Once, it carried clean water through the city's veins. Now it was dry, cracked, and buried beneath layers of forgotten history — like everything else the Empire wanted erased.
Ashir crouched in the shadow of a broken archway. Night had fallen, but even now, the sky above glowed faintly from the city dome. The Empire never allowed full darkness. The people feared it. But Ashir had come to crave it — the stillness, the honesty of it.
He clutched the pendant the girl had pressed into his palm before vanishing. It bore a simple flame, hand-carved into stone. No drones tracked it. No scanners could read it. It was ancient — and dangerous.
He waited.
Then he heard it: three soft knocks — tap, tap, pause, tap — against the stone wall.
She stepped into view.
Same dark cloak. Same intense stare.
> "You came," she said.
Ashir stood. "I need to know what this is. Who you are. Who they burned yesterday."
The girl nodded, then motioned for him to follow. "Then it's time you met the ones who still remember."
---
They walked in silence, slipping through a gap in the aqueduct wall and descending a narrow, winding stairwell.
Deeper and deeper they went — past rusted pipes, old surveillance nodes long deactivated, murals of gods that had long since been renamed.
Then they entered a cavern lit only by torches. Around the room stood dozens of figures — old and young, male and female, faces marked by soot, age, and something deeper: truth.
Ashir froze.
This was no rebellion. This was a remnant.
At the far end of the room, a single torch flickered beside a table. Upon it lay a black book, bound in leather, cracked by time.
The girl approached it and turned to Ashir.
> "This is what the Empire fears most. Not armies. Not weapons. This."
She opened it.
---
The script inside was nothing like the Empire's holy texts. No glowing sunbursts. No golden borders. Just ink, plain and powerful.
The first page read:
> "In the beginning was the Word.
And the Word was with the Creator.
And the Word was sent into the world…
but the world did not know Him."
Ashir whispered, "This isn't Divinius."
A voice behind him replied, "Because Divinius was never real."
An old man stepped forward, robes patched and faded.
> "His name was Isha. A man of the Word. A servant of the Flame.
He walked among the people with truth… and was silenced by empire."
---
Ashir's mind raced.
"But we were told the Flame Throne began the Light Age. That before it, there was chaos…"
The man nodded grimly. "That's what all empires do. They rewrite beginnings to justify their thrones."
Another voice chimed in — a woman seated near the torchlight.
> "Rome was not the first. But it perfected the lie. They took the old gods — Apollo, Sol Invictus, Mithras — and painted halos on them. They took the real messengers and buried them under marble."
Ashir turned to the girl. "Why show me all this?"
She met his gaze. "Because the Offering changed you. You saw what others refused to see."
---
The old man stepped closer. "We call ourselves the Silent Ones. Not because we are quiet. But because we are the last echoes of truth… in a world built on noise."
He picked up a scroll and unrolled it — a timeline drawn by hand.
The burning of the ancient temples.
The rise of Sol Invictus in Rome.
The merging of old sun gods into a false prophet image.
The creation of the Flame Throne.
"Every religion, every image, every ritual the Empire teaches," he said, "was engineered — not by men alone… but by one ancient spirit."
Ashir whispered the name.
> "Iblis."
---
The room went still.
The flames flickered. A cold draft blew in.
The girl didn't flinch. "You said it. That name has power. He's the one behind it all. Not just the Empire. But the false prophets, the fake messiahs, the glittering gods of old."
Ashir looked down at the book.
"Isha warned us about him, didn't he?"
The old man nodded. "Yes. And for that, he was erased. Replaced by statues and sermons that twist his words. They made him one of their own."
---
Suddenly — noise from above.
Boots. Echoes. A mechanical whine.
The girl's eyes sharpened. "They've found us."
Ashir stood. "How?"
"They track heat signatures. Torch smoke. Even breath patterns now."
The Silent Ones moved swiftly. Scrolls packed. Books hidden. Ashir helped lift the ancient book.
> "Take this," the old man said. "If we fall, the truth must survive."
Mira pulled Ashir toward a hidden tunnel. "Come on. This way leads to the Broken Quarter."
Ashir looked back one last time.
The Silent Ones remained still, ready to die for a flame the world forgot.
> "They're not hiding," Ashir thought. "They're holding the line."
---
As the tunnel door shut behind him, the flames of the old room were replaced by silence.
Ashir carried the book in his arms — heavy with history, alive with fire.
> And in that moment, he understood:
He was no longer just a witness.
He was a keeper of the Flame.