? ─── ?? ? ?? ─── ?

  Autumn arrived slowly, almost imperceptibly, yet with an iron inevitability. Leaves turned yellow, like the parchment of ancient tomes; the wind carried the pungent scent of rotting branches and damp earth—the smell of fading life lurking in every breath of the forest. Moss on the stones darkened, and the fog grew thicker and bolder each day, crawling between the trees as if something invisible were breathing down their necks. The Sphere, their silent companion, occasionally flickered brief warnings onto the visor:

  [TEMPERATURE DROP. HUMIDITY INCREASED. VISIBILITY UNSTABLE. BACKGROUND MOVEMENT DETECTED WITHIN FIFTY PACES.]

  “We’ve been walking too long,” Brenn grunted, flipping through a map slick with cold droplets of moisture. “We need to reach the old settlement by sunset. If we’re lucky, we’ll find a roof.”

  They were lucky. At first glance.

  The settlement did exist: a few dozen wooden and stone huts with boarded windows and skewed doors. The roofs were caved in, overgrown with moss. No smoke, no roosters, no barking dogs. The place stood petrified, as if under a curse. But it wasn't dead yet.

  “This isn't an abandoned place,” Irellis said, crouching low. Her fingers traced patterns in the dust. “Fresh wagon ruts. And look—bare footprints. Children.”

  The tracks led straight to the houses. The group moved forward cautiously, like approaching a disturbed hive. The inhabitants remained—but they weren't living; they were merely clinging to existence. Haggard faces, eyes cast down at the dirt, movements like those of sleepwalkers. And not a single beast-kin or demi-human in sight.

  “Where did the others go?” Brenn asked, but there was no answer.

  The silence was so profound the world felt hollow. Finally, someone whispered without lifting their head:

  “Taken. In the night.”

  And swiftly slammed the door in their faces.

  ? ─── ?? ? ?? ─── ?

  They stopped for the night in an old shop. Inside, the air stank of rotting wood, and moonlight pierced through the gaps in the ceiling in thin, jagged strips. Violetta sat apart, wrapped in her cloak, as if shielding herself from the world. Her anxiety was almost physical—like the shimmering of air near a flame.

  The Sphere remained silent, but red signals flashed on the visor:

  [PASSIVE TRACKING DETECTED. RECOMMEND HEIGHTENED VIGILANCE.]

  “From the road, are you?” a voice drifted from the window.

  A man entered—grey-haired, in a threadbare tunic, with a large bag slung over his shoulder. His eyes were overly attentive, and his smile was a fraction softer than a stranger’s should be in the middle of the night.

  “I am a healer,” he said in a low, almost honeyed voice. “I can help, if there are wounded.”

  Brenn fixed him with a look like a wolf eyeing an uninvited guest, but only nodded.

  “We’re fine,” he replied curtly.

  “Oh, that won't last,” the man was already kneeling beside Irellis, noticing a scratch on her arm. “This elixir heals quickly. For free, of course.”

  His movements were strangely delicate—too precise for a wandering medic. His fingers slid over Irellis’s skin as if studying her, rather than the wound's healing properties. Then he approached Violetta.

  “And you, girl?” he asked softly. “You look exhausted. Allow me…”

  She didn't look up, only pulled her hood deeper. But it was too late. He had already noticed the pointed tips of her ears, the shadow of the bone plate on her forehead.

  The man touched her hand, seemingly by accident. His fingers slid down… and suddenly, a light scratch. The edge of a ring. Calculated?

  There was no blood.

  The visor flared with a warning:

  [SUSPICIOUS ACTIVITY. HIGH PROBABILITY OF HOSTILE INTENT.]

  Violetta didn't stir.

  “My apologies,” he said too quickly. “A slip of the hand.”

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  He scanned the room with a final look… and left. Quietly. Calmly. Too calmly to be natural.

  ? ─── ?? ? ?? ─── ?

  Half an hour later, they packed their gear in silence.

  “Are we going?” Irellis whispered.

  Brenn only nodded.

  No words were needed. Only short, knowing glances. They felt it exactly as Violetta did. When the night thickened into black tar, they slipped out of the settlement—shadows deciding not to wait for the dawn. By morning, they were gone.

  And when the first silhouettes entered the village, the fog had already swallowed the last traces of their presence.

  ? ─── ?? ? ?? ─── ?

  ...And in the morning…

  Silent figures drifted slowly through the streets of the abandoned village. Faces were hidden beneath hoods; fingers were stained with wax, dried blood, and a thick black ointment. They didn't walk—they oozed through the fog like shadows that had learned to stand.

  They wore filthy, patched robes tied with old ropes, but ritual knives with wavy blades glinted at every belt. Some carried heavy iron staves with leather straps where human teeth dangled. When they stopped, the air around them seemed to chill.

  They didn't speak. They sniffed. They stood in the middle of the street, drawing in the air like jackals. One lay on the ground, pressing an ear to the dirt. Another touched a door and licked his finger, then froze. A third climbed a roof and, spreading his arms, inhaled the mist so fervently it looked like prayer.

