The first thing Amvrosiy felt was the dull pain of cold that had set into his bones and then, all at once, a sharp pain of ice quickly forming in his lungs. Forcing himself awake, his eyes open looking up at the canopy of impossibly tall trees blocking out most of the sky. Snow lightly falls around him though the gaps of leaves and swaying branches as the moon peaks past the canopy. He is wearing tattered black robes of a clergy with designs of a crimson snake embossed around his collar. His clothes are soaked from the slush of red melted snow. If he does not get up now, this will be his grave. At his side is a shattered, featureless, red mask, half buried in the snow. He begins to push his broken body off the numbing cold blanket and onto his feet. His sodden black robes cling heavily to his sides, allowing no protection for the increasing cold. Forcing himself to step forward onto the compacted snow, his broken leg shakes attempting to hold himself up. In all directions, all Amvrosiy can see is the expansive wilderness ending in a dense fog with no star to guide him.

  “Now where the hell am I?” Amvrosiy lets out steam as he mutters to himself, “I need to find a town before sun down.” He stands there, weighed down by his doubt and the ever mounting dread of blood loss. There is something unexplainable whispering behind his ear, “keep walking…. make it home… escape.” As he turns to look at the sound, he only sees the swaying branches of the trees creaking as snow piles on them. Remembering the legends of the forest his mother would tell him at night when no one else was there, he knew not to trust voices deep in the forest. Today, however, so injured deep in the forest, he had no choice but to follow the advice. Amvrosiy cautiously and methodically starts to limp forward, gripping a blood-soaked letter while muttering a prayer.

  “Ailiria, her holiness of death, please grant your loyal follower more time to do your will.” As he finishes this prayer, a viscous, inky substance starts to seep through the pristine snow making a path through the woods. “Ailiria, I hope that's you.” Walking the ichor-stained course through the woods, he leaves a trail of blood and pain from his broken, bleeding body. He is painfully aware of every off-putting noise, every skittering of animals too quick to see. After twenty agonizing minutes, he comes to the end of this pain filled journey and sees a scene of macabre beauty. In a bed of vermillion snow lies the body of a cleric. The body is draped in robes similar to his own, with a gore-stained rose blooming out of his chest, wrapping around a sword embedded into him. The body is wearing a featureless red mask of a hunter of undeath, not dissimilar to the mask he saw when he awoke. Ailiria has blessed this hunter with a death befitting their role. Everything in his mind screams at him to step forward to see the face under the mask, to see where Ailiria has guided him. As he reaches down to grab the mask of the corpse, he notices a small outline dart past the path onto a tree. Standing up on a branch, a white-honey colored cat with a bushy tail and wings like a moth yawning and stretching. As the cat glances at Amvrosiy, he feels that familiar voice behind him, “no… escape… follow.” As the cat spoke into Amvrosiy’s mind, the words brought forth memories of the comfort of home, of why he is fighting so hard in this wintery hell.

  Looking back, Amvrosiy sees the rose, wilting now with mold, fungus blooming over the body, and onto the rusted sword. Stumbling backward, he collapses onto his leg, feeling the broken bone shatter. He rolled over onto his hands and knees, fighting the urge to succumb to the cold and finally rest. Spitting blood onto the snow between clinched teeth, he growls out, “Please I call to anyone who may heed my prayer… mend my broken body and mind, give me the strength I need so that I may return home.” Shadowy tendrils given vile form encroach from the ground to wrap around his leg, entering the wounds where the sharp bones have pierced the flesh. Wet cracking mixed with screams is heard throughout the forest as the bones in his femur are haphazardly fitted back together. The feeling of relief is fleeting as he doubles over, throwing up onto the snow from the pain. After collecting himself, he sees the pooling, stale blood and bile congeals as mold and fist sized mushrooms flourish out. “I have to get out of here now” Amvrosiy spits out like venom, “I hate this damn place.” He grabs the hilt of a rusted sword, pulling himself up, and leaving a puddle of ever-darkening snow from his bleeding leg. When looking up towards the, no doubt, fae cat, it disappears, jumping to another tree further into the forest.

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  Limping uphill to chase the only lead through this endless tundra, he saw a free-standing, polished silver door embedded a foot into the snow in the middle of a clearing. The door reflected the moon’s light like a beacon, and Amvrosiy’s attraction was likened to that of a moth chasing a flame. The door’s intricately carved designs depict a mountain of fanged skulls. Built atop the mound is a cathedral as dark as a starless night lined with rubies. As he gets closer, Amvrosiy notices the door is covered in esoteric runes that emanate power, making his ears ring and hair stand up on his arms. Above the cathedral lies an inscription carved into the otherwise pristine silver:

  A cathedral looms, gray and cold.

  Doors ajar for the lost and the bold.

  Sinners drift in, heavy with shame,

  Whispering sins in the flickering flame.

  We called it immortal, stone without end,

  A fortress no sorrow could ever bend.

  Flames crept in hushed, inexorable, and vast.

  Devoured the nave where confessions found peace.

  Only ash where confessions once spoke.

  Sinners stand hollow, tasting the fall.

  We know this ruin, we’ve lived it all.

  From silence we gather, subdued yet scarred.

  No grand resurrection, just fragile repair.

  In shadows we kneel, breathing the same air,

  A quiet congregation, bound by despair.

  The cathedral persists, fractured yet mute.

  Bearing our sorrow in its hollowed ruin.

  Amvrosiy’s body, acting on its own, reaches out to grab the door handle. As soon as his hand wraps around the handle, he feels heat as his hand starts to meld to the silver of the door. The sickly sweet smell of roasting pork fills his frozen nose. Panicking, he attempts to rip his hand from the door, as he pulls his flesh and tendons connecting his wrist tear as his bones start to fuse with the silver of the door.

  Leveraging his broken leg to pull harder from the accursed door, he only succeeded in forcing the door open through the snow. Peering through the door, there is an endless snowy meadow with countless forms looking identical to him in various degrees of decay. They are wearing black and scarlet robes of the clergy with various designs of animals embroidered in a deep crimson. The smell of burning flesh is overpowered by the staggering stench of decay. These duplicates are covered in rot and various mushrooms as they all point towards a gargantuan form of a spearman in the distance, nearly thirty feet in height. The spearman stands like an obelisk in a forever expanding pool of fetid snow. His rusted and jagged copper armor stands in contrast to the stunning silver spear fused to the bones in his hand through fungal growths. The charred flesh mixed with decay is gut-wrenching as Amvrosiy opens his eyes.