'Black iron armor adorned with ashen cloth. Attire of the Blackflame Monks. The Blackflame Monks, enthralled by the god-slaying black flame, became traitors, abandoning their posts as guardians. The seduction of a taboo is never easily spurned.' The Blackflame Monks are the Erdtree's most pointed inquisitorial failure. They were posted as guardians at the Erdtree's deeper precincts, the Cathedrals where black flame, the god-slaying fire of the Godskin Apostles, was sealed away by Maliketh's order. Their job was to ensure that the seal held. They studied the seal's contents in pursuit of better seal-craft. They were enthralled by what they were studying.

'Mail hood of iron links covering a headband engraved with flames. Attire of the Blackflame Monks. The Blackflame Monks, enthralled by the god-slaying black flame, became traitors, abandoning their posts as guardians. The seduction of a taboo is never easily spurned.' The canonical sentence is the entire critique of inquisitorial discipline : the seduction of a taboo is never easily spurned. Erdtree priests trained in the deepest god-slaying-flame interdictions had no chance against the very flame they were trained against, because their training required them to know it. The Monks' apostasy is the Order's quietest argument that some forbidden knowledge cannot be policed by anyone who has been told what it is.