by Vic Connor
She holds the heart aloft and it disintegrates: As Aremos watches, the sorceress’ magic level fills by an amount equal to the necromancer’s own. The sorceress laughs, her eyes glowing, and she hurls all the necromancer’s raw power back at the remaining casters, sending all but Aremos flying backward. One of the elves falls at Aremos’ feet, near death. As she lands, he sees that her form has become corrupted with black magic—her own chosen discipline. Her eyes have malformed and her fingers have become long claws, gripping her staff like talons. As she breathes, black flame burns in her throat and several small horns protrude in a line along her temples, forming an unnatural crown.
Black magic corrupts, he knows. All but the strongest will be warped by using it, turned to the darkness body and soul.
“Aremos, here,” the elf whispers, drawing a dagger from its sheath and passing it to him. “It’s powerful, it’ll aid you well.”
Aremos takes the dagger as the elf dies, broken by the sorceress’ magic. The knife feels awful to Aremos’ touch. It’s a thing of black magic, banned in most parts of Arkhart and frowned upon by many even in Sanguis. It’s a thing for enemies to use, not for the player-led characters to involve themselves with. The consequences of delving into that unnatural law lie before him: The elf, a creature warped and twisted, turned mad and deformed by using it.
The sorceress and her minions throw some projectiles at Aremos, but he wards them off, his amulet glowing bright. The troll climbs to her feet, great staff in hand, and sends some return fire as Aremos feels tendrils of the black magic coursing through him. He has already nearly mastered white magic and beast magic; these are desperate times indeed and he asks himself why he should not try black magic as well. They’re running out of options and the dagger, for all that it feels vile, pulses with power. He knows he’s strong, stronger than the now-dead elf by far. Where she fell, he might stand; where she was changed by the magic, bent to its will, he’ll master it, he’ll shape it to his own needs, his own designs…
It is tempting, so tempting.
Listening to his heart, he finds the idea revolting; it goes against everything in his nature. But he feels another force at work. As much as it hurts him, as much as it worries and offends Aremos, the child Somera whispers to him.
“Just this once, just for this battle… The normal rules do not apply, let us ascend, let us wield every weapon available like the gods we are.”
“No, Somera,” Aremos thinks, “we cannot.”
“We can…”
“No, it’s wrong, it’s too dangerous to mix too many disciplines, too dangerous to delve into such darkness—”
“We can handle it—who else can but us? We have shown how strong we are, we have been chosen for this.”
As he’s framing his reply, fighting the desires of the child Somera, a great bolt of green lightning flies toward Aremos, cast by the sorceress. There’s so much power behind it that one of her minions dissolves, his life force used up by the sorceress to channel all his power into her curse. Aremos’ wards prove insufficient. The bolt knocks him flying, tearing a hole in his Silverthread and even penetrating the amulet’s own power. His HP falls to twenty percent in one go and, blinded by the sorceress’ ferocity, he fears the end—
“Now…! We have nothing else to lose…”
Fine, he thinks, desperate, barely clinging to life. He holds the dagger in his hand, black iron engraved with the same kinds of evil runes as adorn the demonic horde’s own tools of war. He kneels in the mud and opens himself to its power.
The troll shaman dies a few yards in front of him, pulled apart by shades cast by the sorceress, even as the dwarven rune-smith fights off the minions, failing, giving out… He dies, blood pouring from his eyes and nose as too many curses blast through his protections. The remaining elf draws an elegant, cruelly-carved axe and, her defenses blazing, her blade empowered with black magic, runs in toward the sorceress. The sorceress flicks her hand, disintegrating two more of her minions to use their power, and the elf is ripped limb from limb mid-charge, leaving Aremos alone. All alone, against the sorceress and her demonic kin.
