The woods around the clearing were dense, and Jake was a little worried that they weren’t heading in quite the right direction when he heard an anguished cry from up ahead, followed by what sounded like laughter.
Cursing under his breath, Jake hurried forward, Alan rushing with him as they moved with a lot less care through the undergrowth.
A shout of surprise cut off the laughter, which was followed in quick succession by a cry of pain and then sounds of battle, none of which filled Jake with confidence.
“I can see them. The woman they were with is down, but the two of them are fighting the one we met earlier. It doesn’t look good,” Alan rattled off as the clearing became visible.
Jake couldn’t see with the kind of detail that Alan could, but he didn’t need to. Blasts of energy flew out into the foliage, making the ongoing fight easy to see. The energy wasn’t the pale grey of normal Wyrd. Instead, it was a dark, purplish colour that had thick black streaks flowing through it.
The blasts ripped into the undergrowth indiscriminately, cutting through bushes and deep into trees.
“What in the name of the gods is that,” Jake breathed, watching as the odd energy seemed to cling to a tree it had hit, eating away at it for several more moments before dissipating.
“Nothing good,” Alan said, his eyes wreathed in Wyrd as he peered up ahead. “They’re moving out into the woods. She’s struggling against the two of them, but she has some sort of shielding Skill that’s keeping them at bay.”
“Alright, you take up a good position somewhere and see if you can take one of them out. We don’t know for certain what’s going on here, but whatever those blasts are, they don’t look right, so don’t hesitate, okay?”
“Got it,” Alan said, taking a deep breath before moving off to skirt around the clearing.
The fighting was still going on, so Jake hurried out into the clearing, pausing only to check on the woman the two Corrupters had been bringing here. Well, he assumed that’s what these two were, anyway.
The woman had fallen on her side, so Jake rolled her onto her back before flinching away in disgust. One of the purplish bolts must have struck her, as most of her left side had been eaten away by something, leaving only a foul-looking mess in its place.
Whatever these people were, they were using some nasty Skills and were clearly uncaring of the consequences for anyone in their way.
Old anger bubbled up in Jake’s core, and his doubts were burnt away as he got to his feet and started forward, rounding the boulder with his shield up as he looked around for the Corrupters.
The area of the woods they were fighting in was being steadily ripped apart by the caustic nature of the Corrupter’s Skills. The male Corrupter was fighting the woman directly, his spear striking out in a series of fast attacks that she danced around, both her blades constantly in motion.
The female Corrupter, meanwhile, was circling the duel, a gathering mote of energy in her off-hand.
Jake started towards her, trying to keep out of her line of sight until he was close enough to charge. Unfortunately, the lack of vegetation around the boulder meant that she saw him before he was even halfway, her head snapping around as she caught sight of him, the hand holding the energy swinging around to unleash a bolt in his direction.
Jake dove to one side, his obstacle training proving its worth as he managed to dodge the attack entirely and not be left completely off balance.
“Fucking Inquisitors, worse than cockroaches!” The Corrupter snarled, a fresh ball mote of purple-black energy blossoming in her hand as she bared her teeth at Jake.
Jake was about to dodge once more when an arrow sped in from the side, burying itself in her thigh and throwing her aim off enough to instead send the energy boring through an unfortunate tree.
Taking the opportunity for what it was, Jake rushed forward as she cursed and stumbled away, putting some cover between her and Alan. Seeing Jake rush in, she conjured a fresh blast, but it looked weaker than the others, with a much paler colour.
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Jake’s mind raced as he took in the situation before snarling and lifting his shield, slamming straight into the blast as she fired it before powering out the other side and tackling her to the ground.
The centre of Jake’s shield had been dissolved, and he could feel the aftermath of the Skill burning into the flesh of his left arm, but Jake was no stranger to pain these days.
Both their swords were lost in the impact as they went sprawling onto the floor in a tangle of limbs. What little was left of Jake’s shield fractured and broke as they fell, wooden splinters digging into both of them as they struggled.
The Corrupter went for a knife in her boot with one hand, the other trying to push Jake away, but he pushed through the pain to grapple her, slamming his forehead down into her nose to disorient her.
Jake tried to twist the knife out of her hand, but his left arm was numb and slow to respond, so he repeated his headbutt, stunning her enough to let go with her right hand and let him throw a swift elbow into her temple.
