The bells of Valmar rang without ceasing. The Vanyar, the fairest of all the Elven kindreds, chanted hymns of praise, their voices filling the golden city with sacred song. Every soul in Valinor rejoiced at the resurrection of the Two Trees.
The newly born Elves, bathed in the restored radiance of Laurelin and Telperion, found themselves growing purer and stronger in its light. The ancient High Elves, those who had witnessed the Trees' original glory in ages long past, gazed upon the glowing Trees on the hillside beyond the western gate and felt, for one breathless moment, as though they had been transported back to the Years of the Trees.
Ingwë, the supreme High King of the Vanyar, king of all Elves, the oldest and most revered of the Firstborn, and devoted servant of Manwë, personally received the Valar and their guest. Amidst the chanting of the Vanyar throughout the city, accompanied by a great retinue of noble Elves and Maiar, the Valar and Sylas entered Valmar to participate in the grand celebration.
Manwë himself, walking among the assembled host, proclaimed the resurrection of the Two Trees and the merit of Sylas.
Sylas's name resounded throughout Valmar, and indeed, across all of Valinor.
The Valar's open deference toward him was enough to establish Sylas as a figure of the highest honor. The Elves revered him as the Healer of the Two Trees. From this day forward, so long as the Two Trees stood, Sylas's name would be linked to them, an eternal symbol, woven into the fabric of Arda's history.
[System Notification: Hogwarts Sign-In System. Location detected: Valinor, Valmar. Sign-in available. Proceed?]
Amidst the banquet, the notification appeared in Sylas's awareness. His expression betrayed nothing. Calmly, inwardly, he replied:
"Sign in."
[Sign-in successful. Congratulations, you have obtained: The True Nature of Love Magic!]
Sylas blinked. Love magic?
He paused, searching his memory. He recalled Dumbledore speaking often of "the power of love," that ancient, mysterious force that had shaped the destiny of Harry Potter. But despite years of studying magic, Sylas had never truly grasped what this "power" actually was.
Curious, he absorbed the flood of knowledge pouring into his mind.
And then he understood.
What wizards called "love magic" was, in its essence, the power of the spirit, a force driven entirely by genuine emotion and deep understanding. It was not a spell to be memorized or a technique to be practiced. It was something far more fundamental.
Spiritual power was an invisible force, more mysterious than magic itself, and in certain respects, more potent. It was more terrible than death, more profound than human intellect, more miraculous than any force of nature. It could ward off the deadliest curses. Even the Killing Curse could not overcome it.
This was no external power. It originated from within, from the heart, from the spirit.
Dumbledore had called it "the power of love."
Harry Potter, shielded by his mother Lily Evans's willing sacrifice, had carried this spiritual power within him. It was what had deflected Voldemort's Killing Curse, what had rendered the Dark Lord unable to touch him, and what had ultimately led to Voldemort's destruction.
But the power of the spirit was neither mysterious nor incomprehensible. It manifested throughout the wizarding world in countless ways.
The Patronus Charm was a direct application of spiritual power. The caster needed to sustain a purely joyful memory, channeling intense positive emotion and a fierce will to protect, in order to summon a corporeal guardian. Likewise, the power of any spell was directly influenced by the caster's emotional state. This was itself a form of spiritual manipulation, using the force of emotion to harness greater magical energy.
An ordinary wizard, fighting to protect their family, could unleash power far beyond their normal limits. Molly Weasley, driven by grief over Fred's death and the desperate need to protect her daughter Ginny, had released a fighting fury that far exceeded her previous abilities, striking down Bellatrix Lestrange, Voldemort's most fanatical and dangerous follower.
Spiritual power was, in truth, the key to mastering magic.
Furthermore, deep within the Ministry of Magic's Department of Mysteries, there existed a permanently locked room. Within it was contained "Love," raw, concentrated spiritual energy.
This force, which by all rights should have been intangible and impossible to store, had been captured by ancient wizards using methods now lost to time, sealed within that chamber and transformed into tangible, measurable energy.
