Scene #6186: This Present State of Grace pt.2

Owner	Pose
Morgan Berselius	LAST TIME: Through the arcane workings of two magi with approximately as much concern for potential collateral damage as your average atomic bomb, a certain swamp on the blasted deathworld known as Othrys has been stripped of much of the supernatural corruption afflicting its waters. That's the good news. What's the bad news? The bad news is that they did this thing by taking all of that liquid Malice and shoving it into the body of an unsuspecting little swamp centipede. As such things tend to go, said little swamp centipede immediately ballooned in size and mutated into a horrific abomination as though having lept from the nightmarish fever-dreams of a chronic entomophobe. Fortunately, servant of a local deity and all around nice guy (tm), Morgan Berselius, consequently dumped a temple on top of said insect-monster and erected a sizable barrier to keep it contained. All this for the sake of possibly restoring the power of a half-dead river deity-- or perhaps doing something /else/ with it. But now the time has come to reconvene. Morgan sits waiting in front of the collapsed and ruined shrine, still somewhat... dissociated. But in addition to missing an arm entirely, there are still strange crystalline growths mottling his skin which haven't quite been fully removed yet. He can get to that after all this. Behind him, the spherical black seal occupying much of what used to be the river-god's temple bulges and cracks like some kind of fetid, rotting chrysalis just about to disgorge its rancid contents into the world. It seems they're running out of time. The land around the shrine seems even more thoroughly blighted than it did previously, and strange, wicked-looking ferns and deathcaps have begun peeking out of the ground. Hopefully the others get here soon. It's almost that time again.
Tomoe	Tomoe had picked up a distress beacon when she was prowling the multiverse and had been homing in on it for a little while. Given the nature of what few details, she had on it? It would be a good idea to go look into this, and she'd come in for a landing on high with her wings flared out as she came in for a landing, or at least to hover near the ground given the nature of the area in which she was arriving too. God help her the smell was only outdone by the servants of a certain plague god she'd had the misfortune to run into once long ago. Pushing that lovely little memory out of her head she will survey the area and try to take note of whom is also arriving to deal with this. To those with supernatural senses she might seem a bit strange, something almost digital about her yet not, still very strange to anyone with such senses. She does not take a deep breath as she checks a menu making sure she's got a very good stock of items for this sort of environment. Certain items are running low and the Salamander really should look into that, yet for now, she goes to check her gear as well, seeing all is in order. "So, just what are the full details on what we're dealing with here?"
Aoko Aozaki	"It's big! It's got a torso for a head and several angry limbs! Iiiit's, KILLERPEDE!" Aoko announces and answers Tomoe with the same statement, as if she were commentating a wrestler's arrival. "Ahaha, no, but really, it's a big angry centipede made of malice. And uh, maybe maybe not the magic of the swamp. You know. Everyone makes mistakes!" Aoko scratches the back of her head. "Note to self, fine-tune siphon better next time." Oh well, no used crying over spilt... mana? Sure, that works. "So I'm pretty sure our plan is to beat it senseless and then mister monster hunter over there is going to go all murder on it, and that'll somehow make things better! Purification, what a boon. Wow I really hope it hasn't grown up or leveled up while we were gone."
Nie Li	The sky above grows dark as clouds roll in, appearing out of nowhere on the horizon and approaching swiftly. The wasteland air turns sharp and ionized with the faint smell of ozone tingling nostrils. After a minute or two of this, the weather is right overhead and now rumbling with thunder... but no rain. Nie Li is directly under this mobile weather phenomenon, the same sword as last time clutched in his hands - the Thunder God's Meteorite Sword. "Whatever you want to call it, it's a unique creature! I'm a little bit excited to see what'll happen when we kill it. I wonder if any of its remains will be useful for making anything?" He's wisely keeping a bit of DISTANCE from Aoko even as he undoes some of his protective garments, ditching the cloak and wrappings to fight in his normal clothes - and stuffing the excess garments into his Interspatial Ring. But when his gaze falls across Tomoe it narrows. She's a weird one, and he isn't sure where to place her power and threat level at all. "What IS that aura...?"