But now the black magic courses through him, replacing the white, enervating him. Aremos reaches out and plucks his soul from the dead dwarf’s ruined body—it’s as if by instinct, such a dark spell, and he is working it before he even knows what he is doing. He consumes the dwarf’s soul just like the sorceress had consumed the necromancer’s. Aremos’ HP soars back to its previous level; his aches and pains disappear, and he feels almost overwhelmed as the magical energy rushes into him.
This is a sick feeling, a creeping unease. As he consumes the soul, he feels nature itself rebel inside him, debasing his spirit into the savagery of darkness.
But he doesn’t have the luxury of being able to stop. He reaches out a hand and the enemy minions vanish, blotted out by his own power. The sorceress snarls, baring long, pointed teeth, and the onslaught becomes insane. Aremos deflects a few of her spells, empowered by the darkness. But while he avoids injury at her hand, he feels his heart begin to blacken; something sordid and evil has taken root in him, corrupting him.
Aremos remembers little of what follows as this pure, dark instinct kicks in. He remembers the joy in the child Somera’s heart as her creation bows to her own darkness. And he remembers the fear. Spells flicker between Aremos and the sorceress, killing everybody around them. They cut a great hole in the demonic hordes’ advance, though the sorceress seems to care little, intent only on destroying this overpowered battle mage. Aremos allows his power to flow, flinging spells effortlessly, wishing to kill in a way he has never known before. He delights in slaughter with the child Somera, who wants more and ever more blood as the evil inside him thirsts, calling out for the carnage.
He remembers drawing on the deaths of all those demons, and even a fair number of player-led characters, manipulating their departing essences and souls to power his own spells. He flings them at the sorceress until she begins to fatigue in a way that, because of the dreadnoughts’ gifts, he will not. He beats her down, he makes her retreat until they are in the heart of the demonic army, a circle of flickering, deadly magic all around them, cutting down any who dare approach.
The sorceress thrusts her staff into the earth and the ground heaves. It’s unlike the power Aremos wielded so recently, pouring his natural, primeval rage into the ground to split it, uniting it with his own strength. Rather, this is a rebellion. The earth splits and shudders, seemingly vomiting as Aremos watches. Fire and ash pour out, symptoms of the darkness, the contagion. Slime arises, and Aremos jumps to the side to avoid it all. She has polluted the earth—that’s all such beings are capable of.
I’m capable of it, too, he thinks. He dodges a roar of flame from the sordid earth and falls to his knees. The mud is thick and rancid, warping at the sorceress’ touch. He presses his palm into it, still clutching the dagger, feeling the demonic power, the black magic. He senses the corruption and he feeds it, drawing it into himself and pouring his own power into it. The earth shudders. Aremos feels sick; he feels the bile rising in his throat as the impure, unnatural powers roil in him. But he perseveres and the sorceress’ magic fades, her darkness is replaced by his own.
She recoils, thrown backward as jet-black flame streaks out of the crevices she has opened in the ground. The fire is Somera’s black fury manifest, Aremos realizes, and as it gushes from the spoilt earth, he rejoices. He stands and manipulates the flame, using the black dagger and the Staff of Adamant to wield it, throwing it through the ranks of demons as they draw in, letting it wash over them, pulling them to pieces. He wraps it into a large, undulating ball and launches it at the sorceress, knocking her defenses aside and causing her to stagger backward under the weight of his dark strength.
The sorceress is low on power now, with nowhere left to draw it from with her minions all spent, and she grows scared… Aremos understands this and feels the child Somera exulting in the fear that she causes… It’s not r
ight, he thinks, but it’s useful, it’s needed right now. And as the sorceress’ protective spells die down and she stands alone, powerless, defenseless, Aremos throws his last attack at her, ripping her apart. She explodes, her demonic power escaping, no longer bound by her form—one of the most powerful essences on the battlefield now set free. Aremos shapes it to his own will, the Staff of Adamant in one hand and the black dagger in the other. He sends the essence flying backward, cutting down rank after rank of the horde as it burns itself out.
