[T-minus 40 Minutes Until Dimensional Event Ritual Completion]

The spiral was carved from bone.

Not ivory. Not marble. Not artifice. Bone – compressed, reshaped, polished until smooth. The walls bowed inward like ribs of a long-dead god, and every step down echoed with reverent silence. No torchlight guided them. Only the siphon's glow – red and blue, bleeding upward like fire stitched into the air.

They descended in silence.

Max walked first. His boots scorched black crescents with every step. Hellfire bled from his knuckles in slow, steady drips, smoking against the bone. The fire was colder now – controlled, sharpened into something lean and bitter. He didn't speak. He didn't need to.

Behind him, the others moved like shadows.

Alyssa's grip on her blade never loosened. Her jaw clenched tight, breath held. The air felt wrong. Not heavy – sterile. The absence of decay. Of motion. Like walking into a hospital that had forgotten the sick.

Ferron muttered under his breath. A steady string of mantras from a dead language, each syllable striking the air like a counterweight against the Circle's stillness. The metal of his chain sang faintly at his side.

Omega stumbled once. His HUD flickered.

"Signal degradation: 74%," he whispered. "Environment is parasitic."

Alpha didn't reply. She was scanning the walls—tracking glyphs that changed each time she blinked. One moment scripture, the next scripture rewritten. Unity. Peace. Salvation. Belonging.

Dan walked in silence. Golden threads of soul aura laced the cuffs of his coat, twitching with uncertainty. He didn't let himself look at Liz yet. He couldn't.

But Max did.

At the bottom of the spiral, the sanctum opened like a throat. A vast, circular chamber – half cathedral, half wound. Pillars rose like vertebrae. The floor was a flawless disc of fossilized prayers, engraved in human languages Max had never learned but somehow understood.

And at the centre of it—

Liz.

Her containment pod hovered above the altar. Suspended by tethered glyphs, spinning slowly. The red psychic shell around her was cracked – still holding, but barely. A thin vertical shaft of red-blue fire pierced through her crown, trailing up into the rift in the sky like a god's IV drip.

Her limbs twitched.

Her face was drawn, gaunt, but not broken.

She was alive.

Max exhaled.

Then he remembered.

He had forgotten her.

The moment struck like impact – not grief, but shame. Shame hollowed into rage. Not the wild kind. Not the grief-fueled fire that once devoured his enemies. This was cold. This was engineered.

Verrine made him forget.

She took the memory of Liz from his hands like a child's toy and told him he could rest.

He bared his teeth.

The Hellfire rose around him like steam from splitting steel. Blue veins surged up his neck, his shoulders. One drop of fire slipped from his fingers and hit the bone floor—

The room flinched.

Across the altar, Verrine stood waiting.

Arms outstretched like an evangelical preacher. Her robes hung like light itself – woven strands of prayer and silk, floating without breeze. Her hair was dark, unburnt, long. Her face glowed with the purity of someone who knew they were right.

She didn't speak.

She just smiled.

Max didn't stop walking.

Not yet.

The others caught up, fanning out behind him, eyes fixed on the pod – on her. But Max never looked away from Verrine.

She had made a mistake.

She made him forget.

And now?

He would make sure she remembered.

…………………

The chamber breathed.

Not with air. With conviction.

Every etched prayer on the walls shimmered as if newly inked. The siphon pulsed – red and blue fire twisting up through the centre like a divine spinal cord. At the base of it stood Verrine, haloed by light, hands extended as if welcoming a congregation.

Verrine stood like a statue carved from scripture and flame.

She was beautiful – terrifyingly so. Not with softness, but with the polished perfection of belief made flesh. Her skin glowed with a faint opalescent sheen, unmarred by time or violence, the kind of skin untouched by consequence. Her hair fell in waves of vibrant jade, drifting slightly as if always caught in the hush before a sermon. Not dyed. Not unnatural. As if the colour had chosen her.

She looked like a woman in her late thirties – a mature Chinese figure of grace and conviction but there was something ancient in her stillness, something not pretending to be human but honouring its shape. Every gesture was deliberate. Measured. Holy in its restraint. Her robes were crimson trimmed with gold thread, cut in the style of Han ceremonial garb, but interwoven with scripture: spiralling glyphs in countless languages stitched like veins across the fabric. They glowed faintly with the rhythm of her voice.

Her face was kindness sharpened into fanaticism – eyes too steady, smile too forgiving. She had the bearing of a preacher who never doubted the altar, a martyr who welcomed the nails.

To look at her was to feel forgiven – and judged.

She was not rage. She was not hunger.

She was the calm after the storm. The voice that came after despair. The light you followed because it promised to never leave you.

She was the saviour they had begged for. And she would save them all. Even if it killed them.

