The DiMera crypt has witnessed more resurrections, reversals, and operatic declarations than perhaps any other location in daytime history. But even by Days of Our Lives standards,

the moment that unfolded this week sent a chill through Salem that may linger for months — perhaps years.EJ DiMera put on Stefano’s ring.

What might sound like a simple, symbolic gesture played onscreen like the coronation of a king — or the awakening of a curse. Because in Salem, the Phoenix is never just jewelry.

It is destiny, power, and the promise that evil never truly dies.

And by the time Susan Banks came barreling into that stone chamber, shrieking that Stefano’s wickedness now lived inside her son, viewers everywhere were left asking the same breathless question:

Is EJ still EJ… or has Stefano risen again?

A Farewell That Felt Like a Beginning

The gathering began quietly, almost tenderly. The DiMeras assembled to pay tribute to the man who defined their legacy. Chad offered grief wrapped in restraint. Tony carried the weight of history. Kristen, as always, radiated combustible emotion beneath a polished exterior.

And EJ — complicated, wounded EJ — seemed smaller somehow in the shadow of his father’s memory.

For a fleeting moment, the family felt united. Old rivalries softened. Brothers embraced. The myth of Stefano DiMera loomed large, but it also felt finished, sealed inside an urn like a chapter finally closed.

Then everyone left.

And that was when the story truly started.

Enter Dr. Rolf, Keeper of Nightmares

If Salem had an angel of death, he might look a lot like Dr. Wilhelm Rolf — loyal, clinical, and forever bound to Stefano’s grand design.

Rolf did not arrive to mourn. He arrived on orders.

With ritualistic gravity, he presented EJ with the original Phoenix ring, the gold band etched with the symbol that has terrorized Salem for decades. Not a duplicate. Not a prop from one of Stefano’s many false endings. The real thing.

“My final instruction from your father,” Rolf intoned, “was to place this in your hands when the time was right.”

Like a knight receiving a sword, EJ accepted it. And in that instant, the air in the crypt seemed to change temperature.

The Hesitation — And the Choice

For longtime viewers, EJ’s pause carried enormous meaning. This is a man who has spent his adult life wrestling with inheritance. He has loved deeply, failed spectacularly, and repeatedly tried to step out from under the suffocating mythology of Stefano DiMera.

He knows exactly what that ring represents.

Power. Ruthlessness. Legacy.

To wear it is to surrender to the narrative that blood will always win.

Grief flickered across EJ’s face — grief for the father he hated, loved, feared, and could never escape. Then, slowly, he slid the ring onto his finger.

The camera didn’t rush away. It lingered.

And EJ’s expression hardened into something chillingly familiar.

Susan Sees What Others Fear

No one senses DiMera doom faster than Susan Banks.

She burst into the crypt in a whirlwind of panic and maternal terror, took one look at her son wearing that ring, and recoiled as if she had come face-to-face with a ghost.

Stefano’s wickedness was in him, she cried. The Phoenix was not finished. Something had transferred, awakened, ignited.

EJ attempted reassurance, but even he didn’t sound convinced. Because how could he be? The evidence was right there in the tremor beneath his composure, in the cold calculation creeping into his eyes.

Susan fled, leaving behind a silence louder than her screams.

Possession or Psychology?

Here’s where Days of Our Lives thrives — in that delicious gray space between supernatural horror and emotional tragedy.

Could Rolf have engineered something literal? In Salem, microchips, memory transfers, and impossible resurrections are practically family traditions. If anyone could hide Stefano’s essence in an artifact, it would be him.

But perhaps the truth is even more unsettling.

Maybe the ring is only a trigger.

Maybe EJ, exhausted from fighting his nature, finally stopped resisting.

A New Era for the DiMeras

If EJ embraces the Phoenix identity, Salem will never be the same.

Chad, forever the moral counterweight, may find himself opposing his own brother. Tony could attempt diplomacy, history repeating in elegant tragedy. Kristen, however? She might celebrate it. A reborn patriarch could mean renewed dominance.

And EJ, armed with Stefano’s legend, would possess something more dangerous than any weapon: inevitability.

Enemies would expect cruelty. Allies would fear disappointment. Every move he made would be interpreted through the lens of his father.

That kind of pressure doesn’t just change a man.

It creates one.

History Repeating — With a Twist

Yes, EJ has worn the ring before. But never like this. Never after a goodbye that felt so final. Never when Salem seemed almost ready to believe Stefano was truly gone.

The Phoenix mythology is about rebirth through destruction. Something must burn for something else to rise.

The question now is painfully simple:

What will EJ set on fire?

The Thrill of the Fall

For viewers, the development is irresistible. EJ’s struggle between humanity and heritage has always been one of the show’s richest veins of drama. Watching him teeter on the edge of surrender is heartbreaking — and impossible to look away from.

Because if he falls, he won’t fall halfway.

He will become magnificent in his darkness.

Salem has been warned. Susan felt it. The crypt witnessed it. And EJ himself may already know it.

The Phoenix has chosen.

Whether that means possession, destiny, or a man finally giving in to the blood in his veins, one truth is undeniable:

Stefano DiMera’s story is far from over.

It just has a new face.