"What should we do?" Hecarim circled the altar and returned to ask.
Karthus pointed to the corpse of N'Zoth's claw: "We need to recycle waste once more."
He had Hecarim sever all of N'Zoth's tentacles and use them to arrange a special magic circle. After completing it, he pinched his chin with his hand bones and pondered, adding some more magical materials.
Karthus grabbed N'Zoth's soul, imprisoned in the Soul Thief's Scroll, and commanded it to act according to his will.
N'Zoth's soul struggled frantically for a while, but was eventually completely controlled. Karthus and Hecarim poured energy into the magic circle. N'Zoth's tentacles, from when he was alive, immediately "came alive", wriggling from the edge of the altar and delving deep inside.
The tentacles explored the stone coffin beneath the altar, and the energy within enticed them to swarm it madly. Their ends, like suction cups, tightly adhered to the stone coffin, greedily drawing power from it like leeches. The immense energy was transmitted through the meridians on the tentacles to the magic circle, and then absorbed by the two Shadow Isles creatures.
Karthus tilted his head back, opening his mouth, with a completely intoxicated expression: "That's it, the power of divinity!"
Hecarim laughed likewise, extremely satisfied with this.
"My strength is recovering! It's already at forty percent!"
If an eye could penetrate into the stone coffin beneath the altar, it would see a broken and incomplete body lying inside. There was a large corroded hole in the chest of this corpse, and near the wound was not blurred or rotten flesh, but a bronze-like texture. The corpse was covered in various cracks, from which gushed hatred and flames that had materialized—this was Sargeras's fel flame from hell after his corruption, a polluting energy he called "fel."
However, as the tentacles extracted the energy, the fel flames erupting from Sargeras's corpse became dimmer and weaker. One could imagine that the remaining power in the corpse of this master of the Burning Legion would eventually be completely drained.
On the Dreadnought outside the Broken Isles, Gangplank, Alistar, and Fizz were watching the ritual in real-time through the vision of a scout ward.
"These two guys seem to be getting stronger," the minotaur exclaimed, seeing the two guys in the picture who had become excited after absorbing the fel energy.
Gangplank swallowed, feeling his throat a little dry, "Looks like I can't call Karthus that 'Bonehead' anymore."
Alistar nudged him with his shoulder, mocking, "Show some guts, pirate captain, don't let me look down on you!"
Gangplank retorted, "Then dare you call him that?"
Fizz fiddled with his seastone trident boredly, rolling his eyes: "You guys are so boring!"
While they were chatting idly, the ritual had already ended. The Eye of Sargeras, which had been suppressing the altar, no longer functioned due to the disappearance of the power in Sargeras's remains, and fell from the air, rolling to Karthus's feet.
The lich picked it up, took a closer look, and then stuffed it into his space. Then he said to Hecarim, "Smash it open!"
The tentacles that had been frantically absorbing the energy from Sargeras's remains lost the support of magical power and became like dead snakes, no longer moving. The centaur stepped forward, raised his long-handled glaive, and asked while violently disassembling it, "Why don't you do it yourself?"
Karthus retorted, "Are you asking me to knock stones with my staff?"
Hecarim was speechless. However, he had recovered more than half of his power in this ritual, which made him feel more powerful than ever before. So he didn't mind the lich's teasing.
He chopped at the stones on the altar, and under the enormous force, these magically shaped stones fell apart like tofu, with dust and gravel flying everywhere in the secret chamber.
"How much power have you recovered?"
"More than half," Karthus replied, while making his signature "crack crack" laughter. Since joining the League of Legends, he had not felt so powerful in a long time. Half of his peak power was many times stronger than when he was first summoned by the summoner! If he encountered Dar'Khan now, he could definitely kill that elven mage easily!
Almost at the same time, far away on the continent of Kalimdor, a woman sensed something. She looked towards the Broken Isles and muttered to herself, "Sargeras's seal has been completely broken."
She was Aegwynn, the recluse. The mother of the astral mage Medivh, the Guardian of Tirisfal who killed Sargeras.
Several months ago, after resurrecting her son, she chose to live in complete seclusion. In fact, she had sensed something more than a decade ago when Gul'dan went to the Broken Isles to open the Black Iron Gate of her sealed tomb. But that was when she was most disheartened and unwilling to reapply the seal.
But now that Aegwynn had resurrected her son, she had nothing to worry about. As for the Guardian's duty—to hell with it!
Aegwynn stood up and walked towards her cottage. In order to resurrect Medivh, she had lost the magical power to maintain her youth, and now the traces of time were beginning to invade her body. Wrinkles gradually grew on her once flawless face, her skin was no longer smooth and firm, and even slight labor would make her feel powerless.
