Koda's eyes blinked open to dim torchlight and the faint scent of moss and old metal. A ceiling of rough-cut stone hung above him. Every part of his body ached—his chest, his arms, his thoughts.
Before he could speak, Maia was there, wrapping her arms around him and pressing a firm, trembling kiss to his lips. She pulled back slowly, her forehead resting to his, eyes shimmering.
"You're awake," she whispered. "Don't you dare do that again."
He tried to respond, but only a croak came out. Maia hushed him gently, brushing back his hair, while a warmth surged through his chest—not from injury, but from her healing. Junen stood nearby, eyes tired but focused, isolating the soft regenerative light from her shield over Koda. She gave a weary smile when he caught her gaze.
"Tough bastard," Junen muttered. "You'd make a medic's life easier if you just died like the rest of us. But I'm glad you didn't."
Koda gave a weak laugh, then winced.
"Easy," Maia warned. "You broke things. A lot of things."
He sat up with help, the others gathering near. Thessa leaned against a pillar of rusted iron, arms crossed, her flame-dyed hair tied back. Wren knelt by an old mining crate, sigils glimmering faintly in her journal. Terron loomed near the entrance of the shaft, hammer within reach, watching for any sound that didn't belong.
And then there was Deker, crouched upside-down on a beam above them, chewing some dried leaf and gesturing wildly.
"Okay, so," Deker began, voice animated, "you missed the whole swallowing-the-shards bit—Veylan goes full nightmare prophet and now the city is eating it up like it's festival day. People are bowing, Koda. Bowing. Like, to him. And I'm telling you, if someone doesn't punch that guy straight in the—"
"Deker," Wren cut in gently, "maybe let Koda breathe before the lecture?"
"Right. Yes. Of course. Welcome back from almost dying. Again."
Koda exhaled, looking around at the cramped shelter, the dirt beneath their boots, the anxious silence beyond the shaft.
"Where are we?"
"An abandoned mining shaft," Thessa answered. "Junen found it. Far enough from the city we haven't been tracked. Yet."
Koda's gaze turned to Maia, who simply nodded.
"We had to move," she said. "Pride—Veylan—he's changing. The shards have taken root in him. He's not just claiming to be the True God anymore. He's starting to make people believe it."
"Pride…," Koda echoed.
Junen stepped closer. "He's stronger than Wrath was—because he's not just a weapon. He's a voice. He's speaking to the people, and they're listening. Not because they believe. Because they can't not."
Deker chimed in again, pacing like a caged animal. "It's his charisma. We think it's a skill, or a trait—whatever system crap it is, it works. He talks, and the air shifts. Like he's rearranging your thoughts. We're lucky we got out before it hit full force."
Terron grunted. "Lucky won't last."
Koda absorbed it all in silence. The pressure in his mind hadn't faded—not completely. Pride's voice still lingered in the distant corners of his thoughts. A whisper. A presence. Not strong enough to control him, but enough to know the danger was real.
"We're preparing the counterstrike," Maia said softly. "Tomorrow, we move."
Koda blinked. "That soon?"
"We don't have time to wait," Thessa said. "The longer he holds the city, the harder it'll be to break his hold. He's reshaping everything."
"And if you can understand him," Maia added, "if you can resonate with what he's become… then maybe we can use the Sanctuary against him. Turn his control back on itself."
Silence followed. The kind that settled not from fear, but determination.
Koda nodded, already pushing himself up. His body screamed in protest. Junen steadied him.
"We'll free them," he said. "Even if we have to fight through hell again."
Deker cracked his knuckles. "Good, because I packed for hell. Got bombs, got smoke, got anti-deity darts. Probably won't work. But, y'know. Options."
Terron hefted his hammer. "We all march."
Wren looked up from her sigils. "And this time, we finish it."
——-
The mountain path was narrow, weather-carved and windswept, the cliffs yawning open to either side. And at its peak—looming like a final judgment—stood the Gates of Reprieve.
Twin iron towers, black with soot and centuries of wear, framed the passage into the capital. Behind them, the stone wall rose higher than it should have, ancient engravings half-erased by time and neglect. It had always been a fortress, but now it felt more like a prison.
Six guards stood at attention. Spears upright. Expressions hard.
They had seen the group climbing from far below. They made no move to open the gates as Koda's party approached.
Maia walked at the front, her posture stiff with resolve. Thessa beside her, flames flickering faintly at her knuckles. Wren followed close, her sigils cloaked but ready. Junen's coat was stained from treating Koda's wounds, eyes shadowed with exhaustion. Terron loomed tall at the rear, hammer on his back. And Deker—grinning, humming something tuneless—flicked a small stone between his fingers, eyes scanning the walls.
Koda walked in the center, every step a weight. The steel of the broken battle still echoed in his joints. He could feel Pride's influence radiating from beyond the walls like heat from a forge—subtle, suffocating, ever-present.
