Arthur burst through the secret grate in the city wall, his body weary and his heart pounding with exhaustion. He was a shadow of the man who had left, covered in mud and grime from his perilous journey, but in his satchel, the Sunstone pulsed with a warm, steady glow. He found Elias waiting for him in the cellar, his face a mask of worry that instantly turned to relief.
"Arthur! You made it," Elias whispered, his eyes fixed on the satchel. "I felt the Stone Giant fall. What happened?"
Arthur, unable to speak, simply handed him the pouch. Elias carefully opened it, and the Sunstone's brilliant light filled the dark cellar, a single, potent sun in the heart of the earth. He marveled at its warmth and its pure, uncorrupted energy. This was the key, the one thing that could counter the foul corruption of Lord Valerius.
With the Sunstone in their possession, they went to King Ottachi. The king, his face gaunt from the stress of the siege, was in the great hall, watching the relentless assault on the Shield of the Ancients. The magical barrier was flickering, its golden light dimming under the strain. The Shadow Weavers, stationed on a distant hill, were channeling their dark magic into the army, their power feeding the assault.
"You have returned," the king said, a spark of hope igniting in his weary eyes as he saw the Sunstone in Arthur's hands.
"We have," Arthur confirmed, his voice rough. "And we have the means to end this."
They took the Sunstone to the highest parapet of the city walls. The air outside the shield was thick with the foul magic of Lord Valerius. Below, the corrupted army hammered at the barrier, a symphony of destruction and decay. Arthur held the Sunstone aloft, its light a brilliant beacon against the storm. Elias opened the ancient book, its pages fluttering in the magical wind, and began to chant a long-forgotten spell of focus and power.
Arthur felt the Sunstone's magic flow through him, a pure, clean energy that cleansed him of the fatigue and the fear. He focused his mind, not on destruction, but on light. The spell in the ancient book, the one Elias was chanting, was not a curse, but a counter-enchantment. It was designed to find a corrupted source of magic and cleanse it, to strip away its power. Arthur channeled the Sunstone's light, a beam of concentrated energy that shot out from his hand, passing through the Shield of the Ancients and arcing toward the distant hill.
The light struck the three Shadow Weavers, their dark forms cloaked in swirling shadows. The moment the light touched them, their cloaks of darkness disintegrated. They screamed, a collective, pained shriek that echoed across the plains. The Sunstone's glow, so pure and unblemished, was a poison to their very being. The Shadow Weavers tried to absorb the light, to corrupt it, but its purity was too great. Their forms began to crack and crumble, the dark magic that held them together unraveling.
With a final, desperate gasp, the three Shadow Weavers dissolved into nothing more than motes of dust, their dark magic returning to the earth from whence it came. The effect was immediate and catastrophic for Lord Valerius's army. The soldiers of stone and shadow, no longer powered by the Shadow Weavers' enchantment, began to fall apart. The glowing crimson in their eyes went out, their forms turning to dust, their weapons clattering to the ground. The army that had laid siege to Aethelgard for weeks was gone in a matter of moments.
On his dark steed, Lord Valerius, a figure cloaked in black armor, watched the destruction of his army from a distant hill. His rage was a palpable force, a hurricane of fury that radiated from his very being. He had lost his army, but he had seen the source of his defeat. He saw Arthur on the city walls, holding the Sunstone, a tiny figure of defiance and light.
"You have won this battle, boy," Valerius's voice, a cold rumble of a thousand angry echoes, carried across the plains. "But you have not won the war. I will come for you, and I will take everything you hold dear. This is not a battle of armies, but a war of wills, and your will is no match for mine."
With that, Lord Valerius turned his steed and rode away, a single figure of darkness against the dawn. The siege was over. The city was saved. But Arthur knew this was only the beginning. The first of the sagas had come to a close, and a new threat, a personal threat, had been unleashed. The Usurper's Shadow had been repelled, but the full power of Lord Valerius, and the other villains of the elemental war, was just beginning to stir.