"Who would let such a 'Guardian' perform her duty?" She smiled mockingly, made herself a cup of tea, and lay on the rocking chair to rest.
Having recovered half of his power, Hecarim quickly completed the violent dismantling. The entire altar was completely cleaved open by his glaive, revealing the massive stone coffin beneath. This coffin was more than ten meters long, making it clear that a giant was inside. Hecarim roared and, after a few running steps, leaped forward, his front hooves slamming into the lid of the stone coffin.
His immense strength opened a gap in the coffin, and then Karthus used magic to move it entirely aside.
Then they saw Sargeras's broken body in the stone coffin—the Dark Titan's body was fragmented, and no longer spewing out fel energy from the cracks. It looked like a tattered bronze statue, lacking the majesty befitting a demon lord who could destroy countless worlds.
Hecarim poked the bronze corpse with his glaive, but unexpectedly, after losing the support of fel energy, it became like dust, crumbling into powder with a light touch.
Karthus blew into the stone coffin, and instantly a cloud of metallic dust filled the air. The Dark Titan's corpse was reduced to ashes in this way. However, two things remained at the bottom of the coffin—Sargeras's demonic horns and his heart.
"Looks like there are still some surprises," Hecarim joked. He bent down, picked up the horns, and hefted them in his hand, finding them quite heavy. Karthus, on the other hand, used magic to levitate Sargeras's heart and held it in his hand.
"This doesn't look like a heart a living being should have. It's somewhat similar to the mechanical engine Viktor created," Karthus observed, looking around.
"Try injecting some energy?" Hecarim suggested.
Karthus did as he suggested. After absorbing the fel energy from Sargeras's corpse, his power had recovered to seventy percent. It wouldn't hurt to try.
As magic flowed into the heart, the lich suddenly felt his consciousness sink into complete darkness. A tremendous force pulled his soul into a twisted place.
"You stole my power, now submit to me!" A figure appeared in the void. He was immense, with bronze skin, and fel flames blazed from his eyes, mouth, hooves, tail, and all the cracks in his body.
Karthus recognized him at a glance: "Sargeras!"
"Call me master!" Sargeras roared. "Accept my control and let me return to Azeroth!"
The dark soul of the Burning Legion's master unleashed mental power, stirring up the resonance of the fel energy Karthus had absorbed. He was utterly confident that almost no one in the universe could escape his control after absorbing his power.
Fel energy wasn't so easy to absorb! Absorbing it meant becoming a demon and being controlled by him, the demon lord!
—Unless the target's divinity was even stronger than his!
However, this small demigod lich was clearly far from reaching that level. Sargeras saw that this target had stopped resisting.
Karthus indeed did not resist, and his abilities certainly could not compete with Sargeras's soul.
The Deathsinger completely relaxed his mind, allowing Sargeras to invade his body.
"If you are more powerful than my master, then I would be happy to serve you!" The lich chuckled. Karthus said it very sincerely, knowing very well that this was not a joke—he would submit to a more powerful master.
Sargeras shouted, "No one in this universe is more powerful than me!"
Before his fall, as the strongest warrior of the Pantheon, he wielded the most powerful weapon in the universe, and no one could match him. After his fall, he gained even greater power. He had enough qualifications and confidence to say such words.
"Then prove it!" Karthus did not resist at all. As long as Sargeras could destroy the contract between him and Aiden, he would fulfill his promise.
Sargeras was very satisfied to see the lich's obedience. Previously, he had forcibly entered Azeroth, but was defeated by the Guardian Aegwynn. Although he had controlled her son through soul manipulation and used Medivh's body to guide the orc invasion, he had ultimately failed.
His soul was banished to the void, and his body was sealed on the Broken Isles—where the remaining power was absorbed by this lich and another centaur ghost.
That included a portion of his divine power. Even though it was small, he would never allow his divinity to be damaged.
Sargeras fully drove his mental power, triggering the resonance of fel energy. But he could still feel that the lich's soul was not under his control. In the dark, a more powerful contract was at work, binding the lich's soul.
Could it be that this lich's master was his pedantic brother, the King of the Pantheon—Aman'Thul?
"No, impossible!"
How could Aman'Thul make a contract with a lich!
Sargeras frantically drove his soul power, using all his strength to destroy this contract. Even Aman'Thul's contract could not stop him from exerting his full power!
Karthus could completely feel everything that was happening in his body. He let out a sigh, like regret, but also like relief:
"It seems that you are still a bit lacking compared to my master. What a pity…"
The lich chuckled again, but the meaning in the laughter was not the usual expression of happiness, but—mockery!
Yes, he was mocking the demon lord of the Burning Legion!