Part I: In the Belly of Silence
Zion moved through the shattered bones of what once might have been a sacred grove. Trees were blackened husks, weeping sap like blood. Strange vines pulsed faintly, as though breathing.
He stopped before a stone altar—split down the middle.
It bore the remains of a god.
Not flesh, but presence—tattered, bitter, and broken. A fragment of divine essence still clung to it, malformed and twisted. Its power had no shape, no name. Only suffering.
As he approached, the earth beneath his feet shifted.
A voice—not words, but sound—scraped at his mind like claws on bone. The sigils on his body flared, reacting violently.
Suddenly, the mist parted, and he saw them:
Figures once human, now crawling on too many limbs. Their eyes were vacant, but their movements were deliberate. Around their necks: sigils melted into scars—corrupted blessings—twisted marks of a god devoured but not gone.
They bowed to the shattered altar.
And then—they looked at him.
The priest of the living gods.
The one they had been waiting for.
Part II: The Breach in the Flame
Back in Nouvo Lakay, the wind changed.
In the Temple, Elis—the priestess of Maman Brigitte—woke in cold sweat. Her hands trembled. Her sigil pulsed with a heat that wasn't hers.
"He has crossed the threshold," she whispered. "Something followed."
Sael, Ayomi, Ayola, and Thalia gathered within the Temple within the hour, drawn by an unspoken pull. The flame in the center altar dimmed, flickering erratically.
Ayomi placed her hand near the Gate's lock—an invisible line between realms—and felt it strain.
"Something is tugging at the world," she said. "Trying to open what should remain closed."
Ayola walked the edge of the firelight, muttering low prayers to Baron Samedi, but the skulls near the altar offered no comfort.
Sael lit Erzulie's sacred candles, and the wax ran like blood.
Thalia, ever still, watched the flicker of flame in her reflection.
"He's not alone," she said, her voice quiet but certain. "Whatever he faces… it has teeth."
Part III: Eyes of Ash
Zion stood, facing the warped creatures. They did not speak—but his sigils answered their presence, burning with resistance.
The fragment of the devoured god pulsed behind them, vibrating like a heart out of rhythm.
One of the twisted ones stepped forward. Its face was part-human, part-sigil—its voice a broken hymn:
"You wear three… but you have come to a place where gods are food."
Zion didn't flinch.
"And you'll find I don't get digested easily."
He drew the blade that bore no name—gifted in silence, forged in devotion—and the broken faithful rushed him.
And for the first time, Zion fought not just for survival—but against what the world would become if he failed.