The Metamorphosis of Death's Psychosis

The clock struck midnight in the forgotten tavern, where the air smelled of rain and rotting wood. Shadows played tricks on the walls, shifting like dancers in a fever dream. The place was haunted—not by spirits, but by the weight of words that should never have been spoken.

From the dais, a figure emerged—a creature of twisted limbs and porcelain eyes. Impish Quasimodo, his voice a low, guttural murmur, began speaking in tongues that seemed to come from the fog itself. He dipped his words into a chalice of laudanum’s opium, each phrase heavy with the weight of a hundred unshed tears. His sermon was an odd litany, demanding devotion to the dark’s catamount potion, a bitter brew of gin and half-forgotten prophecies.

Death hovered near, indifferent yet somehow amused, for death calls no foul balls. It simply watches as life swings and misses, time and time again. Insomniacs sat at the bar, their eyes wide and sleepless, staring into cups of arsenic-laced cream. They had no dreams left to share, only the emptiness that filled the void where sleep should have been.

Shards of memories, like broken glass, glittered in Quasimodo's gaze. He spoke of the metamorphosis of death’s psychosis, of how it crawled into the corners of the mind, twisting thought and soul until nothing felt real. His words poured out like smoke, curling into the air, mingling with the scent of decay and spilled gin.

"Come," he whispered, pulling his words from the fog's side of the mouth, "Devote yourself to the darkness, for the prophets drink among us."

And in that moment, the room seemed to hold its breath, waiting, as if even death had paused to listen.