Chapter 35

  We were too late.

  The domed hall, moments ago filled with our rushed breathing and the dull pulse of my wingbeats, now seemed to hold its breath. No sound. No whisper. Only silence—a cold, annihilating silence that draped itself like a veil over the horror before us.

  Markus lay on the altar. Or rather—what was left of him. His arms were spread out to the sides, like a dark, desperate parody of a crucifix. The runes beneath him still glowed faintly, laced with an eerie violet light. His throat had been slit, the dried blood forming a grotesque mask across his face. But it was his gaze that clenched my heart—his dead, empty gaze. The hollow sockets stared directly at us, as if to accuse us. As if to say: Where were you when I needed you?

  Beside me, I heard Vin gag softly. Maira instinctively took a step back. Even Gunnar clenched his fists so tightly the knuckles showed white through the leather of his gloves.

  And then we saw them.

  Dwin and Lira.

  They stood motionless behind the altar, identical in posture, hoods drawn low over their faces. Their hands were folded as if in prayer, but the wide smile on their lips spoke not of devotion—but of madness. It was the same grin that had haunted my dreams when Gravor had taken the form of my mother. That false smile. Far too wide, far too calm.

  Lira slowly lifted her head—just enough for me to see her lips moving. Her voice was crystal clear, soft, almost friendly—and all the more disturbing for it.

  “You’re too late,” she said, as casually as if stating, Water is wet. Then, with the fervor of a preacher, she continued:

  “Both souls are sacrificed. The words have been spoken. And any moment now, Ygrin, the Curse of All Fire, shall grace us with his presence.”

  Her tone wavered between reverence and madness. Fanatical. Childlike in its anticipation.

  Then she flinched slightly, as if feeling something. A shiver ran through her form, followed by a strange, bubbling giggle. She tilted her head and murmured with a smile,

  “Oh. I think it’s time.”

  What happened next was grotesque.

  It began with the fingernails. They softened—shimmering like candle wax—then liquefied. The droplets fell to the ground with wet plops, while her fingers beneath grew pale and bony. Then the toes began to dissolve, one by one. The skin melted, joints snapped, until the feet were nothing but sticky husks of flesh and skin.

  Her legs followed—slowly, almost ceremonially, as though she was celebrating her own sacrifice. Piece by piece, her form unraveled. Arms, shoulders, neck—everything liquefied into a gray-black, steaming sludge that dripped to the floor.

  And then—in one slow, seamless motion—their bodies began to collapse, disintegrate, melt away.

  There was no scream. No pain. Only that unnatural, wet smacking sound that froze the blood in my veins.

  Simon cried out—whether in rage, in grief, or both, I didn’t know.

  “NO!” he roared, his voice echoing like thunder through the hall.

  Before any of us could stop him, he hurled a fireball directly at the writhing mass that had once been the Crytomancers.

  The flames struck—and vanished.

  No hiss. No smoke. The fireball simply sank into the glistening sludge as if it had never existed. The viscous liquid kept moving, unstoppable. It flowed in multiple rivulets toward the walls of the domed chamber, painting dark lines as it went, leaving behind greasy patterns.

  Like veins.

  Like a network, preparing to receive something.

  To give birth to something.

  But we reacted. Despair, rage, fear—all of it became action. None of us hesitated. Even if our enemy was no longer tangible, even if all that remained of the Crytomancers was a slimy, unholy mass flowing like liquid darkness through the room’s veins—we fought. Because giving up wasn’t an option.

  Maira was the first to react. With trembling hands and a quivering voice, she murmured incantations and summoned semi-transparent barriers between the veins of the dome. Magical dams of light and runes that tried to stop the dark liquid. And they worked—some of the streams began to dam up, swelling like water before a floodgate. But the pressure rose. You could see it. The barriers trembled.

  Simon growled, clenched his fists—and unleashed a cascade of fireballs. One after another crashed into the wall-veins, bursting in explosions and clouds of smoke. He hissed, “Burn, damn you! Burn!” But the flames merely rolled off the black fluid like water on oil. Only occasionally did a spark sizzle, as if something inside the mass was more resistant than the rest.

  The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  Gunnar raised both arms, forming an intricate gesture with his fingers—then the very air froze. A shimmering cold pulsed from his body, crawling like waves of frost over the veins. In some places, the dark mass turned to glass—but even that didn’t last. Cracks formed, and with a sickening snap, the ice shattered, and the sludge kept flowing, unfazed.

  Vin, channeling her panic into raw energy, murmured a few words and vines burst from the ground, tearing through stone and lashing over the streams. Some of the fluid was redirected or blocked, but many of the vines began to wilt, as if the black essence had drained the life from them. Vin cried out, casting again, repeating the spell. Her forehead gleamed with sweat.

  And I… I stood choking in the middle of the chaos. My lungs cramped with every breath—the stench of the essence was unbearable, like burnt tar mixed with sulfur and blood. My stomach turned. Still, I raised my sword and slashed at the creeping mass with all my strength. Again and again. I hoped, instinctively, that my light magic might do something—but it merely hissed uselessly over the surface, without effect. Nothing. It was like fighting water.

  Desperate, I turned inward—toward him.

  “Gravor,” I thought, barely suppressing my disgust. “Can you help me?”

