Let's get something straight: I did not authorize any temples. If anyone builds something with my name on it, I expect it to be a food storage unit, maybe a sensible latrine. Not this. Not whatever this is.
Temples mean followers. Followers mean doctrine. Doctrine means someone's going to start translating my sarcasm as prophecy.
The ground smells weird before we even crack it open. Burnt bone and wet dust. Relay pinged it earlier—buried chamber under a flattened village, heavy with system tags. There was smoke, not the fire kind. The cold kind. The kind that's arrogant.
Relay didn't come with us. He said something about "pingback distortion", bolted into the trees like the forest owed him answers and ran off chasing static. Left a trail marker, though. He's learning.
And now I'm kneeling in it.
The dirt gives way. A creaking snap, a soft thud, and then air escapes upward. The kind of breath that hasn't moved in years.
Cinders winces behind me. "You okay?"
