Rust Upon the Soul — Novel

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In a world where beauty is worshipped and sacrifice is demanded, Sophia fights to reclaim her stolen life. Once a devoted caregiver, she is thrust into a nightmarish reality when her son is kidnapped and sealed within a statue, a twisted offering to the ideal woman, Maria Rossi. As she battles against the iron grip of a vengeful family and a cruel pact, every choice she makes echoes with the weight of desperation and loss.

Angelo, the man she once cared for, has become a chilling reminder of everything she’s lost. Their relationship, once marked by tenderness, is now a battlefield littered with betrayal and manipulation. With Maria’s return igniting a fire of jealousy and obsession, Sophia finds herself torn between saving her son and severing the ties that bind her to a man who has turned her life into a cruel game.

Will she find the strength to escape the cycle of pain and reclaim her family, or will the rust upon her soul consume her completely? As alliances shift and truths unfold, Sophia must navigate a world where loyalty is fickle and love is a weapon.

Rust Upon the SoulChapter 1

Angelo’s ideal woman, Maria Rossi, had finally returned to the world after being away from her seclusion in the Catholic church.

To show how sorry he was to her, he shaved off all my hair, burned away my scars and gave her the title of the new ‘pure’ woman.

But the ideal woman thought her body didn’t look special enough anymore. She believed that regular statues couldn’t match her perfect image. So, she ordered people to kidnap my five-year-old son and seal him inside a statue made from mud, hoping that her beauty would return to her.

I ran for ten kilometers through the mountains. I dug through a hundred statues with my bare hands before I finally found my son, who was barely alive.

I fell to my knees, hitting my head on the ground again and again, begging Angelo to save our son.

But instead of helping me, he pushed my grandmother into the mud pond and covered it with a heavy iron net.

“Mrs. Dolores Heron,” he called my poor grandmother coldly,

He then continued, “If you hadn’t killed Maria’s family, she never would’ve seen through the pain of the world, become a nun and suffered in a monastery like that!”