World Filter

Mark’s face remained blank as he looked on at the woman who had caused both him and everyone around her so much pain.

He thought her selfishness had ended back in that small camp. Chloe had even confirmed twice that Grace was dead and Mark had willingly believed it because he wanted to.

Whether that was wordplay on Chloe's part or his desire to put Grace behind him, it didn’t matter now.

The woman was alive and in front of him.

At first, Mark was numb, all the walls he’d built stopping him from feeling anything. However, the longer Mark stared at her gray desiccated face, the more the anger wrestled free from his chest.

The pieces began to fall into place. She had brought these things to the city. She had sent assassins his way. She had blocked off all their escapes and even now their people died to protect their home. Grace was the reason Daphne was dead.

The glow in his chest tried to warm him, but Mark’s world had narrowed down to Grace’s cold figure, drowning out the shards in his chest.

So much so that Mark noticed too late that Jeffrey had appeared beside her throne.

The smile Grace gave the man was a smirk at best, as she closed one of her delicate taloned hands around his throat. Corruption had already begun to overrun his body and when Grace added her own, Jeffery jerked and twitched as he fell to the floor. His body rapidly changed as bones, flesh, and muscles began rearranging themselves. His form remained humanoid, but his height increased as his legs cracked backward and began to resemble a Ghoul’s. While the transformation happened, Grace also waved a hand at Donny and his form started to change as well. Donny’s frame and muscles began to grow as he approached the side of a titan, but not quite. His skin swiftly being encased in black chitin

Mark's anger reached new heights when he saw this, and he shoved the Corruption back down into his Aura core. Mobilizing all his remaining strength.

Jonathan arrived next to Mark as Sam clapped her hands together in the air. Releasing a maelstrom of icy wind throughout the chamber.

A screen of Corruption rose around the throne, pushing back the buffeting winds while the two groups stared at one another.

Donny’s eyes stared down at them all from behind his armor, almost entirely unseeing. While Jeffery had gained a set of extended barbs from behind him, reason had left him and a new hunger had taken its place in his yellow irises.

Sam tore her eyes away from the trio and looked at them all.

“Mark, Jonathan, and I will keep Grace busy. Nathan, I need you to deal with Jeffrey. In the meantime Lisa can you contain Donny but please avoid outright killing him if you are able.”

Lisa had just enough time to nod solemnly before a claw made of Corruption slammed into the construct.

It held, but Mark exploded into action by topping off Jonathan's shield and giving Lisa and Nathan their own. Lisa and Jonathan shot out of the main construct almost simultaneously, while Nathan rose into the air on what looked like a mass of rancid water.

Sam shot a thick lightning bolt at Grace, which bounced off the black dome, arcing up towards the ceiling.

Donny and Jeffrey moved to block Lisa and Nathan like they’d hoped, while Grace drifted from her raised platform. Jonathan was there before she’d even touched down, swinging wide and colliding with her shield.

Twelve consecutive ripples bounced over the surface of black, and while cracks did form, the thing held. A second bolt of lightning came and smashed into the weakened surface. It pieced through but dissipated as it did so. Jonathan slipped his shortsword through the crack and tried to skewer Grace, but her reflexes kicked in and she moved her head out of the path of the blade just in time.

In the same movement, she swiped underhanded, grazing her nails against Jonathan's stomach and chest. He dove back to avoid being disemboweled, but a tiny bolt of Corruption followed, smacking through Jonathan's right lung.

Mark's Corruption was becoming harder and harder to contain, but he mobilized his gathered Prana and pushed it into [Engrave Mana] and sent his construct forward as a tidal wave.

Seeing it coming Grace bounced back a step, and her own wave of Corruption rose to meet Mark. Jonathan used the disengage to fall back into Mark’s spell, his wound closing in a heartbeat. When the two forces met it was like oil and water. Hissing filled the chamber as the spells wrestled for control. Mark caught sight of Grace through the constructs and her grin just caused Mark’s anger to continue to climb.

Sam completed her spell and shot a ball of fire no bigger than a quarter. The moment it left Mark's shield, it detonated into a cyclone of fire, burning into Grace’s spell. Like a flash in the pan, the image of a flaming twister was burned into surrounding retinas. Its force expanded between two solid fronts, and sent cobalt fire blooming upward.

Jonathan dove directly through the inferno, but not a hair was singed as he drove his weapons into the mass of Corruption and tore an opening for himself. Disappearing beyond their sight for just a moment, before Grace shot out of the wave of Corruption, catching herself in midair with her wings.

The wave of corruption collapsed and Mark saw Jonathan panting where it sank into the ground, his shield cracked and leaking. There were no outward wounds, but dark veins were mapping his skin. Sam was much the same and every time she drew on her Mana, they spread further.

Mark craned his neck to look at Grace his teeth itching, reaching up he tore at the force she was creating to keep herself in the sky. Even while falling like a stone, she released a column of black lightning that slammed into Mark's construct. He was running out of energy now and the Corruption was starting to get out of hand, poisoning his Mana against him.

[Telekinetic control] came undone at the edges and Grace rightened herself just before she hit the ground, lessening the blow greatly.

Looking at them she smiled and closed her fist. The Corruption inside them suddenly went crazy. Jonathan collapsed where he stood and Sam moaned while clutching her head. Mark cursed as he shrank the size of his construct. Using the influx of Prana he got from it to push back the symptoms. He should have drawn their Corruption out of them earlier, maybe then they would not have been having such a problem now.

