The church was the last place left untouched.

Miles County was a graveyard—silent houses, ash in the air, the streets slick with the memory of blood. Every corner felt haunted by the same grin, the same sound of steel scraping concrete.

But when you and Sienna stumbled upon the old stone chapel at the edge of town, the world changed.

The air inside was different—still, cold, almost… holy. The moment she crossed the threshold, the noise outside stopped. The echoes of laughter, the distant dragging of metal—all of it vanished like it had never been there.

You collapsed against a pew, breath hitching. Sienna shut the heavy wooden doors behind you, sliding the iron latch across with shaking hands. For a long moment, neither of you spoke.

You could hear her breathing. Fast. Sharp. Alive.

“He can’t come in,” she whispered finally, voice trembling with disbelief. “I don’t know how, but… he can’t.”

You lifted your head weakly. “How do you know?”

She looked back toward the door. “Because I saw him try.”

You followed her gaze. The window above the entrance was shattered, streaked with something dark—but outside the frame, smeared across the glass, was a handprint. Pale. Bloody. Stopped.

Art had reached the edge of the light spilling through the stained glass… and then turned away.

It didn’t make sense. Nothing about this nightmare ever did. But for the first time in days, there was quiet.

Sienna slid down beside you on the floor, clutching her sword like a lifeline. “You okay?”