The sound was not just hooves hammering against unseen stone, but the groan of a world poisoned by corruption. Darkness churned around them, writhing like oil, spilling from the body of the corrupted frost stag. Its eyes glowed an unnatural scarlet, antlers jagged like broken spears, dripping with pitch that hissed whenever it touched the frost-covered ground.
Orryn lowered his crystalline antlers, frost-blue light flashing as they clashed. The two stags collided with a shockwave that rattled bones scattered across the abyss floor. Fragments of ribcages and shattered skulls jumped from the ground as if the graveyard itself flinched.
Ice met black fire.
Hope met despair.
The clash rang like steel.
Orielle flared to Shellia's side, her flames spiraling upward, illuminating the pitch-black cavern. [This is no ordinary corruption,] she hissed, her voice burning hot in the air. [It's feeding on Orryn's origin—his very existence!]