Lezard Valeth	"Why /do/ negative emotions linger in these places so easily, anyway?" The question is somewhat lost in the chaos as the beast begins crashing about, seeking to harm and sate its violent nature (other natures likely come later), if given the chance. Lezard arrives himself, looking a little worse for wear (though lacking errant crystals). for the same reason as Morgan looks a little more peaky than normal. Lezard Valethormal being relative for the being, of course. "I am prepared to exterminate this beast when you are." Lezard says to Morgan, simply. "Just hit it until it stops moving, there appears to be little more strategy needed for such a thing. It is inchoate, hardly able to manifest anything more than being a blighted being of chaos and destruction.
Morgan Berselius	"Yeah basically that," Morgan says to Aoko's very rough summary. "We took all the nastiness in the area and shoved it into a centipede, and now we're fixing to kill it. That's the plan, anyway. It's maybe not the BEST plan, but it's probably the most exciting one I've been part of for a while. So if we're all ready--" Oh. Oh no. Oh no, Aoko said /the words./ As if in response to that challenge, the shadow-dome suddenly and violently bursts, erupting in a sudden deluge of viscous, oily fluid. Out of the makeshift, magical cocoon the thing emerges, looking... Larger. More mature than it once was. It's a centipede writ-large. What was once a flat, smooth carapace has been replaced with jagged, dragon-like scales, and its venomous limbs have doubled, if not tripled in size. Those strange, ghostly limbs still writhe out from each of its body segments... but so do strange pustulent growths that fluoresce with some kind of ichorous inner light, highlighting sinuous forms writhing within. But the most significant change is its... face. It actually /has/ a face this time. Gone is the grotesque tower of knit-together corpses that flung magic haphazardly at the centipede's crown. Now it more closely resembles some kind of alien, predatory beast. An unsettlingly humanoid jaw distends around a mouthful of vicious teeth and a terrifying, earth-trembling scream. Its four eyes surround a gap in its forehead, home to a malevolent and yet undeniably human face. Closer inspection (if such a thing is risked) reveals that it's not /one/ face but a mosaic of dozens if not hundreds of lesser of faces, all contorted in vile expressions of depraved ecstacy. As it bursts free, those pustulent growths explode from between several of its segments, seeking to smash and anchor into the surrounding terrain for some nefarious purpose. It surges out and over the temple, unfurling its full size and lashing out at the forces arrayed against it in a bid to break loose and, presumably, to rampage across the countryside. ...What's left of it, anyway.
Morgan Berselius	Morgan whispers a quiet hiss and dissolves into a pool of shadow to evade the sudden stampede of countless deadly limbs. He rematerializes a short distance away and lifts his chained lantern high. Eerie un-light pours out from the instrument and begins suffusing the gathered Elites. It's... an enhancement spell, of some kind. Enhancement and protection. Something that suffuses weapons and bodies with energies anathema to corruption and creatures /of/ corruption. A monster hunter, indeed. "I'll do what I can to keep anything contagious at bay," he says, ghostfire dancing in the air around him. "You guys can handle the firepower, right?" Right!?