She didn't descend toward them. She didn't advance.

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She let them come.

Max stopped just short of the altar. Hellfire danced along his arms, wreathing his fingers in slow-burning defiance.

Dan knelt beside Liz's containment pod, one hand trembling near the glyphs—but not touching. Not yet.

Verrine finally spoke.

"You came far."

Her voice echoed without force. No compulsion. Just resonance. A sound that echoed in the chest more than the ears.

"You burned through every lie. Survived every Circle. You killed the ones who only wanted to heal you."

She stepped forward once. The siphon didn't flicker. The fire bent to her. Loved her.

"And yet you are still fractured. Still separate. Still alone."

Her gaze passed over each of them. A catalogue of failure.

Victor, blood drying on his claws.

Alyssa, trembling in silent fury.

Dan, glowing faintly with borrowed light.

Chloe, breathless, clutching her spear as if it might vanish.

Ferron, silent. Watching her lips. Waiting for the lie.

Alpha. Omega. Barely holding together.

And Max – burning.

"You ache to be whole," Verrine said softly. "But unity terrifies you. You think it's control. You think it's surrender. But I promise you—"

She opened her arms.

"It's peace."

Max took a step forward. Blue flame rippled beneath his skin.

"Peace," he repeated, voice dead.

She nodded. "She will live. I've given her purpose. A role in creation. She is the thread through which the new world is stitched."

Dan rose slowly.

"She's your battery," he said. "That's not salvation. That's theft."

"She volunteered."

"You lie," Max said.

Verrine's smile didn't falter.

"She is the bridge. The hinge. The strand that lets meaning take root. She will save more in silence than you could with all your fire."

Max didn't blink. "You stole her fire."

Verrine's eyes softened.

"I gave it direction."

Blue Hellfire flared up Max's back.

"She already had direction."

She tilted her head.

"And where was it taking her? Toward the grave? Toward madness? Toward gods who devour and demons who devour slower?"

She raised a hand – not in threat. In benediction.

"Here, she burns for all. As do I. I carry every sin. I carry every prayer. You can't hate me, Max. I am what comes after the breaking."

Max stepped closer. Just short of the altar.

"Good," he said quietly. "Because we're not here to hate you."

He raised the chain.

"We're here to break you."

The siphon pulsed once – brighter. The chamber seemed to inhale. Verrine's expression didn't change.

She simply whispered:

"I forgive you."

The Circle of Revelation began.

…………………

The light in the chamber didn't flicker. It thickened.

A shimmer of distortion passed through the sanctum – barely visible, like heat rising from still water. The air bowed with reverence, and the glyphs along the walls responded in perfect synchrony. Words changed mid-sentence. Prayers rewrote themselves. The siphon beam pulsed with gentle finality.

And then he stepped forward.

A second figure moved beside Verrine – tall, expressionless, wrapped in a flawless PLA general's uniform, ironed with precision, buttons polished to mirror-finish. The red star on his chest gleamed like blood caught in ceremony. His glassy eyes weren't human.

Max didn't recognize him. But Victor did.

His eyes narrowed, lip curling back from his teeth.

"That's military." His voice was low. Animal. "High command. General."

Ferron stared harder, then looked at Max. "This is how they got her."

Dan's face paled. "After the plane crash… they said Liz was in PLA custody. She was never lost. She was given."

Alyssa spat. "That bitch didn't sneak in. She bought the whole damn country."

The man didn't speak. Didn't need to.

His presence was clarity – rigid, methodical, precise. The smell of gun oil and incense. The stillness of a battlefield where no one left alive was still breathing.

Max's grip tightened on his chain. His eyes burned hotter.

Then Verrine raised her hand.

Not in anger.

In invitation.

"Let me show you peace," she whispered.

The words passed like prayer.

And the pulse hit.

Not a blast. Not light.

A wave.

It washed across the chamber like warm water poured over exposed nerves. No sound. No pressure. Just sudden collapse – internal, spiritual. A perfect suppression pulse, tuned to every soul in the room, eroding individuality like chalk under rain.

Dan gasped and dropped to one knee, gold aura flickering, cracking.

Victor snarled. His body lurched mid-shift, half-beast, half-man, forced into a form that wasn't his. He clawed at the air like it might give him back his spine.

Chloe's scream was silent. Her hands clutched her skull, and her eyes went white with overload. Instinctively, she flared her aura – phasing in front of Alyssa, who stumbled and nearly collapsed from the backlash.

Ferron's kusarigama trembled in his hand. The blade curled – warped under the pulse, its spiritual form buckling. His mantra caught in his throat. He couldn't speak.

Alpha staggered, blood running from one nostril, her knees trembling as her HUD shattered into static.

Omega convulsed, bone armour snapping outward like a defence reflex, then collapsing into itself.

