The stitched heads turned as one.
"You came back angry. That's not like you."
Their voices echoed across the chamber, layered and perfect. The Selene head smiled sweetly. The Kumiko head blinked, lashes thick with wet red. Risa's copy laughed, her teeth sharper than they should be.
"Is it because we're not pretty enough?"
"Or too perfect?"
"You always liked it when we begged."
Nikolai didn't speak.
He didn't think.
The beast inside him moved first.
He launched forward, claws digging deep into the obsidian floor and ripping it to shards as he closed the distance in one lunge. The black tide around his body surged like a storm, his figure a blur of shadow and muscle.
He slammed into the doll's chest, driving it back with a bone-shattering crack. One of the heads split on impact, half its face shearing off as Nikolai's claws tore downward.
The thing screamed — a warbled, multi-voiced shriek that echoed like static through flesh.
It didn't fall.
