Purification-ers

Biodata

Organization

Place Within the Church

• The Purification-er squads form the most important component of the Inquisition, the Church of the Eternal Blazing Sun’s sole enforcement body 45.
• Inquisition facilities lie beneath each city’s cathedral, with their size varying by location. They include offices for civilian investigators and analysts, secure storage for dangerous objects, and cells for imprisoned heretics 45.
• Clerical personnel handle records, supplies, and communications, supporting the field squads 77.
• Veteran Purification-ers no longer suited to frequent field missions serve as wardens inside the Hall of Holy Radiance. Active squads rotate through exterior security and enter to retrieve authorized materials and items 93.
• Captains report major threats through the Church hierarchy. In Trier, the Archbishop ordered Donovan’s squad to respond immediately to the Armory threat after receiving corroborating intelligence 63.

Known Deployment

Internal Outlook

The Inquisition is not synonymous with the Preaching Brotherhood, which advocates harsh measures against heretics and cultists; that outlook belongs only to some members. Viève contrasts it with the Little Brotherhood, also called the Mendicant Order, which favors spreading the faith, treating neutral Beyonders gently, and recruiting outsiders 45.

Recruitment and Advancement

Membership Options

• Contribution-based support: Assignments can count toward a member’s contributions, including reporting supernatural incidents or secret faiths encountered in otherwise inaccessible social circles 55.
• Early advancement: Charlotte is told she may seek advancement by proving that she has mastered her current potion’s powers 77.
• Ingredient funding: The Church agreed in principle to support Charlotte’s Sheriff potion, but lacked ingredients in stock and would closely scrutinize her application. Reimbursement for reasonable ingredient expenses had precedents 106.
• Cross-city recognition: Charlotte’s status in Trier was verified through Viève’s letter to the local diocese, allowing her to continue receiving assistance away from Suhit 54 55.

Training and Restricted Knowledge

• Peripheral-member guides cover Hermes vocabulary, confidentiality, ritual magic, charm-making, and signs of cult activity. They warn that cultists may appear respectable and occupy influential social positions 23 93.
• Joel describes ordinary potion training as repeated ability practice, meditation, mental stabilization, and experience gained through missions 93.
• The Acting Method is not generally taught to members. Viève independently discovered its principles, then swore an oath not to volunteer information about it to anyone who did not already know it 106.
• Access to some higher-Sequence intelligence requires an application; Donovan could not freely consult the Church’s records on the Hunter pathway’s higher Sequences 67.
• Routine candles and essential oils can be collected from the Inquisition’s storeroom after registration, while collecting spiritual ingredients in quantity requires permission 93.

Known Personnel

Duties and Operational Methods

Investigation and Public Protection

• Ordinary authorities refer suspected supernatural cases to the nearest church. Purification-ers can then cooperate with other official Beyonder forces when a case crosses institutional boundaries 97.
• Standard procedure is to investigate traces of Beyonder powers, secret rituals, and concealed cultists before deciding how many personnel and which Sealed Artifacts to deploy 63.
• Peripheral members supply access and intelligence unavailable to ordinary field agents. Charlotte’s noble identity lets her observe aristocratic gatherings and approach suspects without immediately exposing a Church operation 23 37 55.
• Public-security personnel handle routine cleanup after operations, allowing Purification-ers to concentrate on supernatural threats 40.

Patrols and Workload

• Each team receives roughly four or five reported cases per month, with about half proving to be false alarms 97.
• Saint Roch Cathedral’s teams patrol the Sona River banks to prevent drifting corpses from becoming zombies or wraiths 97.
• Fieldwork also includes night watches, emergency responses, and guarding the Hall of Holy Radiance 77 97.
• Viève explicitly acknowledges that the available squads cannot manage everything, making peripheral informants an important supplement to their manpower 97.

Abilities and Combat Capabilities

Sun Pathway Purification

Sun-pathway members provide purification, supernatural offense, and support against corruption 37.

• Solar High Priests can create holy water, summon holy light, empower weapons or limbs through sacred vows, and bless companions against fear, exhaustion, and corruption 37.
• Viève’s Purification Slash destroys a possessing shadow without setting the surrounding office furnishings alight 38.
• Light Pray-ers summon weaker sunlight capable of harming ghosts and walking corpses, provide blessings and limited purification, and can prepare rituals to produce holy water 37.

Mixed-Pathway Teams

The two fully described squads combine a Sun-pathway captain, a lower-Sequence Sun-pathway member, and a member with different abilities 37 64.

