The beast spread terror for seven days and seven nights, tearing down temples and palaces, setting fire to hundreds of buildings, and tearing apart with its claws the trembling figures it found begging for mercy after tearing off the roofs over their heads. The crimson dragon grew day by day, devouring everything in its path. Torn bodies rained down from the sky and the flames of its breath flowed through the streets like a torrent of blood. On the seventh day, when everyone in the city believed that the beast was going to raze it to the ground and annihilate all its inhabitants, a solitary figure came out to meet it. Edmond de Luna, barely recovered and limping, climbed the steps that led to the roof of the cathedral. There he waited for the dragon to spot him and come for him. From between the black clouds of smoke and embers the beast emerged in flight low over the rooftops of Barcelona. It had grown so much that it already surpassed in size the temple from which it had emerged. Edmond de Luna could see his reflection in those eyes, immense as pools of blood. The beast opened its jaws to swallow him, flying now like a cannonball over the city and tearing away roofs and towers in its path. Edmond de Luna then extracted that miserable grain of sand that hung from its neck and squeezed it in his fist. He remembered Constantine’s words and told himself that faith had finally found him and that his death was a very small price to pay to purify the black soul of the beast, which was none other than that of all men. He thus raised the fist that held the tear of Christ, closed his eyes and offered himself. The jaws swallowed him at the speed of the wind and the dragon rose high, climbing the clouds. Those who remember that day say that the sky opened in two and that a great glow lit the firmament. The beast was enveloped in the flames that slipped between its fangs and the beating of its wings projected a great rose of fire that completely covered the city. There was silence, and when they opened their eyes again, the sky had become overcast as if it were the darkest night, and a slow rain of bright ash flakes fell from above, covering the streets, the burnt ruins, and the city of tombs, temples, and palaces with a white blanket that melted to the touch and smelled of fire and curses.
