The warehouse office vanishes. Thadeus stands alone in a cathedral of ash and charcoal, the invoice gone from his hands, the fog cold around his boots.
Ahead, the pulpit burns with one clean gold light. Everything else is grey, including the stained glass, the pews, and Thadeus himself.
Elizabeth Bathory
Thadeus? Stay with me. Look at the paper. EB, that is my initials, but I have never seen this place.
Thadeus Jovanović
The light is the only color in the room.
Elizabeth’s voice echoes from somewhere behind the fog, thin as if it comes from another reality. The pulpit light holds steady, patient and impossible.
Elizabeth Bathory
If that route belongs to Stars of Divinity, then it runs through me somehow. If you move toward it, you may learn why.
The cathedral waits in silence, offering one path to the truth and leaving the grey stillness behind him. The next step is Thadeus’s to choose.
“Thadeus, compelled by the glowing light, walks towards the pulpit. Every step carries great weight, as if he is walking through wet cement. He can faintly hear Elizabeth, but only echoes, nothing he can make out. His purpose is to make it to the pulpit. He thinks he knows what awaits him - Peacebringer.”
SUCCESS (Legendary Willpower, rolled +2)
Thadeus steps forward, and the fog parts around his legs like slow water. The pulpit’s gold light catches his beard, his coat, his hands, pulling him through the ash-grey nave.
Thadeus Jovanović
The light is still there.
Elizabeth’s voice thins behind him, broken by distance and echo, but it stays with him as a shape, not a sentence. The cathedral remains silent except for his boots and the hush of the glow.
At the pulpit, the gold resolves into the familiar outline of Peacebringer, resting where a sermon book should be. Beside it lies the invoice page, black initials stark against the pale paper.
Elizabeth Bathory
Thadeus, look at me. That paper matters. Don’t let the room decide what it is.
Thadeus reaches the pulpit and stops with both objects in front of him, the vision and the invoice sharing the same small space of light. Elizabeth’s silhouette lingers in the fog behind him, worried and out of reach.
The gold holds steady, but now it feels less like a promise and more like a question waiting on his hands.
✓ Quest Accepted
Confront the voice of Peacebringer
“Thadeus looks down at the pulpit, and sees what he was expecting. Peacebringer in its original form lies on the pulpit, waiting for its user to pick it up. Thadeus moves his towards it, but the pauses, a shocking sensation coursing through his body. "You have doubt," the disembodied voice of Peacebringer echoes to him again. Thadeus shouts looking up at the ceiling of the cathedral, fighting the mental strain within him.”
SUCCESS (Legendary Willpower, rolled +0)
Thadeus closes his fingers around Peacebringer, and the shock rolls through him like cold iron under the skin. He grits through it, lifts his chin, and the cathedral stops feeling like a trap for one clear breath.
Peacebringer
You have doubt.
Thadeus Jovanović
No. I have questions.
The words ring up into the vaults and come back softer. The invoice still lies beside the weapon, the repeated EB initials plain and undeniable, while the light at the pulpit stays steady.
Thadeus looks from the page to the weapon, and the two refuse to become separate problems. The room does not change its mind for him, but it does not accuse him either.
Elizabeth Bathory
What do you see when you look at it, Thadeus?
Her voice reaches him through the fog without breaking. The question hangs there, gentle but exact, as if the cathedral is waiting for him to decide whether the initials are a clue, or a frame.
Quest Complete
Confront the voice of Peacebringer
“As Thadeus strains to hold onto Peacebringer, he thoughts race to Elizabeth, "I have to believe her, she redeemed herself, it wasn't her fault. Why do I still have doubt?" With a thunderous roar, Thadeus slams the hilt of Peacebringer onto the pulpit, then again, and again. The more he does, the louder Elizabeth's voice becomes. He can faintly hear her crying, "Don't leave me". He thinks to himself, "I won't doubt you Elizabeth." With one final heave, Thadeus slams Peacebringer through the pulpit, causing the world to fade away in a dark haze. Thadeus opens in eyes to see he's back in the office room of the warehouse sitting on the floor, next to Elizabeth kneeling next to him, holding him tightly and crying, her tears staining her blouse a deeper shade of red.”
SUCCESS (Legendary Willpower, rolled -2)
Thadeus clamps down on Peacebringer and drives the hilt into the pulpit, once, twice, then again. The cathedral answers with a low thunder, and Elizabeth’s voice swells around the stone like it is coming closer instead of farther away.
Thadeus Jovanović
I have to believe her. It was not her fault. Why do I still have doubt?
Elizabeth Bathory
Don’t leave me.
Thadeus Jovanović
I won’t doubt you, Elizabeth.
With a final wrench, Thadeus drives Peacebringer through the pulpit. Gold gutters into black, and the cathedral dissolves in a hard, silent rush.
He comes back on the warehouse floor beside the overturned office furniture, the invoice still near his knee. Elizabeth is there already, kneeling tight around him, crying into his shoulder, her blouse marked dark where her tears have fallen.
Elizabeth Bathory
I thought I lost you.
Thadeus feels the room, the paper, and Elizabeth all at once. The hidden button under the broken desk is exposed beside them, and the repeated EB initials sit in the open, no longer floating inside a vision.