You stumbled backward, your breath hitching as Ether loomed over you, his eyes gleaming with a sinister light. In his hand, the vial pulsed with a strange, unearthly glow—its contents swirling, almost alive. You could feel the unnatural energy emanating from it, and every instinct in your body screamed at you to run, to get away before it was too late.

“Ether, please!” you choked, your voice barely above a whisper, as fear constricted your throat. Your legs felt like jelly beneath you, barely able to keep you upright. “I’m begging you… Don’t do this. I don’t want to be… I don’t want to be trapped as one of them.”

Ether’s face remained cold, unmoved by your pleas. His once-gentle features had hardened into something almost unrecognizable—there was no warmth, no humanity left in his eyes. They gleamed with a mixture of malice and twisted amusement, feeding off your terror.

“Beg all you like,” he sneered, slowly uncorking the vial. A thin wisp of vapor rose from it, curling in the air like a serpent ready to strike. “You should have thought about the consequences when you decided to interfere. Now, you’ll get exactly what you deserve. Once the transformation begins, you’ll be trapped in that body—an object, a tool for my amusement. Forever.”

His words cut through you like ice. The finality of it hit you harder than you could have imagined. You wouldn’t just be turned into some animated object, but you would lose yourself—your memories, your identity, everything that made you you. Gone. Reduced to a character in some twisted game. You could already feel the horror crawling up your spine, a dreadful certainty that there would be no escape.

“No memories?” you stammered, your chest tightening with panic. “You can’t… you won’t do that, Ether! We were friends once—doesn’t that mean anything to you? I’ll do whatever you want, just don’t take away who I am!”

For a brief moment, Ether’s expression flickered, the slightest shadow of hesitation crossing his features. But it was gone in an instant, as he smirked…. “N-no.”