She saw it.
The "Great Spirit" Evangeline had been the witness to the strange mortal who had entered her domain.
The mysterious young man who had bravely... or perhaps foolishly wandered into her realm.
At first, she had seen him as merely another brazen mortal who would only disturb her peaceful solitude. Thus, she had resorted to her usual tricks to scare him away...
But no matter how much she'd tried to frighten the strange mortal, he'd never heeded her presence.
Every attempt she made was brushed off as if she were nothing more than a passing shadow or even a nuisance.
It was truly an odd experience for her because...
It was the first time that someone had not been afraid of her.
And even if she were to deny it—she was intrigued by him.
Thus, tonight... Evangeline had made an actual attempt to make her presence known to him.
But...
She had never thought everything would suddenly turn to chaos.
Then...
She saw it.
She saw the blade of the priest piercing his heart.
She saw how his eyes widened in shock when he realized the cold, sharp blade had embedded into him.
His gaze shifted from the blade... to the murderous priest... and then—
To her.
He was not angry, nor resentful toward her.
But instead—
He showed... remorse. Remorse for failing to save her.
Then...
She saw his life fading before her.
And then everything... turned dark.
BOOM—!!!
The whole apartment blew apart—! Pitch-black energy erupted from within—!
It tore off and destroyed the walls of the apartment, shattering everything in its path!
The explosion was so strong that even the robed priests were flung out into the open air through the fallen walls of the apartment as their cries drowned beneath the roaring surge of dark power...!
And it all came from one source...
The Great Spirit.
The Evil Entity.
Evangeline.
There, at the very center of the ruined apartment, she stood in solitude...
Not simply as the lonely yet prideful ghost girl, but...
In her 'true' form—
An entity of darkness.
Her entire body was cloaked in a torrent of black, tainted spiritual energy that coiled and writhed around her like living shadows—corrupting every trace of light it touched.
With only one exception...
Her eyes.
Those crimson, scarlet eyes that shone through the darkness which had fully embraced her...
However—
"...Why...?"
Those same eyes that pierced through the dark... were overflowing—not with fury, but with a stream of red.
A stream of blood.
No...
A stream of tears.
"...Why did you save me...?"
The entity known as "Evangeline" slowly stepped closer to him...
The once-mortal man lay on the ruined apartment floor, his eyes closed... as he found his final rest beneath the moonlight that shone through the shattered walls.
Yet...
She couldn't accept it.
"...Why...?"
She couldn't accept his death.
"...Why, mortal...?"
She had so many questions... so many thoughts left unanswered...
And they all came from this man.
She crouched down, reaching out with her pitch-black hands... and held his hand—
His hand that was slowly turning cold and pale.
She remembered, quite vividly, that recent, brief yet strangely intimate moment when she had first approached him... how he had approached her... how he had emitted that strange, yet welcoming warmth.
Yet this strange coldness was the opposite of that... and she hated it.
She carefully squeezed his hand, trying to find that warmth that was missing...
But it didn't matter.
Because this hand would never share its warmth with her again...
... ... ...
But then...
"...What...?"
She could sense it—
The warmth!
"...How...?"
It was faint, yet... it was there.
She felt it!
"...How could this be...?!"
She could feel the warmth, however weak, slowly returning to him!
But when she looked back at his pale, resting face... there was no trace of that warmth.
She was baffled—bewildered. She couldn't understand why his hand was slowly growing warm while his body stayed cold...
Until eventually... she found the reason.
Her hands...
The dark spiritual energy that enveloped them was slowly fading away, revealing her true hands beneath...!
"...What is happening...?"
She thought for a moment, wondering what was happening to her own body...
Only to realize that the dark spiritual energy was being siphoned toward the man's hand—!
His body was absorbing her spiritual energy!
"...How...?"
She didn't know why nor how, but...
The more of that energy he absorbed from her, the more his warmth slowly returned...!
"..."
It didn't take her long to realize—his body was slowly recovering through this.
And thus...
She made her decision.
"...You saved me..."
She steeled her resolve as the dark spiritual energy began to flow like a river into his body, revealing her real form once again...!
"...This time... it's my turn to save you!"
And with that... she dove into his body—her entire essence merging into him in one radiant surge of black light that enveloped his whole body...!
His body jolted in response to the massive spiritual energy that was coursing through him...!
However—
Rushed footsteps echoed from the corridor—!
The mysterious robed priests stormed back inside the ruined apartment, their garments torn and covered in dust, with their cracked porcelain masks barely clinging to their faces—hardly hiding their identities anymore.
"Where is it?!" the head priest shouted, gripping his silver sword tightly in alarm. "Where's that evil spirit?!"
His eyes narrowed sharply, scanning the destroyed site for the whereabouts of the malicious entity that had blown them away so mercilessly...
But all he found was... him.
At the center of the ruined apartment, a black light still swirled violently—pulsing like a living storm...!
And it all came from the supposedly deceased body of the foolish man he had killed...!
"Be ready!" he barked, raising his sword. "The evil spirit has not vanished yet—!"
But then—
The "dead" man suddenly rose from the ground—!
His feet hovered just above the cracked floor as his form floated eerily in the air...!
"...What the...!?"
Eyes widened in disbelief—the priests were all taken aback...!
The "undead" man's body still radiated an ominous ebony light that sent chills down their spines... but—
The dark, malicious energy slowly began to change color...! The once swirling, malevolent aura was turning pure—transcendent in its radiance...!
The "undead" man... then turned toward them as his appearance began to change—!
His blonde hair turned pitch black...
His body, once covered in bruises and cuts, was slowly healing—! Even the deep wound in his chest—his very heart—was mending...!
Then... the "undead" man opened his eyes—
"—!"
And what they saw was not the calm blue irises of a mere, mortal man... but instead—
Scarlet red eyes.