The church creaked as Arthur stepped inside.
A damp stillness clung to the air, thick with the scent of candle wax and rotting wood. Moonlight spilled through broken stained glass, painting fractured saints across the stone floor. At the front of the sanctuary, a single candle flickered on the altar — already lit, though Arthur hadn't seen the old man strike a match.
"It's not much," the old man said, stepping in behind him. "But it keeps the cold out and the silence honest."
Arthur scanned the room. Time had worn down the pews into uneven ribs of wood. Dust clung to every surface like snowfall that no one bothered to sweep. Yet there was no rot, no mold, no smell of death — just the lingering weight of waiting.
The old man gestured toward a small door tucked behind a pillar.
"There's a cot through there. Rest, if you can. Tomorrow, we talk."
But Arthur didn't move. His eyes were drawn to the walls — not to the saints or the symbols of faith, but to the names carved deep into the stone. Hundreds of them, maybe more. Faint, overlapping, written in a dozen different scripts. Some were scratched with knives, others burned in with fire.
"What are these?" Arthur asked.
The old man paused.
"Names. The last thing the prophets remembered before madness took them."
Arthur stepped closer to the wall, fingers hovering just above one etched line:
> I saw Him at the edge of the sky, where light breaks and screams bloom.
"Who wrote these?"
"Not me," the old man said quietly. "They were here long before I arrived. Some believe these names aren't just memories — they're the remains of souls that tried to hold truth inside them and failed."
Arthur's gaze darkened.
"Failed?"
"Truth isn't gentle, lad," the old man said. "It doesn't arrive as a whisper. It comes screaming, clawing, pulling your mind apart one question at a time. The ones who saw God... they weren't chosen. They were caught."
Arthur looked down at his hands. They trembled, but only slightly.
"Then why stay here?"
The old man gave a weary smile.
"Because someone has to remember. Someone has to read the names aloud, now and then. So they don't vanish."
Arthur didn't respond. He turned and walked to the room behind the pillar. It was small and bare — just a cot, a stool, and a crucifix with no face carved into it.
He lay down, his sword close at hand.