"She’s gone," I muttered, the words tasting bitter on my tongue. "That thing standing there isn’t Velra anymore."
Amelia’s grip tightened on her staff. "Then what is it?"
The firelight reflected in her wide eyes—orange and gold, flickering with fear. I didn’t answer. Because the truth was worse than anything she could imagine.
Velra moved.
No, twitched.
A sharp, unnatural motion—like a puppet yanked by tangled strings. Her head tilted to one side, neck cracking with an awful sound, and the flames that surrounded her pulsed as if breathing.
Then she smiled.
It wasn’t Velra’s smile. It was something wearing her face.
---
"A perfect body."
Velra’s words cut through the crackling air like a blade. Her tone was calm—melodic, even—but so empty it made my skin crawl.
"Infinite mana. Light, agile muscles. Hundreds of times better than the worthless original."
The way she said it—clinical, detached—sounded less like admiration and more like a scientist describing a specimen.
For a moment, silence stretched between us, broken only by the faint hiss of magic burning the snow at her feet.
That wasn’t Velra anymore.
It was the parasite—mocking her voice, puppeteering her grace, mimicking everything that had once made her... her.
I felt my jaw tighten. "You sound proud of yourself," I said, stepping forward. "But you’re not her. You’re just wearing her skin."
Velra—or whatever was inside her—tilted her head, the movement eerily precise, too deliberate to be human.
"Don’t you think so?" she asked softly, eyes gleaming like shards of molten gold.
"Ha," I exhaled, my voice sharp with disgust. "Who’s trying to gain sympathy from whom here? Do me a favor and get out of her body before I make you."
Her lips curved into a slow, deliberate smile—Velra’s smile, twisted into something cruel. "My, you sound almost possessive," she murmured. "Could it be... you’ve grown attached?"
I didn’t answer. My silence seemed to amuse her.
"You seem to care greatly for this woman," she continued, voice dipping into a mockery of affection. "How touching. But don’t worry—this is only a temporary vessel."
Her smile widened just enough to show the faint glint of fangs. "Once I kill you and take the throne meant for the Faceless King, this body—she—will no longer be necessary."
A flicker of red light rippled across her skin, veins glowing faintly beneath the surface like cracks in a furnace. Her hair, once golden and soft, burned at the ends, twisting upward as the air itself warped around her.
I stared at her—no, at it—and felt something heavy twist in my chest.
...And then she raised her hand rose lazily.
Whoosh—!
Flames twisted around Velra’s arm like living serpents before snapping forward in streaks of orange and gold.
Boom!
The blast hit a nearby hill, shaking the ground hard enough to rattle my teeth. Snow, dirt, and rock erupted skyward, turning into a storm of steam and fire. For an instant, the entire world glowed red—like we were standing inside the heart of a forge.
I exhaled slowly, lowering my stance, Amelia still pressed against my chest. The heat licked at my skin even from this distance.
’We were almost caught in that,’ I thought grimly.
That wasn’t ordinary fire magic. It was layered—element upon element, reaction upon reaction. Fire wrapped around combustion, laced with impact runes. A spell designed not to burn once, but to detonate in waves.
If I hadn’t recognized the pattern, we’d be nothing more than ash right now.
Velra—or rather, the monster wearing her shape—clicked her tongue. "Oh, you dodged that too?" Her voice dripped with a mock sweetness, her golden eyes gleaming like molten coins. "Impressive. But tell me..."
She raised her hand, firelight playing across her face. "...how long can you last, I wonder? Parasite bodies burn out fast, don’t they? And your little human heart—" her smile sharpened, cruel "—won’t last much longer."
I didn’t answer. Words wouldn’t reach her. The thing in front of me wasn’t Velra anymore. It was something born from her remains.
I gently set Amelia down behind the cover of a half-melted rock, her body trembling from the heat. My fingers tightened around my sword hilt.
"Lady Amelia," I said, not taking my eyes off the creature. "Take the soldiers and fall back. Now."
Her head jerked toward me. "What? Are you insane? You can’t take that thing on alone!"
"...Maybe not." I forced a crooked smile. "But I’ll have to figure something out."
