From above, the subway tunnel streaked with a dance of shadow and light, as the train rocked back and forth on the tracks. Creatures swarmed over the top of stationary carriages, searching for a way in. From inside, survivors could be seen fighting and conjuring magic, in an attempt to hold the creatures at bay.
Mark could hear the metal of the carriage screaming in pain as it warped under the pressure of the Corrupted outside. The short-rounded beak of one such entity, slammed repeatedly into his barrier with enough force to cause cracks. To make matters worse the thing had attached itself to the dome and had begun trying to squeeze the life out of them with constricting pressure.
Normally, with no leverage this would not be a problem, Mark would just shake them off and use the opening to kill them. However, these things had hundreds of suckers along the surface of their bodies, and they used them to great effect. Gripping onto their prey, which in this case was Mark’s dome. While they weren’t big enough to wrap around the whole of his barrier, they generated a surprising amount of crushing weight on his dome.
Sam made a disgusted face at the Corrtupted and fire bloomed in the space burning them off with jets of flame.
Only, as the fire licked their mucus-ridden bodies, it seemed to have little effect. The creature almost entirely ignored her flames.
Sam snorted, and arcs of electricity jumped from her hands at the Corrupted. Lightning discharged around their forms, as if unable to find a way in, once more the mucus protected them.
Mark looked up toward their frontline. Jonathan was crushing the things with his bare hands as they clung to his body. Mark noticed he had attempted to cut the things but had abandoned that idea, in favor of ripping them apart. Mark soon realized why, when Jade’s reflective disk cut one of them in half and both parts remained alive. Squirming uncontrollably for a couple of seconds before both wounds closed and two new creatures righted themselves, only to continue attacking the dome. They were noticeably shorter, but that didn’t seem to dull their enthusiasm.
Crushing seemed to work, but while it was the best method they had seen so far, it was far from the best method.
The creatures were seemingly boneless, instead, relying on their natural elasticity as a defense. Killing one was time-consuming, and by then, two more had taken its place.
The Corrupted's only goal seemed to be to outlast their prey, and Mark could see why. More of them were squeezing into the space to overwhelm the party. If enough of these things anchored themselves to an Aura user, with their combined strength they would be able to restrain them, much less anyone else.
Both Jonathan and Lisa, already had no less than five or six each, wrapped around their bodies, attempting to squeeze the life out of them.
Their natural defenses were still enough but Mark didn’t know how long that would be the case.
Sam had not given up on killing the things and had moved to lob huge chunks of ice and stone seeking to crush them. Jade had once more chosen to run distraction, while Bonnie and Terry attempted to push the Corrupted back with blasts of air, as it seemed the vibration magic was mostly ineffectual on these things. The bullets fired by Patrica’s men even less so, the holes closing rapidly.
Deciding he needed to help wherever he could, Mark slammed all three iron spears together reshaping the metal into a cube and sending it toward the frontline. Weaving in and out of their people, making sure to bludgeon the creatures that were already attached.
Gibby was handling himself well, laughing as the leech-like creature attempted to cling onto his armor, only for him to rip them off and pop them like horrific balloon animals. Shameez was having the most trouble as several had latched onto her and her only recourse seemed to be cutting them off. Which only made things worse for her. Tyler and Wesley were having their own problems but they were managing.
Unfortunately, Mark could see that this was not going to work, the repulsive creatures were swarming in faster than they could kill them, and at this rate, Mark could see them being buried alive in the things. Which is probably what they wanted.
Then Mark noticed another problem, their whole frontline was slowing down. Lias and Jonathan weren’t showing it as much as the others, but then Gibby shouted.
“Shit! Mark paralysis!”
Gibby was rapidly speeding up again, but everyone else was still slowing, their bodies locking up.
Mark knew right away Gibby was using Prana to heal himself. It had to be the mucus. Whatever they were secreting was not only protecting them but also being absorbed through the skin like poison.
He would have to wash the area of the toxin so he could heal any lasting effects…
Mark's eyes narrowed and he turned to Sam as he shouted, sending his construct forward at the same time.
“Water! We need water, flood the area. They’ll lose their protective layer, then hit them with something destructive!”
Sam's frustration turned to a smile and she brought her hands above her head.
“Take a breath and hold it!”
A single blob of water floated between her palms for a second before bubbling up and bursting outward in a torrent of water.
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Mark noticed Jade casting a spell that created a screen in front of her and the moment Sam’s water crashed into it, another detonation of water rippled out. She was not copying Sam’s spell, just the water itself, doubling the volume of water created and flooding the train car.
The tide of fresh water filled the small space in seconds, pushing everyone and everything back. Mark was prepared for this though, and held their frontline upright with the construct. This had the unintended effect of stabilizing the Corrupted attached to their people, though the rest were launched back the way they’d come.