The method for creating such a space, a vessel capable of containing pure spiritual energy, was exactly what Sylas had just received.
His mind raced. He was intensely interested in this power. Spiritual energy represented a form of boundless potential, an infinitely renewable force. As long as intelligent beings existed in the world, spiritual energy would flow ceaselessly, inexhaustible by its very nature.
If he could master this power... perhaps it would be the key to taking that final step toward ultimate ascension, without needing to follow Morgoth's path of seizing the Flame Imperishable by force.
The thought set his pulse quickening. He should create a space similar to the Department of Mysteries' locked room, or something far larger. A vessel vast enough to gather and contain the spiritual energy of all Arda.
All living beings possessed spiritual intelligence and energy. If Sylas could truly succeed in creating such a vessel, he would possess an inexhaustible treasure trove of power.
However, this was not something to be rushed. And even if such a spiritual repository were to be built, Valinor was not the place for it. The Blessed Realm was too peaceful, too tranquil. The Elves of Valinor were serene and emotionally placid, fundamentally poor producers of spiritual energy.
Humans, by contrast, burned with abundant emotion. Their lifespans were brief, barely a century, and within that fleeting span they bloomed desperately with the radiance of life. Joy, grief, love, fury, hope, despair: all blazed within them at extraordinary intensity. Their spiritual energy was concentrated beyond anything the immortal Elves could produce.
If Sylas wished to gather spiritual energy in meaningful quantities, he would need to go to Middle-earth.
But traveling to Middle-earth was no simple matter. At minimum, one needed to be a Vala-level existence to move freely between the realms. Valinor's laws restricted the Elves and the Maiar from journeying to the mortal world of Arda, but no such restrictions applied to the Valar themselves. Oromë, the Huntsman, was famously fond of Middle-earth and often rode his great steed through its forests, hunting the remnants of Morgoth's creatures. Ulmo, too, had long been absent from Valinor, dwelling instead within the waters of the world. The Valar were the true ruling powers of Valinor; the restrictions they imposed were meaningless against themselves.
For now, Sylas filed the idea away for the future.
Returning to the feast: in recognition of Sylas's extraordinary achievements in creating the star system and resurrecting the Two Trees, Manwë granted him a territory of his own.
The region of Avathar, located in the southeast of Aman, at the eastern foot of the Pelóri Mountains, was bestowed upon Sylas as his domain.
This was a land with a dark history. Avathar had once been the dwelling place of Ungoliant, and after the great spider and Morgoth had conspired to destroy the Two Trees and fled, the region had fallen into ruin. In the ancient Quenya tongue, Avathar meant "the Shadows," for Ungoliant's vile and corrupting darkness had saturated the land so deeply that it possessed the most intense and enduring shadow in all of Arda. The environment was gloomy, treacherous, and perpetually shrouded in gloom.
But granting Sylas this territory was not a slight. It was the product of careful consideration.
Though steeped in darkness, Avathar was a vast region with a superior geographical position. Unlike the frozen, desolate northern reaches of Aman, the climate and conditions here were naturally favorable. The coastline featured natural bays perfectly suited for building harbors, and to the north lay easy access to both the Bay of Eldamar and Alqualondë, the Haven of the Swans.
Moreover, Sylas possessed the Fruit of the Sun and the Flower of the Moon. Their radiance would be more than sufficient to purge Avathar of its ancient darkness, transforming the blighted land into a realm of light.
And so, Sylas finally had a domain of his own in Aman.
After the celebrations in Valmar concluded, Sylas bid farewell to the Valar and prepared to depart.
Before leaving, however, he made one last visit to the Two Trees upon Ezellohar. There, with reverent care, he broke off a single branch from Laurelin and another from Telperion. Using strands of hair given to him by Manwë and Varda, he crafted two powerful new wands, each containing a core of divine origin and a shaft of sacred wood.
Then he returned to Minas Tirith.
After reuniting with his family, Sylas paid his respects to the esteemed King Elessar and bid him a proper farewell. Then, accompanied by his wife Arwen and their son Elroth, he departed the White City and set out for Avathar, ready to build their new homeland.