The priest laughed.
"What a heavenly coincidence, it's the same for me... well almost!"
After uttering this few words, the priest closed his eyes. Deep inside the labyrinth of his brain cells, the reminiscence of some past days and events was pulsating, trying its best to resurfaced and finally be free from the shackles of time and sorrow.
***
Long, so long ago that, he himself couldn't quite clearly remember, the priest wasn't who he was now: the faithful, righteous and honorable bishop in charge of St. Meroa cathedral, as well as that of the faith and spiritual lives of more than a thousand believers, settled in this city and the surroundings.
Actually, as far as he knew, he was born in the slums of Ilmeran—a disreputable town in Rivenoir County, somewhere in the Karvit Union—more specifically in a cluster of foul-smelling alleys where water stagnated in the gutters and children resembled stray dogs.
His name at the time was worthless, as were his rags and his voice. His mother, dried up and weakened by years of poisoning from the nearby factory, was nothing more than a sickly breath, a stooped figure who spat blood into her handkerchiefs.
His father was a miner who also ruined his health, not only because of the dust and various poisons from the extraction of minerals and other metals used mainly to produce gadgets and jewellery for the nobles of the region, but above all because of alcohol.
To tell the truth, the guy hardly ever came home, and when he did, it was only to drink himself into oblivion.
So the child grew up like this, between hunger and fear, fed on stolen leftovers and the blows that drunks, many of whom were his father's drinking buddies, handed out like coins.
For the average child, this kind of "upbringing" tended to lead down one of two paths: either you ended up broken, or you became harder and more insensitive than the rest of the world. After all, it was well known that to avoid being seen as weak, you first had to learn to control your emotions... right?
So, from the age of six, the little boy had learned not to cry. Crying meant inviting the older children to take away what little you had. Crying meant admitting your weakness.
However, one winter night, as he took refuge under a porch to escape the freezing cold, he thought he was going to die. The wind blew like a knife and his little body trembled.
Faced with this situation, and despite his young age, the little boy was nevertheless relatively calm and even serene. He closed his eyes, letting the cold kiss his skin and leave its frosty marks, and in the icy darkness, he figured the world could go on without him.
But it was at that moment, when everything seemed already decided, that a soft voice called out to him.
"Little one? What are you doing here?"
He opened his eyes with some difficulty and saw a man standing in front of him. The man was carrying a lantern and wearing a simple grey robe. His face was beginning to show signs of age but radiated a strange warmth.
"You'll freeze. Come on!" continued the man.
The child hesitated, even instinctively protecting himself, accustomed to mistrust and disdain. But the outstretched hand did not strike.
It waited.
So, for the first time, he accepted.
This man was Father Hileron, a priest of the Il-Naearâd faith who often preached in the surrounding area.
Unlike the other clergymen he had sometimes seen, dressed in gold and distant, Hileron lived in the heart of the slums. He shared his meals with the poor, tended to their wounds, and listened to their cries without ever judging them.
The priest led him to the small, modest house where he lived. There, the child discovered a clean, cosy bed, hot soup, and above all, a gaze that did not despise him.
"Don't you have a name?" asked Hileron, stroking the boy's head as he set about devouring the soup in front of him.
The little boy put down his bowl, lingered for a moment, turned his head away and replied:
"They call me... nothing... or hey... or little rat."
The priest smiled sadly. Raising a hand to his neck level, he placed his index finger under his chin and rested it on his finger. The man thought for a moment and suddenly smiled brightly, like a child who had just found the solution to a difficult equation.
Not that the young boy knew what an equation was...
"Since you have no name, then you shall be "Mahilrik"... It means ... uh... "strong in the storm", or "Fight the cold" in the ancient Kilithar language, depending of the context!' The priest almost sang.
His dazzling smile pierced the darkness in the young boy's heart.
"Mahilrik... My name is... Mahilrik..." repeated the child.
The word, simple but powerfully symbolic, was engraved in his mind like a blessing. For the first time since he had come into the world, he was no longer 'nothing'.
In the weeks that followed, Hileron became a figure of light. He taught the boy how to read, write and meditate. He also taught him how to read the psalms, recognise the symbols of the Il-Naearâd faith, but above all to understand that every being, even the most broken, had a spark.
'Misery is not a fault, but indifference is the true sin!' he often said.
Mahilrik grew up with these words as his only guide. Much later, when his mother died, and again when his father disappeared for good, he did not break down. In fact, he did not even felt affected by it, since he had found a family in the small, decrepit chapel where Hileron gathered the outcasts.
