---- "Lavinia, this is the light that represents our families, the ce youve always lived in.


    But Im different..." he said suddenly, a seriousness in his voice that made me tense.


    "Pm the shadow thats always watched you from the darkness, the one that craves to devour you," he whispered against my mouth, his voice strange and distorted.


    I swallowed, heart ready to burst out of my chest, but I wasnt scared...


    not yet.


    "We can stop.


    Ill stop the second you ask me to.


    But if you say yes, I promise I''ll take you to the wildest madness... He smiled in that way that hypnotized me.


    Goddess, Id never seen him smile, and that look would be my downfall.


    He stepped back a few paces, and I suddenly felt so alone.


    Everything around us started to shift.


    The warm lights turned into shadows stretching into everyer, ck stains infecting the dance.


    The familiar faces sank into the darkness surrounding us, the whispers, the strange voices...


    ah!" I let out a choked cry, stepping back as the floor began to vanish, like some infection spreading over the tiles.


    Below our feet was a bottomless abyss, suffocating, and only T ---- remained on a patch of solid ground.


    "Laziel..." called out in fear. He stood a few feet away, his feet floating over nothing, chaos stretching out around us.


    "Come, Lavinia, trust me.


    Let me show you my world," he said, reaching out.


    I stared wide-eyed at his fingers.


    1 felt myself sinking into a dark hole, strange things moving above our heads.


    Was I ready to cross that veil? What was waiting on the other side? My instincts screamed danger, that I still had time to turn back.


    But my soul pushed me forward.


    Treached out my hand and stepped to the edge "Come closer..." "No,e.


    Come, Lavinia..." And I did. My foot stepped into the void, without even daring to look down.


    I felt fear and excitement...


    another step...


    and another...


    I started to smile, shocked that I was walking on nothing.


    Laziel was showing me a kind of magic so powerful and pure I had never known.


    ---- But just as I was about to touch his fingers...


    "LAZIEL! AAAHHH!" I stepped wrong and felt myself falling into the abyss.


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