The first light of day filtered through the cracks between the vines as if the Mother herself were yawning awake.
It was not the clean golden radiance of the Eternal Sun that Lira knew. Instead, the light was pale and earthen green, mingling with the faint emerald glow of the luminescent roots spread across the ceiling. The hideout smelled of damp moss and freshly turned soil. Outside, the distant crow of a hoarse rooster echoed through the fog, followed by the rattling of the first carts rolling through the streets of East Borough.
Lira opened her eyes with a low groan.
Everything hurt. Her legs still tingled with lingering corruption, her back ached from sleeping on packed earth, and her pride burned from having been carried like a sack of potatoes the night before.
She pushed herself up onto one elbow and blinked.
Matt sat in front of her.
He was already dressed in his brown priest's robe, clean and pressed—or at least as pressed as a garment that smelled faintly of church incense and sacred rot could manage. The cloth hung loosely from his shoulders, its edges worn by years of use. He looked absurdly comfortable in it, as if he had been born wearing the thing.
In his right hand, he held another identical robe, folded neatly.
"Good morning, little light," he said with that ridiculous crooked smile that was already becoming familiar. "The price of sleeping in the Mother's house is helping prepare today's sermon. Get up. The priest arrives in half an hour, and he likes everything perfect."
Lira stared at him as if he had spoken in the language of demons.
"Excuse me?"
Matt tossed the robe at her without warning. She caught it by reflex, though the fabric briefly tangled around her face. When she pulled it away, her black hair was disheveled and her expression clearly said this must be a joke.
"You can't be serious."
"Very serious," Matt replied calmly. He was already kneeling beside a large pot of golden wheat that looked far too healthy to be growing inside a church in Backlund.
"The priest always says, 'First the stalks in ascending order, symbolizing the growth of the spirit.' I just repeat the instructions. You do the work. That's the deal."
Lira stood slowly, still holding the robe as though it were contaminated.
"I am a Suppliant of Light of the Church of the Eternal Sun," she said coldly. "My voice blesses with pure radiance. I do not arrange altars for heretics preaching about rotten harvests."
Matt shrugged and continued aligning the wheat stalks with military precision.
"Then sleep on the street tonight," he said.
He paused and raised an eyebrow.
"Or you can wear the robe and pretend to be a very devoted novice of the Mother Earth. Your choice."
Lira exhaled a long sigh that sounded halfway between defeat and hysterical laughter. She removed her torn traveler's cloak, pulled the robe over her head—
—and immediately got stuck.
The robe fell to her knees, but the sleeves were absurdly long. She had to roll them up three times while muttering curses under her breath.
"This is humiliating," she grumbled while adjusting the collar. "If my superior saw me right now, I would be excommunicated on the spot."
Matt didn't even look up. He simply continued repeating the priest's instructions in a solemn monotone, like a strangely devoted parrot.
"Now the pots. Three fingers of water. No more, no less. Let the soil drink with gratitude, not greed."
Lira grabbed the clay jug he pointed toward and poured the water.
Too much.
A small puddle formed around the base of the pot. The soil bubbled happily.
Matt glanced sideways.
"He said three fingers," he noted calmly. "Not the entire river."
"Quiet," she hissed, though the corners of her mouth twitched.
It was ridiculous. Completely absurd.
A warrior of light kneeling on the floor to water plants for a fallen goddess.
"…And now?" she asked.
Matt continued without pause.
"The green candles go in a circle around the main altar. They symbolize the eternal cycle of decay and rebirth."
Lira snapped her fingers, igniting the candles with a brief spark of solar light.
Matt raised an eyebrow at that.
However, when she began placing them, one slipped from her fingers and rolled beneath the altar.
She groaned and had to crawl across the floor to retrieve it, her robe dragging behind her while she muttered increasingly creative curses.
When she crawled back out, there was dirt on her nose.
"This is worse than fighting the Shadow Ascetic," she muttered.
Matt, completely serious, continued the instructions.
"The incense of dried herbs. Three turns around the pulpit, counterclockwise. Because the Mother prefers things to turn the other way."
Lira began the turns.
On the second, she stepped on the hem of her robe and nearly pitched forward into a flower pot. Matt caught her arm before she fell. For a brief moment, his gray eyes gleamed with genuine amusement.
"Don't laugh," she warned immediately, pointing an accusing finger at him.
"Not even a little."
"I'm not laughing," Matt replied.
But the ridiculous smile was already there.
"I'm simply observing how a Suppliant of Light manages to make the Mother's sermon… illuminated."
Lira crossed her arms, robe wrinkled, face red with embarrassment and suppressed laughter.