Tomoe	Tomoe says "Killerpede? Sounds like an Arcade game from the 1980s. So a scapebug in this case." She hears Aoko's comment about likely having a hand in it, well shes' hear trying to clean it up and she seems to be not alone in dealing with it she smiles at Nei Li as she's worked with him before. "Aura?" She blinks for a moment pausing for half a second. "Also hello to you too Nei Li. As for that, that's just how I work, my world is ... a bit strange even for the multiverse the digital and material are merging. It's a side effect of the entity that fused with my world had on some of us." She looks to Lezard the former Confederate Officer. "If anyone out of old Feds chain of command survive it would be you Lezard wouldn't it. We won't be lacking in firepower for this thing." She's slightly tense with Lezard around but it seems she'll be able to manage. "Generally how I do it, wack it till it stops moving." She looks back to Nie Li. "I'd be happy to tell you later Nei Li, when we're not in a swamp hell I could show you a few things later too if you like." She doesn't seem too guarded about what she is, then again it's rather public information at this point given the scattering of former Unionisties. It's public record in the end. She looks to Morgan and give a nod. "I'm best at taking damage for others 'tanking' things." She not before summoning a long ornate sword with a faint holy aura about it and a shield with names upon it which flicker in every once and a while names like Diable, Ryu-9913 and Lightning. It seems the thing is getting lose and she'll get to work popping her taunts as she moves to close in on the creature She'll lash out with her blade as she gets in close on. "Yes, I should be fine." SHe calls back as she's already engaging the monster with Caliburn, well her world's Caliburn anyhow.
Nie Li	Nie Li's seen some pretty ****ed up things out there. But this creature is WAY up there on the top ten list and reaches it in record time upon him laying eyes on the thing. His face drains of color and his cheeks scrunch up in utter disgust. SCARED, he isn't, though. After a moment's breath he calms his reactions to observe the monster... "It's EVOLVING... if we give it much more time, it will only become better at using that power we infused it with! Take it out now or leave it alone and hope it unravels...." Those are the only options available. Well and truly. Nie Li, though, can INDEED handle the firepower. He casually hoists the blade.. and with only a tiny jolt of spiritual power forced into it, COMMANDS the lightning. The storm above crackle-roils to a full fury, and FIVE THICK COLUMNS of jagged DIVINE LIGHTNING spear down from the heavens to spear into the creature from different angles at once! "We should have taken this thing out earlier!" As for the answer Tomoe gives though... he can only stare without quite comprehending at the use of the word 'digital' and 'merged'... but the enchanted gear she brings out, especially that sword, has him quirking an eyebrow. Caliburn is a worthy weapon, after all! "However that works... I look forward to seeing what you can do with that gear!"
Aoko Aozaki	Aoko is, for a few moments, completely giddy at having helped create the first dragon-centipede hybrid. After a while she realizes this means having to fight it and maybe it wasn't such a good thing. Or... no, that's absurd, of course it was a good thing. How could it be anything else? Look at how AWESOME it looks! Thanks to Morgan's buff, Aoko opts to leap away from the gigantic thing and it's awful, liquid-oozing... uh... things. You know, she's not sure how that works, but she knows she doesn't want to shower in that stuff. Must be more of that liquid malice. "Set!" Half a dozen blue bullets form around Aoko, about the size of a fist. An instant later they fire, less like bullets and more like continuous laser beams. Which don't stop! At least now for now. They lack punch individually, but they're basically like magical scalpels. They're directed to constantly scorch and carve away at the beast's hide - maybe cut some of its scales off, but that's going to be harder.
Lezard Valeth	Lezard steps back as the containment system fails, more or less as expected of something handled in such an ad hoc manner. He adjusts his glasses, looking over the massive beast, and hums. "It appears that the beast seems to have matured and mutated while it was sealed away, compounding on itself." A pause. "/Fascinating/. It seems to have become increasingly chimeric, steeping the negative energy to grow more powerful over the few days we had locked it away." The thing lashes out, and with a grimace, Lezard immediately erects his barrier, the Philosopher's Stone taking a strike and sending him staggering back from the impact. "Hmm... This beast might be a worthy adversary, especially as ragged as many of us are. I pray the prior battle has not exhausted us completely." By us, he of course means Morgan. As the enchantment takes hold, Lezard sighs. "Yes, we'll take care of the problem." He says, his tone longsuffering. He raises a hand, and the Philosopher's Stone spins around him, pages swirling as he calls up his magical power in order to start striking out at the beast. "FRIGID DAMSEL!" As he calls out, a spectral woman with a long blade, both formed of ice, dances through the air about the beast. She spins gracefully, the blade lashing out and focusing on the anchors that the beast is attempting to establish. He knows a setup tactic when he sees one.
