Smoke rose like sermons — thick, dark, and unrepentant.
Elías entered the city not through gates, but through teeth — stone arches shaped like open jaws. The streets were paved with scorched scriptures and cracked bones. And everywhere he turned, a single name was carved in flame and blood:
> Mordeus.
Here, faith did not kneel — it bled.
Children learned to pray with blades before they learned to speak. Women wore veils soaked in ash. The priests walked barefoot through embers, chanting as if their lungs were made of smoke.
And in the center of it all stood the Furnace Temple — alive with screams.
> "Pain is proof," whispered a hooded man beside Elías.
"We suffer because He still listens."
The people didn't fear fire.
They feared being skipped — untouched, forgotten.
To burn was to be seen.
The city had no official name. The priests said only:
> "We are the Devoted.
We are what remains when mercy dies."
Every morning, the furnace devoured someone.
Not criminals. Not heretics.
But volunteers.
And not because they wished to die —
because they wished to be cleansed.
They stood in line.
Chanted.
Cried.
Smiled.
Because to question was treason.
And the first lesson children were taught was simple:
> "Mercy is a lie the weak whisper to escape truth."
Elías passed murals showing Mordeus crushing figures of light beneath his heel.
In one image, a city made of gold was drowned in black flame.
In another, faceless crowds wept as they threw their own tongues into the fire.
He entered a public square.
A boy no older than ten was being crowned for purity.
His hands were bandaged.
He had cut off his fingers so they would never sin.
The crowd clapped.
Elías said nothing.
He felt the shadow of Noctvorr still curling in his bones.
He didn't know whether it pulsed in anger — or approval.
That night, he met a girl named Ysa.
She had lost two brothers to the flames.
Her eyes were hollow, but her smile was genuine.
> "I will walk into the fire tomorrow," she said.
"To keep thinking would be to betray them."
And before Elías could answer, three bells rang.
The city paused.
Then knelt.
Then pointed.
A name was spoken.
A man cried out.
He was taken to the furnace without resistance.
Sacrifice wasn't rare here.
It was rhythm.
He watched as ash replaced identity.
And then he wrote something in the dirt, just beneath the furnace's glow:
> "What god fears questions enough to burn the ones who ask?"
But the wind carried it away.
And as the night deepened, and Mordeus' followers chanted louder than the stars, one thought refused to leave him:
> Smoke rose like sermons — thick, dark, and unrepentant.
Elías entered the city not through gates, but through teeth — stone arches shaped like open jaws. The streets were paved with scorched scriptures and cracked bones. And everywhere he turned, a single name was carved in flame and blood:
> Mordeus.
Here, faith did not kneel — it bled.
Children learned to pray with blades before they learned to speak. Women wore veils soaked in ash. The priests walked barefoot through embers, chanting as if their lungs were made of smoke.
And in the center of it all stood the Furnace Temple — alive with screams.
> "Pain is proof," whispered a hooded man beside Elías.
"We suffer because He still listens."
The people didn't fear fire.
They feared being skipped — untouched, forgotten.
To burn was to be seen.
The city had no official name. The priests said only:
> "We are the Devoted.
We are what remains when mercy dies."
Every morning, the furnace devoured someone.
Not criminals. Not heretics.
But volunteers.
And not because they wished to die —
because they wished to be cleansed.
They stood in line.
Chanted.
Cried.
Smiled.
Because to question was treason.
And the first lesson children were taught was simple:
> "Mercy is a lie the weak whisper to escape truth."
Elías passed murals showing Mordeus crushing figures of light beneath his heel.
In one image, a city made of gold was drowned in black flame.
In another, faceless crowds wept as they threw their own tongues into the fire.
He entered a public square.
A boy no older than ten was being crowned for purity.
His hands were bandaged.
He had cut off his fingers so they would never sin.
The crowd clapped.
Elías said nothing.
He felt the shadow of Noctvorr still curling in his bones.
He didn't know whether it pulsed in anger — or approval.
That night, he met a girl named Ysa.
She had lost two brothers to the flames.
Her eyes were hollow, but her smile was genuine.
> "I will walk into the fire tomorrow," she said.
"To keep thinking would be to betray them."
And before Elías could answer, three bells rang.
The city paused.
Then knelt.
Then pointed.
A name was spoken.
A man cried out.
He was taken to the furnace without resistance.
Sacrifice wasn't rare here.
It was rhythm.
He watched as ash replaced identity.
And then he wrote something in the dirt, just beneath the furnace's glow:
> "What god fears questions enough to burn the ones who ask?"
But the wind carried it away.
And as the night deepened, and Mordeus' followers chanted louder than the stars, one thought refused to leave him:
> If obedience is the only path to survival…
…what kind of civilization are we surviving for?