Darkness bled into light.
Lucifer's body arched in the void, pain wracking every nerve. His father's hand pressed gently to his forehead, anchoring him as the cocoon of blood and shadow constricted tighter around him.
He gasped, eyes rolling back as his veins burned with white-hot agony. His chest convulsed. Something shifted inside him—something massive. Old walls crumbled. Boundaries he didn't even know existed dissolved like salt in rain.
"Let it happen," his father whispered. His voice vibrated through the hall like a warm tide, steady against Lucifer's ragged breathing. "Don't fight it. Accept what you are."
Lucifer clenched his teeth, blood running from his lips.
A scream tore out of his throat—ragged, deep, ripping through the throne room and echoing across the endless dark. The moons above pulsed, their red light intensifying, bleeding down into him in rivers of living illumination.