One guard stepped forward, the crest of the True God emblazoned on his tabard.
"You return now?" the man asked coldly. "When the city needed you, you vanished. When His will was revealed, you fled."
Deker opened his mouth—but Thessa threw out a hand to stop him.
"We didn't flee," she said, voice flat. "We survived. There's a difference."
Another guard scoffed. "Spare us your excuses. You weren't here when it counted. You didn't see what He did."
"He?" Koda asked quietly.
The guard's chin lifted. "The True God. You may enter… but know this: your names aren't sung here. You won't find welcome."
With a groan of ancient metal, the gates creaked open.
And they stepped inside.
The city beyond was both familiar and alien.
Streets they'd once walked freely were now lined with banners—deep crimson, trimmed in gold, bearing the jagged black sigil Veylan had revealed at his sermon. That same symbol had been scorched into buildings, painted over murals of the Five. Where once there had been prayers to the Eternal Guide, there were now declarations of Sovereign Will. Billboards. Slogans. Eyes.
Statues of the old gods had been defaced, and in their place rose crude effigies—elongated limbs, twisted faces, half-man, half-beast. None bore a name. All bore his shape.
Pride.
Children whispered His name. Merchants wore His symbol out of fear, not faith. Preachers on corners chanted sermons that sounded more like commands. Every phrase began the same way:
He Has Spoken.
The deeper they walked into the city, the more they felt it—not eyes, not spies, but pressure. Something spiritual. Mental. A tension that hummed behind every thought. Like a voice brushing against the inside of your skull, even when it said nothing.
Wren's wards shimmered faintly, counteracting the worst of it. Still, Junen winced now and then, muttering prayers under her breath.
"This city's sick," she said, "and it doesn't know it's dying."
Deker pointed to a window where an elderly couple stared vacantly back at them, unmoving.
"Not dying," he said, "just… rewritten."
Koda stopped at the edge of a plaza—the same one where Veylan had given his sermon. It looked worse in the daylight. The banners were larger. A new monument had risen where the city's old shrine had been. It was half-formed, chiseled from black stone, a towering figure draped in unnatural proportion. It wasn't finished.
But it was becoming.
Maia took Koda's hand. "We can't wait long."
"We don't," Koda replied. "Tonight, we set our foothold. Tomorrow—we take it back."
They moved as shadows beneath the bones of the city.
The Church of the Eternal Guide stood at the heart of the capital, once the brightest star in a constellation of faith. It had been a sanctuary, its steeple visible from every quarter—stone walls etched with ghosted murals with stories of guidance, sacrifice, mercy.
Now, its sanctity was gone.
The steeple had been defaced, its apex severed. A new symbol—razor-edged, obscene in its angles—had been bolted in its place. The windows had been shattered, and their remains used to mosaic the entry hall in the form of a single image: a man, arms outstretched, standing above a kneeling world. Where the Eternal Guide had once stood above supplicants with a hand extended, this new icon looked down with a crown of fire and an open mouth.
Pride.
As they approached, even the ground seemed to resist them. The cobblestones rippled faintly, like breath. The stonework around the doors seemed... listening.
Maia kept a firm grip on Koda's wrist, pulse hammering. Wren layered subtle wards over their steps. Deker whispered to himself in a loop: "We're not breaking in. We're reclaiming. This is ours. Not theirs. Not his. Ours."
No guards flanked the entrance—but that wasn't mercy. It was arrogance.
They stepped into the nave.
It was worse inside.
Gone were the wooden pews and golden sconces. In their place stood columns of glass and steel, twisting up like frozen screams. Voices murmured faintly from within—echoes of old prayers warped beyond recognition. What had once been an altar was now a black throne, built from melted offerings, books, and bones. Every candle burned with a too-white flame. Every breath stung of myrrh and rot.
Thessa kept close to the walls, flames dancing along her fingertips.
"Where are the acolytes?" Junen whispered.
"Watching," said Koda.
The central aisle stretched toward the altar, wide enough to march an army through. The vaults overhead trembled faintly with song—a layered chant, all voices repeating the same word at different tones:
"True. True. True."
Maia pointed to a side stairwell tucked behind one of the broken confessionals. "There. The access to the lower sanctum. If the Order survived the purge, they'd have gone underground."
They made for it quickly, boots muffled on scorched stone. Deker jammed a spike into the stairwell door, wrenching it open with a soft grunt. Dust spilled out—thick and choking.
The scent was familiar. Old wood. Cold stone. Blood.
Junen stepped down first, hand glowing with gentle light. "If they're here," she said quietly, "they're hurting."
The staircase curved down deep beneath the cathedral, past forgotten crypts and shattered record halls. The iconography on the walls became older—less touched by the new regime. A painting of the Eternal Guide had survived halfway down, one eye blackened out, the other still open in calm defiance.
