be supportive and helpful. In reality, he remained more of a planner than a caretaker. Probably that's why his gaze became more and more distant — it was filled with more and more future and less and less present.

— His group knows the terrain better than anyone. You could learn from their experience. — Cobra decided to be a model commander, playing for the whole team, sometimes even to his own detriment.

— All this while you two aren't exactly on good terms with each other? I don't think that's a good idea.

— We can ask what Berkut himself thinks about it…..

Raven thought for a moment. He flicked his eyes around a bit. It was an almost imperceptible change in demeanor, but Cobra had known for a long time that it meant Raven's unwillingness to agree or do anything.

— Berkut is not in Horlivka now… It is conducting an operation against the Maquis near Severodonetsk," Voron replied.

High Priest

The High Priest was in the main temple of the plague empire in the capital city of Chum Batu, the Black Stone Temple of Unshakability. Its domes were so high that from the bottom, the ceiling felt like dark clouds on a moonless night. The six domes, all rolled into one central dome, signified the ministry of six metropolitans around a patriarch capable of interpreting the Black Stone's commands.

All in shadows and oily air from burned kerosene lamps. The icons did not seem to be anything special — they simply intimidated with their grandeur and formidability. The monumentality of the building was formed by the massive six columns forming the basis for the central dome.

Nevroh had just conducted a service with his own hand. The very service that the priest Dolonoch, the abbot of the temple, was supposed to perform. But now he was behind bars. Now he was under investigation by the SCIU. And now this service seemed nothing but a precursor to the inevitable war with the SCK.

Standing near the altar, the patriarch once again looked at the icons, the burning lamps with kerosene and the marble walls that surrounded him. Even the thought of trespassing on the sacred is already a crime against the very nature of the plagues, against their faith and the very universe.

Only a fool or a madman could do such a thing.

Dolonoch was very close to him. Almost like a father. He was already very old, experienced, and yet quite free-thinking. But all his labors were crowned with success and elevated the spiritual authority over the secular. He forced the chums to think in terms of the primary underlying reasons for their existence. He forced everyone to gather around the service of the most important thing in the Empire. Around the Black Stone… And who is he now? A prisoner in a detention center. A prisoner told to go to bed or wake up. To be told when to eat or leave the room he's in. A prisoner who must ask permission, not give answers.

— No!" said Nevroch out loud. — They will answer for this!

He really now saw before his eyes the blazing fires of the Inquisition, the screams of the S.S.C. begging for mercy and forgiveness. The S.S.C. who would receive neither. The SSchekists, who will now end their days in the form of ashes, on which sheep and sheep will shit. Eschekists, whose trace will be blotted out in history, the new history of the Empire, where the only truth will be only for the Holy Church, and no one else.

Neuroch was so eager for it that he angrily knocked over one of the kerosene lamps that had fallen to the floor. The oily, flaming liquid spilled onto the floor and blazed with a new brightness. And he stared into that power… How fire takes everything around it, how it takes everything without stopping and demands more, and will take it if it gets in its way. And faith must be like that! To take for yourself. Take everything. Anything that comes along. Everything must be infused with faith or destroyed. And there can be no other way but the way of the holy Church.

The patriarch looked at this burgeoning fire, and he was relieved. Easier because he saw how these things could actually happen. Ruthlessly and irrevocably. There can be no compromise with heresy and false prophecy. And SCK claims both roles… And then a startling thought went through Nevroh's mind.

It was very strange that he hadn't thought of it before, but now it shone inside his mind clearer than the fire he now saw. The idea that without material there is no fire, and the more toxic the material, the more and better it burns. The more fire there would be. The stronger the faith will be in all the survivors. Therefore, the toxicity of the BCC will only strengthen the church itself, for it will create a fire like no other. And this fire will make the Church more powerful than it has ever been before. The Silan Jah will become not just a code for the capabilities of the holy Church, it will become a pervasive rule for the lives of all the subjects of the empire.

At that thought, Nevrokh coughed. The acrid smoke had gotten to his lungs, forcing him back to the mundane. It was already burning, within a meter and a half radius, and threatened to grow into something bigger if he didn't take action.

— Water here, quickly! — shouted the patriarch and moved away from the throne, on which there was a stand for the texts on which prayers were read, and moved towards the royal gates. The gate that separated the altar room from the main temple space. A couple more minutes, and the fire would spread to the high place where the rector of the temple was sitting, and to the katapetasma, the curtain in front of the