Morgan Berselius	To try and hold back a creature that is essentially a living cargo train (if all the cargo aboard was some form of world-devouring pox) is not an easy task. Tomoe's work is aided by the holy energies infused into her blade, striking wounds into its carapace that bubble and boil at the touch of those sacred energies. The thing's body isn't just cut into, its very form is worn away, carapace at times dissolving into writhing masses of humanity before sizzling away. But her opportunities to strike are fewer than she might expect. To hold back the colossus from the front is to engage with dozens of deadly, envenomed limbs as well as its own tremendous momentum. A hundred or more legs struggle forward, aiming to try and push in to grind this defender to dust beneath its incredible mass. Nie Lie and Aoko strike next, attacking from afar. Lightning screams down into the massive centipede at five different directions. The thing unleashes a shriek that sends shivers up the spine and rattles the inside of the brain, but for a moment the creature seems dazed... At the same time, Aoko's blasts smash into the beast's hide, but it's about as difficult to penetrate as she had expected. Though to a lesser degree than Tomoe's sword-swings, those beams still seem to carry some trace of Morgan's divine blessing-- and the plates they smash into would be weakened somewhat by the energies they leave behind. The first strikes do little more than singe, but those that follow dig increasingly deep trenches. Lezard busies himself with another set of targets. The Frigid Damsel dances among the glowing pustules, carving into them with her deadly blade. Where she strikes, the things burst and rupture, releasing a thick, toxic brew-- and something more. Fetid, half-formed humanoid /things/ groan and choke back their first, abortive breaths before collapsing into the noxious soup of their own afterbirth. Nearby, Morgan does the same, slamming a palm into the earth and ravaging several of the eggsacs with deadly arrays of shadowy blades. But some manage to hatch properly, and immediately begin disgorging disgusting half-human, half-centipede /things/ into the world. "We need to take out those pods," Morgan yells as he smashes his lamp into one of the crawling, grasping, many-toothed abominations. "'Fore it overwhelms us!" And then Nie Li is proven far too right. It IS evolving. He can see as the lightning that had moments ago paralyzed its body feeds into the limbs writhing around between its carapace plates. It sweeps its head and unhinges its jaw, disgorging a vile, corrosive brew at the assembled exterminators. The noxious geyser not only burns on contact, it also coruscates with the very same electricity Nie had struck it with...!
Tomoe	Nei Li was right in her mind the creature had to go down sooner rather than later, she's keeping her wings out allowing her to fly for short bursts should she need it. Given how big this thing is? Tomoe was totally going to need that mobility. She keeps moving as she fights and Lezard is bringing down magic, the talk of his plan for an MKII idea on this leaves her chilled but this monster is a clear and present danger which she can't just let it rampage. She seems in a lot of situations like this as of later. Aoko seems to be doing all right for the moment as does Nei Li. Morgan isn't down she's never really run into him before so she doesn't know what he can do much like Aoko. The good news is her blade seems to affect the thing quite nicely from the looks of it so she has something that works, still, the thing is large and is fast? It's also got more limbs than a spider convention. Which mean she's often blocking, parrying or /taking/ hits. There's no way she's not taking hits with the rate of attacks that are coming on her. She's taking hits but she should be able to last for a while. Worse she feels ill and a second later a poison debuff appears on her HUD and she knows she's going to be in for a rough time since the thing is trying to keep her away, from melee strikes to its body? Shes' going to cast a spell, she chants in Norse, Lezard might know it but her accent is bad, very bad, still, as the runes dance about her body they will vanish and a barrage of light rays will attempt to slam into the hulking horror's body.
