The Creepy Statue

The air in the cathedral shifted, thickening with an unnatural chill.

Vastarael took a wary step back, his eyes narrowing as he scrutinized the final mural. The priestess's hollow gaze seemed to bore into him and for a fleeting moment, it almost felt like the painted figure was alive.

A loud CRACK echoed behind him.

He spun around just in time to see the massive statue of the goddess at the altar move—no, lunge—toward him with inhuman speed.

Its stone form, once so lifeless and still, now bore down on him with terrifying intent.

"What in the—?!"

Vastarael's instincts kicked in. With a single thought, he materialized a sapphire glaive, its crystalline surface glowing brilliantly in the dim cathedral light. He gripped the weapon tightly, bracing himself for impact.

The statue's stone arm swung toward him, its movement unnatural, as though it defied the laws of physics. Vastarael barely managed to raise the glaive to block the attack, but the force behind the blow was unlike anything he had faced before.

The glaive shattered upon impact, shards of sapphire scattering like fragments of light across the cathedral floor.

Vastarael was thrown backward, his boots skidding against the cracked tiles as he fought to regain his balance, his arms still vibrating from the sheer force of the attack.

"What is this thing?! It shattered my sapphire?"

The statue stood there for a moment, its head twisting unnaturally to one side as if sizing him up. Its blank, stone face showed no emotion, but the way it moved felt almost sentient.

Phaenora's holographic form flickered violently beside him, her voice shrill with panic.

[Veneri, get out of here! That's not a guardian, it's a cursed vessel! It's going to kill you!]

"We can't leave. We're in her domain."

Vastarael stood frozen for a fraction of a second, his mind still processing what had just happened. He had never encountered anything like this before, especially not with the sheer raw power the statue exuded.

He had always prided himself on the hardness and indestructibility of his sapphire creations. Yet, in an instant, that belief shattered. Not even a sapphire glaive could withstand the force of its unnatural attack. It was as though the very essence of the statue was made to destroy, to overwhelm, and to tear through the defenses of the divine.

He was still reeling from the attack when the statue's face twisted upwards, her head snapping at an impossible angle, her features contorting into an expression of grotesque anticipation. Her stone body creaked and groaned, the sound like ancient bones grinding together.

Then, she was gone.

In the next instant, she was directly in front of him, her claws, sharp like stone daggers, reached for him, ready to rip through his flesh.

The air itself seemed to freeze. Vastarael's body screamed at him to move, but his limbs felt like they were frozen in place. The distance between them was too short. His reaction time was too slow.

He barely had a moment to raise his hands, but it was already too late. His sapphire materialization fizzled under the pressure. The statue's claws slashed toward him, aiming straight for his chest.

Then it stopped.

The voice was deep, dripping with a hollow, disturbing femininity, like a broken record trapped in some otherworldly void.

"Oh, my..."

The voice coiled through the air, its tone dripping with malicious affection.

"You... you're so handsome. Your soul..."

Vastarael's heart skipped a beat as he felt an unexplainable chill crawl up his spine. His eyes widened in shock as he stared at the grotesque face of the statue, which had now morphed into something far worse than stone.

Her lips curled into a sickly smile, lips that were now not made of rock but of some dark energy, as if the very presence of her voice had given the inanimate form life.

"...it's so bright, so pure..."

The voice grew louder, suffused with an eerie, unbearable energy.

Vastarael could feel his chest tightening, his breath coming in ragged gasps. There was something wrong, something sinister about the way it spoke. The words felt like an invasion of his very soul, like the statue was trying to sink into him. His composure was starting to crack under the weight of this madness.

"What... are you?"

The statue's eyes, once stone cold and lifeless, now gleamed with an unnatural light, a black mist emanating from her. The smile on her face stretched wider, as if the horror of the moment was not enough.

Phaenora's holographic form flickered erratically beside him, her usually calm demeanor shattered, trembling with fear. Even she, the one who had seen and experienced countless horrors, even though she couldn't remember them, was unnerved by the presence of this creature.

