Meanwhile, during these past few years, Sylas also spent a long period in the castle successfully creating the Room of Requirement.
The Room of Requirement functioned like a wish-house. Its form changed according to the user's needs, providing nearly anything they wished for. Aside from food and life itself, it could conjure almost any real-world object.
For example, if someone wished for a chamber filled with mountains of gold, the Room would manifest countless piles of gold coins.However, these coins existed only inside the room, once taken out, they would vanish instantly.
Sylas designed the Room of Requirement to appear randomly throughout the castle rather than staying fixed on a particular floor or location.
The Room could also open pathways to all parts of the castle, the kitchen, dormitories, the Basilisk's Chamber, and even the Dragon's Treasury.
Of course, to prevent students from wandering into dangerous areas, Sylas placed strong restrictions on access. Only specific spells and focused imagination could make the door appear and reveal the desired room.
Sylas used the Room of Requirement as his private secret research chamber. It also housed his most important relics, the Palantiri, the Philosopher's Stone, the Crown of Wisdom, and the Golden Cup.
Aside from Arwen, no one else knew of its existence. It was a truly hidden sanctuary.
In recent years, after Saruman's complete disappearance and the Ring of Thrór being destroyed by dragonfire, Mordor fell strangely silent. No activity came from its borders.
Yet, because of Saruman's dying warning, Sylas, Gandalf, Elrond, and the others never lowered their guard. They were particularly worried that Sauron might attempt to use a sacrificial array to contact Morgoth.
But they could not simply storm Mordor without evidence. So they could only prepare in secret, determined to meet any threat head-on.
Mordor- beneath Mount Doom.
Under the supervision of Ringwraiths and dark sorcerers, countless orcs toiled across the ashen plains. Following the prepared blueprints, they used molten lava to cool and harden black stone, constructing a massive altar.
Around the altar stood enormous stone statues, twisted, ferocious, exuding suffocating darkness.
The altar's surface was carved with a labyrinth of trenches which, when viewed from above, formed an enormous magical circle.
Lava streamed down from Mount Doom like a river, flooding the plains of Mordor with blistering heat and choking sulfur.
Upstream of one such lava channel, the orcs positioned a huge iron conduit. Two burly orcs smashed open the sluice gate with iron hammers, allowing the molten rock to surge through the pipe.
The red-hot lava poured into the altar's trenches.
As the lava filled the carved channels, the entire altar seemed to awaken. The towering statues emitted an even darker, more malevolent aura, absorbing the power of Mount Doom like bottomless voids.
Mount Doom itself roared violently, throwing up greater waves of magma and volcanic ash.
The sky over Mordor, already smothered in clouds, turned even darker, volcanic ash blanketing the heavens until day resembled night.
The Witch-king of Angmar, leader of the Ringwraiths, stood atop the altar. His cold, rasping voice echoed across the plains:
"Bring him up."
The densely packed orcs below instinctively parted, forming a path.
Dozens of humans, and a few elves, were shoved forward in chains and driven up onto the altar.
They were captives taken from Gondor, Rohan, Lothlórien, Mirkwood, and surrounding lands.
Imprisoned in Mordor, the captives had endured endless torment; many were barely recognizable as human anymore.
Originally, their fate had been to serve as food for the great spider Shelob, but now their purpose had changed.
These humans and elves, some numb, some struggling and begging for mercy, others consumed by hatred, were forced to kneel in rows upon the altar's stone slabs.
A brutal orc executioner, wielding a butcher's blade, decapitated them one by one, blood spilling freely across the stone.
Below the altar, the orcs erupted in bloodlust and frenzy, brandishing their weapons and roaring with savage joy.
On the altar, the orcs tossed the freshly slain into the lava below, kicking their bodies into the molten river where they were instantly swallowed and dissolved.
Above them, the Witch-king of Angmar chanted ancient, malevolent incantations, a dark ritualistic litany.
Human and elf alike became slaughtered offerings, their blood splashing across the altar, their severed bodies consumed by the lava.
With each life taken, the sacrificial array grew more sinister. The lava filling the carved channels glowed hotter and brighter, radiating violent and destructive power.
As the sacrifices increased, the dark clouds overhead churned more violently. Lightning flashed endlessly within them, while swarms of black crows and giant bats circled above the altar like an omen of doom.
After hundreds had been killed, the Witch-king's voice rose cold and sharp:
"Not enough. Bring more." (spoken in the Black Speech)
The captured humans and elves had all been slaughtered, but this did not trouble the orc chieftain.
For in Mordor, there were also human tribes who served Sauron, the Easterlings, the Haradrim, and countless native Mordor slaves.
At his command, thousands of terrified human slaves were dragged to the altar.
Screaming and pleading for their lives, they were cut down mercilessly, their bodies thrown into the seething lava.
After thousands more had perished, the entire sacrificial circle erupted with horrifying power. Smoke and flame, thick with destruction and darkness, surged upward as though some monstrous being were about to break free.
The orcs who moments earlier had cheered with excitement now trembled in fear, their souls recoiling from the darkness forming above the altar.
The Witch-king, however, grew only more feverish. His hollow eyes flickered with crimson evil.
"More! The sacrifices must continue!" (Black Speech)
But at this order, the orc chieftain hesitated.
"Witch-king… we've used all the humans prepared for the ritual. If you need more, we must capture more."
The Witch-king erupted with fury.
"No! The offerings must not stop!"
His gaze swept across the thousands of orcs surrounding the altar.
"Are there not still many here? Offer the weak ones!"
Terror rippled through the ranks of orcs. They stumbled backward, scrambling to avoid being chosen.
But the Witch-king gave the chieftain no chance to balk. The other Ringwraiths and dark sorcerers stepped forward, surrounding him, ready to destroy him the moment he resisted.
Seeing this, the orc chieftain abandoned all hesitation.
In desperation to protect his own life and his own kind, the stronger orc breed created by Saruman, he immediately ordered his warriors to seize the weaker orcs around them.
Chaos exploded across the altar's surroundings. Shrieking orcs were hacked down and dragged up the stone steps to be slaughtered.
Thousands of orcs were sacrificed in this frenzy.
As their bodies fell into the lava, the altar underwent a drastic transformation.
Thick black smoke and hellish fire erupted upward, carrying an overwhelming aura of darkness. The skies over Mordor shifted color as though an eternal night had descended.
And then, within the smoke and flame, a pair of burning eyes opened.
They glowed like living fire, radiating a suffocating, crushing power of pure darkness.