...However, despite all this, Mahilrik could not completely fill the gaping void that had taken root deep within his soul.
One evening, some years later, as they were returning from visiting an old woman who was dying, Hileron made them stop at a street vendor's potato porridge kiosk.
"Mahilrik, you have seen this world. You know perfectly well how cruel it is. It leaves you with only two choices: to become like it, or to carry a light, however fragile it may be." said the priest.
These words echoed in the young boy's still tormented mind and decided his future. The child from the slums would become a man of faith. Not out of mystical conviction, but out of gratitude, out of debt to the one who had saved him, and also to serve as a beacon in the darkness that covered the lives of others like him.
***
The years passed. Mahilrik, a teenager on the cusp of adulthood, officially entered the priesthood. His face had hardened, his thin body had filled out, but his eyes retained the same fierce intensity.
At first, he served humbly under Hileron's guidance in the small local parish. He was often seen distributing bread, comforting widows, defending children from the brutality of soldiers and others who thought they could do as they pleased. His zeal was surprising. Some found him too direct, too impetuous. But no one doubted his sincerity.
This sincerity soon set him apart from the crowd. He quickly made a name for himself and was sent by the regional clergy on missions to remote areas.
It was there that he discovered another form of misery: not only poverty, but also the cold indifference of the authorities. The local nobles demanded that mayors and municipal officials impose exorbitant taxes, and the priests of the big cities embezzled the offerings.
The people, exhausted, began to turn their backs on faith. One day, as he was trying to overcome all this frustration and devote himself solely to his preaching, the inhabitants, exhausted, hungry and, above all, extremely sensitive because of all the misery they were enduring, spat out words that once again shook Mahilrik's perception of the world.
"Brother Mahilrik, your prayers do not fill our granaries!" they said.
Deep down, he understood them. He shared their anger. To be honest, it stirred a dull bitterness within him. Why did the light of the gods seem so dim? Why did sincere prayers go unanswered?
One evening, overwhelmed, he confided in a colleague.
"I have given my whole life to this mission. But the further I go, the more I see men sinking into cruelty. Where is divine justice? Where is the hand that pulls the innocent out of the mud?"
At this plea, his colleague just shrugged his shoulders.
"Perhaps the justice of the gods is not ours. Perhaps it does not even exist. All we can do is continue to preach and hope for the best."
These words struck him as sacrilegious. No, he couldn't believe that. Hileron had not been wrong. His sacrifices had not been in vain.
But a seed had taken root.
...If the light did not act, perhaps it was necessary to force its hand.
After that, he became more rigid, more demanding. His sermons spoke less of love and more of discipline. He wanted to rouse the crowds, to remind them that faith should not be a balm but a flame.
***
On another distant day, night had fallen heavily on the small hamlet of Vaelekt, where Mahilrik had been officiating for three years, leaving the two moons to claim their rightful places in the night sky. The hamlet where he had served his umpteenth assignment was a miserable place, bordered by dry fields and woods too often haunted by bandits.
The chapel he had rebuilt with his own hands, with the help of the villagers, had become the only refuge for the population. They prayed there, sometimes ate there, but above all, they cried there a lot.
But that evening... that evening, there was palpable anxiety. There were rumours that marauders were prowling, men from the southern plains, wilder than horned wolves. That evening, Mahilrik prayed longer, fearing what the night might bring.
But the crash of doors broke the silence.
Armed figures invaded the sanctuary, their torches — both made from fire lit up on woods , and others, newer ones, fueled with Kilith — casting dancing lights on the icons. The faithful and other inhabitants, who had taken refuge in the chapel, screamed and scattered in panic.
Mahilrik tried to intervene.
"This house is sacred! You can't do this!" he shouted.
A blow from the pommel of a sword brought him to his knees and silenced him.
"Sacred? While we're starving outside? Your gods can feed on ashes. We're going to enjoy the baron's generous pay!" sneered one of the marauders.
With a gesture, the bandit threw his torch at the altar.
The fire caught as if it had been waiting. The hangings, the benches, everything went up in flames. Within minutes, the chapel became a living inferno.
Cries rose, muffled by the smoke. Children were crying, women were suffocating. Those who tried to escape were attacked and cut down by the bandits' blades.
Mahilrik, his face burned by the heat, ran towards the nave where a little girl was trapped under a fallen beam. He strained with all his might, his hands bleeding as he tried to free her, but he did not stop.
"Hold on! I'm here, I'm here!"
