The Church That Eats People

“It baptizes in blood, not water.”Start writing...The Church That Eats People
n when the church appeared, only that it hadn’t been there the day before. A structure of soot-black stone and towering iron crosses now squatted at the edge of Graven Hollow, where only tangled woods used to be. It bore no name, no sign, and no history—yet its doors were wide open, inviting anyone foolish or lost enough to step inside.

Most people in town ignored it.

But Mara did not.

She was sixteen, curious, and angry with the world. Her mother called it a phase. The kids at school called it weird. Mara just wanted silence. So, when she passed the church on a rain-heavy afternoon and heard the low toll of a bell—one long, slow note that shook her ribs—she felt something shift in her. A pull.

She walked through the gate.

The air inside was cold and dense, as if she’d stepped underwater. No wind, no smell, no sound beyond the slow drip drip drip of something unseen. The walls were lined with tarnished icons—paintings of saints with bleeding eyes and twisted mouths. The pews were cracked and warped, but freshly used. Someone had sat here recently. Or something.

A single voice broke the silence.

“You came for absolution.”

Mara turned to see a figure in black robes, face hidden in a deep cowl. The voice was neither male nor female—soft and sharp, like a whisper through broken glass.

“I didn’t come for anything,” she said, backing away.

“But you stayed. That is enough.”

The figure gestured, and the floor beneath Mara shifted. She stumbled, falling to her knees as the carpet peeled back like skin, revealing a baptismal font carved from bone. The liquid inside was dark, viscous. It steamed in the cold air.

“Baptism cleanses the soul,” the figure intoned. “But this church does not cleanse with water.”

“I’m not part of your cult,” Mara spat, trying to stand.

The figure raised a pale, veined hand. “You are already part of it. Your name was etched in the stone the moment you walked through our doors. The church does not choose poorly.”

The ground trembled. From beneath the altar came a sound—wet and rhythmic, like the breathing of a sleeping beast. The candles flickered wildly, throwing shadows that danced with claws and teeth.

Mara turned to run, but the doors behind her had vanished. In their place: a wall of solid stone, pulsing like muscle.

She screamed, but no one heard.


---

One Week Later

Officer Deacon stared at the building, frowning. “You sure this wasn’t here before?”

The old man beside him nodded, eyes glassy. “Place comes and goes. Always when it's fed. Girl went missin’, didn’t she?”

“Yeah. Teenager. Mara Cole.”

The church stood silent, but it seemed to watch them. Something about the windows—the stained glass didn’t depict saints. It showed a girl, thin and pale, sinking into a vat of crimson, her mouth open in a silent scream.

Deacon walked the perimeter. No footprints. No tire tracks. But inside, the floor was damp. He saw something glinting at the base of the altar.

A phone.

He picked it up. The wallpaper was a picture of Mara. The screen flickered, and a video began to play automatically.

Shaky footage. Screams. Shadows reaching. The font bubbling like it boiled from hell. Mara’s voice: “Please—please don’t—” followed by a sound no human throat should make.

The video cut to black.

Deacon dropped the phone and backed away.

The church doors slammed shut on their own.


---

That Night

They burned it.

Poured gasoline over every beam, every shingle, every pew. The flames reached high into the sky—but the structure didn’t burn. It absorbed the fire. And then, as if satisfied, it folded into itself like paper—and was gone.

Only ashes remained.
And Mara’s phone.
Still recording.


---

One Month Later

Four towns over, a pastor discovered a new chapel on the edge of his graveyard. It wasn’t there before. He didn’t remember building it. But the doors were open, and inside, the air smelled of copper and rot.

At the altar, a voice whispered to him.

“Come closer, child of faith. You already believe. Let us show you what true baptism means.”

And beneath the floorboards, something hungry stirred.“It baptizes in blood, not water.One Month Later

Four towns over, a pastor discovered a new chapel on the edge of his graveyard. It wasn’t there before. He didn’t remember building it. But the doors were open, and inside, the air smelled of copper and rot.

At the altar, a voice whispered to him.

“Come closer, child of faith. You already believe. Let us show you what true baptism means.”

And beneath the floorboards, something hungry stirred.


---

Two Weeks Later

The pastor’s congregation dwindled quickly. Those who entered the strange chapel didn’t return the same. Some stopped speaking altogether, eyes glazed and mouths always slightly open, as though they were still gasping. Others claimed to hear voices in their sleep—chants in Latin, names they never knew speaking from their walls.

One woman, Ellen Mays, slit her wrists in her tub after drawing a strange symbol in blood on the mirror. She wrote a single sentence beneath it:

“The font must be fed.”

A week after that, a child went missing.

Then two.

Police searched the new chapel but found nothing—just an empty room, an altar, and a baptismal basin filled with what they assumed was rust-colored water. But when Officer Reddick dipped a test strip into it, the paper turned black and dissolved.

They tried to drain the basin.

It refilled itself overnight.


---

Present Day

Now, those who live near the chapel don’t speak of it. No one parks near it. No one touches it. But they hear it.

Every Sunday at midnight, the bells ring out.

Twelve slow, wet gongs.

And if you walk by at just the right moment… you can still hear Mara screaming from beneath the floor.

Because the church does not forgive.
The church does not forget.
And the church—
Is always hungry.

”