There are two people critically important in understanding the founding of the deadly cult Anno Domini.
These people, in order of importance, are Orwin Blythe, and Jacob Merenze.
Orwin Blythe was a bishop in the diocese of Rockwell. Born to a devout Catholic family, there was always a major focus on the bible throughout his upbringing. Early on, Orwin must’ve developed a nasty god complex, but he was always good at keeping it quiet. He attended and was raised near the Cathedral of Saint Antipas, and always intended to serve there, which he did of course.
Pastor Jacob Merenze was the founder of Elevation Ministries, a series of homogenous Baptist churches in the Maine area. He came from a bad household and saw religion primarily as a moneymaking scheme. He married and had a son when it was financially feasible.
During the late nineties, these two religious leaders became business partners, and together they engaged in fraud, theft, embezzlement, and extortion, among various other lucrative work. None of this activity was ever caught or connected to them by authorities, but some veteran workers in the underworld still remember their names. Jacob must’ve been content with the good life as he had two more children during this time. Orwin, conversely, seemed dissatisfied with the limited amount of power that money gave him, and kept looking for something more.
The disappearance of Bridgette Carter was concurrent with beginnings of the fringe group Anno Domini, and this was by no means a coincidence. In Rockwell, people didn’t just go missing like that until AD showed up, and this was the case that started the pattern.
Bridgette Carter was a private investigator and notorious loner. Though she had two DUIs on record, her car had already been impounded in a parking lot near the cathedral, barring the possibility of a fatal crash somewhere obscure. Additionally, the car had been picked up the same evening of the day it’d been parked, and while I can’t tell you what kind of person she was, I doubt someone of her profession had been drinking much while the sun was still out.
Her remaining archives proved that an anonymous party hired her to look down the old man.
The [hiring party] themselves are a mystery for the ages. John Doe. Clearly somebody didn’t want anyone coming back to look into them.
Orwin was at one pointed questioned by police, but he denied any knowledge that he was being spied on. He hadn’t been known as a liar and there still wasn’t enough evidence to suggest he was actually implicated in the disappearance, so they let him go.
They had that fucker right at the very start of all this and they just let him go.
I don’t know what it was he did with her but I guarantee you that whatever happened that day was the impetus for Anno Domini’s creation.