"When I leave this place," she said firmly, "I will burn this robe with Solar Flame."
She pointed at him.
"And then I'll burn you for making me go through this."
Matt placed the final wheat stalk and stepped back.
"Done."
He examined the altar with quiet satisfaction.
"The priest will be pleased. And you… have paid for your lodging."
Outside, the sun had begun to rise.
Inside the hidden chamber behind the altar, two figures wearing identical brown robes faced each other—one furious and flushed, the other calm, with a smile that clearly suggested this was only the beginning.
Lira sighed.
"…At least tell me the sermon doesn't talk about 'nourishing with souls.'"
Matt's smile widened.
"I can't promise that."
For the first time in a long while, the hidden room behind the altar filled with something that was neither corruption nor pure light.
It filled with muffled laughter.
The priest arrived exactly on time.
He was an elderly man, slightly hunched, with a disheveled white beard and eyes that seemed to have witnessed far too many failed harvests. Entering through the side door, he murmured a quiet blessing as he passed the altar.
"May the Mother nourish you."
He didn't even glance twice at the two brown-robed figures seated in the first pew.
To him, Matt was simply the boy who helped around the church.
And Lira… just another novice.
Harvest Church did not ask questions.
Matt sat beside her on the hard wooden bench. The robe hung loosely on Lira's frame, the sleeves still rolled awkwardly, and her face carried a mixture of embarrassment, irritation, and deep existential exhaustion.
Before the priest climbed the pulpit, Matt leaned slightly toward her and whispered in a low voice:
"Hey, little light. What was that about burning the robe—and then burning me?"
Lira turned, golden eyes flashing with defiance.
"That was a sincere threat."
Matt clicked his tongue.
"Save it. Just because the Mother Goddess isn't famous across the Kingdom of Loen doesn't mean she's evil. Her Church is one of the Seven Orthodox Churches. It has as much right to exist as the others."
He shrugged slightly.
"It's official. People just prefer to talk about storms, night, and steam instead of soil and roots."
Lira opened her mouth to respond, but Matt raised a finger.
"And speaking of churches… your beloved Eternal Sun doesn't even have official residence rights in Loen. Did you know that? His church operates in the shadows here like an uninvited guest."
He gestured vaguely toward the altar.
"Meanwhile the Mother has her plaque on the door and her altar full of wheat."
He tilted his head.
"So tell me… who's the real heretic?"
Lira stared at him, half offended, half stunned.
"You are defending a fallen goddess with legal arguments. That's ridiculous."
"Ridiculous, but true," Matt replied calmly.
"Now be quiet and listen to the sermon. You earned it watering the plants."
An hour later, the sermon finally ended.
Matt and Lira stepped out of the Harvest Church into the gray morning fog of East Borough.
The streets were slowly coming alive with rattling carts, shouting vendors, and the smell of fresh bread mixed with factory smoke.
Matt now looked like a respectable middle-class gentleman: a crisp white linen shirt, a fitted black vest that subtly defined his shoulders, black trousers, and polished leather shoes. The priest's robe had been rolled up and stuffed into his bag.
Beside him walked Lira, now dressed in simple but decent clothes he had lent her: dark trousers, a plain black shirt, and a slightly oversized vest.
She glanced down at the vest for the tenth time and frowned.
"Why the vest?" she asked finally. "The black shirt was already enough. This makes me feel… disguised."
Matt chuckled quietly.
"Because if we're sticking our noses into the Black Market beneath the Old Bridge," he said, glancing sideways with that crooked smile, "we need to look respectable."
"A black vest says I have money and I know what I'm doing. Without it, we look like beggars. With it, we look like business partners."
Lira raised an eyebrow.
"Partners? Since when?"
"Since I saved your life and you decided not to burn me yet."
She snorted softly.
"You're impossible. First you force me to prepare a sermon, now you dress me like your accomplice. What's next?"
Matt thought briefly about the gray-black shadows he had left hidden inside his old jacket behind the altar.
I should retrieve them tonight, he thought.
If they stay there too long, they might mutate into some cursed artifact…
But first—
Breakfast.
"You can't plan conspiracies on an empty stomach," he said lightly, pointing toward a bakery down the street.
"And after that," he added, "we talk about how you're going to help me get into the Black Market without anyone looking at us too closely."
Lira studied him for a moment.
Then she sighed.
"At least you're not boring."
Matt smiled wider.
"That's the nicest thing you've said to me, Lira."
And together they walked deeper into the fog—
one wearing a black vest and a crooked smile,
the other wearing borrowed clothes and wounded dignity.
For now.