharper, faster, as though feeding on the grief.
The creature thrashed, chained by invisible restraints. Panic flared through its warped mind. It reached toward the young mother, desperate, pleading—
But the moment its twisted claws brushed her cheek, black tar erupted from its skin.
The ooze crawled over her, over the wailing child, swallowing both in a suffocating tide. They sank without a sound.
The world seized.
A crack tore across the fog.
A howl burst through—the creature's own—shaking as the ever-present crunching grew deafening.
Then the dream dissolved into the true nightmare.
A colossal bloody maw ascending from below, its fangs grinding into the creature's malformed body. The mouth chewed leisurely, almost gleefully, savoring every convulsion of agony between its teeth.
The abomination shrieked, flailing helplessly as its suffering completed the twisted ritual Venemaris demanded. Creating the final piece of its deformed mind from the reminder of its humanity.
Tomás—whatever was left of him—sank deeper into the god's hunger.
With a wet, resonant plop, Venemaris tore free from the fleshy mass. Its new, slender winged form slithered out of its own dripping placenta, trembling and slick. Tufts of feathers clung down its spine, overlaying blue-green scales from the feathered crest on its skull to the fan of plumes flaring at the tip of its tail.
Like a newborn, Venemaris dropped helplessly to the pulsing floor, unable to control the unfamiliar shape it had been remade into. The absence of legs confused its young, fractured mind. It shook its red-green feathers free of bloodied chunks and attempted to rise again, lifting itself with the awkward leverage of its long body and tail.
The hybrid form—serpent, bird, and human—was grotesque, unstable. For a long while it practiced. Like a malformed hatchling, it flapped its raw, slick wings, testing their weight, their strength, learning the limits of tendons not yet fully hardened.
Only when most of that morning had passed in painful, instinctive study did Venemaris finally slither from the underground shrine, wings wrapped tight around itself like a vibrant, feathered cloak.
It moved with deliberate purpose through the forest, silent as venom sliding through a vein. Its forked tongue flicked the air, tasting the absence. The animals that once crowded these woods had fled after the many massacres committed in its name. Their blood, flesh, and terror had been worthy sacrifices—small offerings to prepare the world for its new form. A noble purpose, it thought. Their lowly lives should be grateful to have been used so well.
Venemaris smiled. A thirst—feral, gnawing—itched at the back of its throat. Saliva dripped from between its teeth, each drop sizzling into whatever it touched.
It thought of the chosen and hungered.
At last, it reached the outskirts of the village of Bahía Oscura. Cautiously, like a shadow gaining weight, it circled the perimeter. Children ran laughing between the houses, chasing friends or tumbling with pets. Adults labored, distracted and unguarded, never once noticing the presence that watched them from the tree line.
Though tempted by the small, tempting morsels, Venemaris moved on. It sought only the chosen—the protectors of this community. The only prey that mattered.
Not until evening bled into sunset did it find one. A chosen returning from the forest with a group of exhausted men, their clothes stained with sweat and dirt. They carried no weapons. This pleased Venemaris.
Yet it still did not dare approach.
The life-fire nurtured in the cuauhxicalli would protect the village. Scouring his corrupted divinity, burning away the divinely tainted marrow of his being. Even one chosen could weaken him—perhaps fatally, if he misjudged.
No.
It would wait.
Stalk them from the dark. Until the moment they finally strayed. Falling helplessly into its venomous claws.
At least, that was what Venemaris believed—right up until great violence shattered the moment.
A flaming punch exploded against its cheek, magenta fire rippling outward in concentric waves. The sacred blaze swallowed its body, turning its feathers and scales into crackling fuel. Bone crunched beside its own skull as more blows followed, each strike punctuated by bursts of unnatural flame.
The sweet scent of Venemaris' own burning flesh filled the air. The fire clung to him like a living parasite, refusing release, feeding on his essence. His regeneration faltered under its vicious hunger. He could do nothing but endure as Jimena pressed the assault.
She punched him again and again—left, right, left—without technique, only raw fury and power. Her flames writhed inside her, snapping against her gem like a beast desperate to escape and feast. Obsidian armor crawled over her body, plates locking into place as her magenta fire surged higher.
The pitiful creature before her was engulfed entirely. The wicked flames latched on, refusing to die until their victim was wholly consumed.
Venemaris shrieked—a ragged, voiceless hiss. His feathered cloak burned to the bone. His face sagged in disfigured patches where fire ate through scale and seared exposed flesh. If not for the increasing sweetness in the air—proof his blood sacrifices still fueled him—he feared he would die here, slain by this furious little girl.
With instinct alone guiding him, Venemaris opened his ruined jaws and vomited a cloud of noxious gas. Jimena collapsed mid-swing, her final punch nearly crushing his skull. Her wicked fire continued sizzling into his recovering flesh, each regrowth instantly blackening.
He did not retaliate. He fled.
Or tried.
Jaime slammed into him from the side, pinning his tail beneath his heel. With a single brutal swing of his macuahuitl, he severed Venemaris' arm.
Venemaris shrieked and belched more gas. Jaime dodged, but underestimated its blood. A single splash hit him—and the boy froze, collapsing face-first into the dirt.
Under different circumstances, Venemaris might have delighted in his stunned expression. But fear gnawed at him now. His god-given will surged, forcing his body to regenerate, draining the last stores of sacrificed divinity. The magenta fire still clinging to him devoured each new cell, sending curls of smoke upward from his diminishing life.
He fled again—only to be cut off by the final chosen.
The one he'd been hunting all along.
Something primal snapped awake. His pupils tightened to predatory slits. Every instinct demanded he lunge, tear, consume. But the rational shard left in his twisted mind held him back. He would survive this pain. He would repay it.
Slowly, cautiously, he edged toward the treeline, never breaking eye contact. Only once he slipped out of sight did he collapse, forcing his ravaged body to regenerate faster.
He barely rested a heartbeat before continuing. The chosen was pursuing him—he could feel it. Hissing through the pain, he dragged himself onward, ignoring the peeling flakes of his charred flesh.
He slithered—weak, but driven. Corrupted faith thundered in his heart.
Then pain struck again.
Marisol barreled into him, tackling the creature to the forest floor. He writhed, paralyzed by the fire still gnawing at his wounds.
"Tomas," she said softly—calling to a ghost. To a man long devoured.
He hissed a warning, empty and frail.
Then opportunity arrived. The girl stepped closer, and men approached with nets and ropes. Children—always too trusting.
Venemaris lunged upward and expelled a thick burst of gas. Marisol resisted, obsidian armor snapping around her as her divinity purified the toxin attempting to invade her lungs.
Some hunters fell instantly, dropping where they stood as the narcotic fog drifted over them. Others fired from a distance—their obsidian-tipped arrows weak, but dangerous in his condition.
As he escaped into the trees, he cast one final glance back at the staggering Marisol. Her throat—so close, so fragile—lay within reach.
But the glow of her armor intensified, warning him back.
He slithered away, wounded and trembling.
He would survive.
And he would repay this pain.