Kratos5627
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The Broken Psalm
🕑 Added 2025-06-16 17:47:29 +0000 UTC---
The Reliquary of Saint Mereveleth stood like a spire of faith carved from the bones of titans. Not the tallest structure in the district, but easily the most alive. Pilgrims crowded every stair, every ledge, every wall they could lean their suffering bodies against. Some bled from their feet, their knees. Some sang through cracked throats.
Saint Mereveleth had earned her place.
Cassian remembered the story from old Ministorum hymnals. Mereveleth had been a battlefield medicae voidborn, lowborn. No noble ties, no saints’ blood. Just scars and stubbornness. She’d held together an entire Astra Militarum regiment with her own organs, if the story was to be believed. Let them harvest her nerves and veins to use in transplants. She died humming a lullaby, while an Ogryn held her bones together. It was the kind of tale that you weren’t supposed to question, not because it was sacred just because it was too terrible to disbelieve.
Obviously, exaggerations.
Inside, the reliquary was suffocating in a gentler way. Warm candlelight, wood polished, quiet songs hanging like mist in the air. The scent of oil and rosewater filled every breath. Incense clung to skin like regret.
Cassian walked among them quietly shoulder brushing penitents, cloaked figures, tourists, zealots. Everyone here moved with purpose, even if they didn’t know what it was.
At the main reception dais, the man behind the desk looked like he belonged there. He had a serenity that wasn’t forced just tired. His robes were simple. A small icon of the Emperor dangled from his collarbone like an anchor.
Cassian stepped forward. When the man looked up, his greeting came naturally, like he had repeated it thousands of times already today.
“Welcome, honored one,” he said. “You walk in the path of flame and healing. May your heart remain pure and your feet not falter. How may I serve?”
Cassian smiled politely, producing a small, smooth iron badge between two fingers. It was circular, shaped like a crescent curling inward. No obvious symbolism unless you knew what to look for. It could pass as devotional jewelry, maybe a token from a forgotten order. But to those who knew…
The man blinked once. Slowly. And then looked up, something shifting just behind his eyes. Recognition.
“I see,” he said softly. “You seek the Broken Psalm.”
Cassian nodded, his voice level. “If the doors are open.”
“They’re never closed,” the man said with a faint smile.
He moved from behind the desk in one smooth motion, robes whispering against stone.
“Walk with me,” he said. “The vault lies beneath the lungs of this place. Hard to find unless you know the old hymns.”
They stepped into one of the side halls. The crowd noise faded quickly, replaced by the murmurs of distant prayer rooms. The path sloped downward so subtly it was easy to miss. The deeper they went, the thicker the walls became. No decorations here just bare stone, lit by flickering lumen strips that buzzed faintly. The scent of incense gave way to something older: stone dust, rusted metal, stagnant water.
“I didn’t expect a reliquary to have a basement,” Cassian muttered, voice low.
“Oh, this isn’t the basement,” the man said cheerfully. “That’s three levels further. This is the... historical layer.”
“Historic how?”
“Depends who’s asking. Some say it was part of the original chapel built by Mereveleth’s followers. Others say it predates the city entirely.” He looked at Cassian sideways. “The truth’s not in the records. Devotees believe what they want to believe.”
The hallway narrowed, became more tunnel than corridor. The walls began to sweat in places. It wasn’t a ruin. Everything was functional. Maintained. Just not maintained to be inviting.
“You seem... calm,” the man said, glancing back.
Cassian shrugged. “Comes with the badge.”
“That it does. Though most still look at the floor when we get to the door.”
Cassian said nothing.
They stopped at a thick metal gate. The door itself looked more like a vault hatch, ringed with tiny glowing script. At its center was a small, recessed plate black, glassy, shaped like a stylized eye.
The man turned to him. The warmth in his voice faded a little.
“This is where I leave you. When you touch the plate, they’ll know you’re here. Try not to lie to them. You’ll regret it, even if they don’t say anything.”
He stepped back into the tunnel, leaving Cassian in front of the vault. The quiet pressed in from all sides. The smell of incense was long gone.
Cassian studied the door. He reached out, placed his hand on the black plate.
There was no sound. No vibration. Just a click, barely audible. The door opened inward on its own, revealing a dark stairwell that curled downward like a throat.
He exhaled.
And stepped inside.
