As Selma got a much closer look at Julius, while holding her mouth since she was terrified that she was going to scream—

—she saw so many different things that had happened to his body.

There were so many injuries and wounds that looked so grotesque.

But what struck her the most right now was the fact that his lungs did not look like normal lungs at all.

Along with Luna, she had seen some anatomy books of how lungs are supposed to be.

They were supposed to be red spongy things.

But Julius’s lungs weren’t completely red. Instead, part of his lungs were actually golden in color.

No, rather than golden, it was like an amber that was spreading here and there, almost as if it was a disease.

Selma tried to think in her mind where she saw such a thing before.

It looked extremely similar to something...

And then she got it!

A honeycomb. It was actually a honeycomb. Part of Julius’s lungs had turned into a honeycomb!

Selma thought in her mind, ’What is going on? How is this even possible? Is this what happens when you have your body cut open like this?’

She didn’t know how to make sense of it at all. The body would simply rot if it left like this.

But instead, Julius’s body had honeycombs inside of it.

As she stood there frozen—a tiny movement caught her eye inside one of the golden cavities.

Wriggle!

It wasn’t the normal rise and fall of his breathing. It was a wiggling motion inside one of the honey cells.

For a split second, a tiny, pale white point poked out from the golden wax before sliding back in.

She rubbed her eyes, telling herself the flickering light was messing with her.

But as she stared at the next cell, it happened again.

Wriggle!

A small, pale shape pushed through the sticky fluid, followed by another right next to it.

A sick desire to know the truth took over.

Reaching a shaking hand toward the table, her fingers closed around a surgical knife.

She brought the handle back to the hanging body, her breath catching. Using the blunt, flat end of the handle, she gently tapped the edge of the golden lung tissue where the white shapes had appeared.

It was the biggest mistake of her life.

The moment the metal touched the organ, a sharp vibration went through Julius’s internal system.

The unconscious elf flinched violently, a low, pathetic groan coming from his throat—

"Ahh..."

—a sound so hollow he didn’t even sound human anymore.

He didn’t have the vocal cords to scream, but his entire limbless body began to shake and wiggle against the metal hooks in pure agony.

And because his body was shaking, the twisted ecosystem inside his chest woke up!

Under Selma’s horrified gaze, the hundreds of geometric holes in his golden lungs suddenly started bubbling with life.

The cells erupted. Not one, not two, but a massive, squirming wave of hundreds of tiny, white, worm-like bugs started drilling and tunneling their way out of his living flesh, disturbed by the vibration!

They poured from the honeycomb structures in a disgusting, moving blanket.

Selma’s vision went blurry as she recognized the creatures.

Maggots!

His living, breathing lungs were completely infested with hundreds of crawling maggots!

They were swarming through the amber wax, crawling over his breathing tissue in a thick layer of white bugs.

The sight broke her completely. Her legs gave out, and she fell backward onto the dirt floor, frantically scrambling away on her hands and knees as she whimpered in absolute terror.

"No, no, please, no..."

In that single second, she finally understood why even Nyx had been terrified.

This wasn’t just torture.

It was...transformation. Desecration. Something far beyond mere punishment.

But just as she genuinely felt like she was about to pee herself out of sheer terror—

"Selma."

The voice came from behind her, calm, conversational.

She spun around, her heart leaping into her throat.

Luca stood right behind her, his hands clasped behind his back, a small, polite smile on his face.

He looked exactly as he always did—handsome, confident, gentle.

But in that moment, surrounded by the horror he had created, he looked like the most terrifying thing Selma had ever seen.

"L-Luca." She stammered, backing away until she hit the wall. "I...I was just..."

"Curious." He finished for her, his smile never wavering. "I understand. Curiosity is natural."

He took a step forward, and she flinched.

Noticing her fear, his smile softened, becoming almost pitying.

"Let me help you." He said and snapped his fingers.

Instantly, the overwhelming terror vanished.

The trembling stopped. The nausea receded. Her racing heart slowed to a steady, calm rhythm.

It was as if someone had poured cold water over her frayed nerves, smoothing them out, calming them down.

She looked at her hands—steady.

Felt her breathing—even.

The horror was still there in the room with her, but her reaction to it had been...turned off. Like a switch flipped in her mind.

"What did you do?" She whispered, looking up at him.

"The Sacred Mark." He said, taking another step closer. "It doesn’t just let me stimulate pleasure. It lets me...regulate. Emotions. Reactions."

He gestured to Julius. "You were having a normal response to an abnormal situation. I simply...adjusted your response."

Selma processed this, her mind struggling to reconcile the terror she’d felt moments before with the eerie calm she felt now.

"So you can...you can make me feel anything?"

"Panic? Happiness? Sadness? You can control my emotions?"

"Technically, yes." Luca admitted, his expression thoughtful. "I have access to your entire nervous system. Your endocrine system. Every chemical that makes you feel what you feel."

But then he shook his head, his expression growing more serious.

"But that all depends on you."

Selma blinked in surprise.

Luca continued, his voice gentle. "The Sacred Mark isn’t like some sort of slave mark that gives me absolute control over you or anything."

"As long as you think about it, you can completely cut me off and cut the connection as well."

"So if there’s a moment that you don’t want me to be by your side, or you don’t want any influence by me at all—you can do so."

He gave her a reassuring look.

