The gun sat between them.
Not cocked. Not loaded.
But alive.
Azari stared at it across the firepit—faint flames casting warped shadows across the chamber's ruined stone. Her name still shimmered faintly in the barrel.
Etched. Burned in by the Choir.
Jung Min didn't touch it.
Not out of fear.
Out of respect.
"You're part of their hymn now," he finally said. "They've written you into the verse."
Azari looked up, jaw clenched.
"I don't want to be a character in their story."
"You think I did?" He cracked a smile. It didn't reach his eyes. "The second they call you a Saint, you're already dead. You just haven't realized which kind yet."
Outside the chamber, relic static hummed beneath the surface of the ground—low vibrations like a choir's breath held tight.
They were near the Tomb of the First Round, an underground vault said to house the original bullet used by God to execute the Serpent. A relic of legend. No one had ever confirmed it existed.
But Azari's shard had led them here.
And it was pulsing again.
The tomb doors were carved in ancient script—far older than the Saints, older even than the Choir. Not divine. Not demonic.
Just truth written in metal.
Jung Min placed a hand against the seal. The glyphs responded instantly—lighting up red-hot like a trigger mid-pull.
"It knows me," he muttered.
Azari watched him.
"You sure we should open that?"
"Nope," he said, stepping back. "But everything after this is prelude."
The tomb opened.
Inside was a single round.
One bullet. Floating. Suspended in scripture, frozen in air. Its surface shimmered with words that changed depending on where you stood.
Azari took one step in.
The room screamed.
Both collapsed—visions slamming into them like whiplash.
Jung Min saw the last war.
Azari saw the next one.
They saw relics loaded into the mouths of saints.
Heard sermons fired through snipers.
Saw cities baptized in gunfire.
The visions stopped.
Azari sat up, nose bleeding.
"That bullet," she whispered. "It's not for killing."
"No," Jung Min said, face pale. "It's for ending."
They took it.
Wrapped it in linen and silence.
Neither of them spoke on the walk back up.
Even the glyphs on Azari's arm went quiet.
That night, they didn't camp.
They walked.
Jung Min carried the bullet in his coat.
Azari carried the weight of knowing she might have to use it.
Above them, in a distant monastery long thought collapsed, the Choir was already preparing the altar.
Not for sacrifice.
For performance.
And at the center of the stage was a gun—
Waiting.