"Woe to every scorner and mocker, who accumulates power and counts it, believing his power will make him immortal! They are their own true enemies, and only destruction is waiting for them... while whoever surrenders his face in doing good has grasped the most trustworthy handhold!"
The white flame sliced cleanly through Maeron's dark blade, shattering it into black embers. The golden whip caught him across his chest, burning through his silver-lined robes and searing deep into his corrupted flesh.
Maeron let out a sharp, wet howl of pain, stumbling backward three steps. His ruined right eye bled liquid shadow as the holy heat hissed against his dark skin.
"Impertinent brat!" Maeron snarled. He threw both hands into the air, drawing upon every ounce of the corrupt entity's ancient malice.
The grey fog around them darkened into a boiling, pitch-black hurricane. Out from the black storm, Maeron manifested horrific, twisted illusions of the people Aeryn loved.
Flickering projections materialized around her: Rissa slipping a dark relic under a pillow, Vienna cunningly taking her crown, the Omon girls parading for gold, and the Captain bowing to his old king.
"Look at them!" Maeron sneered, his double-layered voice booming as he lunged through the shadows from behind his illusions, targeting her flank with a jagged tendril of void energy. "Rissa was busy with her own life while slipping relics under your bed! Vienna stripped you of your throne while you lay feverish! Those Omon girls are simple flies seeking money! And the Captain? Even seconds ago, he was my pledged man! They don't love you they pity a broken girl!"
Aeryn didn't flinch. She closed her eyes for a single second, feeling the deep, silent truth of her spirit.
When her eyes opened, her gaze cut straight through his dark illusions like silver blades.
"Their love was never something I had to earn with a crown!" Aeryn's voice rang out, clear, resonant, and overflowing with divine authority. "They loved me when I was broken, fragile, and terrified. That is something a hollow creature of greed like you could never comprehend!"
She thrust her left hand toward his incoming void tendril. A barrier of pure, translucent water-light materialized around her arm, absorbing the dark strike and redirecting its momentum. With her right hand, she summoned a blade of dense, blinding light and slashed upward.
The holy arc cut through the illusions, dissolving them back into harmless grey dust. The blade caught Maeron across his ruined face, severing the pitch-black horn of void energy protruding from his skull.
Maeron shrieked, his balance completely shattered. The dark hurricane around them collapsed into flickering wisps of smoke.
"How?! How can your spirit hold against the void?!" Maeron screamed in horror, backing away frantically, his trackless steps faltering for the first time.
"Because my power isn't built on greed," Aeryn said, stepping forward through the dying shadows, her white-and-gold aura expanding until it filled the entire expanse. "It is built on sacrifice."
Panicking, Maeron threw everything he had left a chaotic storm of void bolts, dark barriers, and screaming shadow waves, desperately trying to construct an impenetrable wall between them.
Aeryn did not stop. She strode through the darkness like a shining star, cutting through his barriers with single sweeps of her hands, closing the distance between them no matter how far he glided or how violently he pushed the space apart.
"No! Get away from me!" Maeron shrieked, his voice cracking into a shrill, terrifying sound as he saw her hand reaching out.
Aeryn lunged forward and slammed both palms flat against his chest.
The white-and-gold fire exploded straight into his core.
Maeron screamed in sheer horror, instantly grabbing her wrists. His black, clawed fingers dug into her arms, pulling, straining, and trying with all his horrific strength to pry her hands off his body. He twisted his torso, thrashing wildly to throw her off, but Aeryn held on with impossible, iron resolve. Her boots remained locked to the four-dimensional floor, her white-and-gold soul fire blazing hotter with every agonizing second she held him.
"Let go of me! RELEASE ME!" Maeron howled, his entity thrashing in agony as the holy fire began to blister, peel, and melt his oily black flesh.
Realizing he couldn't force her hands away, Maeron turned his dark malice straight onto her. He brought both of his blackened hands up and locked them viciously around Aeryn's face.