---
The stairwell wound downward like a rusted helix, every step ringing with the sound of his boots. He kept one hand near his waist not quite on his weapon, but not far from it either. The air was thick, stale, and colder with each descent.
At the end of the stairwell, a small chamber greeted him. Empty, at first glance. Bare stone. Single lumen globe overhead. Then, with a mechanical hiss, the back wall slid open, revealing a chamber carved from polished onyx, lit with soft blue glowpanels.
Cassian stepped inside.
“SCAN IN PROGRESS,” the vox chirped.
He heard the door seal shut behind him with a thump. Then came the hum low, harmonic. The chamber lit up around him, a lattice of invisible beams crossing through his body.
“PHYSIOLOGICAL PROFILE: HUMANOID HOMO SAPIENS AUGMENTED.”
Lines of red light flickered across his skin. For a moment, the air shimmered.
“BIOMETRIC SCAN: COMPLETE.
MUSCULAR DENSITY: 215% STANDARD ADEPTUS ASTARTES.
BONE COMPOSITION: MODIFIED CERAMIC LATTICE STRUCTURE
CELLULAR REPAIR RATE: ACTIVE
FOREIGN MATERIAL DETECTED: NON CATALOGUED NANOTECHNOLOGICAL SYSTEMS.”
The humming stopped for a moment. Then a different tone began sharper, more surgical.
“COGNITIVE SCAN INITIATED.”
Cassian winced, ever so slightly. The inside of his skull vibrated.
“NEURAL ARCHITECTURE: ENHANCED. MEMETIC LAYERING DETECTED.
MEMORY RETENTION: 99.98%.
SOURCE: MEMETIC VIRUS
He gritted his teeth. “Yeah, that one was fun.”
The vox didn’t laugh. It simply went on.
“PSYCHIC FIELD SCAN IN PROGRESS.”
Whatever technology was used here. It was not just Imperium, xenos technology was used here. For that Cassian was certain.
“PSYKER CLASSIFICATION: EPSILON GRADE. NOTED VARIABILITY TUNED CONTROL STRUCTURES PRESENT.
NO SIGNS OF IMMINENT INSTABILITY.”
The humming dimmed.
“SCAN COMPLETE. SUBJECT: CLEARED FOR ENTRY.
STATUS: OBSERVED.
REMARK: ASSET CONDITION STABLE BUT EXCEPTIONAL.”
A different door, narrower and unmarked, hissed open in front of him. The corridor beyond was darker, lit only by glow strips embedded into the floor marking a path forward.
He didn’t move yet. He just stood there in the soft, cold light of the machine’s judgment.
Then he exhaled, the air catching ever so slightly in his throat, and stepped through.
---
Cassian waited.
The corridor led nowhere yet just down. Cold, curved walls, lined with half-dead lights that buzzed softly. He stood still, arms crossed, the hum of the scanner still buzzing faintly in the back of his skull.
Then footsteps echoed from further down.
A figure appeared, backlit by a white lumen, tall and lean beneath a long, dark coat lined with purity seals. Gold threaded rosettes were sewn into the collar. His face was pale, clean shaven, and creased more from exhaustion than age. No weapon visible, but Cassian didn’t kid himself this one had the authority to order Exterminatus and make it stick.
“Inquisitor Rhelan Tovarin,” the man said simply, voice clipped, dry. “You must be Cassian.”
Cassian gave a nod. “That’s my name.”
Tovarin gestured down the hall. “Come on. Let’s walk. Not much for ceremony down here.”
They started moving. The hall curved left, then right, winding deeper.
“You look better than your file,” the Inquisitor said. “Cleaner, too.”
“You should’ve seen me on Desoleum,” Cassian replied, tone deadpan. “I was very fashionable. Covered in blood. Hair full of soot. Screaming.”
Tovarin gave a small grunt that might’ve been a chuckle. “A lot of people screamed on Desoleum.”
Cassian's jaw tightened a fraction. “Dain Verrus. Orlan. Did they make it out?”
There was a pause. The air felt heavier with it.
Tovarin shook his head once. “No. They held the breach. Held it long enough to evacuate the last transport. They died doing what they swore they would.”
Cassian looked ahead, eyes a little distant.
“They were the ones who made me join illuminati” He went quiet for a few steps. “Dain was the first man who I can call a friend in that world.”