Max stood at the centre.

Unmoved.

The blue Hellfire ignited around him – not as explosion, but as obliteration.

It didn't push the wave back.

It erased it.

The pulse met the flame and evaporated – cleansed, like ash through a forge. The glyphs around him short-circuited, symbols collapsing into static. Even the siphon beam shivered.

Max bled from the corners of his eyes.

But he took another step forward.

"You think light doesn't burn?" he muttered, voice hoarse but full.

His back ignited – Hellfire trailing from his shoulders like broken wings.

And behind him, the others began to breathe again.

The suppression cracked.

Verrine's smile faded by one degree.

Max kept walking.

…………………

Max stepped closer to the containment pod.

The siphon above flared, searing brighter – its beam no longer just light, but a living artery, thrumming with purpose. The air crackled. Prayer-script etched into the floor curled upward like burned paper, reacting to Max's approach. His boots left scorched prints with every step.

Verrine didn't look at him. She kept her gaze upward – into the rift, into salvation. She had no fear. She didn't need to. Not yet.

Max's chest tightened. Not from the heat. From something older.

Then—

It hit him.

Not a word. Not a thought. A pulse. Like fingers clawing against the inside of his skull. Defiance. Recognition. Pain. Liz.

It wasn't a message. It wasn't a cry. It was a flare of soul – raw, wordless, real.

Max staggered. Just a half-step. His breath caught. The fire inside him twisted. For one heartbeat, his fury flickered. Not from doubt – from guilt. She was still fighting. She had never stopped.

He whispered her name. "Liz…"

And she heard him.

The red pod around her pulsed. A sudden shockwave of psychic energy exploded outward from her body – not clean, not focused, but furious. Her will – fractured and bruised – lashed out like a scream made of soul.

The Circle reeled.

Alyssa dropped to a knee, hands to her ears. Chloe's eyes rolled back but a reflexive shield of psychic phase-light surged out from her, catching them both. Victor staggered back two steps, clawed hands raised instinctively. Omega hissed, venting steam. Alpha went down to one hand, visor glitching. Ferron spun his weapon like a warding bell, keeping upright but only just.

The light on the altar dimmed for a split second.

And in that instant – Max surged forward.

His Hellfire detonated. No finesse. No precision.

A torrent of blue-white flame burst from his spine, tearing across the chamber in a blazing spiral. The walls shook. The siphon faltered for a blink – just long enough for Verrine to react.

She turned. Slowly. The corner of her smile twitched – almost imperceptibly.

Max didn't stop.

His voice was low. Breathless. Shaking – not from pain, but from clarity.

"She never stopped fighting for me."

The siphon flared. Max's fire roared in kind.

"Now I fight for her."

And the flames surged – hotter, higher, hungrier.

Verrine turned fully this time.

Her smile was gone.

…………………

The floor groaned beneath him – bone straining against blue flame.

Max stepped between Verrine and the pod.

The siphon roared overhead, pulsing brighter now, as if aware it was about to be severed.

Liz's containment sphere flickered. Cracks webbed across its surface like frost over shattering glass. The glyphs around it stuttered, as if her soul itself was resisting the ritual's final verse.

Max raised the chain.

Hellfire raced across it, surging down his arms in forks of cobalt flame. His veins glowed. Skin cracked. Smoke peeled from his shoulders. He scorched in agony, but he didn't stop. Didn't slow. He bore the fire like a man already tired of burning.

Behind him, the others moved as one.

Dan rose fully, eyes blazing gold, aura sparking like kindling struck by fate. Victor stood to Max's right, teeth bared, breath steaming from between cracked lips. Chloe wiped blood from her nose, spear steady now, mind re-anchored. Alyssa stepped to her side, gauntlets raised, silent. Alpha and Omega flanked wide – symmetrical, calibrated, lethal. Ferron faded into the edge of the room, chain coiled at his hip, watching the rift for movement.

Max didn't look at them. He didn't need to.

His gaze was locked on Verrine.

"You don't get to rewrite her."

The flames rose higher.

"You don't get to save her."

The heat warped the sanctum floor beneath his boots.

"You don't get to live."

Then he struck the ground with the chain.

A wave of Hellfire ripped outward in a horizontal blast – pure defiance made visible. It scorched the bone walls, sent glyphs screaming into static, and tore a chunk from the sanctum's rim. Prayer banners vaporized on contact.

Verrine didn't flinch.

Her robes ignited – red silk wreathed in blue fire – but they did not burn.

They shimmered. They sang.

She stepped forward into the flame, unblinking. Her smile returned. But this one was thinner. Tighter.

"Then let your final prayer be fire."

Above them, the siphon twisted.

Below them, the Circle cracked.

And the battle began.

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