• Joel supplies exceptional strength, close-combat ability, mental resistance, and the Lawyer pathway’s inherited skill at exploiting rules and verbal weaknesses 37.
• Hill uses stiff, sharp-edged paper as weapons during the Armory operation 65.
• Mixed abilities do not eliminate rank disadvantages: Nikolai, a Sequence 6 Conspirer, nearly overwhelms Donovan’s team despite its preparation and equipment 67 72.

Equipment and Sealed Artifacts

• Holy water — Used against corrupted or shadow-associated enemies and to suppress certain Sealed Artifact side effects. Field supplies include thin glass bottles designed to shatter on impact 18 50 64.
• Sealed Artifact 3-1452: Dagger of Judgment — Originally Etienne’s dagger. After absorbing Julian’s power, it gains increased damage against the guilty and a Conviction-like restraint lasting around two seconds, depending on the participants’ mental states 45.
  • Its guilt-inducing effect leaves the Purification-ers who test it unable to fight normally. Prolonged use also encourages dangerous complacency 46 67.
  • The organization authorizes Charlotte to carry and test it. A special leather sheath bearing the Sun Holy Emblem, treated daily with holy water, suppresses its tendency to attract shadow creatures 50.
• Guardian Shield — A Grade 2 Sealed Artifact deployed by Donovan’s squad. Its active weight requires coordinated handling, while its black covering reduces that burden when reapplied 64 65.
  • Provides protection during the Armory explosion and unleashes a Storm of Light that severely wounds Nikolai 65 67.

Major Operations

Suhit Sacrificial Cult Investigation

The Church of the Eternal Blazing Sun, the Church of the Artisan, and Suhit’s garrison disrupted a human-sacrifice ritual at the Old Church Ruins. Investigators recovered seven victims’ bodies but concluded that eight sacrifices had been intended, identifying Charlotte as the apparent survivor 11 99 108.

The Purification-ers subsequently used Charlotte as bait for surviving cultists, providing holy water and covert protection. She later entered their peripheral network and assisted Viève’s team in approaching Julian Wright at City Hall 12 20 37.

Charlotte killed Julian after the attempted arrest became a battle, and Viève questioned his spirit. Follow-up arrests left two cultists captured and one dead while resisting. The identity of the Supervisor, Julian’s exclusive superior, remained unresolved 39 45.

Corrupted Mystery Pryer

A squad following leads near Earl Fulais’s hunting grounds responded after Roselle fired his gun during an encounter with a mutated Mystery Pryer. Charlotte credited their intervention, alongside Roselle’s and Henriette’s help, with preventing her death 29 30.

The corpse was ultimately returned to the Machinery Hivemind, which had previously registered and monitored the Beyonder 29 32.

Trier Armory Operation

Charlotte brought Donovan intelligence concerning a possible True Creator plot at Saint Marle Prison’s Armory. After another channel corroborated the warning, the Archbishop ordered an immediate operation, with Charlotte accompanying Donovan, Edmund, and Hill 63 64.

The team survived an explosion and fought Nikolai, using the Guardian Shield and Dagger of Judgment to severely wound him. He escaped the Purification-ers but was intercepted by Miss N, who had manipulated official forces into exhausting his traps and weakening him 65 67 68.

The subsequent investigation identified Nikolai as a likely Sequence 6 Conspirer and established that Miss N had left Trier 72.

Tamara Murder Investigation

The Machinery Hivemind requested Viève’s assistance after two bodies bearing the Tamara family’s old coat of arms were discovered in a Harbor District warehouse. Charlotte accompanied her because she had previously encountered the suspected Tamara Beyonder 97.

Using the Machinery Hivemind’s Arrodes’s Mirror, Viève obtained the murderer’s identity—Tres Tamara—and his location at the Old Church Ruins 99.

External Relationships

• Machinery Hivemind — Fellow official Beyonders and frequent collaborators. The organizations share cult intelligence and assist with investigations despite disputes over jurisdiction and the handling of supernatural remains 32 82 83 97.
• Secular authorities — Sheriffs, public-security personnel, soldiers, and military Beyonders provide referrals, cleanup, operational support, and specialist investigation 40 67 72 97.
• Earl Foulis — Cooperates with the Purification-ers and helps conceal traces of official Beyonder operations 44.
• Tres Tamara — Independently hunts the same cult. After identifying him as a murderer, neither official organization appears eager to pursue him unless he attacks their members or causes further harm affecting civilians 83 99.
• Miss N and the Aurora Order — Subjects of investigation after Miss N directs multiple official forces toward Nikolai’s ambush for her own purposes 63 68 72.