Chapter 1255

At the shrine, the Offering Bowl shimmered more brightly than before. The liquid inside rippled like a living thing, reflecting their faces with strange distortions. The symbols on the walls pulsed in time with the shimmer, as if urging them closer.

Jude stared down into the bowl. "If we can't reverse it… can we seal it?"

Sophie ran her fingers over the carvings. "It wasn't meant to be sealed. It was meant to be used. That's what all this is. A ritual, a promise. A cycle. The ones who came before us - they didn't seal it. They succumbed."

Emma circled the basin, looking for weaknesses, for cracks. "But maybe they didn't know how. Maybe we do."

Zoey crouched beside the bowl, studying the liquid. "What if the answer isn't in stopping it, but in changing it? What if it needs an Offering, but not the kind it's used to?"

Lucy's brow furrowed. "What do you mean?"