They descended into silence.
At the base of the stairs, a heavy door stood ajar.
Behind it—a soft rustling.
Koda raised a hand, motioning them to stop. Then: "We're not enemies."
A pause.
Then movement.
A figure emerged from the dark, cloaked in old vestments, blade drawn but shaking in hand. An older woman, half her robes singed, her voice cracked with disbelief.
"Koda…?"
He nodded once.
Then, from behind her, others appeared—twelve in total. Some bore wounds. Others bore scars no medicine could reach. Survivors of the purge. The last of the Eternal Guide's faithful.
"We feared you were dead," the woman whispered. "Or worse—converted."
"We're here to stop Him," Maia said. "But we need your help."
The priestess looked at them—at the exhaustion, the resolve, the defiance.
Then she stepped aside, allowing them in.
The sanctum beneath the ruined Church was quiet—but not dead.
Books lined the shelves in careful stacks, organized with reverence even amid the dust. Candles flickered with modest flame, their light low and warm—untainted by the false white fire above. The air here tasted of ink, old stone, and determination. The old heart of the Order, buried but beating still.
The priestess, one of the last ordained Watchers of the Eternal Guide—led them past crumbling vaults and iron-locked prayer chambers to a deep council room. There, maps were spread across an oaken table. Scrying bowls glimmered faintly with captured light. Scrolls lined the far wall in labeled bundles: "Civics — False God." "Behavioral Shifts." "Consolidation Patterns."
And beside them, leaning heavily on a carved staff, stood Calthis.
Koda blinked. "You're alive."
Calthis turned, haggard but grinning. His robe was scorched at the hem, eyes bloodshot from sleepless nights—but the weight of wisdom still hung heavy on him.
"I don't die easy," he said. "Not while there's still something to chronicle."
He looked at the group, gaze pausing on Maia's hand still looped through Koda's.
"You've seen Him, then," Calthis said. "The new God."
"Pride," Thessa spat. "Or the thing wearing Veylan's skin."
Maia stepped forward. "We need information. The city's broken, but not empty. What's left of the Order must know where He's hiding. What He's doing."
Sister Halwen nodded grimly. "We know."
She moved to the map table, placing a trembling hand on the outline of the city.
"He's taken the old Grand Archive," she said. "Ripped out the library's core and replaced it with something living. That's where He nests now—His voice broadcasts from beneath, through the speakers and bells. Every time He speaks, more fall to Him. A sermon without end."
"He calls it The Mouth of God now," Calthis added, voice bitter. "And it's growing."
Junen leaned in, frowning. "Growing?"
Sister Halwen gestured to a second chart—arcane, sigil-marked, smudged with recent ink. "The Mouth is both physical and psychic. A wound through which His presence leaks. Every day, the pull gets worse. Not just commands—feelings. Doubt. Need. Adoration. It's not loyalty He wants. It's submission."
"And the people?" Koda asked.
"Not possessed," Calthis said. "Not all of them. They... choose. That's the horror. They feel it in their bones—this warmth, this certainty. That all doubt can end if they just kneel. That's Pride's gift. Certainty."
Wren exhaled slowly. "It's like drowning in a dream you want to believe."
Deker shuddered. "He's rewiring them."
Maia stepped forward. "Can we reach the Archive?"
Sister Halwen hesitated. "Yes. But not unnoticed. The roads near it shift. The buildings lean toward it. Watchers—human and otherwise—patrol the area. Those who resist are marked."
Koda was silent. Then: "We don't need to kill Him. Not yet. Just sever the connection. Disrupt the Mouth. If we can shake their belief…"
Junen nodded. "We might wake them up."
Maia turned to Calthis. "You said you had news."
He smiled grimly. "We do. Wrath's fall... mattered. The primal's reach didn't extend beyond these walls. The other city-states are recovering. There's disarray. Chaos. But the Sin's influence hasn't spread past the capital."
Even Deker let out a low breath. "So this isn't global."
"Not yet," Calthis confirmed. "But it will be. If He consolidates here, He'll reach farther. Sloth, Wrath, Lust—He has all three inside Him now. Pride is the root, but those others feed Him. He's learning fast."
Koda looked down at the table, the shifting lines of the city, the expanding black blot marked Mouth of God.
"We march tomorrow," he said.
The room went still.
"We've had a day to rest. That's all we get. If we wait too long, there'll be no one left to save. But if we hit that place hard and fast—cut through the lie, ground Pride's delusion with Sanctuary—then maybe... just maybe... we remind this city of who it is."
Maia stepped beside him, hand finding his.
"We can give them back their minds."
"And if we can't?" Thessa asked, quietly.
Koda's voice was low. "Then we burn the Mouth shut."