I have stood before many demons, seen the twisted faces of evil manifest in the bodies of the afflicted, but nothing could have prepared me for what I faced that night in Rome. My name is Father Enoch, and I was once proud to call myself an exorcist. I've lived a life I've tried desperately to forget. But the past, it seems, never forgets you.

I first met her, my disciple, Maria, a few years back. She was eager to learn, her faith unshakable. She followed me on countless exorcisms, a quiet observer, never wavering in her belief. But faith can blind you. It blinded me.

We were summoned to a decrepit apartment in the heart of the city. A simple call, or so I thought, just another case. The family had been hearing strange noises, objects moving on their own. But as soon as we arrived, the temperature dropped, unnaturally cold for a Roman night. That's when I felt it—a presence, one I hadn't encountered before. It was ancient, darker, more sinister.

Maria was uncharacteristically silent as we prepared. I dismissed it as nerves. She had been with me for years, but even the bravest of us falter. As we entered the room where the disturbances had been strongest, I felt it, that familiar sensation of being watched, hunted. The air was thick with malevolence.

Then it happened. The lights flickered, and I turned to look at Maria, only to find her eyes... black, hollow, like endless voids. "Father Enoch," she said, her voice layered with something that wasn't hers. "You should have known."

I recoiled, heart pounding in my chest. My disciple, the one I had taught, the one who had shadowed me for so long, was possessed. But this possession—it was unlike any I had seen before. This demon wasn't just toying with her. It was waiting. For me.

I began the rites, speaking the ancient prayers with a shaking voice. "In nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti…" But every word I spoke seemed to only make it stronger. The entity inside Maria laughed, her body convulsing, but her eyes never leaving mine.

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"You cannot hide from what you are, Father," the demon hissed, its voice echoing in the small room. "We know your sins."

The words struck me like a hammer. My sins. The things I had buried, the acts I had committed before I took my vows, before I became Father Enoch. Things no one, not even Maria, knew about.

The air became thick, oppressive. I couldn't breathe. My vision blurred, and suddenly, I wasn't in that apartment anymore. I was back in the streets, years ago, before the cloth, before the collar. I saw them—the people I had wronged, their faces, their cries. The theft, the betrayals, the blood on my hands. I had been a broken man, a violent man. And now... now, it was all coming back to me.

The demon fed on my guilt, my shame. "You cannot cast me out, Enoch," it sneered. "You are mine. You have always been mine."

My hands trembled as I held the crucifix before her. The rites spilled from my lips, but they were hollow, powerless. I wasn't speaking to cast out the demon anymore—I was speaking to convince myself that I was still a man of God.

Maria's body twisted violently, her bones cracking unnaturally. She screamed, a sound that seemed to tear through the walls, through my soul. "You cannot save her. You could never save yourself!"

The room around me began to warp, the walls bleeding, the shadows growing longer. I could feel the weight of my past pressing down on me, suffocating me. The sins I thought I had left behind were alive, clawing at my flesh, my soul.

And in that moment, I realized the truth. This wasn't about Maria. This demon hadn't possessed her by chance. It had been waiting for me. It knew. It knew everything.

The prayers died in my throat. My knees buckled, and I collapsed to the floor. I stared up at Maria, no longer my disciple, but a puppet of something far more terrifying than any demon I had faced before.

"You are not here to save her," the voice whispered, cold and mocking. "You are here to face what you are. And you will burn with it."

I don't know how long I sat there, my hands trembling, the weight of my sins bearing down on me. The room was silent now, save for my own ragged breathing. Maria's body lay still, but I knew the demon wasn't gone. It wasn't finished with me.

It never will be.

I can still feel it inside me, lurking in the corners of my mind, waiting for the right moment to resurface. It knows what I've done. And now, so do I.