Aoko Aozaki	It's making children! Aoko squees. "They grow up ~so fast~." She fake-wipes a tear of joy. Of course, the immediate step two of that plan is to not get caught in that breath. And so of course, Aoko's answer is the more direct one she can think of. "Converge!" Her continuous beams converge into a single one, which fires dead on into the KILLERPEDE'S nasty breath attack. Splashes of the corrosive liquid still hit her exposed forearms, and it sucks a LOT, but it's better than being hit dead on. And it's also a fantastic time to aim at that thing's mouth. Of course, she won't leave it at that. The bright blue laser keeps its pressure on the beast, but with her spare hand Aoko releases two bright blue orbs of light. They look and feel like stars, incredibly hot, with babby solar flares and all. She hurls them at the hatching pods, at which point they'll detonate with significant fanfare into blue flames and plasma. It won't get them all, but it should help.
Nie Li	"Gr!" The thunderstorm Nie Li had stoked disperses as he observes the results of the gang's handiwork. They hit the thing hard, but it almost doesn't show a thing of it. He stuffs the weapon back into his Interspatial Ring, it vanishing into a mist that's sucked straight into the artifact. "Since it's come to this, I'll give it my best shot..." Nie Li starts to say, only to then have to BACKFLIP AWAY at high speeds as he sees the thing unleash ZAPPY TOXIC SPEW from its huge mouth. "It ABSORBED the lightning...?!" That. Is. troubling. Very troubling! And yet... he reaches deep down and summons up a Demon Spirit. Energy ripples around him and solidifies into the form of a brown-furred panda standing tall and proud where Nie Li had just been. The beast wears his clothing! With a dramatic CLAP of its hands, the Fanged Panda INHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAALES a long and impractical breath, chest and cheeks puffing out as if it were a DRAGON ready to let loose with its fire breath! Fire breath though is NOT what happens. Instead... With a thunderous BOOM of roaring energy, he spits out a pair of GLOWING SPHERES - one white, one black. They twirl around each other and fly at the Centipede at a maddeningly swift pace... And then they reach the lingering effects of Aoko's blue flames. The white and black spheres smash together right at the point of impact, compressing and whining with the telltale sign of DISASTER ABOUT TO STRIKE. The light engulfs the blue starburst flames and then-- And then, EVERYTHING is awash in white, the complementary energies reacting with both each other and the catalyst of FIRE to annihilate each other with gusto. A swirling maelstrom of white-hot spiritual energy BALLOONS outwards, vaporizing the ground and any chunks of building that might be too close. The ground CRATERS and cracks, leaving swampwater to rush in and down and begin to pool....though some of it was instantly vaporized and rises into the air as steam. ALl in all, the explosion is twice the size of the Killerpede's body, and anyone who's not bracing themselves might be knocked flat on his or her ass by the resultant shockwave!
Lezard Valeth	This is unpleasant. Lezard might be able to defend against most attacks, but inevitably something gets through. The toxic breath is one such thing, as some of it simply splatters around the barrier, sizzling and spitting as it splatters over Lezard. He gasps, grunting as his flesh begins to smoke and dissolve. If he were not enchanted by Morgan, he might have to cut off his limb as well to stop the spread. As it is, it is merely potentally lethal, not hellishly corrupting. The lightning does not help, the power causing him to spasm and fall back with a yelp. He is getting tired of this already, this battered flesh has not had enough time to recover from the battle with Ort, and now he might be getting threatened with losing it entirely. This is not acceptable. "You DARE to challenge me?!" He yells at the thing, his anger getting the better of him once more as indignation rises, the power of the magical circle around him flaring. "I will not accept this! Die, in agony!" The energy from the previous spell surges back, cycling through his spell as he amplifies and increases the power exponentially. A storm swirls over the beast, and Lezard holds out a hand, incanting. "If ye shall accept the benedictions of beauty, "then yea, let these chains of aster surround thee!" From the sky, massive chunks of frigid sleet begin to rain down, instantly freezing around the beast in ever mounting piles. Quickly, it creates a massive icy tomb, burying it and the surrounding beasts in crystalline death. "ABSOLUTE ZERO!"" As he finishes the incantation, the ice shatters, exploding into murderous shards that rip through the contents of the ice sheet, perhaps cracking those who could not resist the cold into pieces.
