Something is breathing inside Bone Castle.
A wet, congested rasp rolls through the corridors, accompanied by the horrible sound of something thick being dragged through a narrow passage.
Reaver stands hunched beneath the vaulted ceiling.
His chest heaves.
His nostrils twitch.
Something wrong.
A violent sneeze erupts from his enormous frame.
Blood and mucus explode against the opposite wall, splattering the ancient stone in glistening ropes of yellow and crimson.
Something solid strikes the floor.
A tooth.
Reaver stares.
Mine.
He retrieves it, pushing the bloodied molar back into his swollen gums.
It doesn't fit.
His jaw closes anyway.
A sickening crunch follows.
Reaver swallows.
His throat has swollen grotesquely. Each breath whistles through inflamed flesh, producing a hideous gurgling sound as bubbling secretions collect somewhere deep within his chest.
His skin burns.
His bones ache.
Beneath his fingernails, the flesh has turned an unpleasant shade of purple.
And his nose?
His nose will not stop leaking.
Thick, green mucus pours from both nostrils, occasionally interrupted by dark clots of blood and fragments of something altogether more substantial.
Too much.
Reaver presses his palm against his face.
The pressure sends a revolting stream of infected fluid squirting from the corner of his eye.
He freezes.
Slowly, he lowers his hand.
His eye continues weeping yellow.
Bad.
Something has invaded him.
Something impossibly small has crawled into his body and begun multiplying, turning his own flesh against him.
An infection.
A virus.
Reaver remembers a name.
Padre Venganza.
The World Champion calls himself a virus. A sickness that spreads through others, corrupting them until they belong to his Family. He enjoys infecting.
Reaver considers this.
A virus.
Such a tiny thing, causing such extraordinary misery.
His body aches. His lungs burn. His skull feels ready to split apart.
Yet Reaver isn't frightened.
Still Reaver.
A dreadful convulsion seizes his stomach.
His spine arches.
His mouth opens impossibly wide.
A torrent of blackened phlegm erupts across the floor, threaded with blood and pale, writhing strands of infected tissue.
Reaver coughs again.
Something tears inside his throat.
A fleshy lump lands amongst the discharge.
It pulses.
Once.
Twice.
Still moving.
Reaver watches the thing struggle.
Then brings his enormous foot down upon it.
A wet pop echoes through the corridor.
No more.
His breathing steadies.
Only slightly.
Somewhere within his ruined chest, the infection continues its relentless work.
Reaver straightens.
Soon, Padre Venganza will stand before him, carrying his promises of corruption and belonging.
The Family.
The virus.
The infection.
Reaver has already discovered what a virus can do.
It can hurt him.
It can sicken him.
It can make his body suffer in ways even he does not understand.
But it cannot make him afraid. It cannot torment him. It cannot bend him to its will.
Only he does the bending.
Fun.
Reaver wipes a string of bloody mucus from his chin.
His fingers tighten.
Virus fun.
Another cough rattles through Bone Castle, followed by a playful growl.
Something inside him answers.
Reaver smiles.
I like sick.
Padre is the ultimate sickness.
Reaver Takes.