Clang!
A strong, crisp metallic shriek echoed through the market square, cutting through the chaos like a blade through silk.
Ashan held his ground, the new blade from Kumar Taevor steady in his grip, its edge catching the light, its weight a promise.
Screech!
After the initial, testing swipe of claws, the corrupted thing that was Rokan descended into a true frenzy. Swift blurs of claws—sheathed in corrosive, corrupted prana that left trails of darkness in the air—hurled toward Ashan in a whirlwind of violence that seemed to bend the light around it.
Shine!
Ashan channeled a thread of his prana into the gifted blade, feeling it hum with eager power, feeling the metal sing with the energy that flowed through it. He met the onslaught head-on.
Clang! Clank! Clank!
The impacts were brutal, each one a lesson, each one a warning. The blade held, but his arms screamed, his shoulders burned, his breath came in ragged gasps that tore at his throat.
Is this the strength of corruption? He let the thought surface, cold and clear, even as his body fought to keep up, to keep blocking, to keep surviving. I can feel the stain of it just by being near him.
He disengaged with a quick backstep, putting precious distance between them, feeling the air shift, the pressure change, the weight of the thing that was hunting him.
Swish! Swish!
He flung two fireball charms, watching them arc through the air, watching the papers ignite mid-flight, becoming swirling orbs of flame that seemed to have their own hunger, their own will. The Nirsadha didn't evade. It lunged into the path of the fire, its mutated claws sweeping out with terrifying force, tearing through the flames like they were paper, like they were nothing.
Swish!
The fireballs were cleaved in two, snuffed into nothingness, leaving only wisps of smoke that curled toward the sky and were gone.
He cut through them? Ashan's eyes narrowed, his grip tightening on the blade. What monstrous physical power!
The entire confrontation had spanned mere minutes. It felt like hours.
......
"You vile being!" A bold member of the crowd finally broke from the circle of fearful faces, his voice high, his courage bright, his judgment clouded by the need to do something, anything, to push back the darkness that was spreading through the market square. "You dare sully this sacred ground!"
He leaped at the corrupted Rokan, his blade raised, his face set, his fate sealed.
Screech!
The Nirsadha's rubbery tail snapped out with sickening ease, coiling around the attacker's waist, his chest, his throat. The man's blade fell from nerveless fingers, clattering against the stone, the sound small and final.
"Release me, you evil bastard!"
The tail constricted. The Nirsadha's hungry, black-eyed gaze fixed on its captive, and there was nothing in that gaze that was human, nothing that had ever been human, nothing that would ever be human again.
"Ah! Stop! What's—what's happening to me?!" The man's cry turned to horror as a wave of corrupting prana washed over him, as his body visibly deteriorated, flesh darkening and sloughing, muscle dissolving, bone crumbling, until there was nothing left but a pool of black, ichorous slime that bubbled and hissed on the stone.
"Everyone, keep your distance!" The voice was sharp and urgent, the voice of someone who had seen what corruption could do and knew what it would do if given the chance. "The corruption is infectious! Get too close, and it will consume you too!"
The circle around the creature widened, a ring of fearful faces, of hands raised, of weapons drawn, of hearts pounding. The grim lesson was etched in the bubbling remains on the ground, in the silence that had fallen over the market, in the way the light seemed to dim, the air to thicken, the world to hold its breath.
......
This corruption is profound. Ashan watched, calculating, waiting, his eyes fixed on the thing that had been Rokan, on the way its tail swayed, the way its claws flexed, the way its corrupted prana leaked from it like blood from a wound that would not close. Even with [Viksana], I can't risk a deep analysis—the feedback might taint me.
The crowd was paralyzed and aghast. The Nirsadha stood in the center of the circle they had made, a thing of nightmare made flesh, a warning made real, a lesson that would not be forgotten.
Screech! Screech!
This can't be prolonged.
"Everyone, fire!" Ashan's voice was cold and commanding, the voice of someone who had been waiting for this moment, who had been preparing for this moment, who was ready to meet it. "Mantras, now! We cannot let more of our brothers fall to this wickedness!"