"The only reason I was able to do that right now is because you were in a very vulnerable state, and you seemed to want help unconsciously in your mind."

"So I was able to do something like that." His expression softened. "Don’t worry. It’s not like I can turn you into my dolls or something."

Selma managed a weak smile.

"I didn’t think so. I was just...wondering if you could make me pee my pants as a prank or something."

The fact that she could joke, while standing in this room of horrors, drove home just how powerful Luca’s calming influence was.

It was as if her emotions were being held at arm’s length, observed through glass rather than felt directly.

Luca’s expression shifted, becoming more serious.

"I wasn’t expecting guests today." He said, glancing around the room. "Leona and I made it quite clear this area was off-limits."

Selma flushed, guilt cutting through the artificial calm.

"I know. I’m sorry. I was just...curious. About Julius. About what happened to him."

But to her surprise, Luca’s eyes lit up with genuine excitement.

"Oh, that’s wonderful!"

He placed a hand on her shoulder, his enthusiasm almost childlike.

"Honestly, I’ve been waiting for someone to come see this. I’ve been working on this...project...for a while now."

"It feels almost selfish to keep it to myself."

Selma stared at him disbelief

"P-Project?"

"Of course!" Luca said, gesturing grandly to Julius. "When an artist creates something, he wants to share it, doesn’t he? To show someone who can appreciate the work?"

His expression turned briefly sad.

"I showed Nyx. I thought she’d appreciate it—she understands punishment. But..."

He shook his head.

"The worms triggered something in her. Old trauma. She couldn’t handle it."

He looked at Selma with new interest, his eyes gleaming.

"But you...you came here on your own. You’re curious. And right now, you’re calm enough to really see it, to appreciate it."

He leaned closer, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper.

"So, would you like a tour? Would you like to see what I’ve done to Julius? All of it?"

Selma was taken aback. There was something in Luca’s eyes, a manic excitement that was completely at odds with the gruesome scene surrounding them.

He almost looked like a child who wanted to show off his painting.

It honestly scared her a bit.

But still, maybe it was because of her own curiosity to know the full picture or perhaps because of the unnatural calm that still enveloped her, Selma found herself nodding.

"Yes." She heard herself say. "If you’ll let me."

Luca’s face broke into a delighted smile.

"Thank you! I was beginning to think no one would ever appreciate it!"

He took her hand, a strangely gentle gesture in this horrific setting and led her back to Julius.

The hanging elf swayed slightly, his transformed lungs rising and falling, the maggots moving in their endless dance.

"Let’s start with the basics." Luca said, his tone taking on a lecturer’s cadence. "The limbs had to go first. He was struggling too much. Fighting. Screaming. It made the work difficult."

He pointed to one of the arms, the flesh around the shoulder mangled and torn.

"I didn’t cut them off. That would have been too clean. Too quick." He mimed a twisting motion. "I twisted. And twisted. And twisted."

"Until the joint dislocated."

"Until the tendons tore."

Selma gulped as he continued.

"He screamed and moaned at that time. But still, I just twisted and twisted until it popped out."

He mimed the motion with his hands. "It was honestly quite satisfying."

She had been right. Luca really had ripped out his legs. She could just imagine how painful that must have been.

Luca pointed to the hooks that were hooked into Julius’s back.

"As for these hooks, I thought it would be rather funny if he was hung up like a chandelier. I can just swing him around anytime I want."

He actually pushed loose Julius’s body, which made Julius start to subtly groan. Slowly, his body swayed around, almost as if he was a swing.

"I just want to sit on top of him and go for a ride." Luca said with a chuckle.

Selma felt a chill run down her spine.

The Luca that she normally knew wouldn’t say such things. This was a different Luca, a darker Luca, one she had never seen before.

Luca stopped Julius’s swinging and pointed at his hair.

"Ever since I met Julius, I always thought that he had such beautiful golden hair. He would always flaunt it at every turn, which honestly made me irritated."

"So that’s why I just tore it off slowly, bit by bit."

He then pointed at his ears. "He was also very proud of his ears as well. Apparently in elvish tradition, the longer your ears, the more noble you are."

Selma nodded slowly. She knew this tradition well.

Luca chuckled in an eerie manner. "That’s why I took a scissors and slowly shaped them into human ears."

Selma shivered all over as she clutched onto her own ears protectively.

Luca continued, his voice taking on a meaningful tone.

"I can just imagine how Julius must feel right now. He was supposed to be a high elf, but now he looks like a human. The same humans that he looked down upon."

He laughed softly. "Quite funny, isn’t it?"

"Y-Yes." Selma managed, her voice small.

Luca then guided her to face Julius directly.

For the first time, Selma saw his face clearly—or what remained of it.

It was a ruin.

Deep slashes crisscrossed his features.

His nose was gone, leaving only ragged cartilage.

His eyelids had been removed.

His lips had been cut away, revealing broken teeth in a permanent grimace.

But the eyes...

Selma leaned closer, squinting. Julius’s eyes weren’t their natural color. They were a strange, pinkish hue.

And their shape...it was wrong. Too round.

"Why do his eyes look like that?"

Normally, Selma would never be able to ask such a question, as she would be terrified to even speak.

But the calming spell that had taken over her was working overtime right now. So she just asked.

Luca just gave a casual shrug.

"Oh, those...Those are his testicles."