The Corrupter’s eyes rolled back as she slumped limply to the ground, Jake rolling off her with a groan as he looked for his blade. A glance at his arm showed that it was missing large chunks of flesh. Fortunately, the same numbness that made it unwieldy also seemed to be blunting the pain.
Reaching across to awkwardly grab the knife with his right hand, Jake dispatched the woman with a grunt of effort. It brought a certain finality to all this, but Jake wasn’t one to do things by halves, and the dead woman in the clearing deserved vengeance.
Leaving the knife where it was, Jake levered himself off the dead woman, the glint of steel bringing his eyes over to his sword, which lay just a few feet away from him.
Getting to his feet with a wince, Jake froze as a shout of anger ripped through the air. Looking up from his sword, Jake saw the male Corrupter bearing down on him, his spear coated in that strange energy. Cold dread whipped through Jake as he imagined what being struck by that would do.
Jake’s sword was between him and the oncoming Corrupter, but the other man was moving too fast for Jake to get it and get out of the way, forcing him to instead back peddle and dodge to one side to avoid being skewered.
Cold sweat dripped down Jake’s face as he tried desperately to stay alive, using everything around him to stay ahead of the other man and away from his spear and the deadly energy it was dripping.
For all his training, Jake just wasn’t as fast as the Corrupter, and slowly but surely, the gap between them was closing despite Jake’s best efforts.
A mote of energy blossomed in the man’s palm, and he thrust it forward, Jake throwing himself to one side in a wild dive to avoid the point-blank attack.
Jake hit the ground hard, gasping in pain as he landed badly on his wounded arm.
The Corrupter chuckled darkly as he stalked towards Jake, the unspent energy building in his palm as he aimed it at Jake once more with a malicious smile.
Jake’s mind whirled as he scrabbled for purchase to try and get out of the way, but the Corrupter was too close, and he was all but flat on his back.
The purple-black energy shot forward, hurtling towards Jake’s chest even as the Corrupter grunted in pain, a feathered shaft sprouting from his shoulder as Alan made his presence known.
Pale grey energy snapped into place in the path of the incoming bolt, shattering under the impact but taking a lot of the volume and strength of the attack with it. The reduced attack struck Jake’s chest like a hammer, making his heart stutter as numbness threaded itself through him, stealing his breath and leaving him gasping on the floor.
An angry growl came from the Corrupter as he brought his spear down towards Jake, trying to finish the job.
A shadow fell over Jake as a figure was abruptly standing over him, his sluggish vision barely coping as the figure and the Corrupter moved into a blistering exchange of attacks. The Corrupter continually tried to attack Jake but was unable to bypass Jake’s defender.
Limited by having to defend Jake, his defender, who he now saw was the dark-haired woman they’d spoken to earlier, was caught in a stalemate with the Corrupter. He was unwilling to leave Jake alive, and she was unable to move away from Jake or be unable to protect him.
The numbness that was gripping Jake began to slowly fade, but the outcome of the fight was already decided. The woman’s blades danced around the Corrupter, keeping him locked in place as Alan delivered a second and third arrow into his back.
For all that he was a detestable piece of shit, Jake had to admit that the Corrupter was tough. It was only when the third arrow made the man stagger that Jake’s protector was able to bat his spear away with one sword and open his throat with the other.
The Corrupter slumped to the ground. His eyes fixed hatefully on Jake until speeding steel separated his head from his shoulders and brought stillness back to the woods.
“Thank you,” Jake managed to rasp as he recovered enough to push himself up to a sitting position.
“It was foolish to involve yourselves,” the woman said, her stern gaze softening slightly as she saw the state of him. “Your aid was well-timed, however. I doubt I could have taken them both, especially not a pair that has clearly been hunting together for some time. Long enough to make me think they worked like this before they became as they are.”
“So they were Corrupters then, they did that to the guy on the boulder?” Jake asked, filing away the way she referred to this as ‘hunting’.
“Yes, but we can talk of this more once you’ve rested. I promise to answer your questions as best I can.”
“Good,” Jake gave as best a nod as he could before letting himself slump to the ground as he fumbled for one of his potions. One had been broken during the fighting, but the other was intact, and Jake eagerly drank it down.
The numbness had faded, bringing with it fresh awareness of his wounds, awareness that the potion muted once more, much to Jake’s relief. The potion wasn’t strong enough to restore his missing flesh, but it would help seal the exposed wounds, which would do for now.