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The dim chapel echoed with the sound of George’s labored steps as he knelt on the cold marble floor, each movement a struggle against the weight bouldered on him. The room, ancient and decrypted by time, seemed to exhale a breath of sadness, as if the very stones pitied the lost souls who had passed through its doors. Varied fractured windows reached high above, their fractured images casting distorted reflections of celestial scenes—fractured, like his own fractured soul. 

The largest of them all loomed above the altar, depicting a seraphim, six wings ablaze with fiery light, a halo burning like a dying star, countless eyes glimmering, watching—always watching. George had sought this place for years, driven by a gnawing need for redemption. He had hoped that here, in this silent sanctuary, he might finally find redemption, a way to amend the darkness that had festered deep within him, poisoning his thoughts and actions, like a slow-acting drug he had been too blind to recognize until it nearly consumed him. 

As midnight struck, the candles around him flickered, casting long shadows that danced like restless spirits. The air grew still, unnaturally so, as if the entire world held its breath. His skin, damp with sweat, felt clammy in the oppressive silence. Then, a soft hum began to vibrate through the walls, like a distant choir singing a song of ancient power. It grew louder with each passing second, an otherworldly resonance that seemed to pierce into his very soul. He froze, his heart pounding. 

He looked up, trembling. 

From the stained-glass window above the altar, something began to emerge—a form of light, too pure, too brilliant, too raw for mortal eyes. The entity descended slowly, the very air around it warping, bending to its will. Its six wings radiated light so pure it seemed to burn away the darkness of the chapel, illuminating every chasm, every crack, every crevice, until even the shadows seemed to recede in its wake. The wings shimmered with hues George could not name, their colors shifting in ways that made his senses spin. It was like watching the dawn break for the beginning of time, like witnessing the birth of the world itself. 

The figure’s face was veiled in radiant light, no features visible, only a presence—a presence that seemed to stretch across time and space, filling the chapel with something vast and eternal. But it was the gaze that caught George. The eyes that weren’t eyes, but an all-seeing force that reached into the deepest corners of his mind, into the parts of him he had hidden even from himself. 

“George,” the voice came—not from the lips, for there were none—but from the very air around him, a voice that could not be understood by any measure of language. It was a voice that simply was—the voice of truth itself. “You have called for purification. Do you understand the cost?” 

George’s throat tightened. His mouth went dry. His eyes burned with tears he could not shed. For so long, he’d run from his guilt, burying it deeper and deeper within him, hiding from it in the smallest corners of his heart. He had deceived, betrayed, and crushed the very things he had

once held dear. His sins were a mountain on his chest, suffocating him. But this, this was something else—something not of this world, something he had no control over. 

He nodded, but words failed him. How could he speak when the weight of his past loomed so large, so overwhelmingly real? 

“Then prepare,” the seraphim intoned. Its voice, though not harsh, carried the weight of inevitability, the force of a truth too painful to deny. The wings unfurled, their span vast, filling the room with a light so intense that George’s very bones seemed to tremble. 

He squeezed his eyes shut, but it did no good. The light burned through the darkness in his mind, searing away everything he had tried to forget. The air crackled, heavy with the scent of burning purity. 

The first wing brushed against his chest. He gasped, his skin ablaze with an unearthly heat. It wasn’t pain, not exactly—but it was something far worse. It was exposure. Every sin he had buried, every lie, every betrayal, every moment of selfishness, they came rushing to the surface, crawling out from the dark places he had kept them hidden. He could feel them twisting beneath his skin, the memories like jagged shards of glass, each one tearing at his soul, each one a wound reopening. 

His mind flashed back to moments—too many moments. The face of Clara, his sister, the betrayal in her eyes when he had left her behind to fend for herself, his promises hollow in the wind. His mother, frail and kind, who had once trusted him to care for her, but instead, he’d turned away when she needed him most. His father, whose disappointed gaze still haunted him, even in death. He felt each of them inside him now, pulling, clawing, accusing him. 

The second wing swept across his back, and for a brief moment, the weight of those sins lifted. He felt as if chains were being torn from his flesh, the very essence of his guilt ripped away, each link falling to the floor with a sound like thunder. His breath came in ragged gasps. The pain was unbearable, but it was the only way he could let go. 

“Endure,” the seraphim commanded. Its voice reverberated in his chest like a drum, steady and unyielding. “For only through fire can impurity be destroyed.” 

The third wing touched his hands. He felt the fire of it, yes, but it was not a fire that burned. It was a fire that purified. The sins of his actions — the anger, the greed, the way he’d clenched his fists against the world — all of it burned away, leaving only the raw tenderness of his bare, trembling hands. He felt his palms open, his fingers uncurl, as if for the first time in his life he could release what he had been holding onto so tightly. 

The fourth wing passed over his head. The cloud of guilt and shame that had shrouded him for so long lifted. The fog cleared, and in that clarity, he could think, could remember with startling sharpness — the guilt he’d buried, the years he’d wasted, the people he’d wronged, and the way his heart had turned to stone in the pursuit of success. It was as if he were seeing his own life through new eyes, eyes that weren’t clouded by self-deception.

The fifth wing brushed his feet, and suddenly, George felt something he’d never experienced before—a sense of grounding, of being anchored to the earth, to the truth of his own humanity. The sins that had dictated his every step, the false directions he had followed—all of them melted away. He felt as if he could finally stand on solid ground, free to walk a new path—one that was not defined by the darkness he had carried for so long. 

And then, the sixth wing enveloped him entirely. It was not like the others. It was not a brush, nor a sweep. It was a complete and total immersion. He felt as though he were being consumed, not by fire, but by something far greater — by the presence of the divine, the unyielding force of pure love, of relentless forgiveness. His entire body burned, his spirit was consumed, and for a moment, there was no George. There was only light. 

When the light finally receded and George opened his eyes, the chapel was as it had been before, silent and still. The faintest glow lingered in the air, a soft halo that might have been mistaken for sunlight. The only sign of the divine presence was the absence of the crushing weight he had carried for so long, the burden of guilt and shame that had suffocated him, now gone, as if it had never been there at all. 

He rose to his feet, unsteady but free. And for the first time in his life, George felt that he could breathe.