After a nearly superhuman effort, the beam finally gave way, and he pulled the girl close to him. She was trembling like he had once, on the night Hileron had found him. The only diffrence was, back then he was trembling because of the deathly cold, death that Mahilrik himself was ready to accept. But this little girl... She was trembling from sheer fright. A kid shouldn't have to feel such terror.
Never.
He tried to carry her outside, but the roof was already collapsing in large sections. A deafening roar filled the church. The fire roared like a beast. The fire roared like a beast.
Suddenly, in the scarlet glow of the flames, Mahilrik thought he saw... something else.
A silhouette. Immense, indistinct, shaped by flames and shadows. Eyes without pupils, a presence that crushed him with a single glance. He stood frozen, clutching the child, unable to look away.
The creature—or vision—spoke, but there were no organs on this silhouette that could have served as a mouth. At least, not from what Mahilrik could see at that moment.
In short, the creature, or vision, spoke to him without a voice.
"You seek light. But light only exists in destruction. Look: fire purifies, fire devours the ungodly and leaves only the essential."
A section of wall collapsed, crushing the marauders who had been laughing just moments before. The creature seemed to smile.
"Save those who deserve it. Burn those who corrupt. Only then will the truth shine."
Then everything disappeared in a deafening burst of embers. The noise and intense heat caused the priest to lose consciousness and collapse.
——
Mahilrik regained consciousness outside, gasping for breath, covered in ashes, still holding the little girl. Around him, a dozen survivors were sobbing. But most of the village was now nothing more than a pile of charcoal and charred corpses.
He looked up at the dark night sky. The silence that followed the carnage echoed like a divine response. The little girl, huddled against him, raised her eyes, filled with tears that flowed profusely, expressing her deep sorrow.
"Father Mahilrik... why ? Why didn't the gods... save Mummy?" She asked, her lips trembling as she uttered these heavy words.
He did not know how to answer, and could only look into the distance, unable to find the beginning of a single clue as to why.
Yet, in his heart, one certainty prevailed: it was not love that had saved them. It was purification through pain.
...It was fire.
***
In the days that followed, Mahilrik wandered among the ruins. There, he found only ashes and charred wood... as well as a strange patch of salt.
The survivors looked at him with a mixture of gratitude and terror. Some called him a saviour, others whispered that he had attracted both divine wrath and the carnal anger of the nobles.
But he, in silence, was now forming a conviction.
After all these years, he had finally understood a fundamental truth: goodness alone was not what could change the world.
After all, on reflection, the facts spoke for themselves! Kindness had allowed marauders to prosper, corruption to spread, and given the nobles reason to attack this village, which had asked for nothing more than to exist and for its inhabitants to be simply good believers.
And yet, fire had accomplished what prayers could not.
He thought back to the words of the creature—or the vision. He still did not know what that thing was, for that matter. But in the depths of his soul—which had begun to open up again—something told him that perhaps the divine intervention he so desired was not so foreign to it after all.
In his tormented mind, the words of the vision—or of the creature—echoed so loudly that they became physically deafening.
'Save those who deserve it. Burn those who corrupt.'
From then on, that was his motto.
He continued to preach, but his sermons changed.
"Brothers and sisters... do not believe that mercy alone paves the way. Mercy must be a sword, not a balm. Compassion without rigour feeds evil." he would now say.
Some wept, others nodded in agreement. All felt that he had crossed an invisible line.
In this world plagued by chaos, not only from the Negaciones, but also and above all from men, Mahilrik began to see himself not only as a guide, but as a judge.
He had begun to implement rules of life, to decide who deserved to live and who needed to be purified.
A drunkard who beat her son was denounced, and her house burned down during the night.
Some people whispered that it was Mahilrik, but no one dared accuse him.
Besides, he did not see himself as a monster. On the contrary, he believed himself to be the executor of a sacred mission. Every life taken, every fire lit, he offered to the Il-Naearâd as fervent prayers.
Yet, in the shadow of his fanaticism, more than being extreme, there remained a contradiction. He continued to sincerely help orphans, feed the hungry, and care for the wounded. He believed these actions were consistent with his mission: to protect the 'pure' and destroy the 'corrupt'.
But each act of kindness drove him to be more cruel towards those he deemed unworthy. For if he loved to save some so much, it was to better justify the damnation of others.
And it was in this context that he one day came into contact with a messenger who claimed to belong to an order composed of people who had suffered similar experiences to his own, and who had also received the "vision" in their deepest distress.
