Peter looked at the doors to the hotel. He saw a faint outline of what was truly there, hidden behind the material structure. A grand archway of light rose behind the door.

“Glorious.” He said in a hushed tone.

He dropped down to his knees. He heard his congregation do the same behind him.

An eye opened on the door in front of him. He looked away, dropping his head, as was proper.

“Angel of the miracle, we are yours to command.” He intoned.

The angel delivered unto him a message, a box glowing with God’s light, inscribed with their words. It had been delivered directly into his mind. He read it.

First Temple of the Harbinger is at challenge level one. Petitioner’s may only congregate in groups of three or fewer at this level.

Petitioners may challenge Temple rooms to gain fruitful gifts.

Offer sacrifices at the Temple Core to increase the challenge.

Temple will expand to find new petitioners if none challenge it.

Enter Temple?

[Yes] [No]

You are unprepared fallow and untempered thing

“Father, what is this? There is some sort of message…” Leah began.

Peter considered for a moment. He had already known the lord desired a sacrifice of those who were willing to face the armageddon. An angel had come to Peter as he slept and whispered a message to him.

It had told him that ‘Those who did not trust in him will perish. You must build up the strong and discard the weak.’ Peter had not been a believer then, not when he had heard those words. He had been blind then, literally, he had been born unable to see.

But that angel had then whispered the true name of God into his ear and he had heard that blessed sound and it had changed him. He had been catatonic for two days, but on the third day he had risen. Now he saw, truly saw, not just what others had described to him his whole life, but what was really there; the Kingdom Come.

Peter stood and he turned to address his congregation.

“I believe we must enter, and we must make a sacrifice.” He boomed.

He looked over his flock. His followers, the true followers gazed back at him with adoration. The blessed simply stared ahead with glazed eyes. They could follow basic commands, they could recite prayer, but the path to Christ had not come easily to them.

They would make fine sacrifices. It was far better for them to enter God’s kingdom this way than to face the trials yet to come.

“Each of the righteous will enter, and we will each take with us two of the blessed.” He shouted out, raising his hands in the air. “We will proceed to the temple core with our charges, and we will deliver them unto the lord!”

“Amen!”

“Hallelujah!”

The rapturous shouts rang out into the night. They were in their fervor, that was good. That hot energy, that divine presence boiling up inside would serve them well. Peter felt it himself tonight, he did not always.

“Elijah!” He shouted, pointing ahead. “Venture forth, and spread the word!”

He sent them in one after the other, until finally it was his turn. He walked forward arms spread wide.

“Amen.” he muttered and passed through the gateway.

—

Olivia held her torch out in front of her. Despite Hannah’s repeated insistence Olivia had left her suit on. Hannah had reluctantly agreed to disagree.

Olivia had been fine speaking to the deluded woman, but she would not be speaking to Meera. Not after she had unilaterally decided to kill Olivia’s brother and old friend.

Above them rose gilded arches of marble and rose quartz. They walked down the cavernous hallway in near silence, only broken by Hannah’s humming and comments.

“Gosh gals, I’m pretty sure this place is bigger than it was, is that just me?” She asked.

“It is bigger.” Meera said. “The actual structure has been enlarged, somehow.”

They had been walking along hoping to make it to whatever the armory had changed into. The first room they had come to had been wide open with multiple altars. It could have been some analog to the lobby.

Olivia wouldn’t have been comfortable assuming that that room, or any other were analogous though. As soon as buildings started to change shape, one had to assume that all bets were off the table.

The stairwell they had been in had remained a stairwell. Things had been less similar from then on out, but they still headed in the general direction the armory had been.

The weapons they had now consisted of two torches and Hannah’s eyes. Hannah said she needed more Flesh of the Beyond to use her eyes than she got from killing monsters, so they tried to proceed just using the torches.

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

Olivia considered the torch in her hand. She thought it would kill Meera very quickly. She wasn’t sure how Hannah would react to that, but Olivia didn’t think it would be much of an issue. Olivia might earn as much as a ‘darn it!’ for killing the woman, but Hannah’s reactions to everything going on around her were inordinately pleasant.

Probably best to keep Meera around though. After the others had been snatched away into the walls, they had had to fight their way through increasingly strange and dangerous monsters. There was safety in numbers.

“It would be fascinating to study it if we could. It isn’t my field but-” Meera started.

She was interrupted by a sprawled creature that leapt from the walls. It had five legs arranged radially. It secured itself onto Meera’s neck, one of the claws at the end of the legs dug into the woman’s mouth piercing through her jaw.

The lower two claws stabbed into her chest below her collarbones. The middle two legs wrapped around her neck. The claws at the end curled back towards the body and stabbed forwards through the back of her neck.

Olviia heard sucking sounds and gnashing coming from under the wet flaps that were undulating against Meera. Oliviia lit up her torch she swiped at it as fast as she could. She raked the back of the monster.

It scorched down to nothing as the white flame passed over, like Olivia had passed a knife through it, it was severed. It began to bubble away to nothing. As it fell away, Meera grasped at her throat.

Through the woman’s hands and the blood, Olivia could see puncture wounds, and some pretty nasty scorch marks.

“Darn it!” Hannah said, in a slightly louder than normal tone of voice. “I should have seen that one coming.”