He dug his thumb into her cheekbone and forced his palms over her brow, pouring raw, unholy void power directly into her skull. Oily, jet-black streams of dark corruption flooded straight into her eyes, her skin, and her mind. Dark, throbbed veins violently erupted across Aeryn's pale face as the corrupt magic attempted to dissolve her brain, poison her soul, and break her concentration so she would let go.
"BURN WITH ME, GIRL!" Maeron shrieked into her face, his breath a foul gale of black ash. "I WILL TEAR YOUR MIND TO DUST BEFORE I AM ERASED!"
Aeryn's vision turned completely black. Pain like molten lead flooded through her skull. Her body shook uncontrollably, tears of dark, purified blood leaking from her eyes as his corruption tore through her spirit.
Yet, despite the unspeakable torture, Aeryn did not loosen her grip by a single millimeter.
Instead, she gritted her teeth, channeled her mother's burning love and the absolute depth of the Trinity, and pushed her palms deeper into his chest.
"I am not afraid anymore," Aeryn whispered through the black corruption devouring her face.
The white-and-gold fire flared into a blinding, nova-like explosion.
Suddenly, a warm, magnificent presence bloomed from right behind Aeryn a holy, incandescent light wrapping around her shoulders like wings of pure dawn. Aeryn gasped, her eyes snapping wide in the blinding radiance.
The jet-black corruption that had flooded her face, eyes, and brain violently reversed its flow! The oily black streams were pulled right out of her skull, swirling back into the air and driving straight into Maeron's chest with double the divine momentum, burning him from the inside out with unyielding heat.
And high above their burning bodies, a majestic, sublime voice rang out across the expanse the same ancient, transcendent voice from her trance:
"Woe to every scorner and mocker, who accumulates power and counts it, believing his power will make him immortal! They are their own true enemies, and only destruction is waiting for them... while whoever surrenders his face in doing good has grasped the most trustworthy handhold!"
The holy flames overwhelmed Maeron's dark magic completely. His clawed hands on her face blistered, peeled, and turned to brittle white ash. His terrifying, soul-rending screech reverberated through the entirety of the grey dimension as the dark entity within him was utterly destroyed. His silver robes, his stolen human face, his void tentacles, and his ancient malice burned away completely until nothing was left under her hands but harmless, white dust that scattered into the silvery fog.
The dark entity had been utterly erased from existence.
With the entity gone, the black corruption vanished from Aeryn's face. But the terrible cost hit her all at once.
Her luminous aura dimmed into a faint, exhausted wisp. Her knees buckled beneath her, and she fell forward onto her hands and knees in the grey mist, gasping softly into the quiet expanse.
Down through the shimmering veil, the physical world reacted instantly to the entity's complete erasure.
Across the woods and distant roads, the dark magic that had bound the corrupted forces snapped. The black-clad soldiers screamed in agony as the black magic in their blood ignited, their bodies dissolving into plumes of grey dust that blew away into the night wind. The corrupt curse was lifted entirely from the realm.
Aeryn lay on her side in the quiet, four-dimensional sanctuary, her breathing slowing to a soft, faint whisper. She looked down through the translucent veil one last time.
Down below, Vienna was shouting to the Omon sisters, pointing toward the valley: "Search the ridge! Search every inch! Find the Queen!"
Beside her, the Captain was lifting Finn onto a wooden litter, his face pale but resolute.
And Rissa lay in the dirt, her fingers twitching as she slowly began to stir, the dangerous fire around her completely extinguished.
Aeryn reached out a faint, misty hand through the greyscale light toward her beloved friend.
"Be safe... my sweet fire..." Aeryn whispered into the silent grey expanse.
Her eyelids grew impossibly heavy. The grey dimension began to fold inward, fading into a gentle, absolute darkness. Aeryn closed her eyes, letting go of the crown, her power, and her hold on the world, slipping peacefully into deep, unbroken unconsciousness.
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