"Crack!" a special magical shield placed upon Lucias Vyn broke, Assistant Professor Vyn immediately cast a spell to place another of this shield on her, but it lasted only a mere moment.
"It's no use, you know why." Lucias Vyn took out a small bottle with some pills inside and poured the entire bottle into her mouth, her eyes were bleeding, her face was sweating and her hands were trembling. There were significantly more wrinkles on her face and her arms, and her movement became slower - it was as if she just aged many years.
"Let's go in." Assistant Professor Vyn sighed: "When you break the riddle, use mine instead."
"No I can't, you're the last son."
"I'm not asking."
"... fine. But I get to cut it off and you can't stop me."
Assistant Professor Vyn and Lucias Vyn extended hands at the giant family crest carved on the floor and dripped their blood onto it. The crest shone in silvery blue light, and without opening up at all, the two Hellingers were transported to a chamber below.
Though having renounced their Hellinger name, both Lucias Vyn and Assistant Professor Vyn were very familiar with the catalogue of family artifacts, which was a catalogue of family pride and glory. And right now, inside this very chamber were some of the greatest artifacts neither of them had come before, many of the most powerful and intricate artifacts were placed in various enchanted glass or metal boxes. On each of the shelves and small stone platforms on which these boxes were placed, there was a metal plate with words on them, most of which were English, some were in German, French and there were three in other languages not recognized by either Lucias Vyn or Assistant Professor Vyn.
"It's gotta be this one." Assistant Professor Vyn looked around and pointed at a completely black metal box with non-reflective surfaces.
Lucias Vyn walked over and took a look at the metal plate.
"Blessed be the blood of meek, cherished be the tome of old. Vengeance shall be cold and sweet, beware, my child, of the Night Wolf's teeth". Lucias Vyn let out a disappointed and spiteful laughter: "What is this, a joke? The key to unlock this most powerful and important of the Hellinger creations, is hidden behind a morality slogan of family unity and a fucking children's fable?"
"I brought the blood of Flames. Looks like it's gonna be useful." Assistant Professor Vyn took out a small vial with thick and sticky dark red liquid inside, passing it to Lucias Vyn and extended his hand at her as well: "It's good that we kept the last bloods of the three branches. Shall we?"
"Now or never." Lucias Vyn took the vial, grabbed her brother's hand and looked to the metal box with both her eyes glowing in an ethereal green light.
It was a unique gift, one that Assistant Professor Vyn was fully convinced was never documented or even considered as a possibility before, which completely explained the fact that she was assigned to the "talentless" branch of the family. He and Lucias Vyn called it The Eye of Fade, named after the signature Hellinger Weapon the Blade of Fade, but much, much more powerful and came with a much greater cost. When activated, Lucias Vyn could do two things: one was to unleash an energy beam of sheer destructive power that could penetrate every kind of defense, even some weaker forms of mortality scapegoat, which never failed to bring complete annihilation to a target, until just a few minutes ago; and the other was what eventually gave her the nickname "Mama Reaper", which was the ability see the ways that could "end" a being, be it a life, an artifact, a math function, or a complicated defense array.
While Lucias Vyn was staring at the metal box, Assistant Professor Vyn could feel that his life force was slowly being drained away through his hand held by his sister, and he was starting to age as well. But the process did not take long at all - in just a few seconds, Lucias Vyn let go of his hand and stopped the use of her gift.
Without saying anything, Lucias Vyn walked up to the metal box, poured the thick liquid from the vial onto the metal box and then dripped her own blood on it.
"Let me..."
"No, yours is not needed." Lucias Vyn sounded like she was trying to suppress her excitement: "It's already partially broken - it just needs the blood of two branches."
"... okay." Assistant Professor Vyn frowned, but decided not to say anything.
The metal box opened up, and the smell of burnt metal was released from within. When both of them looked at it, they found that the interior of the metal box was in a strange condition: it was smooth in some places, had signs of air bubbles in some spots and were heavily rusted in other places. A strangely shaped crystal lay inside the box, surrounded by grey ashes.
"A relic?" Lucias Vyn reached inside the box and picked the crystal up: "What in the world - "
The crystal lit up, then a holographic image was projected into the air - it was a male wizard in a ragged robe, with a missing arm and blood on his face. He seemed to be heavily injured when he recorded this message, for when he spoke, he was wheezing and coughing and his voice was barely audible.
"My Hellingers, my apologies for this misplaced warning - I - I've come to the realization that our research - our attempt at the means of shaping reality through the collective will, or the collective faith or illusion has fallen into a trap of hubris and conceit. Malice, no matter how strong we believe we are, how calculated we try to be, cannot be contained. And the altering of the fabric of the reality, it really is the arts that can only be done by the gods. I - I've tried my best to control and contain the malice at the hospital and the temple - but my efforts have been proven to be futile. So here I am, attempting to use the best and greatest of my discovery and creation to correct what could be my worst mistake. For if I do not, the vengeance of the malice will be exact against our entire bloodline. If I should succeed, come find me and I shall impart on you everything about how to recreate this and how to find the sto - "
The holographic image cut off, it seemed that the wizard was not able to finish his message.
Lucias Vyn's body fell onto the ground, her fingernails ripped off due to her clawing at the ground with all of her strength. Her screams rocked the entire chamber, and even Assistant Professor Vyn did not know how to console her.