Hannah shook her head as she walked over to Meera. Olviia just looked on as her mentor stared up at her from the ground, eyes wide, mouth working. Hannah looked back at Olivia.

“That looks pretty bad, what should we do.” She asked.

Olivia watched as her mentor lay on the floor and the light faded from her eyes.

“You need to bleed on her.” Olivia said after a few more moments had gone by. Meera was nearly unconscious, her eyes fluttered as she heard Olivia but she was too weakened to respond.

“Ooooh, I don’t like blood that much…” Hannah said. “Can you do it?”

Olivia stared at the woman for a moment, a bit dumbstruck. “No… well I could but it wouldn’t help. You have to give her the Harbinger’s Blood, at least it worked when Eva did it.”

“No..” Meera managed to get the single word out before she coughed a weak wet cough.

“Oh, like the ritual!” Hannah nearly squealed.

She bit into her wrist and began to hum a new and different song. Olvia didn’t recognize it but it was off and didn’t seem very rhythmic. Blood dripped from her arm down onto the now unconscious Meera. Hannah’s eyes seemed to glow a bit brighter as she held her bleeding arm over the woman.

Olviia was surprised to learn that she was actually worried they had waited too long. Olivia’s eyes widened as the wounds began to close. She had seen it before, but had been too in shock to really take it in.

The word that rose to her mind was miraculous. She caught herself before she could laugh.

—

Rick peered around the corner. He spotted two of the ugly sons of bitches. They were better than the big balls of tentacles, but he still didn't like them. The windows in his mind called them ‘Bloaters’.

They looked like a human being was having a very, very bad allergic reaction. They weren’t human of course, just looked vaguely human shaped. When you hit them, their swollen flesh often ruptured, exploding and coating their surroundings. The blood inside was tacky, and wherever it made contact with another living thing that thing puffed up in sickly red boils.

They had found it was best to take them from afar. Rick held up a hand to Gross with two fingers raised. Gross nodded and raised his rifle to his shoulder.

"Wait, let me get this one guys." Isaac whispered.

Rick shook his head vehemently and put a finger to his lips.

"C'mon we really should conserve that ammunition. There's only two, we should really see if this works." Isaac said, slightly louder.

Gross sighed then shrugged and looked at Rick. The two men had quickly gotten the measure of each other. They had both served, both in special forces, both never received a rank above private.

Gross proved himself to be the superior soldier in mere moments. He had deferred to Rick's seniority before Rick could come up with a reason why Gross should have to be in charge. So Rick had gotten stuck in charge.

Isaac smiled brightly looking between the two of them.

"Oh fuck alright… go.” Rick whispered. “Gross cover him."

Isaac pumped his fist in celebration. He reached up and grabbed two handfuls of eyeballs, plucking them from the masses dangling down his cheeks. Rick felt his stomach turnover as they came free from the nerves holding them.

"Praise the lord guys!" he whispered excitedly before stepping around the corner.

Gross stepped forward with the rifle raised, staying in a crouch. He moved low and stayed behind and to the side of Isaac. The two creatures saw the advancing men. They both moaned loudly as they started shambling towards the men.

Rick gripped Gross' plasma torch and stole a quick glance back the way they had come. They had found out that yes, it was absolutely necessary to cover their rear. It was all clear, for now.

When he looked back to the front, Isaac was winding up to throw.

He lobbed one handful of eyes at each of the creatures. Where they hit, they stuck; some missed and bounced off to the floor, rolling to a stop. The ones that stuck began to swell up like water balloons. The swollen creatures moaned all the louder.

As the eyes began to grow larger and larger the creatures began to look like raisins. Their once swollen bodies became more dessicated by the moment.

"Sweet fucking christ." Rick muttered. "What a way to go."

He hoped the day never came when he had to fight that kid. Isaac had a good heart, but he was all mixed up in that cult of his. Rick wondered how he had gotten so absolutely fucked in the head.

Gross had stopped and was pointing the gun at the creatures as they slowed. The eyes had become the size of beach balls. The weakened creatures fell over, their moans of pain became whimpers which faded to nothing. Soon they were liquefying.

"Ah gosh that's so disorienting." Isaac said. "Oh man, I might throw up."

He looked ready to keel over, and he was breathing hard like he had just run a mile. Rick stole one more glance backward before advancing up towards the group.

Isaac made a face like he'd just eaten something rotten. He made his way forward slowly, unsteadily. When he reached them, he stepped on the eyes. He winced as he did so, but he seemed to feel better once they were all smashed.

"That should be our new go to tactic against low mobility enemies. Could have taken 3 shots each to bring those guys down. This was quiet too, compared to gunfire." Gross said.

"Yeah, can't argue with the results." Rick said.

"Yeah, the only thing is, it did use up more Flesh of the Beyond than I got for doing it." Isaac said, losing his cheer for a moment.

Rick realized Isaac was sad because he wasn't going to be able to help the team all the time. He wondered again what had happened to this kid. The world could be a cruel place, it let good people end up in some pretty bad places.

Isaac’s smile returned as Rick clapped him on the back. Rick tried to not to wince as the bunches of eyes jiggled on the kid’s face.

“Alright, let’s keep moving, see if we can find a way out of here.” Rick said.