Lisa and Nathan were also struggling but the Corruption was not affecting them nearly as much, and for now, they held their own against Donny and Jeffrey.

Mark's eyes felt heavy but he refused to lose sight of Grace. His energy was sitting at less than twenty percent, while Grace still looked like she had plenty of strength to spare. His eyes flashed toward the opening they had come through, only to find it already sealed up. Retreat would be the best option now, but Mark didn’t want to leave.

Narrowing his construct down, Mark got ready to filter his Corruption through his Resistance. His body didn’t have much strength left but he could still endure a bit.

Before he could do anything, Grace acted. Shooting forward she dove towards Mark and then changed direction at the last moment and crashed into Jonathan, crushing his remaining shield. The two were sent tumbling across the ground with Grace landing on top. Before he had the chance to physically overpower her, Grace sent huge amounts of her Corruption into Jonathan.

He let out a snarl like a wounded animal, and the net of black vein seemed to reach a turning point.

Sam freaked and released two scythes of inky shadow that forced Grace to retreat.

Jonathan’s spasms didn’t stop though as he twisted on the ground as though in desperate pain.

Mark, was unable to fly with the loss of [Telekinetic control], but he was not too far, so he sent his remaining construct ahead while they ran toward Jonathan's form.

Sam dropped down and tried to help but she glanced up at Mark with pleading eyes.

Grace should have taken advantage of their opening but she didn’t, instead, she watched them like one would a high school science experiment.

A look of interest and excitement on her face.

She was looking for Mark's response, which was currently exactly what she hoped for.

Anger, despair, worry, Mark felt them all as he tried to examine Jonathan. The guy was too strong to restrain directly, but his eyes –even filled with pain– told him to approach.

Mark could feel the mental connection strain as Jonathan tightened his body like that of a cord in an attempt to stop his spasms. He could tell right away that there was too much Corruption in Jonathan's body for his natural threshold to deal with.

Jonathan was changing into a Corrupted.

Knowing the solution Mark attempted to pull Grace’s Corruption out of the guy and into himself, but when [Draw Corruption] took hold, the energy in Jonathan refused to move. It had already bonded to his Aura and was in the process of converting his energy and by extension him. Mark couldn’t pull the influence out.

Mark's breath came out slower as he searched for another way.

Sam was still staring at Jonathan's face as it grew pale and tumors began to fester above his jugular.

Trying a flood of Prana, Mark attempted to use his reserves to burn away the Corruption, but the energy was immediately swallowed up by the process and actually accelerated things.

Mark saw Grace’s grin become larger as everything he tried failed. She still hadn’t moved from the spot, but when she spoke it contained a smug satisfaction.

“You know… I’ve found that the longer I steep my candidates in the energy before their evolution, the better the outcome. It deepens their connection to Corruption, granting them a more powerful body.”

Mark's brow twitched as he attempted to stop the ring of Corruption from closing within Jonathan, but Grace continued.

"It's a shame he couldn’t be brought under me more slowly because he would be a powerful subject, but it's no matter. He’ll do just fine as is.”

Jonathan's eyes were beginning to lose their focus and a yellow glow had begun to fill his pupils. His struggle had all but stopped.

Sam called Mark desperately as she clutched Jonathan's twitching hand but Mark had wedged his Prana into the process to prevent it from progressing so he couldn’t respond. Even with all of that it still edged ever closer. Mark was once more, only able to watch as a friend died in front of him.

Unable to help in any meaningful way, Mark’s anger bloomed into rage and wilted, becoming wrath. It had no direction or escape, all the bottled grief and anger, rose to the surface and threatened to drown him.

The warmth in his chest was all but gone, though something did respond to his pain.

The Corruption. It swam freely through his body, mirroring his loss, and feeding off it. Mark had stopped himself from taking the easy way out many times because he knew what the energy was capable of, but when he felt the smallest response from the Corruption in Jonathan, Mark paused. It wanted to help and he knew it could.

The change was a hair’s breadth away from completing, and Mark was out of options.

Turning to look at Sam he caught her gaze and extended his open palm with a small object in it.

“I’ve got this, you get the rest.”

Sam looked down confused, but took the item.

No sooner had she done so, than Mark wrapped the both of them up in their own shields with all his remaining energy.

When that was done he reached for the densely packed core of Corruption in himself.

The energy rushed to meet him halfway, coiling up in his hands like a tame kitten.

Power like nothing he had ever felt before flooded his body and mind. Thrumming with waves of ecstasy and pain.

The world’s colors washed out before him as the energy crawled up his spine. Pure and eager to listen, it felt like he’d been working blindfolded before as the fragmented power responded like an old friend.

All it took was a thought and Jonathan's Corruption froze in his veins, halting the process, and then reversing it. By the time Mark moved his palm over Jonathan a small mycelium network pushed itself out of his chest and built its way up to Mark’s hand. Rushing to join the tides churning in Mark. At the same time, Sam’s hands on Jonathan acted as a bridge to draw out her Corruption too.

Jonathan’s body shuddered, his eyes wide and breath ragged, but Mark lost interest in him when he had all of their Corruption.

Getting up, Mark turned towards Grace, the object of his anger, and couldn’t help but grin at her.

The corruption screamed gleefully in Mark's veins as it echoed his pain and anger, this was it, this was what Mark needed to feel better.