Columba’s awareness floated in a muted expanse of twilight gray, suspended in a stillness neither alive nor gone. Was this the afterlife he’d devoted his life to? The eternal peace he had so earnestly believed awaited him? The thought flickered and faded, replaced by a strange unease. He felt… adrift.
"Your sacrifice was noble, dear Columba," came a feminine voice both achingly beautiful and terrifyingly alien. It reverberated through the void, each syllable laden with power that transcended mortal understanding. "But the rigid dogma of your beloved Church sees only the sin of suicide."
Columba’s awareness recoiled, a voiceless shock reverberating through him. Suicide? The word lingered, jagged and unfathomable, tearing at the fabric of his faith. How could they see his sacrifice, his final act of devotion, as anything but holy? His mind grasped desperately for reason but found only emptiness. The very ground of his beliefs seemed to crumble beneath him, leaving him suspended in silent, horrified disbelief.
From the swirling mists of unreality, a figure materialized before the disembodied cleric. Eris, Titaness of Chaos, manifested in all her terrible glory. Her form constantly shifted, never settling on a single appearance for more than a heartbeat. One moment, she was a vision of unearthly beauty, with skin like polished brown marble and chestnut eyes that held the secrets of the cosmos. The next, she was a nightmarish amalgamation of writhing tentacles and gnashing teeth. Through it all, an aura of ancient, primordial power radiated from her very being.
"Indeed, they have denounced you, Columba," Eris continued, her voice a symphony of whispers and screams. "In the eyes of those you served so faithfully, you are no martyr. You are a lost soul, condemned by the very tenets you upheld in life."
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Rage and despair warred within what remained of Columba's essence. To be denied entry to the Heavens he had so long championed, to have his ultimate sacrifice tainted by the short-sightedness of mortal interpretation... It was a betrayal beyond measure, a cosmic joke of such cruelty that it threatened to shatter what little remained of his sanity.
"Worry not, my dear," Eris cooed, her ever-changing lips curving into a smile that promised both salvation and damnation. "I have such wondrous plans for you..."
Before Columba could protest, before he could cry out to the God he had served so faithfully, tendrils of chaos snaked out from the Titaness. They enveloped his spectral form, each touch sending waves of agony through his very soul. He felt himself being torn apart and reconstituted, his essence fused with the lingering remnants of Nessie's malevolence and Skye's unwavering loyalty.
The pain was beyond description, beyond anything a mortal mind could comprehend. It was the agony of birth and death combined, multiplied a thousandfold and stretched into an eternity. Columba screamed, but no sound emerged. He wept, but there were no tears to shed in this realm of chaos and madness.
When at last the horrific transformation was complete, Columba–the man, the would-be saint, the servant of God–was no more. In his place stood a being of nightmare and sorrow, a creature born of sacrifice perverted and faith betrayed. The Rain Wraith had been forged in the crucible of cosmic injustice, its very existence a mockery of all that Columba held dear.
Eris' laughter echoed through the void, a sound that could drive lesser beings to madness. "Go forth, my beautiful creation," she whispered, her voice now a seductive purr that seemed to caress the very core of the Rain Wraith's being. "Sow the seeds of despair among those who once revered you. Let them taste the bitter fruit of their hypocrisy."
With a gesture that rent the very fabric of reality, Eris opened a portal back to the mortal realm. The Rain Wraith was drawn towards it, pulled by forces beyond its control or comprehension. As it passed through the shimmering threshold, Eris's final words followed it like a curse:
"Remember, dear Columba... Chaos is the only true constant in this fickle universe. Embrace it, and you may yet find the freedom you so desperately crave."
The portal snapped shut, leaving only the echo of the Titaness's mirthful laughter reverberating through the endless gray expanse. The Rain Wraith had been unleashed upon an unsuspecting world, a herald of sorrow born from the tears of faith betrayed.