When Sempere finished translating the notebook, the first light of dawn was breaking through the clouds. Shortly afterwards, the inquisitor, without saying a word, left the room and two sentries came to look for him and take him to a cell from which he was certain he would never emerge alive.
While Sempere was lying in the dungeon, the Grand Inquisitor’s men were going to the wreckage, where, hidden in a metal chest, they were to find the scarlet flask. Jorge de León was waiting for them in the cathedral. They had not been able to find the medal with the supposed tear of Christ that Edmond’s text alluded to, but the inquisitor had no qualms, since he felt that his soul did not need any purification. With his eyes poisoned with greed, the inquisitor took the scarlet flask, raised it to the altar to bless it and, thanking God and hell for this gift, he swallowed the contents in one gulp. A few seconds passed without anything happening. Then the inquisitor began to laugh. The soldiers looked at each other in bewilderment, wondering if Jorge de León had lost his mind. For most of them, it was the last thought of their lives. They saw the inquisitor fall to his knees and a blast of icy wind sweep through the cathedral, dragging the wooden pews, knocking over figures and lit candles. Then they heard their skin and limbs break, as among the howls of agony the voice of Jorge de León sank into the roar of the beast that emerged from his flesh, growing rapidly into a bloody mass of scales, claws and wings. A tail marked with sharp edges like axes extended from the largest of the snakes and when the beast turned and showed them its face furrowed with fangs and eyes ablaze with fire, they barely had the courage to run away. The flames surprised them motionless, tearing the flesh from their bones like a gale tears the leaves from a tree. The beast then spread its wings, and the inquisitor, Saint George and dragon at the same time, took flight through the great rose window of the cathedral in a storm of glass and fire to rise above the rooftops of Barcelona.
