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FELIX

The silver ritual blade gleams in the crimson light as I make a shallow cut across Gaida’s palm. Her blood wells up immediately, unnaturally bright against her pale skin. The moment it appears, the chalice responds, its ancient markings glittering eagerly.

“Hold the chalice beneath her hand,” Luke instructs, his voice steady despite the chamber shaking around us.

I position the vessel carefully, allowing seven precise drops of her blood to fall into its depths. Each drop lands with a sound like distant thunder, reverberating through the chamber despite the ongoing collapse of reality outside.

“The attunement begins,” I announce, watching the blood swirl within the chalice, forming patterns that correspond to the sigils carved into its surface. “I need absolute focus now.”

Constantine maintains his position at the eastern point of our triangulation, his ancient power reinforcing the failing wards. Luke stands at the northern point, channelling energy into the ritual matrix beneath our feet. Dante remains behind Gaida, his hands clamped on either side of her head as her anchor to consciousness.

The chalice grows warm in my hands, then hot, nearly painful to hold. The blood in it doesn’t settle but moves of its own accord, tracing increasingly complex patterns against the metal.

“It’s working,” I murmur, recognising the signs of sympathetic resonance. “The chalice recognises her blood signature.”

“Proceed with the incantation,” Luke urges as another section of the ceiling crumbles, revealing the maelstrom of colliding realities above.

I centre myself, recalling the ancient words inscribed on the chalice. These aren’t mere symbolic phrases, but operational commands encoded in the primordial language of reality itself. Each syllable must be perfect, each inflection precise.

“ Vek’thar nol pridius, sek’mah vor entius ,” I chant, the words feeling unnaturally heavy on my tongue. “ Kah’lor fen rexus, mor’dith sel ventius. ”

The runes carved into the chamber walls respond instantly, flaring with blue-white light. The floor shakes from the power awakening within the ancient stone.

“ Tek’vah sor cridius, nek’pah yor gentius ,” I continue, the chalice growing hotter in my grasp. “ Jah’nor zen lexus, por’rith del mentius. ”

Blood-rune circuits ignite across the chamber floor, lines of power that have lain dormant for millennia suddenly blazing to life. They form a complex geometric pattern around the altar, connecting the three anchor points where Luke, Constantine and I stand.

The final verse approaches, the most dangerous part of the incantation. Once spoken, there will be no turning back. The extraction will proceed regardless of consequence.

I meet Luke’s eyes across the chamber, seeking confirmation. His slight nod is all I need.

“ Rek’thar sol bridius, xek’lah zor hentius ,” I intone, my voice growing stronger as the ritual builds. “ Fah’gor ven wexus, tor’nith rel sentius! ”

The final word echoes with supernatural resonance, and everything goes unnaturally still for a moment before the blood in the chalice rises up in a perfect sphere, suspended above the vessel.

Then everything changes.

The chamber dissolves around me, replaced by visions. I have connected to Gaida’s mind through our sire bond, and I see what she is seeing.

“What’s happening?” Dante demands, his voice sounding distant despite standing mere feet away.

Before I can respond, the vision envelops me completely.

I float above an alien landscape that somehow feels deeply familiar. A singular world, unified and whole. Not Earth as we know it, but the primordial reality from which all separated worlds eventually sprang. Continents arranged in patterns mathematics would deem impossible, oceans glowing with bioluminescent life, skies where multiple suns cast light of impossible colours.

The vision shifts, focusing on beings moving through this unified reality. Some appear nearly human, others utterly peculiar, but all possess a common quality of a luminous energy that connects them to the fundamental forces of existence.

“They’re drawing power directly from the unified energies,” I mutter. “No barriers, no limitations.”

The scene changes again, showing these beings evolving over countless generations, growing exponentially more powerful as they learn to channel the combined energies of all reality. Some become godlike in their capabilities, reshaping portions of existence according to their whims.

Then I witness something darker emerging.

In the spaces between realities, in dimensions that exist perpendicular to conventional experience, entities form, chaotic, incomprehensible beings composed of pure potential. The vision grants me fleeting glimpses of their true nature, mercifully brief flashes that nonetheless threaten sanity.

Chaos-bringers. Attracted by the concentration of power in the unified world.

These entities infiltrate reality, drawn to the energies manipulated by the most powerful beings. Their presence accelerates the already dangerous accumulation of power, creating feedback loops that threaten to tear reality apart.

The vision shifts focus to one particular being. A woman of impossible beauty and terrible purpose. I recognise her immediately despite never having seen her true form before.

The vision continues, showing thirteen individuals gathering in secret, planning desperate measures as reality unravels around them. These thirteen powerful mages and seers from various species realise that the Blood Queen, the primordial force of the world, cannot be destroyed. Her consciousness has become too thoroughly intertwined with the fundamental energies of existence.

Instead, they conceive an unprecedented solution to divide reality itself.

“They created the separation,” I murmur. “Thirteen primary realms, with countless subdivisions.”

I witness the ritual that changed everything. A working of magick so profound it fundamentally altered the structure of existence. The thirteen mages, standing in a pattern identical to the blood-rune circuit now active beneath our feet, channelling power beyond comprehension.

Reality fractures along precisely calculated lines. The unified world splinters into separated realms, natural barriers forming between them, preventing any single being from accessing the combined energies of all realities simultaneously.