The spell of fear shattered.
"Yes! Fire!"
"It's just one beast!"
"Don't let fear claim you!"
A chorus of profane Ashurain syllables erupted from the crowd, from the members who had been frozen and were now moving, who had been silent and were now shouting, who had been afraid and were now, at last, fighting. The Nirsadha shrieked in response, but its cry was drowned.
A torrent of [Combat Bolts] and [Elemental Bolts] lit the square—a storm of dark azure and earthen brown energy against the harsh sun, a flood of power that seemed to push back the darkness, that seemed to hold the line, that seemed, for a moment, to be enough. For a moment, the world was painted in violent, conflicting hues.
Ashan added his own power to the deluge.
[Combat Bolt]
[Elemental Bolt: Prithvi]
Let's see if my refined mantra can bite into a corrupted hide.
BLAM!
The collective impact threw up a cloud of dust and smoke that blotted out the light, that choked the air, that left the world reduced to sound and shadow and the slow, steady beat of his own heart.
"Did we get it?" Someone whispered, the tension thick, the fear palpable, the hope fragile.
Ashan's eyes flickered grayish-white, the whirlpools spinning, the future unfolding before him.
[Viksana: Foresee]
Still breathing.
......
Screech!
A blur of shadow shot from the smoke, darting straight for Ashan, its trajectory a line of darkness drawn across the light. The corrupted form was now heavily damaged. Scorched flesh hung from its frame in strips, a limp right arm swung useless at its side, its elongated teeth had been shattered, leaving its visage more hideous than ever. Corrupted prana leaked from it like a mortal wound, like something that was dying and would not stop dying until it had taken everything with it.
Swish! Swish! Swish!
Ashan, having foreseen the charge, hurled fireball charms into its path, watching them ignite, watching them burn, watching them become walls of flame that should have stopped anything that lived and breathed.
KILL! KILL! KILL!
It roared, a raw hunger given voice, and crashed through the flames.
Damned thing! Ashan's eyes glinted with cold fury, his hands already moving, his voice already shaping the words. If you want my death, be prepared to pay for it!
He fired two [Combat Bolts] in rapid succession, the dark azure energy lancing forward, striking the creature's chest, its shoulder, its face.
BLAM! BLAM!
Screech! Screech!
The thing howled in pain, but its momentum carried it forward, carried it toward him, carried it through the fire and the light and the power that should have stopped it. A claw swiped for his throat.
He ducked, lunged inside its guard, and stabbed his blade deep into its chest—once, twice—feeling the metal bite, feeling the corrupted flesh give way, feeling the thing that had been Rokan shudder and scream. He planted a powerful, prana-infused kick that sent it sprawling.
Infectious! He felt the stain of it on his skin, in his lungs, behind his eyes. He purged the clinging corruption with a focused effort, pushing it out, sealing it away. Manageable. He glanced at the blade. It remained completely untouched, the metal pristine, the edge sharp, the light still playing across its surface. The blade, though...
Screech! Screech!
The creature writhed on the ground, its corrupt energy sputtering chaotically, its limbs twitching, its eyes—those black, depthless eyes—fixed on him with something that might have been hatred or might have been the last flicker of something that had once been human.
Ashan gave it one final, dispassionate glance and threw his last charm.
The paper fluttered through the air, caught the light, and birthed a perfect, swirling ball of flame.
Once again, Rokan... He let the thought surface, cold and clear. My thanks for the publicity.
The fireball's impending doom flickered in the Nirsadha's black eyes, and for a moment—a moment that was too brief and too long at once—there was something in them that might have been recognition, might have been regret, might have been the ghost of the man who had been.
"NO! NO!" The voice was a shriek, a howl, a thing of rage and despair and something that was beyond both.
"ASHAN! KILL—!"
Its body seized.
The corrupt prana within it twisted in a final, catastrophic revolt, and the fireball struck.
The Nirsadha ignited.