Morning light didn't feel comforting anymore.
It just revealed how tired the city was.
Aiden and Seris noticed it first in the way people moved. Slower. Heavier. As if something that used to help carry them suddenly refused to.
Market stalls opened late.
Conversations paused halfway through.
People stood still longer than they should have after stopping.
Not sick. Not cursed.
Just less.
Seris scanned people quietly before approaching a weary older woman seated on a crate.
"May I?" she asked gently.
The woman nodded.
Seris cast softly, diagnostic magic humming like calm water. The light didn't heal. It simply revealed.
Her brows knit.
"No disease. No curse. No external intrusion."
Aiden placed his hand over Seris' wrist.
He didn't cast.
He didn't force.
He simply listened to the world.
And the world whispered back.
"…they're tired from believing," he murmured.
Seris blinked.
"What?"
"Faith," Aiden said quietly. "They used to lean on it and feel supported. Held. Warm."
He swallowed.
"It doesn't just give anymore."
His voice lowered.
"It takes now, too."
Seris exhaled slowly.
"Someone did this," she said. "Faith doesn't decide to become predatory."
Aiden nodded once.
"So we help," Seris said simply. "We don't panic them. We stabilize what we can. We keep them breathing and standing."
He almost smiled.
"You sound like Aureline."
"Don't insult me," she muttered… but her hand squeezed his briefly before they moved on.
Partners.
---
Liora didn't need to sense magic to see the truth.
Pain didn't always scream. Sometimes it just sagged.
She moved through a poorer street, sleeves rolled, voice warm and alive.
"Sit. Yes, sit," she said, guiding an old man to rest. "Common sense isn't weakness."
A young mother leaned against the wall beside her, a child clinging faintly to her sleeve.
"I feel like something's pressing on me," the mother whispered.
Liora smiled softly.
"Then for now, press back against me."
She blessed water lightly—not with grand divinity, but with warmth. Enough to remind bodies they mattered.
She stayed.
Because sometimes staying was resistance.
---
In another, quieter part of the city, two beings who did not belong to mortal schedules walked side by side.
Inkaris spoke first.
"You could have stayed hidden, Caelum."
The fallen angel smiled faintly.
"So could you."
They walked like old acquaintances meeting after too many years—neither hostile, neither friendly, both dangerous.
"You gave Malvane a method," Inkaris said flatly.
"I gave him perspective," Caelum replied calmly. "Mortals adore tools. They define themselves with them."
"He's bleeding the city," Inkaris countered.
"He's redirecting belief," Caelum corrected. "Faith is a resource. He simply stopped pretending otherwise."
"People will break," Inkaris said.
"People always break," Caelum answered gently. "The interesting question is how."
They paused at the edge of a street where laughter used to come easier.
"Why, Caelum?" Inkaris asked.
The fallen angel actually considered his answer.
"Because," Caelum finally said, "he asked for strength and I gave him a way to find it. The consequences are his. The shape of the ruin is his. I merely… enjoy seeing which path a desperate man chooses."
"You're playing," Inkaris said.
"I'm… curious," Caelum replied, smiling faintly. "Curiosity is kinder than boredom. Trust me."
They stood in silence a moment longer.
Inkaris looked tired, in a way beings like him rarely let themselves look.
Caelum only looked entertained.
"I won't interfere with your little protégés," the fallen angel said casually, almost reassuring. "Our games aren't crossing yet."
"Yet," Inkaris echoed.
Caelum bowed with ironic politeness.
"Until the city becomes more interesting."
He stepped into a crowd.
And vanished.
Leaving streets full of quiet exhaustion…
a Church unaware of what it had started…
and the first cracks in faith
spreading softly like hairline fractures
beneath stone.
---