The Blood Queen, caught unaware, finds her consciousness divided as well. Her power diffused across the separated realms, her awareness fragmented into thirteen primary vessels.

The original vessels. They became the first vampires.

Their bodies transform, becoming immortal but bound by new limitations, unable to walk in daylight, dependent on blood for sustenance, connected to their created charges through sire bonds.

“They created vampires as living ward stones,” I say as the vision continues. “Each vampire carries a fragment of the divided power, maintaining the separation through their very existence.”

The sire bond takes on new significance in this context. It’s not merely a mystical connection between sire and charge, but a containment mechanism. Each new vampire created helps distribute and dilute the Blood Queen’s fragmented consciousness, preventing any single vessel from accumulating too much of her original power.

As vampire generations multiplied, a disturbing pattern emerged. Through the sire bonds, fragments of the Blood Queen’s consciousness occasionally managed to exert influence.

“The severing wasn’t about autonomy,” I say grimly, wondering if the others can even hear me. “It was about breaking Primordial control.”

The vision fades, having revealed the fundamental truths kept hidden from most vampires throughout history. As my awareness returns to the present chamber, I blink at the others staring at me.

“Did you hear me?”

“Yes,” Luke croaks.

Constantine frowns at me. “That’s not what happened in my world.”

“Your world is an offshoot of one of the primary thirteen worlds. So is this one. So are most, obviously. Things change, worlds appear where there was none moments ago. Evolution of the universe.”

“Which we need to hurry the fuck up and protect,” Constantine growls.

I nod and glance down. The chalice in my hands has transformed completely. Where once it bore markings specific to Draken’s essence, now it displays entirely new patterns attuned to Gaida’s blood signature. The metal itself has changed colour, shifting from burnished gold to a deep crimson with veins of silver running through its surface.

“It’s working. It’s rewriting itself. Adapting to contain the Blood Queen’s consciousness.”

The chamber shakes violently again. Everyone staggers, struggling to maintain their positions.

“How much longer?” Constantine demands.

“Seconds,” I reply, feeling the chalice approach critical resonance. “The attunement is nearly complete.”

Another violent tremor rocks the chamber, more severe than any previous. Cracks spread across the floor and walls, threatening the integrity of the blood-rune circuit. If that pattern breaks before the ritual completes, the consequences would be catastrophic.

“The pattern is failing,” Luke warns, channelling additional power into his section of the circuit. “Felix, we cannot sustain this much longer.”

I hold the chalice steady with everything I have, watching as the final transformations occur within its structure. The revelation of vampire origins clarifies everything about our current situation. Gaida, with her unique connection to multiple bloodlines, represents a convergence point. A vessel capable of containing significantly more of the Blood Queen’s fragmented consciousness than any vampire before her.

“We were created for this,” I say, the emotional weight of this understanding hitting me fully. “Vampires exist specifically to prevent the reunification. We’re living ward stones maintaining the divided realities.”

The chamber shudders again as something fundamental shifts in the world outside. The reunion of realities accelerates beyond control, creating a singularity that begins drawing everything toward it.

“It’s starting,” Constantine announces grimly. “Full implosion. The worlds are collapsing into unity.”

“Now or never,” Luke says. “Felix, complete the ritual!”

I position the fully attuned chalice above Gaida’s still form, aligning it with the central point of the blood-rune circuit. The vessel hovers there when I let it go, pulsing with power.

“ Extractum vos, protectum nos, divisum in aeternum! ” I chant the final command phrase, directing the chalice to begin the extraction process.

For a terrible moment, nothing happens. The chamber continues to shake, the world outside continues to implode, and Gaida remains unchanged on the altar.

Then everything happens at once.

A column of crimson energy erupts from Gaida’s body, connecting to the hovering chalice. The blood-rune circuit flares to blinding intensity, channelling power from all three anchor points into the extraction process.

Gaida’s body arches upward, suspended in mid-air by the force of the energy transfer.

The Blood Queen’s consciousness fights every step. Through the connection established by the ritual, I sense her rage, her desperation, her absolute certainty that reunification must proceed regardless of consequence.

“The separation is failing completely,” Luke warns. “We have moments at most.”

I focus everything I have on maintaining the extraction ritual, channelling power through the chalice despite the agony it causes. My body wasn’t designed to handle energies of this magnitude. I feel my physical form breaking down at the cellular level, ancient power corroding my existence from the inside out.

“Almost there,” I grit out, refusing to surrender to the pain. “The chalice is nearly full.”

Above ground, the implosion of worlds reaches critical velocity.

“It’s too late,” Dante says, watching through the shattered ceiling as the sky collapses completely. “Even if we complete the extraction, we can’t reverse the reunification now.”

“We have to try,” Luke insists, though even his immense power falters under the strain.

The chalice glows with completed attunement, the Blood Queen’s extracted consciousness swirling within its depths. I stagger under the weight of it, both physical and metaphysical. Containing this much primordial power taxes every fibre of my being.

“Now what?” Dante demands.

Before anyone can answer, the world outside the chamber implodes completely. Reality collapses inward, all separated realms drawn together toward a single point. The force of it tears through what remains of the Custodia Chamber, walls disintegrating as multiple worlds occupy the same space simultaneously.

The last thing I see before consciousness fails is the chalice in my hands, glowing with terrible purpose as everything else dissolves into chaos.

The moment of reunification has arrived.