Chapter 32 – Unwanted Blood
Lumina's body weakened. The light of the median within her cracked, and her breath grew heavy. Ilior's energy kept pushing in through the gaps in her soul.
Serdyn held the unconscious Amari in his arms. But suddenly, the air stopped. Time froze. Leaves did not fall. The wind did not move. The world went silent, as if it had lost its rhythm.
Maxcen appeared quietly. He stood behind Serdyn and looked at Amari's body. "Your time is up," he said softly.
He lowered his head, touched Amari's forehead, and in an instant, her body vanished from the human world. Serdyn didn't know. He kept holding onto empty space.
Maxcen disappeared with her body—silently, without a trace. Only one pair of eyes saw it: Lumina's. Through her blurred vision, she saw a black silhouette walking away, carrying someone.
Archon stood far from the ruins of the battlefield. His left hand gripped an ancient artifact—Nodus Mentem, the soul-binding relic from the earliest Hellseer age. He chanted softly. A sigil shaped like an eye glowed beneath Lumina's body.
"Enough. I've wasted too much time," he said coldly.
Lumina could not move. Her body was being pulled into the sigil. But footsteps sounded from behind Archon.
Enver.
His face was wounded, his body covered in dust, yet he raised one last holy card. Dark-blue light flared. He leapt forward, blocking the sigil's pull.
Archon was surprised, but unmoved. He signaled, and in a flash, three Council members appeared and cast backup seals. Enver broke two but failed to block the third.
"She will come with me," said Archon. "You've delayed long enough."
"And you've spent too long thinking this world belongs to you," Enver replied.
Archon took Lumina away into the mist of magic. Enver stood there, then… vanished. No trace left. He chose to leave the stage.
Raegar arrived too late. The field was empty. Serdyn sat alone, holding onto a shadow. He didn't know Amari was gone. Lumina was gone. Enver was gone. Only dust remained.
Elsewhere, Ilior stood in a white space. No sky. No ground. Only silence. This place was called Nulla.
He looked around. Nothing could disturb him here. Even time did not move. He began to form a body—not flesh, not bone, but a shape. The shape of vengeance.
"Your ancestor deceived me. Now your blood will become the bridge."
Ilior began weaving power from the void.
Meanwhile, Maxcen opened his eyes in the astral realm. He sat on a black stone throne, surrounded by silent voices.
He saw everything.
He knew Archon had taken Lumina. He knew Enver had disappeared. He knew Amari had been taken by him. He knew Nulla was being refilled with ancient power.
"This game is starting to take shape," he murmured. "And the unwanted blood will become the unplanned key."
He closed his eyes again, watching from afar.
The human world trembled slowly.
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(Continuation) – Inside Archon's Seal
In the sealing space, there was no light, no direction. Only pitch darkness. Lumina's body floated, bound by invisible restraints. Her breath was heavy. Her energy was being drained slowly—not by outside magic, but by Nodus Mentem itself, an artifact capable of filtering the very intent within a soul.
"This soul is unstable," Archon's voice echoed from the distance, though his face could not be seen. "Because it is not one, but three."
Blood, curses, and an ancient spirit clashed within Lumina's body—human lineage, median, and a fragment of a spirit that had never known peace.
In her mind, Verruksha's voice whispered, "You're weakening. This should be my moment to take over."
But something held her back—another aura, the trace of an imperfect spell, perhaps from Amari. Verruksha froze. She could not move forward.
"What is this…?" she hissed. "A balancing spell? From the median?"
Meanwhile, Ilior grinned from afar, peering through the rift between dimensions.
"Even that seal can't hold us forever, Lumina," he whispered from within Nulla. "Sooner or later… your body will be my door."
Lumina tried to move. But her body was paralyzed. The only thing still burning was her memory—the sound of Enver's voice, Amari's face, and the question she had never answered: Who am I, really?
In the dark, she spoke to herself, softly:
"If I truly am the result of a mistake… then let me be the one to end it."
And as Archon tried to strengthen the seal with a second incantation, cracks began to appear. Not from the outside, but from within Lumina herself. A collision of three forces—her own power, Ilior's power, and Verruksha's.