  Too late.

  “They were here…” the spy whispered, falling to his knees before a woman. Her face was pale, smooth, and clean as unfired clay. Upon her forehead was a symbol, carved with a sharp blade and rubbed with ash. “She was here. The true… Goddess.”

  The woman didn't answer. She only placed a palm on his shoulder. His head bowed lower, and he began to tremble.

  ? ─── ?? ? ?? ─── ?

  Through leaden clouds seeped a greenish-grey light, like a rot-glow from the eyes of a forgotten god. Everything stood still, waiting for a thunderclap that dared not strike. Beneath this dead sky stood the spy: pale, humble, shoulders hunched as if his own shadow were heavier than his body.

  Before him stood the High Presbyter.

  He wore a chiton of skin, stitched with coarse ropes. Where others wore an amulet, he wore a dried, gilded skull. Every line of his form betrayed a man who had turned pain into clothing.

  “Father… she is alive,” the spy’s voice shook, but the words sliced the air like a blade. “She has been seen.”

  “Seen by whom?” the Presbyter asked quietly, without looking up.

  “The true… Goddess.”

  Silence. And then:

  “Impossible,” the old man whispered. But in his eyes was no doubt. There burned a fever of fear wrapped in hope, like a coffin draped in silk. He rose slowly. The movement was solemn, the gesture of a king who remembers being dead.

  “The Crown Prince?”

  “Already departed. Personally.”

  The Presbyter clenched his fist; the knuckles cracked.

  “He will not understand. He does not know what form is. What faith is. She is not for him.”

  The pause hung like a stone over a precipice.

  “Find her. Bring her here. Immediately.”

  “And if—”

  “No ‘ifs’!”

  He turned. The stone beneath his feet was damp and slick, as if breathing. The Presbyter descended into the catacombs—into the depths of broken prayers and mutilated flesh.

  ? ─── ?? ? ?? ─── ?

  The hall was vast, like the throne room of an emperor long since rotted away. The ceiling was invisible: only clusters of darkness where things stirred… or watched back. Chains hung from the walls. Some were empty. Some were not.

  The scent was thick, heavy: incense, blood, formalin, and decayed sanctity mixed with despair. Candles on tripods burned with blue flames. The fire crackled softly, reacting to the waves of the magical field. Around them lay bodies. Dozens. Perhaps hundreds.

  Some lay motionless, like statues carved for foreign eyes. Others twitched, as if still arguing with death. All bore HER features, but none were Her.

  “The ear is too elongated. The fingers lack symmetry. The skin tone is false. The eyes do not glow.”

  Some were still warm. Others had been part of the altar for a week. Some whispered, lost between prayer and delirium. They were all imperfect shadows. Blasphemous echoes.

  At the far end of the hall stood an elevation. An altar. But not of stone. It was technical, like a sarcophagus from another world. It was framed by fabrics with gold threads. Embroidered prayers resembled magical algorithms, ancient protocols. Candles were arranged in a circle with twelve rays—the symbol of Unification.

  Inside was She.

  ASCARI.

  Frozen, eternal, like the memory of an era that never truly ended.

  Her hair was like molten sun on cold marble. Her skin was pearlescent-white, nearly transparent. Her eyes were closed, yet she gave the impression of seeing even through eternity. On her brow sat a wreath made from the bones of the first martyrs, intertwined with silver, dark and heavy. On her chest—an amulet pulsing with a soft bio-light, like an artificial heart.

  She was not human. She was Sacred Technology.

  The Presbyter knelt. Then he fell prostrate. His forehead touched the cold floor, and tears flowed soundlessly, like water in the cracks of stone.

  “You have answered…” he whispered. “We waited. We sinned for your sake. We broke the flesh, searching for the image.”

  “And you sent her… your daughter. The True Flesh. The New Vessel.”

  “She is salvation. She is the Form that will return the meaning.”

  “Ascari ex Caelo… forma restituta…”

  A piercing scream erupted from behind. Not human. Not animal. Simply a scream that should not exist in nature. It came from a beast-kin—yesterday’s "candidate."

  The scream cut off as suddenly as if a final thread had been snipped. Her body fell softly, like snow.

  The hall was truly gargantuan, a cathedral built of meat and suffering. On the floor—layers of bodies. Some still breathed. Some begged for death. Others prayed. Quietly, almost soundlessly.

  Hooded priests worked sharply, mechanically, as if they themselves had become tools. Blood drained into gutters, forming glowing sigils in the dark. Over all this, a psalm rose:

  “Blessed be she, who brought light to our gloom…” “Come, daughter of the Goddess, and give the Form its content…”

  The chanting was pure, cold, monotonous—absurdly calm. Like the whisper of a blade in the silence.

  The Presbyter whispered one last time:

  “She is here. She is the Savior. And she will lead us into the New Body.”