Old man Joren and Verrus both were his first two friends after he transmigrated to this hellhole. Now, they were both dead. Cassian sighed.
Tovarin didn’t interrupt. Just walked.
Cassian exhaled and pushed it down. "I figured. Just hoped they'd gotten lucky for once."
“They were trusted,” Tovarin said. “Respected. I did not know them personally but I read their files.”
That got a twitch out of Cassian’s lip. “Touching. That’s how I know they’re dead someone said something nice about them.”
That earned a real chuckle from Tovarin. “Cynicism’s healthy. Especially down here.”
Cassian’s hand flexed at his side. There were no guards. No cameras. But he had the distinct feeling that twenty people knew where he was at every moment.
Tovarin kept walking like it was just another Tuesday.
“You don’t trust me,” the Inquisitor noted.
“You noticed.”
“I’d be worried if you did.”
They walked a bit longer in silence. The hall narrowed now, leading toward a chamber lined with soft amber glow, and strange geometrical reliefs carved into the blackstone.
Tovarin stopped at the threshold. “This is where the real introductions begin.”
Cassian stopped beside him. “And what happens if I decide I don’t like what I see?”
Tovarin smiled faintly, something wry and tired in the corner of his eye.
“Then you walk out. That’s how the Illuminati works. We don’t chain the ones we trust.”
Cassian raised a brow. “You trust me?”
“We trust your record,” Tovarin replied, gaze level. As he walked further.
Cassian looked into the chamber.
It was time.
---
Cassian followed Tovarin down the next corridor.
They passed a door, left ajar. Light poured out in sickly gold.
Cassian turned his head.
Inside, rows of men and women stood before a raised dais. Maybe thirty of them. Some still wore their pilgrim robes. Some looked like nobles. A few had the haunted eyes of former soldiers. One by one, they knelt.
A robed figure moved along the line, holding a shallow stone bowl. From it, a clear fluid glistened like glass caught in sunlight. Except it moved on its own, shifting in little pulses. Like it breathed.
Cassian narrowed his eyes. The liquid wasn’t still. It was alive.
As each initiate drank, their faces changed. Some wept. Some shuddered. One fell forward and screamed, clutching at his throat.
And then it started.
He arched back, mouth wide, fingers scrabbling at his skin as something shifted under it. There was a wet crunch. Cassian watched the man’s throat bulge unnaturally, as if something inside was crawling upward.
A sister in surgical robes calmly stepped forward and forced the man down. She inserted a rebreather into his mouth. The man gurgled once then was still. Not dead. But Breathing.
The others watched it happen. No one ran.
One by one, they still drank.
Cassian’s jaw tensed. He stepped forward, just slightly. “What the fuck are they drinking?”
Tovarin didn’t sugarcoat. “Spider eggs. Genetically tailored. Breed only once. They burrow into the larynx and anchor around the vocal cords. Dormant unless triggered.”
“Triggered by what?”
“Heresy,” the Inquisitor said bluntly. “Disloyalty. Treachery. They rupture if the host acts against the Illuminati.”
Cassian stared at him. “You implant living fail safes into your initiates?”
“They’re not fail safes. They’re reminders,” Tovarin replied, voice flat. “You’d be amazed what a man is willing to keep secret when he knows his throat can explode inwards.”
Cassian didn’t speak. He just looked again at the man on the floor, now twitching as two others dragged him to the side.
“Why didn’t you use one on me?” Cassian asked, eyes still on the horror.
“You survived daemon possession. The scanner noticed a unique warp signature residue clinging to your Psychic field. Those people are actually the most trusted here, as they have proved themselves. And have very high amount of chaos resistance.”
Cassian exhaled slowly. The smell from the ritual chamber was starting to settle into his nose. Metallic. Rotten sweet.
He turned and kept walking.
Tovarin matched his pace. “Let’s keep walking, we need to talk.”
Cassian didn’t respond. Didn’t need to.
The sound of screaming continued behind them, muffled by the closing door.
---
Word Count: 2145
Illuminati has records of Cassian for only the first arc, which means they know and have information about Cassian upto first 34 Chapters of this fic. The second arc took place entirely out of Imperium real space.
Comments
Siva Chandan Chakka
I have to say this arc is starting way better than the previous one.
Kratos5628
Inspired by it.
asdo
Sounds like metal gear vocal parasites
