From the distortion, something crawled.
It began as a smudge in the corner of a broken corridor—an error in perspective where walls curved impossibly. From the blur, a body formed: not from birth, but from concept. Flesh shaped by proximity to the unborn god.
A priestess—once called Kaelira.
Now, something more.
Her bones clicked like language. Her skin shimmered with glyphs not written by any mortal tongue. One eye remained human, the other an orb of rotating runes. Her mouth no longer moved to speak, yet when she opened it, others heard truths they had never been taught.
She walked to the sanctum barefoot, bloodless.
Lucien saw her first.
"What are you?" he asked—not with fear, but curiosity.
She knelt.
"I am the first touched," she said. "Born not of womb, but of echo. I serve the god-that-dreams."
Talia stirred at his side, eyelids fluttering as if feeling the disciple's presence.
Kaelira bowed her head to Talia's belly.
"I heard His name before it was spoken. I saw His form before it was chosen. I carry His law in my breath."
Within moments, more arrived.
Not many—only three. All once faithful. All now wrong.
One's spine coiled outside his body, a halo of nerves.
Another's skin was translucent, showing a fetus of light within.
The last walked backward, yet always approached.
They said nothing.
But Kaelira spoke for them.
"We are not disease," she whispered. "We are adaptation. The world bends, and we bend with it. We are what comes after."
Lucien watched them with fire dancing in his gaze.
"And what do you offer?"
Kaelira's eyes widened.
"Worship. Protection. Flesh. We will be the walls of His temple. We will burn as fuel for His path. We will sing His name before it is known."
Talia smiled faintly in her sleep.
Lucien stepped aside.
"Then serve."
Kaelira bowed low, lips pressed to the stone. Her malformed companions did likewise.
Moments later, they began their work—not building, but weaving.
Using blood, bone, memory.
They sculpted corridors that bent into themselves. Rooms that sang lullabies in reverse. A throne that breathed. All around Talia, a living citadel took shape.
Lucien watched in silent awe.
These were not madmen.
They were apostles.
At midnight, Kaelira approached Talia again. The unborn god stirred.
Kaelira lifted a blade of mirrored glass and carved her own palm, letting the blood—thick, black, and shimmering—fall onto the floor.
"I offer the First Pact," she whispered.
A pulse answered her. Talia sat upright, eyes glowing.
From her womb, a tendril of light reached out—like a finger of molten divinity.
It touched Kaelira's forehead.
And branded her.
She collapsed, screaming—not in agony, but in ecstasy.
When she rose, her form was stable.
Human again. Mostly.
Lucien looked down at her.
"You're the first of them."
Kaelira nodded. "There will be more. When He dreams wider."
Lucien turned to the horizon.
"Then we'll build an empire ready for the waking."