The sky above the Black Coven turned crimson.
Thunder rumbled beneath the ground, not from the heavens—but from within the earth itself, as if the bones of the realm quaked in fear.
Aurora stood at the center of the Ascension Circle, her white hair now laced with streaks of black void. Her robes of woven witchfire and shadow writhed like living things. The circle beneath her feet was etched with ancient glyphs not seen since the time of the Primordials. They pulsed with forbidden power.
Around her knelt thirteen of her most devoted witches, each offering their soul to fuel the ritual.
The air reeked of blood and incense. Candles made from cursed wax dripped tears of black flame. The walls of the chamber cracked with each invocation.
"Queen of Ruin," the robed warlock to her right whispered reverently.
Aurora lifted her staff—the Spine of Vynash, crafted from the bones of a forgotten god—and thrust it into the center of the glyph. The circle ignited with a violent roar.
"I call upon the source before sources... the voice that sings before sound... the chaos that birthed gods and ended them!"
The floor ruptured.
A vortex of black mist spiraled upward, clawing at the air like furious wraiths. A scream—not from a throat, but from reality itself—ripped through the chamber as the veil between realms began to thin.
"Today," Aurora declared, her voice now overlaid with dozens of voices, male and female, young and ancient, "I cast aside the name Aurora."
She raised both hands as blood poured from her eyes, nose, and fingertips, but she didn't flinch.
"I am no longer Queen in Waiting. I am no longer the cast-aside wife. No longer the mother to a failure."
She took a deep breath.
"I am Nerezza—the World-End Flame. Let every star tremble."
The sky above the coven cracked.
And the Ascension began.
---
Meanwhile, in the Wastes of Nyr
Zeus stood shirtless in a desolate field of dust and jagged rocks, the wind howling with a thousand voices. Anubis stood across from him, her hands still bruised from earlier battle.
"This place," she muttered. "It's cursed."
Zeus nodded. "Yes. And that's exactly why we're here."
A pillar of dark lightning struck the ground behind him, missing her by a hair's breadth. She flinched.
"This is the Wastes of Nyr," Zeus said. "No magic behaves as it should. Your mind, your will, your essence—it must be absolute. Or the realm will devour you."
"Are you trying to kill me?" she asked, half-snarling.
"Yes," Zeus said simply. "The weak parts of you must die for the rest to survive."
She charged forward, throwing a sphere of infernal wind—Zeus deflected it with a flick of his finger. He moved like a shadow given form, and struck her with a palm that sent her flying across the stones.
She groaned, spitting blood.
"Again."
She rose.
Attacked.
Was struck down.
Again.
Again.
Until her knees bled and her arms shook.
But she never stopped.
"You wanted to be more than a slave," Zeus said, his voice like thunder over a storm. "More than a tool. Then be more. Show me something worthy of being feared."
Anubis let out a scream and summoned her wind—but it wasn't blue.
It was black.
Like the cursed air of the Wastes itself.
"Good," Zeus muttered.
She screamed again, mixing her wind with fire—Crimson Cyclone—a spell not even Ramiel had survived last time. She threw it at him with everything she had.
The blast engulfed Zeus—
—and when it faded, he stood untouched.
But smiling.
"You're learning."
---
~Back in the Black Coven~
Nerezza opened her eyes.
They were no longer white.
They were a swirling maelstrom of shadow and flame—chaotic, divine, hollow. Her body hovered above the cracked circle, no longer flesh, no longer witch.
"Prepare the Gate," she said in a voice that warped the air.
Her followers bowed, trembling.
"I am no longer patient," Nerezza hissed. "I am no longer subtle."
She looked toward the sky. Toward Olympus. Toward Hades. Toward every throne that denied her.
"I am coming for everything."
The sky above the kingdom of Velmora was silver and serene.
Children played in the temple courtyards, unaware that gods once walked the same stones. Priests lit incense to Zeus, their prayers rising like mist to the heavens. Atop the high towers, mage-sentinels watched the horizon, ever vigilant.
But not for her.
No one watched for Nerezza.
They never thought she'd return.
She didn't descend from the sky. No dramatic entrance. No celestial trumpet or demonic scream. She simply walked into the city—her feet silent, her presence heavier than the sky itself.
Cloaked in a dress of smoke and bone, her face veiled in shadows that whispered to themselves, she passed unnoticed through the gates. The guards looked directly at her... and saw nothing.
The first to die was a child.
Not out of cruelty. Not out of rage.
Out of precision.
The girl carried divine blood—descendant of Lilith's mortal line, hidden away in Velmora's inner sanctum. A bloodline Aurora had hunted for centuries.
The child's scream didn't even echo. Nerezza erased the sound of her death, ripping her from the fabric of the realm with a gesture.
By the time the city noticed, it was already dying.
---
Thirty minutes later...
Velmora burned.
Its towers split in half, its temples collapsed in on themselves. Every priest of Zeus was crucified with their own staffs. Every mage was reduced to dry husks, their spells devoured by Nerezza's curse of Reversal—a spell that turned protective magic inward, making the body consume its own essence.
But it was her message that would echo.
At the center of the city, she stood atop a monument carved in Zeus's image—his wings outstretched, his eyes serene.
She lifted her hand and split the statue in half.
Its head fell at her feet.
She raised it to the sky, her voice amplified by the screams of the dying.
"To the sons of Olympus and the heirs of Hades—I am Nerezza, Queen of Ruin! I burn your idols, I erase your bloodlines, I hunt your children! You have made me a shadow—now I return as the flame!"
She crushed the head into dust.
Then vanished.
Not a soul left alive.
---
Far across the realm – The Wastes of Nyr
Zeus froze.
The air around him trembled. He felt it—heard it—deep in the marrow of reality.
Anubis staggered to her knees. "What... was that?"
Zeus didn't answer.
He closed his eyes, and saw the vision: Velmora, reduced to ash. His statues shattered. His name burned.
His silence became a roar.
"She's begun," he muttered. "Nerezza has declared war."
Anubis rose, bruised, panting. "Then we strike back."
Zeus looked at her.
"No," he said. "You're not ready."
"I can fight—"
"You can't survive yet."
Lightning cracked the earth.
He approached her. "If you want to face her, you must become what even the gods fear."
He placed his hand on her forehead.
"I am done training you as a demon. Now... I train you as something more."