The path from above the mountain was simple.
No tunnels, no cave system to navigate, no dark water lake to cross. Just open terrain sloping gradually toward the exile point, the kind of walk that felt almost ordinary if you ignored the fact that a Corruptor that could create walls of dark fire at a distance was somewhere ahead of you.
We walked in silence for most of it.
When we first saw the Corruptor, I stopped moving entirely. It was there, at the edge of my vision, its human like shape unmistakable even at distance, the green at its shoulders burning low and steady. It was not standing. It had settled into something closer to resting, its form half collapsed against a section of destroyed rock, its shoulders still lit, its head oriented toward the sky.
We kept watching.
It did not react.
After a full minute of it continuing to not react, I let the tension in my shoulders go.
"Seems like the dark water works." I said quietly.
