It may break you.”
Roxy, pale and resolute, nodded. She dropped to her knees, wincing at the shift in weight inside her. But it is holy. Between them lay the object: a power core encased in sanctified adamantium, roughly the size of a gauntleted fist. What she endures is beyond comprehension — and yet utterly human. It is not clean. Her body was already tense. But it is holy. This is the story of an unspeakable mission. Her vision swam. Only two souls breathed in that silent chamber: Sister Roxy, stripped of everything but faith — and Priestess Verena, whose hands trembled despite decades of ritual calm. Verena whispered prayers as she worked — half to comfort Roxy, half to steel herself. The belt muffled it only slightly as the edges of the capsule stretched her farther than she thought possible. They beat her. She didn’t have to. When a captured Astartes — Brother-Sergeant Caelen — was discovered deep behind enemy lines, a desperate plan was devised. “We need to remove it.”
“Quietly,” she said.
