After finally herding the ghouls out of the ritual room, Perpetua rejoined the ritual circle around the giant pentagram.

The pentagram was painted in the fresh blood of a ritual goat, and a candle was placed at each point of the inner star. Runes and other symbols were drawn in white chalk around the outer circle, those same symbols beginning to glow as the eerie ritual chant began.

Slowly, smoke began to rise from the center of the pentagram. Not your usual wood smoke that smelt of pine and oak, but thick black smoke that smelt of sulfur and pure hellfire.

As the chant continued, the center of the smoke began to take solid form, and word after word, flicker after flicker of the wax candles, the ghoul's body began to take form, emerging from the pluming black smoke like a dragon from a burning mountain.

With a snarl, the ghoul stumbled forward, just after their body had taken physical form, before losing balance and falling onto their knees.

Perpetua stepped forward, his cold gaze meeting the ghoul's as the other ritual performers slipped out of the room like slippery black eels.

"Come." Perpetua offered the ghoul a hand as the glowing symbols around the pentagram began to fade, and the gateway the ghoul had just come out of closed.