Falling to his knees, Aremos vomits. Black bile spatters out of his mouth and his HP falters. With each soul he consumed, a sickness began; it was fed, it took hold…
What have I become? What has the child Somera become? he wonders.
And then a screech comes, a sound which drowns out all else so that everything stands still and Aremos sobers after his magical gluttony, the last of his power dying down until he stands alone, quieted, in the middle of a grand circle of ruined corpses and dissipating, eldritch power.
The screech sounds again and the slapping of wings crackles beneath it: The Osirion_mod99 descends from the heavens, from where it had been directing its troops, from where it had been aiding them with its own, powerful curses. It lands before Aremos, sneering, contempt written all over its alien, avian face. Its black staff crackles, multi-colored flames surrounding its tip.
“She was the greatest of my chiefs, and you killed her with your forbidden magic,” the Osirion_mod99 says. Aremos was expecting anger, but he sees delight instead. “So far you have fallen, Aremos the Great.” It laughs. “Aremos the Corrupted, Aremos the Black.” It swats the air with one gnarled, taloned hand and Aremos falls to his feet once more.
Again, he vomits—slick, black and green ichor flying out before him as his HP lowers and lowers some more. I am poisoned, poisoned by my own darkness, he gathers. The souls have sickened him, that unnatural magic that he used; wielding the black dagger has changed him, warped him, ruined him…
“Of our many achievements this day, your downfall has been amongst the greatest,” the Osirion_mod99 whispers. Though it speaks in hushed tones, the whole battlefield rings with its words. “And now, at your lowest, in your darkest hour, I will snuff you out.” The Osirion_mod99 laughs, lowering its staff to point at Aremos. “Join my cause for it is noble and just. Listen to what I have to teach you, and together we will—”
Scared, the spirit of Somera wild and confused within him, Aremos flees. He opens a portal beneath himself and deposits his body far away on the other side of the Flos Nocte, miles from the battle, even as his own spirit thrashes and writhes within him. It rages and the battle rages, also, in the distance. He can hear it, he can see the smoke on the horizon from the hordes’ advance, but he has removed himself from it. He sits weeping, kneeling, not knowing who he is…
A devotee to honor, to order, to white magic, the child Somera has grown so dark these last few days, so power-hungry these last few months, that he feels torn in half. He feels the pull to darkness… But if I stray down that path, what else am I but a demon? he asks himself.
He knows the sickness will kill him unless he embraces it fully. It can’t exist in human form, in purity. It must warp him to its own design if he is to survive it.
How would I be any different to them, he asks, craving the madness of destruction, of disorder, of the death of all?
He curses the dark elves with their forbidden lore… He curses the dagger given to him, and he throws it away from himself, cowering from it… But it was all me, he thinks, it was all her, the spirit, his soul, the child Somera. The elves could handle the darkness because they didn’t crave it. With the child Somera grown so power-hungry, so angry, I was open to it, vulnerable, and look what I did…
Aremos remembers snatches of the fight. He remembers drawing soul after soul to him as the duel cut through both armies. He remembers tossing aside the empty husks left behind as the player-led characters died, intent only on using their deaths to empower himself…
I fought for the good, he thinks, though it is of little consolation. The child Somera was letting loose so much anger by then that she didn’t care for the cause, for the good, for the honorable fight. She merely wanted to feel strong, and to use that strength to harm others.
“We must calm ourselves, Somera,” he thinks.
“I know… I know… I went too far,” she replies.
“We must draw back from the darkness,” he tells her.
“Yes… You are right.”
So saying, they unite. They will flee to the light and, if that spells their end, so be it. There is only one thing left to do: Embrace the light, let their own white magic run wild in them as they had let the darkness do only minutes before.
Aremos stands and binds the Silverthread back together with a simple spell. He feels it weave beneath his robes, the chains regrowing, reattaching. But his body is withering, wasting away under the curse he has wrought upon himself. He looks at his hands and sees that they have become deathly pale. His nails have begun to grow longer, already turning to claws, and his skin has started to crack, splintering into scales.
