Chapter 169: The Sorceress's End and the Collapse of Eternal Dignity
The crystal courtyard groaned under the weight of Rina and Diyari's unified radiance, as if the universe could no longer endure the immense energy originating from the union of purity and pain. The Grandmother, whose tongue was riddled with the black needles of the Curse of Voices, now lay like a distorted puppet in the center of that luminous vortex. Her body, which she had kept young and strong for hundreds of years through black magic and the blood of the innocent, had begun to crack. This was not just the end of a battle, but the end of a dark era in which tyranny was viewed as a sacred religion. Rina, with her blazing eyes, felt the time had come to draw the final curtain on this bloody theater.
Rina took another step forward; the crystal ground beneath her feet turned into white light, erasing all the darkness the Grandmother had left behind. In a voice full of dominance, she said: "Grandmother, you thought magic was your private property. You thought you could hide forever behind this shield of shadows. But look—the very magic you worshiped like a goddess is now consuming your body. You are no longer worthy of the power you used for destruction." Rina opened her arms and brought the "Absolute White Radiance" to its zenith. A wave of light so powerful erupted from her body that it shook the very walls of the palace.
In that moment, the Grandmother's body began a terrifying transformation. The black magic remaining in her veins started to ignite because of Rina's light. The Grandmother was in a silent scream, for the needles were still in her tongue. Her skin began to peel away, turning into burnt black ash. Pieces of her body scattered in the air like the fallen leaves of a dead tree. Diyari, standing beside Rina like a shield with his Golden Blood Pulse, watched this scene mercilessly. He saw how the monster who had tortured him for long years was now turning into dust and powder before him.
But Rina did not want to end it so easily. As the Grandmother's body was about to turn completely to ash and vanish, Rina used a forbidden ancestral spell: "The Stripping of the Magic Soul." Rina extended her right hand, and as if casting a radiant rope into the depths of the Grandmother's being, she pulled out all the magical energy the Grandmother had gathered in her lifetime with immense force. The Grandmother felt not only her power being stripped away but also the dignity, youth, and authority she had boasted of for so many years.
At that instant, a shocking change occurred. The ash falling from the Grandmother's body suddenly stopped. The body that was about to disappear took shape again, but this time, not as the powerful sorceress. In place of that authoritative woman, a human old woman appeared—utterly frail and broken. Her skin was so wrinkled it looked like the bark of a parched tree. Her hands trembled, and her eyes, which were once full of magic, were now just two white, dim holes. Rina had stripped all the magic from her, leaving her only with a mortal human body.
Rina said coldly: "Death was a gift for you, Grandmother. If you had become ash, you would no longer feel pain. But I decided to turn you back into the weak human you always feared. Now, you are a helpless, broken old woman. Not only can you not perform magic, but you cannot even take a step without feeling the weight of your age and your crimes. This is your punishment: to live within a body where only your bitter memories remain." The Grandmother tried to speak, but she no longer even had a voice; only a raspy hiss emerged.
Diyari stepped forward and looked down at the broken old woman kneeling on the ground. He said: "Behold... this is the 'deity' who thought I would wither beneath her feet. Now you will be beneath the feet of this land you destroyed. You are no longer a sorceress; you are merely the remains of a lifetime that history will mention with disgust." Diyari's golden light made the Grandmother feel every old wound on her body that she had previously masked with magic. Now, all the pains surfaced together.
The courtyard began to grow calm, but it was the calm that follows a hurricane. Rina and Diyari stood together, their unified radiance still glowing around them. Rina knew that by seizing the Grandmother's power, she had not only crushed the woman but had severed the roots of the black magic that had overshadowed this palace for years. The Grandmother now remained like a lifeless shadow in the corner of the courtyard, unable to even endure the sunlight beginning to appear in the distance.
Rina caused all the magical energy she had seized from the Grandmother to become a white crystal in her hands, then shattered it into the air. She said: "This power no longer exists. Just as your tyranny has ended, your power shall become part of the earth you tortured." The Grandmother watched Rina with her dim eyes, and in that moment, she realized her greatest defeat was not death, but remaining alive in a world where she was nothing. She became the very frail human she had always looked upon with contempt.
Red Vengeance reached an unparalleled conclusion at this point. Rina and Diyari not only triumphed but showed that love and truth can turn even the oldest and most powerful sorcerers into mere ash and helpless remains. The courtyard was now a witness to the collapse of a glory built on blood. The Grandmother remained in the loneliness and pain of her broken body, while Rina and Diyari prepared to face the final stage of this journey: the collapse of the last walls of the prison they called a palace.
In this part, every word of Rina's was like a blade to the Grandmother's soul. Rina made the Grandmother know that magic cannot protect a human soul if that soul is full of hatred. The end of the sorceress was not just a physical punishment, but the collapse of all the crooked beliefs upon which the Grandmother had built her life. Now, in the dust of the courtyard, only one truth remained: light always returns to its true owners, and shadows, when the light comes, have nowhere to run except into the ash of history.
The Grandmother, in the final moments of this chapter, felt the coldness entering her weak bones. She could no longer command, she could no longer kill, and she could not even cry. She was merely a living statue of regret that Rina had left for the world as a lesson. Diyari took Rina's hand, and together they looked at the sky, which for the first time was losing its terrifying red color and moving toward a white clarity. The sorceress ended, and with her, all the curses that had destroyed this land for long years vanished.
Written by: Dlin_myth