Chapter 76: Hope.
『"What’s your definition of success?"』
Amara’s mind was still reeling from the memory of the future seen by Sophia when Corruption moved exactly as predicted. It burst toward them, fungal monsters sprouting behind Amara again. Just as she saw.
She didn’t fully understand what Sophia had planned, but she chose to trust her teammate completely.
She intentionally allowed herself to be swallowed by the fungal horde, struggling convincingly, blade swinging but missing, as though overwhelmed, trapped and helpless.
Meanwhile, as Amara "struggled" against her fungal captors, Sophia slammed both palms together and unleashed a telekinetic shockwave into the cavern floor that kicked up an enormous dust cloud, thick enough to completely mask them from sight.
Inside the concealing smoke, psychic distortions rippled outward as illusions, dozens of them.
Now there were multiple identical copies of herself, Maya, the fungal creatures, and Amara. Each running, fighting, or staying put in different directions.
Corruption halted, its six eyes narrowing with suspicion and growing frustration. "Tricksss..." It lifted three of its massive arms, claws crackling with purple toxic energy. "All pointless tricksss..."
Around the chamber, fake Sophias desperately dragged fake Mayas toward safety while fake Amaras battled fungal abominations in elaborate, convincing fights.
Corruption snarled and released more monsters into the dust cloud. "Find the real ones," it ordered coldly. "Tear apart every illusion. They only prolong the inevitable."
The fungal creatures scattered through the haze, attacking every illusion they found. One illusion burst apart. Then another, and another. And Corruption watched calmly, analyzing it all.
It turned to check on what Amara was doing, the one variable it still needed to account for.
Through the thinning dust, it saw her surrounded by fungal monsters, being overwhelmed, struggling to break free. Which was exactly what it expected and hoped to see.
From the horde that surrounded her, a single infected monster broke away from the melee and sprinted directly toward Corruption itself.
To Corruption, this parasitic fungal monster had probably been confused by the illusions of other Amaras or was simply following its base directive to "find the real ones."
Whatever the reason, Corruption barely glanced at it.
It wasn’t until the creature raised its arm as though it was holding a blade in it, and brought it down in a clean vertical slash that split through Corruption, that its head turned to meet it.
Angel’s Bane flashed as white flames burst out, coating the black steel.
By the time Corruption realized the fungal creature was just Amara disguised by one of Sophia’s illusions, it was already far too late.
Amara saw the lines running across reality as she brought her blade down along one of those lines, tracing its path perfectly. Reality Slash and True Fire merged into one absolute cut that tore downwards through Corruption’s body.
For one impossible instant, the Malice remained standing. Then the line appeared. A perfect glowing fracture splitting it apart.
Corruption looked down slowly as all six eyes widened in disbelief. "How..."
Amara’s white flames reflected in her eyes as she answered in a tone cold as ice, "you stopped paying attention to the right monster."
Diseases that had once coexisted in terrifying harmony suddenly turned on each other without Corruption’s will binding them together.
Viruses devoured bacteria. Fungal growths consumed parasites. Toxins corroded the very flesh producing them. And Corruption came apart completely as its form collapsed into biological civil war.
Its body began to dissolve into nothing, diseases consuming each other in a cascade of self-destruction. The perfect plague had become its own victim.
"I am unstoppable!" the Malice yelled its last word, the words sounding desperate now, lying not just to them but to itself.
"Bullshit," Amara replied as she sliced deeper and set it ablaze.
"Aarrghhh!!!" Corruption shrieked and howled so intensely, Amara felt it in her gut.
Its wailing continued for a brief moment, until its form was eviscerated completely.
Within seconds, nothing remained but black residue that steamed and faded.
With that, the greatest disease to ever manifest in physical form was gone, reduced to nothing, erased from existence as if it had never been.
Silence filled the chamber.
A beat later, Sophia broke into an hysterical laughter. "We—we actually—"
Maya made a sound that might have been agreement, but when Amara turned toward her, Maya’s lips had lost all color. The necrosis had spread to her neck, black veins visible against her skin.
"Maya, hold on," Amara said, rushing to her side. "We won. You can heal now. You can—"
"Can’t," Maya whispered. "Used too much power. The rot... it’s in my bloodstream now. Heading for my heart." She smiled weakly. "But we won. That’s... that’s what matters."
Her eyes rolled back, and she fainted.
"Maya!" Sophia wanted to hold her but couldn’t. Maya was completely unconscious now, barely breathing.
At the same time, Amara’s device crackled to life, Ethan’s strained voice coming through: "Amara? We just--skz--dug through the collapsed--skz--tunnel. We’re coming to you. Are you—please tell me you’re--skz--okay."
"Plague’s dead," Amara said, her voice hollow. "But Maya’s down, and she’s in critical condition. We need medical extraction now."
"On it. We’re—" The device cut out again.
Amara knelt beside Maya, pressing Angel’s Bane against the advancing necrosis. "Please, work," she said, hoping to invoke True Fire once more to help Maya just as it did for her, yet nothing happened.
"Don’t you dare," Amara whispered. "Don’t you dare die after we won. That’s not how this ends." But Maya didn’t respond.
"Amara..." Sophia called after looking up at her.
Amara blinked slowly. "What?"
Sophia pointed weakly toward her face. "You’re bleeding."
Amara raised an eyebrow. Then she felt it. Warm liquid trailing from beneath her nose. She lifted her fingers and wiped at it slowly. It was indeed blood.
For a second, she just stared at it blankly. Then her eyes shifted toward Sophia. "...you too."
Sophia touched beneath her nose instinctively and her fingers came away red.
The two of them stared at each other in exhausted silence for one long second. Then, at the exact same time their legs gave out.
Amara collapsed forward, Sophia collapsed backward, both of them hitting the ground, unconscious.
***
[COMBAT REPORT: PLAGUE MALICE]
Result: Enemy ELIMINATED
[Team Status]
Amara Murray: Exhausted, minor corruption exposure (purged), unconscious possibly poisoned
Sophia Delgado: Severe psychic strain, unconscious, possibly poisoned
Maya O’Sullivan: CRITICAL - Necrosis reaching vital organs, unconscious
Casualties: None (pending medical intervention)
Victory Condition: Enemy Destroyed
Warning: Medical evacuation required IMMEDIATELY
──────────────────────────────────────────────────────
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
SOPHIA DELGADO | The Helmet
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Spirit Weapon: Halohelm (Helmet of Victory)
Rank: Dream Walker
Ascendant Sigil: ▮ (1 Bar - Left Temple)
Abilities Unlocked:
┣ Telepathy
┣ Telekinesis
┣ Empathy
┣ Psychometry
┣ Precognition
┣ Illusion Creation
┣ ??? [LOCKED]
Status: Exhausted as fuck, nose bleed and all, still terrified (Just saw Maya die)