Everyone turned to me.
One of them was shocked to see me, one was annoyed that someone laughed in their holy halls and everyone else was scared of the upcoming storm.
“Meadow!?” I never heard Rose's voice in such a high pitch.
“You dare laugh on sacred ground!” Spiritual pressure engulfed me and pressed me into the unidentifiable goo on the ground. I only could steal a single look before my face was slammed into the ground. The taste of rancid iron filled my mouth. The stern old priestesses robe turned to dust while a mechanical body emerged. She had nearly her whole body replaced! Is that even possible? And those parts weren’t made by the conventional cyber interface corporations, no, they were like the other machines in this cave, made out of gears and pulleys.
Steam rose synchronously to her anger. The temperature in the room increased dramatically. “Abbess, please calm yourself. You will destroy the church at this rate.”
For a long moment, nothing happened. But then the heat vanished and a collective sigh in relief was to be heard. The pressure lifted from me. I retched up some of the goo I swallowed.
“Your name is Ash, right?” The Abbess limbs twitched unnaturally like her movements were controlled by an amateur string puppeteer.
“Y-Yes”, he stuttered.
“Come here, Ash, pray to your lord the Heavenly Demon.”
He kneeled beside me, ready to worship. The scary old woman laid one of her freaky hands on his head. Suddenly, steam rose again. Ash screamed and tried to move but the priestess's grip was like iron. His head began to burn. As soon as she began her demonic prayer as soon was it over. Ash fell to the ground heaving. His scalp blackened and scarred. His hair became his namesake.
“Now, Ash, I hope you learned to never tell me what to do even if you were right. I’m the ultimate authority here. You do well to remember. I won’t be merciful again. Get him out.”
Two more white-clothed women emerged out of the dark corners of the church and dragged the tortured body out.
“Oh Meadow, in what trouble did you get yourself this time?” I asked myself. But Rose's silent stare told me that she was thinking the same.
“Now back to you, young lady”, the scary priestess received a new robe from one of the silent nuns, who emerged from the darkness, “as you witnessed I’m fond of second chances. He should have known better but you do not know our faith. This is one of the seven churches of the Heavenly Demon and I’m but a humble servant. On the surface they would call me an Immortal but down here we don’t have any interest in titles. After all, vanity is a sin.”
“Yeah right but roasting your own minion out of pride is not,” I commented in my head.
She continued: “I’m only interested in the salvation the Heavenly Demon brings to this world upon his true revival. And you, my dear, will help with that.”
One might have interpreted her smile as kindly but it felt menacing to me. I got goosebumps all over. She went deeper into the church. I was dragged behind her. Together we reached some kind of an altar. There over solid stone hovered a black beating heart surrounded by black cogs and red wheels which turned with every beat.
What the fuck!?
Inserted into the heart was a clockwork. A winding key rotated every time the heart pulsed. From it, a mixture of motor oil and blood was slowly but steadily flowing out. That explained the creepy goo all over the floor.
“This is the holy heart of our savior. The demon once shed it because it was ensnared by false promises. It thought it could become human”, her smile vanished and she turned to Rose, “funny is it not?”
Rose averted her eyes but the Abbess continued: “It betrayed its followers once but also in a way the shedding purified it from the mortal taint. What you see in front of you is pure demonic essence.”
The fanatic crone dragged the crying woman, who tried to flee, in front of the heart. The tortured woman had no choice but to look at this perversion.
“Beautiful is it not?” The immortal nun asked reverently. She hugged her unwilling companion like a long lost friend. “You shall be the first”
The Abbess then proceeded to grab each shoulder of her prisoner and literally pulled her apart. She and the demon's heart soaked in a shower of blood. Both enjoyed it in their own way. The crazed woman was holding her hand up in worship while the heart shimmered visibly. It absorbed all the blood in its vicinity like a magnet.
Rose looked away, Cale swallowed hard, even the big guy became a bit pale. I only watched in horror. Wait, that can’t be it, right? That can’t be how I die!
After all the blood was drained from the corpse the Abbess continued her speech: “Young lady, you people on the surface only think a high-grade cyber interface matters for a cultivator.”
She took my mechanical hand between her own. her touch was a lot softer than I expected: “It is not the metal which enables you to cultivate but your heart. The people who enjoy the sunlight forgot this simple fact. Power is a product of hardship. It is not something that someone can simply inherit or buy. No, only the trials of life forge the all-important life qi, the energy which powers all things on this planet. It is the blanket that keeps us, true believers, warm by night and provides the heat to cook our meals. It is what you cultivators desperately yearn for, not knowing that you already have it in every drop of your blood. Sadly, it is also what we are lacking. The Heavenly Demon desires more than we can produce. So we have to hunt from time to time. Although I will use every sacrifice I can get my hands on.”
She took the former hunter by the hand. Only his eyes betrayed his true terror. “Your siblings will thank you for your sacrifice”, the old woman smiled amicably and then ripped his arm off. She finished it with a determined chop to his neck which beheaded the man. The old woman repeated her pious dance in the blood.
I panicked. My heart nearly burst out, my remaining real palm sweated like crazy and I barely could breathe in the iron flavored air. All the events happened so slowly before my eyes. Whatever time I had left to think of a plan, I simply couldn't. There was only a minimal chance that I could outrun this fucked up cult in chains. The fact that an immortal led them made it virtually impossible.
Then Rose stood beside me and opened the handcuffs. She kicked Zoey into a dark wall of the church. “Run!”
I didn’t hesitate this time. Even though my chances were nearly zero. I had to take my shot. Cale tried to stop me half-heartedly but I effortlessly tossed him aside. Two white-clad nuns attacked me from both sides. I barely dodged only to roll into the arms of a third nun which I headbutted with everything I had. She let go of me but the impact made me stumble as well. The two women attacking from the flanks did not waste this opportunity to grab me. But Rose drop kicked the both of them and all three fell to the slippery ground. I stumbled in the direction of the doors only to be welcomed into the arms of the Abbess Blackhand.
“Child, your turn has come.”
Thanks for the chapter