Exactly at the stroke of midnight, the wind howled like a cry from the underworld as Vincent and Charlotte stepped into the abyss of the thick forest. They were cloaked in black from head to toe, garments woven with the essence of darkness itself. Their lanterns glowed dimly, barely piercing through the suffocating shadows that surrounded them. The forest was alive, but not with life—with spirits.
Every step they took echoed with the cries of the night. The chirping of birds turned into shrill whispers, trees twisted unnaturally as though they had eyes, and the howls of beasts carried voices that sounded too human to be animals. A serpent slithered across their path, its eyes glowing red—not a warning, but a greeting. But Vincent and Charlotte did not flinch. They were not humans. They were vampires—predators of the night.
The path became narrower and darker as they moved forward. Soon, they reached a corridor of trees whose branches formed a claw-like canopy, blocking even the moonlight. The dirt path beneath their feet became sticky, then slick, and then—they saw it. Blood. A long stream of it ran through the path like a cursed river. The scent of iron filled the air, thick and suffocating. Without hesitation, they removed their shoes and stepped barefoot into the blood, letting it soak their soles. It was a rite of passage. A toll for passage into the realm of the damned.
A sudden clang—they had arrived. Charlotte's foot knocked against a rusted bowl with a skeletal hand resting atop it. The bones clattered and a voice whispered from the shadows, "Enter..."
They stepped through a crooked, vine-covered archway into the heart of horror. Witches gathered in a perfect circle, all barefoot, dressed in robes made of shadows and dried flesh. Their eyes were pitch black, hollow yet piercing. Their faces were painted with ash and blood, mouths twisted in cruel smiles. Some floated, some crawled like insects, some merely watched with necks turned in impossible angles.
At the center of their gathering, a fire blazed—green and blue, unnatural. All around it were symbols drawn in blood and bones, glowing with a pulsating red light. Human skeletons decorated the trees and hung from the branches like twisted ornaments. But they were not dead. Not really. These were the cursed soldiers of the underworld, cursed to serve in eternal torment. They moved slowly, twitching, eyes glowing as they guarded the ritual space.
In iron cages hanging above them were trapped souls—shrieking, wailing spirits caught in their final moments, forced to relive their death endlessly.