  His answer came immediately, as snarky as ever.

  “Since you ask so nicely,” he began with a mischievous tone, “of course! A bit of Gravor essence never hurt a blade. Also, I’ll calm your stomach acid a little. Wouldn’t want Ygrath strengthened by an even nastier blend.”

  A short pause, then he added with a giggle,

  “Wait… strengthened?” I asked, frowning as my body began to burn—not with pain, but with dark energy slowly spreading within me.

  “Yes,” Gravor replied calmly, this time almost… melancholic. “My old friend is already awake. Stopping this ooze won’t stop him. Only weaken him. But worry not—I’ll help anyway. Never liked self-sacrifice.”

  His words thundered through my mind.

  Old friend?

  Self-sacrifice?

  Who are you really, Gravor?

  I felt it then—how little I truly knew about the demon inside me. We had fought together, argued, bargained—but this… this was something else. A revelation. A deep, dark abyss of knowledge I hadn’t even begun to grasp.

  But now wasn’t the time for questions.

  “Fine,” I said with resolve. “Even if you’re right—we weaken him as much as possible.”

  “Now that’s the spirit,” came the cheerful reply—and at that moment, I felt it.

  My sword changed.

  The golden glow I had shaped with my own light was overrun—coated with black energy, like ink spreading over a painting. The blade began to pulse, to shimmer. It was no longer pure light—but a fusion of light and darkness. Purity and corruption, bound in deadly symbiosis.

  I raised the blade, shouted, and struck the black fluid again.

  And this time…

  It hissed. A sharp, stinging hiss filled the chamber. Where the blade hit, the mass rippled. Smoke rose. Dark smoke that crumbled like ash in the air. A part of the essence… dissolved.

  A hit.

  A real one.

  I could have screamed with joy. Finally—finally something had worked. Every strike of my blade turned parts of that accursed mass into pitch-black smoke, hissing as it rose and vanished into the air like guilt released in a repentant prayer. I was a whirlwind of steel, light, and shadow—driven by rage, desperation, and the quiet hope that maybe, just maybe, it wasn’t too late. I struck and struck and struck, the sword vibrating in my hands, Gravor’s dark energy humming like a voice at the edge of my mind.

  But then I saw it.

  A jolt went through me. My sword arm froze mid-air. Despite all our efforts, the mass had found a way. It had broken through—not on the ground, but on the walls. There, where it had reached the stone veins, it now flowed unhindered, creeping, ravenous. Within seconds, it had filled the entire network along the walls.

  And then it happened.

  A blinding light burst from the lines. It wasn’t ordinary light—it was a painful, searing white, as if someone had shattered the sun itself and pressed it into the stone. We shielded our eyes—too late. Simon cried out, Maira stumbled, Vin cursed softly. I clenched my eyelids shut, my hand raised to my face, but even through closed lids, the light pierced like needles. The dome echoed with a sound that didn’t come from us.

  A sound so ancient, so alien, it defied description.

  A roar. Or… a yawn? It was as if something in the depths of the world was awakening—not abruptly, not startled, but slowly. Lazily. Like a being that had slumbered for far too long and now, at last, was ready to rise. The sound was deep, resonant, vibrating through not just our ears but our flesh, our blood, our minds.

  Then the ground began to tremble.

  Not like an earthquake. No—this was rhythmic. Heavy. Like the heartbeat of something lying far beneath us.

  A tremor. Another. Then a crack.

  The fissures appeared suddenly. The ground beneath the altar split with a sound like shattering ice. First a fine crack—then a web of fractures. And then, with a final thunderous crack, the floor burst open like a fragile shell.

  A scream tore through us all as a massive claw emerged from the abyss. Ice-blue, covered in jagged crystals whose tips glowed with a demonic white. The claws gripped the altar’s remains, crushing them like brittle wood.

  Then came the head.

  A dragon’s head, as large as a carriage, rose—scaled, jagged, forged from pure ice. The eyes were a deep, glowing turquoise, laced with golden fractures. There was no life in them—only ancient cold and hunger. A freezing breath hissed from its nostrils, instantly frosting the ground. Shards burst through the air. With a heave, the dragon pulled more of itself from the chasm, rising—its massive body covered in rune-carved scales, half ice, half twisted flesh, so alien, so wrong.

  And then he stood before us.

  A colossus of ice and curse, wings half-folded, spread like those of a demon from ancient tales. He didn’t move at first. He just breathed. Slowly. Deeply. And with every breath, the air itself froze. Each inhale was a promise of death.

  “Ygrath…” Gunnar whispered. It wasn’t recognition—it was ancient fear, rising from his throat like a reflex.

  The ice dragon opened his jaws.

  And roared.

  A sound that eclipsed anything I had ever heard—a primeval war cry, a call to annihilation. The scream swept through the hall, shattering barriers, dissolving vines, slamming all of us to the floor. I clung to my sword, still pulsing with that dark light.

  The awakening was complete. The Curse of All Fire stood before us.

  And he was ready to fight.

  But first, something utterly unexpected happened. The dragon took one step forward—and lowered his head. Directly in front of me.

  His piercing eyes stared into mine—cold, almost painfully so—and Ygrath spoke a single word:

  “Gravor.”