The central siphon screamed as if tearing the fabric of reality itself. A pale, necrotic vortex spiraled upward, twisting the howling gale into ribbons of blinding violet plasma. The ethereal eye at the epicenter pulsed with blinding fury, its gravitational maw drinking the ruins of the dais in jagged, floating boulders.
Aurelia remained flush against Malakor’s chest for only a heartbeat, their shared warmth a defiant ember against the freezing void. With a sharp exhale, she pushed off the basalt wall, planting her boots firmly onto the shuddering stone.
"The gravity well is anchored by an inverted core," Aurelia yelled over the deafening roar of the maelstrom. Sapphire light flared along the veins of her arms, bleeding through her battle-leathers as she synchronized the resonant frequencies of the Five Bound Shards. "Physical strikes won't shatter it—it consumes kinetic force! We have to invert the polarity from within."
Malakor stepped to her flank, Void-Reaver held in a low guard. His jaw was set in stone, black hair whipping across his forehead, dark eyes reflecting the unnatural glare of the abyss. "How long?"
"Three seconds of unbroken focus," she answered, glancing sideways at him. "Keep the siphon tendrils off me."
A dark, dangerous grin curved Malakor's mouth. "Consider them dead."
Aurelia closed her eyes, centering her consciousness upon the blinding nexus within her ribcage. The Third and Fifth Shards flared in molten synchronization, their astral fire coursing down through her fingertips like liquid lightning. She sank into a low crouch, thrusting both open palms against the fractured obsidian floor. A glyph of silver-and-frost geometry erupted outward from her hands, racing across the platform to ensnare the rim of the abyssal maw.
Instantly, the living siphon reacted.
Ten massive calcified tentacles, dripping with acidic ether, whipped out from the chasm, lunging directly for Aurelia’s unshielded form.
Malakor moved like a thunderclap.
His silhouette blurred across the platform, Void-Reaver tracing arcs of pure obliteration through the air. A sweeping horizontal cleave severed three tendrils in an explosion of violet ichor; spinning fluidly, he drove his armored heel into a fourth, pulverizing it into calcified powder. When a serrated whip lunged toward Aurelia’s throat from her blind spot, Malakor did not even look—he caught the barbed appendage with his bare left gauntlet.
The barbs screeched against dark steel, biting deep enough to draw a thin line of crimson from his palm. Malakor did not flinch. With an animalistic growl, he ripped the tentacle inward, bringing his great sword down with devastating force to sever the trunk at the root.
"Now, Aurelia!" he commanded, his voice vibrating with sovereign fury.
Aurelia opened her eyes—now burning with pure, unyielding celestial starlight. "Fracture!"
She drove her willpower into the glyph. The frost magic did not freeze the outer shell; instead, it raced straight down into the subterranean singularity, seeking the molten, necrotic pulse of the dead star core. The moment her astral frost met the necrotic well, the laws of gravity flipped violently.
The pale light within the chasm stuttered, turned pitch-black, and imploded.
A concussive shockwave ripped across the summit. The remaining tendrils withered into dry ash, disintegrating into the gale. The titanic bone siphon fractured down its spine with the sound of a shattering mountain, collapsing inward into its own collapsed gravity pocket before vanishing into nothingness.
Silence slammed down over the dais, heavy and sudden, broken only by the panting of their breath and the whistling wind.
Aurelia swayed on her feet, the immense magical backlash draining the color from her skin. Before her knees could touch the stone, Malakor’s arms caught her, sweeping her up against him with fierce possessiveness.
He held her suspended against his chest, his crimson-ringed gaze searching her pale face, assessing every inch for harm. His chest heaved against hers, the scent of crushed ozone, ozone fire, and his dark musk filling her senses.
"You pushed the threshold," he murmured, his voice dangerously low, his thumb brushing away a stray lock of dark hair plastered to her temple.
Aurelia met his gaze, her breath ragged, a slow, breathless laugh touching her lips as she gripped the leather strap across his shoulder. "I had you guarding my back. Why would I hesitate?"
Malakor’s eyes darkened, the fierce adrenaline of the kill shifting into a raw, smoldering heat that made her pulse skip a beat. He leaned down until his lips brushed against the curve of her jaw, his voice a gravelly vow against her skin. "Keep that faith, little star. The inner sanctuary of the First Throne awaits us."