The water did no real damage other than soaking everything nearby, but there was a lot of it. Less than a second later Sam dropped her hands with force, as another spell went off. Mark expected lightning or something of the like, but instead, Sam plunged her hands into the now waist-deep water in the car and released heat. All that water boiled and vaporized instantly, expanding so rapidly that their vision was obscured temporarily. Boiling steam filled the carriage, expanding out into the tunnel beyond with ease. Keening screams were ripped from the creature's throats as the ones inside the car were cooked alive. The ones outside were not as affected but Sam had clearly found a weakness by the sounds of their pain. She had avoided friendly fire by wrapping everyone in a layer of air to prevent the boiling water from coming into contact with them. This also however meant that once again, the creatures attached to their allies had been spared.
Jonathan didn’t waste a second ripping the constrictor-like creatures off himself and stomping on them, then going over to help the others. The steam was fading fast and so was their window of breathing room.
Mark already had [cleansing surge] helping their bodies fight the toxin, but they had to remove those creatures because they were already creating new mucus. And, as long as that stuff remained on them Mark would be bleeding Prana.
They all prepared themselves for the next wave, but Terry seemingly unable to help himself quipped.
“Damn, gurl. Nice job!”
Lisa remained focused on the openings.
“Enough, here they come!”
Mark had hoped that the attack had killed off most of them, but he was sadly mistaken as a fresh wave rushed in.
Sam took to controlling a mass of water and following it up with an arcing bolt of electricity. She would swap her focus rapidly to assist each member of their frontline as they needed it. Mark followed suit with the block of iron and diverted some of his concentration to his construct. Making sure to block the Corrupted from latching onto his teammates. Most of the time just a simple push gave them the time they needed.
The creatures still struck at Mark's shield, latching on when they were able, but to counter this he began creating sharp divets in the pane. Since the smooth surface of the shield was so easy to latch onto, he thought angled corners might be a little more of a challenge. Slowly he spread this effect through the shield. Trying to replicate the teeth on a cog as he sharpened them. It took a decent amount of control, but the irregularity of the surface appeared to hinder the creature’s ability to hold on, though not stop it.
It was touch and go as the creature continued to overwhelm them with sheer numbers, but once they knew the creature's weakness, they had a fighting chance. On multiple occasions, the creatures tore their way through the roof, and Mark had to mold the metal back into place to avoid them swarming in from all directions. At the same time, he kept an eye on all of their conditions, while also keeping his iron moving and shield up.
Mark had to spread himself thin to keep up with everything, and it was because of this, that when their numbers did dwindle, he took a moment to realize.
He was not sure how long they fought for but he was still watching the ceiling for more holes when Lisa called out to him.
“Mark, tend to the injured, we’ll rest here for a moment, Tyler, Jade you two are on lookout duty.”
Mark had been keeping a close eye on everyone so he knew quite a few of them had broken bones and damaged organs, but he had deemed them all superficial, only wasting energy if the fighter was unable to continue moving. Checking his reserves, his Prana was just above the halfway point and he had almost no Mana.
Mark let out a breath as the calm of the moment pierced his battle fugue.
The first person Mark dealt with was Tyler seeing as he was one of the lookouts. The guy had a crushed elbow and Mark could detect hairline fractures all down his fists and forearms.
Nodding to the guy, Mark got to work, Tyler was the first to speak.
“I thought your face looked familiar when we first met, but that barrier helped me place it. You were the one that stopped me from punching Rupert Daning.”
His voice didn’t sound angry but there was a definite frown. Mark kept at his work but looked the guy in the eye. He thought this might come up when he had recognized the man.
“Yes. You would have killed him if I hadn’t stepped in. Which is a shame because after meeting the guy I can agree he needs a good beating.”
Tyler snorted.
“He needs more than that. If I had known the bitch would just freak out and cower like that, I would have pulled my punch, what kind of idiot doesn’t defend himself?”
Mark merely shrugged noncommittally as he had moved onto the knuckles.
They lapsed into silence for a minute but then Tyler spoke again.
“Just so we’re clear I won't say thank you, that guy would have deserved it. But I also don't feel the need to punch your lights out, so we’re even”
Mark nodded to that.
“I can live with that, as long as you do your job down here, I’ll do mine, and we can both get stronger.”
Tyler seemed to like that.
“Right… you fancy magic types usually piss me off.”
There didn’t seem to be more to the sentence, but Mark took it as a good sign. He stood while Tyler flexed his healed fists.
Mark moved through their frontline fighters, not one of them had escaped without some sort of injury. He left Jonathan and Lisa for last because they took the most energy to heal, by the time he was done he only had about a hundred and fifty Prana left. With his remaining time, Mark dropped down beside Sam and sunk into [Meditation].
They were moving again soon enough, but at least Marks Mana was full.
As they progressed, Mark and Patrica directed them through the subways, the team killing anything they came across.
The system was calling the newly discovered Corrupted 'Naga' and they were showing up among the usual Corrupted the deeper they went. As Sam was the only one with access to water magic she had her hands full dealing with them. Then the direction of the Corruption changed when Mark felt a steep climb in one particular path.
Following it, they came to a large crater in the floor that once more descended deeper into the earth. The difference here was that this one was not man-made, this particular passage looked like it had been melted into the stonework by the Corruption itself.
The hole dropped straight off into the darkness and oozed enough Corruption that Mark had to take a step back. The space was big enough that they could see the Corrupt life teeming from the walls below.