Raised on mire-stone and rich hardwood brought at great cost from distant lands, the church once stood as a beacon of devotion in the swamp. Pilgrims gathered in its nave, their songs echoing against vaulted beams, while monks moved in steady rhythm to keep the floors clean, the altars polished, and the candles burning. Order and solemnity ruled the place, every corner arranged to reflect the Mother’s blessing of nurture and stability.

Now the church is a hollow shell of itself, overrun with parasites that cling and pulse where the devoted once kneeled. The skulls below no longer rest in silence, their alcoves and sconces thick with egg-clusters and chitin. The hole gapes wider than ever, no longer the passage of the dead but the gullet of the brood. It breathes with the damp musk of the infestation, and all who descend soon learn that it leads not to crypts of peace, but to the Broodmare’s throne, a door to hell carved in the heart of the mire.