The church and parishioners were one living organism, interconnected to the rest of the town by a series of roots and spores that filled the main street with a sweet-smelling haze that lulled passersby into extending their visit permanently. Leaving was so much harder when skin and seating began to fuse.
Their heads were perpetually bent in prayer to the god that slept within their roots, whispering in its sleep to them. As the year progresses they would gradually move from the chapel to the catacombs to wait out the worst of the weather and protect the roots from the bitter frost that seeped through the old stone walls and panted the sanctuary white.
While the town slept, neighbouring communities would take the opportunity to converge and try to purge them from the land. This year was their seventy-eighth attempt at burning it right down to the roots. They were even prepared for the spores, using military grade gas masks.
They thought that with the town being one living being, all the spores would be the same kind. They thought wrong and paid for it as every vengeful mob before them had done. In the spring they would be found, freshly bound to their new homes and waiting for their brethren to join them until winter would drive them back underground again.
The haze grew stronger and spread further each year. The cattle became fixed in place, birds trapped in their nests as sticks and feathers blurred together, every flower slowly morphed into an exact copy of the one before, spreading spores and pollen indiscriminately.
And the town thrived.
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