Ordeal of Erebos

Among the cycle of Ordeal Auras that ask a creature to attack repeatedly before cashing in, this is the one wagering on the fastest clock. The counter ability triggers on each attack; once the creature has three or more counters, the Aura sacrifices itself, and that sacrifice is what fires the discard, stripping two cards from a player's hand. The sequencing carries the design. Because both the counter and the sacrifice happen in the declare-attackers step, the third attack sets off a chain that lands the discard before blockers are chosen. The result is locked in the moment the swing is declared, even if the body dies in the combat that follows. Building the payoff on attacks rather than connections softens the wager: the creature needs only to survive two combats and live to swing a third time, not grind through three full fights. What blunts it is timing against the wrong opponent: the discard arrives slowest against exactly the defensive decks where breaking a hand would matter most. Against an opponent unwilling to block, though, the growing body becomes a clock that forces the issue while the looming hand-attack punishes the stall. One trigger fattens the creature toward a faster kill; a separate trigger, downstream of the same threshold, reaches across the table to shred resources. Most aggressive black tools convert tempo into damage; this one offers a second exchange rate, turning sustained board presence into a card-advantage swing once the opponent is already losing the race.