[Veneri, you need to get out of there NOW! This thing... it's not a statue... It's a vessel, a cursed entity that devours souls! You can't let it touch you! If it gets close—]

The statue's claws reached out, the air growing thick with a palpable, cold dread.

"I want to see you… I want to feel your soul…"

And just when it seemed like the very fabric of reality itself might rip apart under the weight of the statue's haunting presence, the statue spoke one last, horrifying word:

"MINE…"

Vastarael barely had time to process the statue's twisted proclamation before it happened.

Hundreds of black souls surged from the very walls of the cathedral, pouring from cracks and gaps, emerging like a writhing sea of shadows.

Their forms were indistinct, amorphous, a mass of nightmarish figures with eyes full of hunger and desperation. They were moving faster than any mortal eye could track, racing toward him with an almost predatory speed.

He could hear their whispers, their wails, their screeches... the sound of tens of thousands of souls lost to time, cursed to linger in this wretched place. Each soul was a fragment of agony, an essence that had been torn from its original form, twisted into a hollow, mindless shell.

Vastarael's instincts screamed at him. This was beyond anything he had ever encountered. This was an entire army of souls, borne from the horrors of the past.

An entire army, fueled by hate, sorrow, and despair.

In that moment, Vastarael did something he never thought he would need to do.

He reached within himself, deep into his essence, where his Divine Weapon resided.

Calimostria was a double-bladed glaive, forged from the very essence of the divine and imbued with powers far beyond mortal comprehension. It had never been summoned in this life, not until now.

As Vastarael extended his hand, the air itself trembled. The ground beneath him seemed to quake in reverence, and the glaive appeared in his grip.

At first, it was colorless, a weapon born from nothing, gleaming with a faint, ethereal light. But as soon as it materialized, it turned sapphire blue, the same color as his energy, his essence...

Calimostria.

The glaive was massive, its dual blades shimmering with a mystical, sapphire glow. Vastarael gripped the weapon with both hands, his stance solidifying into a perfect form. His expression hardened, his golden eyes flashing with determination and cold fury.

"I won't let you take me. My Bane really is troublesome..."

The black souls charged.

Vastarael raised Calimostria high, feeling the immense weight of its power surge through his veins.

With a powerful swing, he unleashed a wave of sapphire energy that radiated outward, cutting through the very fabric of reality. The souls collided with it, but they were torn apart by the sheer force of the attack. Each swipe of the double blades sent shockwaves through the air.

He was using the Phase Slash enchantment of the weapon.

The souls screamed as they were shredded into nothingness, their forms vanishing into thin air as they collided with the blinding sapphire force. The air boomed with the sound of shattering souls, their black forms dissipating with every swing.

But even as he fought back, the swarm was endless. For every soul he destroyed, another took its place.

Vastarael's body was moving with unbelievable speed as he cut through the sea of souls, his double blades moving like lightning, cutting through the darkness. Calimostria danced through the air but espite his massive essence amount, he felt himself slowing. His energy, though immense, was still finite. And the souls were relentless.

Their hunger was infinite.

He could feel Phaenora's voice in his mind, her panic seeping through the connection.

[Veneri! You have to get out of there! It's too much! You can't fight all of them!]

But there was no time to listen.

The statue reappeared, now standing in the center of the cathedral, her face twisted in a malicious smile. Her eyes locked with Vastarael's and her voice whispered once again.

"Such beauty... So much power... I can feel your soul... and it's mine..."

Vastarael narrowed his eyes, his grip tightening around the shaft of Calimostria. He didn't have time for this. He didn't have time to be mesmerized by her words.

With a roar, he charged toward the statue, his sapphire glaive cutting through the air with incredible speed.

As the distance between him and the statue closed, he leapt into the air, his body glowing with divine light, and brought Calimostria down in a savage strike. The energy from the glaive exploded outward, carving through the air like a storm.

It did no damage at all.

"Such a brave soul... I'm liking you more and more!"