At a pool of water nearby, he stoops to peer at his own reflection.
The sight sickens him: It’s just as he feared. His body has begun to change, to warp. Very soon now, he’ll become a monster on the outside, reflecting what he has done to his soul, his spirit. His eyes have tinted yellow, burning with the unnatural hatred embodied by black magic. His skin clings to his skull, tightly grimacing, fleshless and wasted. His hair is falling out and scales have begun to form in its place; long, black teeth grow where they were once pearly white and even.
I am a devil, he thinks. I have become the enemy. If I carry on down this path, I will become a ghoul, my soul as broken as the dark elf’s, my body as warped as its own.
“It is not too late, my dear, dear Aremos.”
“I know, Somera.” He sighs, closing his eyes and gathering his strength. What lies ahead of him in these next few minutes will be more painful still than anything he has yet experienced.
Accepting his fate, unable to look upon himself in this form, Aremos holds tightly to the Staff of Adamant, feeling unworthy of its use—of its companionship—for the first time. But I can fix it, I can right these wrongs, he thinks. He pushes the black magic within him to one side and reaches tentatively for the light, for the white magic which has been such a constant ally to him.
It burns to draw on it. It burns his heart and his soul to hold it within him. Aremos grits his teeth and sets his mind to the task, ignoring the mounting pain as he pulls more and more white magic to his aid. When he has gathered enough, when he’s almost screaming out with the pain, when he’s sweating and aching all over, he points the Staff of Adamant to the ground a few feet before him.
With one single thought, he releases all of the white magic, launching it into a burning white flame which hits the ground, crackling and dancing. Aremos pushes more and more power into the flame so that it stays in place—a point, a nexus of the purest white magic—crackling and blazing on the spot.
He throws down his staff, pulls the amulet from around his neck, shrugs out of the mail and his robes and the vambraces, and stands naked. His whole body has begun to twist out of shape, scales growing and muscles and joints standing out, raw and fleshless. Darkness pulses through his veins, a purple light burns within him so that he glows ever so slightly, and his very bones seem to vibrate with the overwhelming power of all that darkness, of the curse he brought about himself in the weakness, the desperation of the losing battle.
He forgets it all and he abandons himself, telling himself that fate has spoken and that what must be, must be. He steps forward into the flames, allowing himself to be consumed by the vestiges of his own light.
Agony comes and whole minutes pass as he contorts, as his soul shudders and burns and his body writhes. White Fire covers him. Magic from the earth to which he falls wraps him up and he chokes on it.
The battle rages on the horizon, but here, he fights harder than ever, hurting, changing… He takes himself to the point of death, but death would be a sweet release and it’s not forthcoming. Life lingers a while within him, clinging to him even as he wishes that it might disappear and leave him in peace.
The scales drop from his skin, leaving him bloody and bare. His eyes burn until he is blinded by the light. His heart bursts and, in bursting, releases those souls he has consumed. His bones feel like they’re unwinding and his skin runs like wax. The pain overwhelms him, and he passes from consciousness; he seems to pass from being. The White Fire blazes hotter than ever for a few seconds, and then dies around him, leaving him charred and ruined.
But it remains in him.
It’s like a disinfectant, he thinks, flowing in and out of conscious life. It’s an antibiotic, he tells himself as his mind weaves in and out of being. It tears through the darkness, burning the last of the black magic out of him, driving it out like a fever. Then, when he feels the last of it gone and he hovers on the verge of death, he reaches out a hand and his robes twitch.
From their folds, a small vial flies to him. It is an HP potion, one of the potent ones so common in Sanguis. He unstoppers it, shaking, in agony and blinded, lying in the darkness and the dirt. He puts the bottle to his lips and downs it. Then, he passes out, waiting for his body to heal.