Unfinished Portrait: Beyond the Painting

Asteria Verano only agreed to attend the exhibit because her friend wouldn't take no for an answer. It should have been perfect, an estate filled with art, and a painter she had long admired. But somewhere between the journey and the grand halls, a stubborn flu settled into her bones, turning every step of the tour into a blur of dizziness and heat.

It got worse that night.

What was meant to be a harmless prank pushed her into finishing an abandoned portrait, one whispered about in hushed tones, rumored to be cursed. Disrespectful or not, she touched the brush anyway. The moment the last stroke met the canvas, the world tilted.

And then it changed.

Asteria found herself standing in a sunlit plaza, surrounded by unfamiliar faces that looked at her as though she had committed a crime. They called her by a name that seems like a bad taste in their mouth. A stranger claimed to be her fiancé. And the painter, the very man behind the unfinished piece, stood before her in the flesh, insisting he had never painted a day in his life.

Now trapped in another time, inside a life that isn't hers, Asteria is forced to navigate a reputation she doesn't understand, a wedding she never agreed to, and another man who appears in her bedroom calling her "Mi Alma" asking questions she cannot answer.

Because she has her own.

Why is she here?
How can she return?
And what does she have to do with the cursed, unfinished portrait?