The private sanctum crowning the High Church spire was a chamber of deliberate blasphemy. Black marble walls veined with gold rose to a vaulted ceiling painted with fading frescoes of angelic choirs—now lit only by guttering red candles and the faint, unnatural glow of mana crystals embedded in the floor. The air hung thick with frankincense, melted wax, sweat, and the unmistakable musk of raw, prolonged sex.
Cardinal Vespera—tall and silver-haired, forty-three summers yet preserved in the lush, voluptuous prime of her beauty by decades of disciplined mana circulation—lay sprawled face-down across the wide black marble altar that served as both sacred table and Lucifer's profane bed whenever he chose to defile holy ground.
