"Mayor Alden?" Elara asked as she stared in shock at the figure standing right in front of the huge pillar of dark energy.
The mayor, unlike before, did not look exactly the same. The malice and evil present on his face, the warped expression, made him look almost like a different person.
The figure that had once been Mayor Alden now looked twisted and corrupted, a malevolent force radiating from him. His eyes, once warm and welcoming, now glowed with a sinister light. The veins beneath his skin pulsed with dark energy, writhing as though something alive moved within them.
"Welcome," Alden's voice echoed through the chamber, distorted and filled with malice. "You have done well to come this far, but this is where your journey ends."
Elara stepped forward, her fists clenched and her eyes fixed on the mayor. "Alden, what have you done?!"
"Why have you betrayed your own town?!"