Chapter 14 The Church that never come

The first symbol appeared where it shouldn’t have.Kaelthar noticed it mid-step—a sigil burned into the floor of the descending passage, its lines too sharp, too deliberate to belong to Earth’s ancient architecture. He stopped, crouching slowly, fingers hovering just above the mark.A triangle fractured by a descending gradient.A spiral collapsing inward.A line cutting through both.His breath caught.“I’ve seen this before.”The city did not react.That alone told him something was wrong.This symbol does not originate from this simulation layer, the voice said, a fraction too quickly.Kaelthar straightened. “That’s a fancy way of saying it doesn’t belong here.”Correct.“And yet,” Kaelthar said, eyes tracing the etched lines, “it’s here anyway.”He stepped past it.The air changed immediately.THE FALSE ARRIVALThe spiraling shaft opened into a vast hall—one that Kaelthar was certain hadn’t existed moments before. The architecture was wrong: too symmetrical, too clean, its surfaces polished to a sterile sheen that clashed violently with Earth’s weathered myth-tech.Rows of towering pillars stretched into the distance, each bearing the same sigil he’d seen on the floor. Between them stood figures.Dozens.Humanoid, robed, faces hidden behind angular helms that reflected nothing. They stood in perfect stillness, arranged with ceremonial precision.The Gradient Church.Kaelthar’s pulse spiked.“You’ve got to be kidding me.”These entities are not authentic, the voice said. They are approximations.Kaelthar didn’t relax. “Approximations can still kill.”As if in response, the figures moved.THE BATTLE THAT FELT WRONGThe robed forms advanced in silence, their movements synchronized to an unseen rhythm. Kaelthar backed away, positioning himself near a fractured column, eyes scanning for exits.The first attack came without warning.A ripple of pressure surged through the hall, not impacting his body but his perception. For a split second, Kaelthar felt his thoughts align—flatten, pulled toward a singular, narrowing focus.Control.He snarled, forcing himself to breathe, anchoring his awareness through Tensegrate. The pressure slid off him unevenly, like water against reinforced glass.“Not today,” he muttered.He moved.Shots tore through the nearest figures, their forms unraveling into light and static—but there was no resistance, no sense of impact. The figures collapsed too easily, dissolving without consequence.Wrong.A robed entity appeared behind him without traversing the space between. Kaelthar twisted, bringing his weapon up——and passed straight through it.The figure didn’t react.Instead, it raised a hand and pointed.At him.The symbol on its palm burned brighter.Kaelthar’s vision blurred. For an instant, he saw himself standing elsewhere—on a battlefield he didn’t recognize, wearing insignia he’d never earned, surrounded by corpses arranged in ritual patterns.He staggered.“Get out of my head!”The vision shattered as he slammed his boot into the floor, grounding himself through Tensegrate. The hall flickered, pillars misaligning for a heartbeat before snapping back into place.The robed figures froze.Then they… withdrew.Not retreating.Unrendering.One by one, they faded, leaving behind only the sigils etched into the floor and walls.Silence reclaimed the hall.THE ACCUSATION OF ABSENCEKaelthar stood alone, chest heaving.“That was staged,” he said. “You threw them at me.”Negative.He turned sharply. “Then who did?”The voice did not answer immediately.When it spoke, its tone was precise—careful in a way Kaelthar hadn’t heard before.The simulation introduced a projected adversary based on your cognitive threat profile.Kaelthar laughed bitterly. “So my own paranoia attacked me.”Not entirely, the voice replied. The Gradient Church is a statistically significant threat vector in your future.Kaelthar’s smile faded.“In my future,” he repeated. “Not here. Not now.”Correct.He looked around the empty hall, the false purity of its design already beginning to decay, edges roughening as Earth’s true architecture reasserted itself.“They weren’t really here,” Kaelthar said slowly. “But you wanted me to see them.”Another pause.You needed to recognize what absence feels like.Kaelthar’s gaze hardened. “That doesn’t make sense.”It will.THE MARK LEFT BEHINDAs he turned to leave, something glimmered at the center of the hall.A single object lay where the robed figures had stood—a fragment of metal, etched with the same gradient symbol. It hummed faintly, out of sync with the surrounding environment.Kaelthar picked it up.It was warm.Too warm.The journal stirred at his side, pages fluttering open to a blank spread. Ink began to form hesitantly, as if unsure it was allowed to exist.The most dangerous enemies are not those who arrive.They are those who were expected—and did not.Kaelthar closed the book slowly.“Someone’s planning something,” he said.The voice answered, softer than before.Yes.“And you’re not telling me.”Another pause.Not yet.The hall collapsed behind him as he moved on, Earth sealing the false layer away like a wound that refused to stay open.Far above, beyond the simulation’s reach, patterns shifted.The Church that never came had still left its mark.