These people called themselves the Inner Circle.
***
Over the years, Mahilrik noticed that wherever he went, rumours or events involving the Negaciones spread. Travellers swore they had seen shadowy figures near the fields, children disappeared at dusk, slaughtered herds were found drained of blood, remote villages were found ransacked, and the deceased victims were left only in a charred state.
For the other priests, these were just exaggerated stories about what was already known about the Negaciones, peasant fears.
But Mahilrik knew better.
In every icy breath of wind, in every night darker than usual, he believed he could feel their presence.
It was one of the most concrete topics of his sermons in Vaelekt, where he had become the leading figure.
"The Negaciones are here because of us. They are born of our treacherous emotions and actions. But we can do nothing about this, for we are only humans made of flesh and therefore weak to sin. However, if we do not purify, if we do not sacrifice... then they will take everything!" he whispered to his disciples and followers.
For him, the massacres, called "purification", he ordered were not mere purges. They were shields against these creatures from an ancient age. And every time a village was 'purified', he swore that the shadow receded.
Over time, however, his sermons became increasingly explicit.
"The Negaciones feed on our weaknesses. On corruption. On doubt. On anger and perifidy. Do you want to see them enter your homes? Then purify! Then burn!"
His audience shuddered. Some doubted, but many believed, for since that fateful day, there had been no more attacks. The baron had died suddenly, murdered by one of his mistresses, it was said. And the calamities that were the negaciones seemed to be receding, as several other hamlets had suffered their wrath... but not Vaelekt.
And it was in this climate of fear and obsession that the final apparition occurred a few years later.
***
The years passed. Mahilrik, who had become a renowned priest and then Grand Stellar in the order of the Il-Neaerad, continued his rise. With each new assignment, he imposed his vision. Traditional sermons spoke of love, forgiveness, and patient faith; his spoke of burning justice, purification, and the need to eliminate evil before it grew.
Some of his colleagues opposed him, but his results spoke for themselves. The villages he 'purified' subsequently enjoyed insolent prosperity. It was said that the plague was receding, that harvests were multiplying, that even the Negaciones feared him. The faithful clung to him as if he were a saviour.
But behind every miracle there was a price. Entire families banished. Houses burned down. Men, women, sometimes children branded as 'impure', executed or burned at the stake.
Mahilrik did not see this as a crime. He saw it simply as the fulfilment of the oath he had sworn in the burning church: to save some, to purify others.
And as the years passed, he became more and more convinced that the voice in the fire was not a hallucination. It was a manifestation of the Il-Naearâd themselves.
One day, however, when he had just been transferred to the great cathedral of St Meroa, in the magnificent city of Stravagon, Mahilrik realised that this citadel was full of the most vile beings, and that no one would complain if it underwent purification.
Fortunately, as if the gods had given him their blessing, he had managed to find people in the same city and its surroundings who thought like him. And as if that confirmation alone were not enough, he had a vision one night.
In this vision, he was walking on a desolate land stretching to the horizon, on which there was nothing no matter where he looked.
No, to be honest, there was something there: salt and flames here and there. The salt formed hills, roads, dunes, habitats, and even... statues.
These statues were so realistic that it seemed as if beings made of salt would start to move at the slightest touch. And in the distant horizon, a city made of flames. The heat of these flames, which seemed to be several hundred kilometres away, was so intense that Mahilrik felt his skin burning, his hair breaking and his breath tearing his lungs apart.
Yet, as if he no longer had control over his body, his feet began to carry him towards the city of flames, and the further he walked, the higher and hotter the flames became... and the more salt statues there were.
After what could have been months, maybe even years — Mahilrik no longer knew — of walking without being able to stop, he reached the entrance to the city. On a gigantic sign supported by two gigantic, massive columns were written the words "Welcome to Stravagon!".
Mahilrik left the sign behind and took a step forward to enter this hellish city, but as soon as he set foot inside, the landscape changed, becoming magnificent with gardens and beautiful towers. People appeared dressed in white and celebrated what seemed to be the end of an apocalypse...
...He woke up immediately. In his mind, the vision about people made of salt and a flaming city brought back a saying from the holy writs:
'Cursed be he who turns around and veils his eyes before the divine light, for he will lose the salt of his life! Blessed be he who affirms his faith in doubt and darkness, for to him will be promised a place under the tree of life in the eternal garden!'
A few weeks later, when a creature appeared on the road to Toka, Mahilrik saw it as more than just a divine vision.
He recognised it.