Just like Alice before me, it was now my turn to hold the monster at bay.
Amelia stood frozen, torn between fear and reason. Her eyes darted from Velra’s blazing form to me, as if searching for an answer that didn’t exist.
"What are you hesitating for?!" I barked, forcing the words through gritted teeth.
"W–Wait!" she stammered, clutching her staff. "I’ll find someone who can help us—just hold on a little longer!"
It was the right call. The soldiers wouldn’t stand a chance against Velra—not like this.
Because this wasn’t Velra anymore.
The parasite hadn’t merely taken control. It had rebuilt her.
I could see it in every movement. The once-fatal wounds she’d carried were gone, erased as though they’d never existed. Her pale skin glowed faintly, pulsing with stolen life. Her eyes—once sharp and calculating—now burned with a feverish light, as if she were both alive and not at all.
The parasite’s work was thorough. Too thorough.
"To think you’d stand there chatting while I’m right in front of you..." Her lips curved into a mocking smile. "You’re awfully calm for someone about to die."
And then she moved.
The flames around her ignited all at once, bursting outward in wild arcs of color—red, blue, gold, even streaks of sickly green. The elements didn’t blend; they clashed, consuming one another in a frenzy of unstable brilliance.
The ground shuddered. The snow turned to steam. Cracks spiderwebbed through the frozen field beneath my boots, glowing with molten light from below.
I barely dodged the first wave, the searing air clawing at my coat as I rolled behind a fallen log. The next strike came immediately after—explosive, unpredictable, and too fast.
Velra’s hair whipped through the air, molten gold under the flickering chaos. Her silhouette blurred between the bursts of light—graceful, terrible, unstoppable.
She wasn’t just fighting. She was exulting.
Each step forward shattered the earth. Each gesture sent the world itself twisting under her power.
And for one brief, horrifying moment, I couldn’t look away.
Velra, the noble who once commanded fear through her elegance and restraint, now stood before me as something else entirely—something transcendent.
A goddess of ruin wrapped in fire and shadow.
And though I hated to admit it...
She was magnificent.
"Damn it," I muttered, tightening my grip on my sword as heat washed over me, "why do the worst monsters always wear the most beautiful faces?"
Velra’s gaze flicked toward me, her lips curling into a smirk.
"Because beauty," she said softly, "was always meant to destroy."
The next instant, she vanished—her form dissolving into a cyclone of flame and motion, bearing down on me with the full fury of something no longer bound by mortality.
The world became nothing but light and sound.
Flames exploded where she’d been a heartbeat ago, swallowing the night in a storm of color. The shockwave threw me backward, my boots dragging furrows through the melting snow as I barely managed to brace myself. Every nerve screamed. Every breath burned.
When my vision cleared, she was already there—right in front of me.
Velra’s hand shot forward, claws of fire curving through the air. I twisted aside, the heat grazing my cheek, close enough to singe a strand of hair. The ground erupted behind me, a wall of molten glass replacing where I’d been standing.
She didn’t give me time to breathe.
Another strike. Then another. Each faster than the last.
Her movements weren’t random—they were deliberate, surgical. The parasite wasn’t just lashing out; it was studying me, dissecting every dodge, every counter, like it was learning.
"You’re still holding back," she said, her voice smooth and terrible, the echo of Velra’s tone now hollow and metallic. "How quaint. Do you think hesitation makes you noble?"
I swung my sword upward, steel meeting fire. The impact rattled through my arms like lightning. Sparks flew. My knees buckled. But I held my ground.
"She wouldn’t want this," I snarled through clenched teeth. "Velra wasn’t a monster."
The creature tilted its head, eyes narrowing. "Wasn’t she?"
Before I could answer, she vanished again.
A blur of heat cut through the snowstorm.
There!
I dropped low just as her fist tore through the air above me. The shockwave cracked the ice underfoot.
My blade lashed upward in a counter—metal screaming against her burning forearm. For a moment, the fire dimmed, and I caught a glimpse of her skin underneath—cracked, fissured, bleeding light.
The parasite was pushing her body beyond its limits.
---
Author Note:
Thanks for reading my novel, I hope you liked it