[ WP ] People in this town have somehow stopped aging . The locals are calling it a blessing , but you know different .

A Blessing from Persephone. That's how the inhabitants of this town called their condition. 
 
 Or is it? 
 
 Anti aging drugs was n't really a rare item in this age, but even the most rich of Ruling Executives that governed world's largest companies can not entirely stop aging. And yet the inhabitants of Cellia, a small town in secluded nation Neogrecias in the Mediterranean shore had completely stopped aging at the age of twenty five. 
 
 `` Day one, no significant difference in daily diet between Cellia inhabitants and outside world, but an unusual tendency towards raw meat is observed among the elders, in age but not in appearance, of course.'' I sighed. I recorded my observations in this city in my mem-drive, and crashed myself to the bed. A city observation report was n't really my forte, but this anti-aging obsessed boss of mine always find me for the most obnoxious job possible. I mean, who in their right mind would do a direct, hands-on observation in the day of telepresence? And this city do n't even have any wireless broadband connection! Imagine, a traditional, twisted-pair, basic rate 128 kbps ISDN connection, in 2022? 
 
 I resumed my observations on the next day, observing their daily lives instead. `` The citizens seems to regulates their daily routine almost in religious degree, with almost anyone who had reached their peak condition preffered doing their activities as the sun set and before it rises again the next morning. As result, the elder population had remarkably pale complexion. This might affect their celular aging cycle, as the less exposure to UV-rays prolong the live of the cells.'' 
 
 But there's something else. 
 
 Even when I'm barely here for two days, I ca n't ignore the smell of blood that was hanging in the air. 
 
 `` This might just be my paranoia, and the elders would probably kick me outa here if they hear me, but this intense blood smell is unbearable. I assume there was a major incident dating from mere years ago happened in this city.'' 
 
 I understand now. This is why that depicable boss of mine sent me here. 
 
 I pulled out my sat-phone `` Manager, get me outa here-ack!'' the sun is setting. 
 
 And as the darkness took it's place, the dead rose. 
 
 It's a literal Necropolis, a city of the dead. But they're more vampires than zombies, baring their teeth towards me. Dread washed through my body as a group of people steadyly closing on me, while I ran a fast as I could through the dark alleyways. But they're endless, every turn I took bring forth more of them. 
 
 I mistook the reason he sent me here. I thought it's because he wanted me to investigate the incident that happened in this city, but the reason is far simpler than that. 
 
 He wanted to kill me. 
 
 One of them finally caught up with me, slammed to my body and knocked me down to the ground. I barely felt anything as their teeth sinked in various part of my body. Everything feels so distant, even the drips of my own blood. Is this death? As the fleeting memories of my life flashed in front of me, I realized that this *is* death. 
 
 And I chuckled. 
 
 My chuckle grew into laughter. 
 
 My body, my limbs were torn apart from me. I was closer to death by the second, and yet I laughed. 
 
 `` So this is death, huh?'' the assorted groups of people who just torn into my body stopped and looked into my eyes. `` He sent me to die here, and yet in the last momment in my life, all I could remember was his face. Talk about irony.'' 
 
 And then, as if finalizing my death sentence, a pair of fang sunk deep into my neck, as my very lives were sucked away from me..... 
 
 Cellia, a city of immortals, said to have received blessings from Persephone, the Queen of Underworld. No one ever knew the secret of their immortality, except maybe the girl that died with a thousand slice marks. But the secret was buried deep in the city, along with the torn body of the girl....
