<h4>Chapter 172: Chapter 172: The Last Choice</h4>


    Emma grabbed the silver knife from the real Tobias before anyone could stop her.


    "I choose myself," she said, pointing the de at her own chest. "If I kill my shadow, maybe the portal will close."


    "Emma, no!" ra screamed, lunging forward.


    But before Emma could move, Shadow Emmaughed. "Silly little light. Kill me, and you die too. We’re connected. That’s how shadow magic works."


    "She’s right," the real Tobias said sadly. "Shadow creatures and their originals share the same life force. Destroy one, lose both."


    Emma’s heart sank. There was no way to win.


    Then Jake stepped forward. "Wait. What if we don’t kill the shadows? What if we trap them instead?"


    "Impossible," Shadow Jake sneered. "Nothing can hold us."


    But Jake wasn’t talking to his shadow. He was talking to a tiny field mouse that had just appeared at his feet. Then a squirrel. Then a bird. Soon, hundreds of animals surrounded them.


    "The animals say there’s another way," Jake said excitedly. "But it only works if all three of us kids use our powers at the same time."


    "What way?" Emma asked.


    "We don’t close the portal. We reverse it."


    Shadow Darian’s confident smile faded. "That’s not possible."


    "Actually, it is," said a new voice. Everyone turned to see Luna Evelyn stepping through the crowd of animals. But this wasn’t a shadow version—this was really Emma’s grandmother.


    "Grandma Luna?" Emma gasped. "But you died years ago!"


    "I’ve been hiding in the spirit realm, watching over you," Luna Evelyn said gently. "I’ve been waiting for this moment."


    She walked toward baby Marcus, who was still in Darian’s arms. The ancient evil inside him hissed when she got close.


    "Hello, old enemy," Luna said calmly to the Devourer. "Remember me?"


    Baby Marcus’s eyes wentpletely ck. "You should have stayed dead, witch."


    "I stayed alive long enough to teach my granddaughter the truth." Luna turned to Emma. "Your power isn’t just light or fire. It’s creation itself. You can make new worlds."


    "I don’t understand."


    "The shadow realm exists because it feeds off our world. But what if you created a third world? One where the shadows belonged?"


    Shadow Emma’s face went pale. "You can’t. The portal won’t let us go back."


    "She’s not sending you back," Luna Evelyn smiled. "She’s making you a new home. One where you can’t hurt anyone ever again."


    Emma felt her power stirring, but differently than before. Instead of destroying things, she could feel the ability to build them.


    "How do I do it?"


    "You need your brother and sister’s help. Jake can call all the shadow animals to the new world. Lily can heal the damage the shadows have done to ours."


    "But there’s a catch," Luna’s face grew serious. "Creating a whole world takes enormous power. It might use up all of Emma’s life force."


    "No!" ra cried. "There has to be another way!"


    "There isn’t," Emma said quietly. She looked at her family with tears in her eyes. "This is what I was born to do. I can see it now."


    Jake grabbed his twin’s hand. "If Emma’s using all her power, then I’ll give her mine too."


    "And mine," Lily added, taking Emma’s other hand.


    "Kids, you don’t understand," Kael said desperately. "If you use all your power at once, you might not survive."


    "We know," Jake said simply. "But everyone in the world will die if we don’t try."


    The shadow creatures were getting agitated. They could sense what was about to happen.


    "We won’t let you," Shadow Ronan growled, starting toward the children.


    But the real Tobias stepped in front of them. "You’ll have to go through me first."


    "One man against all of us?" Shadow Darianughed.


    "Not just one man," Luna Evelyn said. She raised her hands, and suddenly the spirits of dozens of dead pack members appeared around them. "Every wolf who ever died protecting this family is here to help."


    The ghost wolves charged at the shadow creatures, buying the children time.


    Emma closed her eyes and felt her power growing. But this time, instead of silver fire, she felt warmth. The warmth of every happy memory she’d ever had—real or not, it didn’t matter anymore.


    "I can see the new world," she whispered. "It’s beautiful. The shadows can be happy there."


    Jake’s power joined hers. Every animal in the area started glowing with soft light. "The animals want to help build it too."


    Lily’s healing power flowed into both her siblings. "I can feel the hurt in the shadow people. They’re not evil. They’re just lonely and scared."


    As the three children’s powersbined, something amazing happened. The ck portal above them started changing colors—from ck to gray to silver to pure white light.


    "It’s working!" the real Tobias shouted.


    But baby Marcus suddenly started screaming. The Devourer inside him was fighting the creation magic.


    "Stop!" the ancient evil roared. "You don’t know what you’re doing! If you send us away, something worse will take our ce!"


    "What could be worse than you?" Emma asked, still pouring her power into the new world.


    "The Void," baby Marcus said, and for a moment his real voice came through. "There’s something behind all the monsters. Something that eats everything—even other evil things. If you get rid of us, nothing will be left to keep it away."


    Emma hesitated. "Is he telling the truth?"


    Luna Evelyn’s face went white. "I don’t know. The Void is older than anything I’ve ever heard of."


    The shadow creatures were fighting harder now, trying to break through the ghost wolves.


    "We’re almost out of time," Jake said. "The new world is ready, but we have to choose now."


    "If we send them away and this Void thinges, we might make everything worse," Emma said.


    "But if we don’t send them away, they’ll destroy our world anyway," Lily pointed out.


    Emma looked at her baby brother, possessed by ancient evil, then at her family surrounded by monsters, then at the portal that could either save them or doom them.


    "There’s a third choice," she said suddenly.


    "What?" everyone asked at once.


    "I go with them."


    "Absolutely not," ra said firmly.


    "Think about it," Emma continued. "If I go to the new world with the shadows, I can watch over them. Make sure they don’t hurt anyone. And if this Void thing is real, I can fight it from there."


    "Emma, you’re five years old," Kael said desperately. "We can’t ask you to give up your whole life."


    "I’m not giving it up. I’m trading it for everyone else’s."


    The white portal was getting bigger. The shadow creatures were almost through the ghost wolves. And baby Marcus wasughing that terribleugh again.


    "Choose quickly," the Devourer said. "Because ready or not, the Void is already here."


    Everyone looked up to see something new emerging from the white portal. Not shadow creatures or monsters or anything with a shape at all. Just emptiness that made everything around it disappear.


    "Oh no," Luna Evelyn whispered. "We opened the wrong door."


    Emma felt her power start to slip away as pure nothingness reached toward her family.


    And thest thing she saw before everything went white was baby Marcus smiling—not with evil this time, but with something that looked almost like hope.