The dark phylactery spun violently, its smooth surface fracturing into geometric shards. From within the fractured cage, the soul of Akua erupted. The divine essence of the Black Goat was an erratic, boiling mass of darkened energy, writhing and thrashing in undeniable agony.
Sensing its impending doom, the corrupted spirit desperately lashed out. The mass of shadows violently expanded, hurling itself directly across the room toward me. I raised my wand instinctively, but the attack never landed. Barely three paces from the broken sphere, a heavy, invisible tether snapped taut. The divine essence was violently jerked backward, hopelessly bound to the magic of the phylactery.
The dark mass boiled, a distorted, dual-toned voice tearing through the physical air of the room.
"They will not let this be, Destroyer," the god hissed, the sound vibrating in my jaw.
The entity then devolved into a frantic, raging tirade. But the words were no longer mortal. The language of the abyss poured from the thrashing mass—a sound like thousands of shards of glass grinding against one another. It was a frequency that human ears were fundamentally unequipped to process. A sharp, piercing pain drove like a nail into my skull. I grimaced, reaching up to touch my face, only to find thick, warm blood trickling freely from both of my nostrils.
Seeing our distress, Father instantly swept his wand toward us. "Muffliato."
A heavy, dulling blanket of magic washed over Lily, Hermione, and me. The agonizing, screeching frequency was instantly severed, leaving a thick, cotton-like silence in its wake. Through the ward, I watched in morbid fascination as Father spoke calmly to the raging demon. Whatever final words Aeternus had for the dying god of Qohor, they were meant for him alone.
After a few tense moments, Father ended the conversation. He brought the death stick up, the wood trembling as a beam of impossibly deep emerald light erupted from the tip, striking the dark essence squarely in its centre.
The erratic mass of darkened energy shuddered. Deep, jagged fissures began to crack across the dense cloud of shadow, blinding white light filtering violently through the cracks. The pressure in the room spiked to a terrifying degree before the entire mass shattered like glass.
The cooled, ancient temperature of the antechamber vanished in an instant. A wave of sweltering heat washed over us, as if the very sun had been summoned and trapped within the windowless stone room.
"Shields!" I roared over the sudden, roaring furnace.
Lily reacted instantly, her redwood wand weaving through the air as she cast a rapid succession of heavy cooling charms to keep our flesh from blistering. I stepped in front of my sisters, layering barrier upon barrier of Protego charms, pouring my recovering magic into the shields to stave off the blinding, scorching light.
Hermione, however, did not cower behind the wards. Following Father's earlier directions with flawless precision, she stepped toward the edge of the blazing array. Her hands moved in a blur, triggering key runic anchors across the black stone floor.
The Imperial array roared to life. Hermione helped Father systematically siphon the primordial, detonating energy, using the ancient runes to process the volatile divinity. The magic was forcefully dragged through the floor, refined by the runes, and funnelled directly into the colossal emerald crystals protruding from the walls of the throne room.
Gradually, the blinding, white-hot furnace of the antechamber died down, replaced by the cool, pulsing emerald glow of the newly empowered crystals.
We lowered our shields, panting in the suddenly chilled air.
Yet, the ritual was not complete. Hovering over the centre of the array was a concentrated, residual portion of the purified white energy.
Father stepped forward, his boots clicking softly against the stone. With calm, deliberate movements, he removed his coat, letting it fall to the floor. He then unbuttoned and discarded his shirt, revealing his bare chest and shoulders.
Deep, jagged black runes were seared directly into his flesh, sprawling across his chest and spiralling outward toward his shoulders like heavy iron chains. Beneath the dark ink, his chiselled body was a canvas of cruelty. Hundreds of faded scars and thick, knotted tissue crisscrossed his torso, accompanied by the dark, mottled patches of horrific burn scars.
I stared at them imagining the horrors. I simply did not understand how a man could endure such catastrophic physical punishment and still draw breath, let alone the things he accomplished.
Father did not hesitate. He reached out with his bare hands, placing them directly upon the remaining sphere of divine energy.
The light aggressively sank into his chest, merging with the black runes upon his skin. Instantly, Father's body seized. Thick, dark blood began to pour freely from his eyes, his ears, his nose, and his mouth.
"Father!" Lily cried out.
All three of us surged forward to aid him, but he forced one trembling, blood-soaked hand into the air.
"Stay where you are," he commanded, his voice a ragged, wet rasp. "This ritual needs to be completed perfectly, or it will have lasting consequences."
The stark warning halted us in our tracks, though it did absolutely nothing to quell the sickening worry knotting in my stomach.
Then, the true weight of Aeternus descended upon the room. Magical pressure began to violently leak from his bleeding form—a pressure infinitely more potent and suffocating than the aura he had unleashed in the ruined plaza that morning.
My knees hit the black stone. Beside me, Lily and Hermione collapsed, pinned to the floor by the unmitigated gravity of the magic radiating from our father. I fought to keep my eyes open, my consciousness fraying at the edges as the pressure squeezed the air from my lungs.
The passage of time seemed to warp and distort. Seconds stretched into hours.
Through my blurring vision, I saw the magic shift. A thick, pulsing chain of whitish-emerald light erupted from Father's chest, branching outward into three distinct tethers that struck Lily, Hermione, and me directly in our hearts.
An untold, unfathomable ocean of ancient energy began to flow through the tether. The crushing pressure vanished replaced by a blinding, intoxicating wave of pure euphoria. The pain of my exhaustion was wiped clean. I felt lighter than air, my mind expanding as the refined essence of a god settled into my very blood.
I began to fade in and out of consciousness, drowning in the warm, euphoric light.
The very last sound I heard before the darkness took me was my father's voice, echoing with godly resonance.
"Duc me ad Lucem."