The Heart of Sabik.
The Heart of Sabik (黒聖石サビク, Kuro Seiseki Sabiku?, lit. Black Holy Stone Sabik) is a piece of auracite that serves as story element in Final Fantasy XIV. It is linked to the ultimate spell, Ultima.
History[]
Before the sundering of Etheirys, a piece of black rock fell from the sky, which was discovered by Athena who took it for her research. She dubbed it "auracite", and discovered it was capable of housing vast aether reserves. She eventually named the rock the Heart of Sabik.
Athena was already fixated on discovering secrets of creating life from nothing and becoming a god, with the Heart of Sabik serving as a cornerstone for her unethical research. When her husband, Lahabrea, discovered her secret laboratory within Pandæmonium and her experiments on their son, Erichthonios, he demanded she release him. Athena knew that Lahabrea would kill her, and so asked him to join their souls briefly for him to understand why she did what she did. In doing so Lahabrea became both fearful of his wife's ambition and terrified that a part of him understood it; he killed her and split his soul, sealing the half that agreed with Athena within Pandæmonium. He took the Heart of Sabik for safekeeping, but what he did not know was that Athena had imprinted her memories within the Heart as a failsafe, which would allow her to return when an opportunity would present itself.
Lahabrea would later reintegrate his split soul back to himself to fully act as Keyward of Pandaemonium and recover his full power. When Hydaelyn sundered Etheirys, Lahabrea survived with his soul intact. The Heart would eventually end up to hands of the Allagan Empire on the Source, to be used as the core for the Ultima Weapon, likely through Lahabrea's involvement. The Allagans were never able to truly tap into the Heart's power and the spell it contained, Ultima.
After the Allagan Empire fell in the Fourth Umbral Calamity, the Ultima Weapon was left buried for thousands of years until the Garlean Empire's XIVth Imperial Legion discovered it. Legatus Gaius van Baelsar, guided by Lahabrea, intended to use the Weapon to conquer Eorzea, unaware that Lahabrea had other plans for the Weapon. Though Lahabrea turned the spell Ultima against the Warrior of Light, Hydaelyn protected her champion from its power and the Ultima Weapon was destroyed.
Lahabrea later retrieved the Heart of Sabik. When the primal King Thordan I absorbed Lahabrea's soul, the Heart of Sabik remained abandoned in Azys Lla. Athena's memories reached out from it to Claudien, the reincarnation of Erichthonios, and called him to Azys Lla. When he picked up the stone, Athena possessed him before teleporting to the aetherial sea to conclude her research. After being defeated by the Warrior of Light, Claudien regained enough will to expel her from his body; without another vessel to latch onto, her phantom dissipated.
Now empty of Athena's memories, the Heart of Sabik was kept by Claudien in Sharlayan for future study. Though its origins remained unclear, Claudien's fellow researchers felt all but certain it was connected to the being Ultima, who had previously been observed to use auracite to ensnare the minds of others before her destruction.