Morgan Berselius	It seems that perhaps being a massive dragonpede born from an infusion of raw human malice doesn't necessarily ensure that you're the biggest fish in the swamp. The creature tries-- it tries damn hard. It's almost as if that stream of toxic, corrosive vileness projecting from its toothy maw is being fed by some kind of massive reservoir. It just keeps coming, being spewed at increasingly high pressures as its limbs writhe and flex like massive pumps to keep the flow going. But even that can't push back the tremendous onslaught of magical and spiritual might being levelled against its wide-open maw. Not forever. Blue and black and white lights flash-boil the vile jet, filling the air with a rancid but ultimately only mildly irritating miasma. It shrieks, the face upon its forehead opening its eyes and mouth wide in a grotesque scream. A column of catalyzed corruption pours out from the second-mouth, adding its strength to the vile geyser. Even now it continues to adapt, continues to learn and evolve. And perhaps that pattern would continue-- But then bolts of holy light hammer hard into its carapace, splitting the already weakened armor and rupturing vital arteries and musculature beneath. Roving blue-fire suns sear and burn at its exposed flesh even as they turn the creatures struggling out from their eggs to so much ash and render the remainder stillborn. Convulsing in pain, the creature's assault weakens and falters, and the combined beam crashes into its face. The explosion briefly turns the world into a veritable mess of camera glare and speedlines, nearly levelling what remains of the temple and knocking Morgan into a nearby pillar. Water rushes in, filling the new crater with gushing, foul-smelling swamp. And the monster... The monster is /still/ there. Its carapace has been turned to ash. Enormous, serrated scales dot the landscape, blown away by the explosion. It's little more now than a pile of bones and sinew-- a skeletal wraith of its former self, animated only by the churning, writhing Malice lurking beneath its surface. The thing hisses and trembles, rattling like the tail of an angry snake. Its body begins to burn and glow and bulge. Rays of sickly light lance out from its tattered form. It's... Trying to self-destruct...!? It's never allowed to do so. Sleet and freezing rain pour down from on high. The creature's death-rattle quiets and slows as Lezard's magic activates some long-dormant function of nature. Winter's wrath is sudden and terrible, the sky seeming to open and disgorge a veritable deluge of snow and frost. A tomb of ice indeed, leaving nothing but frigid waste in its wake. The creature is captured in all its monstrosity for a single, terrible moment, frozen in place by Lezard's spell. Then he finishes, and the entire thing... Explodes into a storm of deadly, frozen shards. When it passes, all that's left is a single, pulsing globe of red-black sludge. Human faces materialize across its surface only to then dissolve again into formlessness. It feels as though even being in the presence of this... /thing/ would somehow taint your souls irrevocably if exposed for too long. But a shadow shoots in through the flurry of ice and grasps around the malevolent sphere. Slowly, a field of black grows across its surface, erasing the crimson deathmasks of humanity in their entirety. Eventually, that terrible sensation fades, and the world seems... ...Refreshed, in a way, for its lack. Morgan emerges again, drawing the blackened orb closer until it rests in his hand. "Well," he says with a sudden huff. "That could've gone poorly."
Aoko Aozaki	"But it didn't!" Aoko says, because it's true. "Oh man it totally looked like it was gonna go nuclear for a second there. High five team, that's a big win! I think. If it isn't we'll just pretend it is and party like it is!" Do people really need excuse to party, really? "So, how do we know if that... worked? I can tell the air is lighter, but I doubt it's that easy to bring a god's power back. Or is it?" It'd be a nice surprise. Idly, Aoko picks up one of the scales lying about. "Oh hello there, enough money for months of food." And another scale. "And hello there, trophy I'll rub in the Association's face." She spins on her feet, to face Nie Li. "And hello there, martial artist wizard! That was some pretty cool wizardry you did there for a punchman! I'm guessing the two aren't too different on your world?"
Nie Li	And that is what happens when the entire party unleashes DEVASTATION all at once. Nie Li does his best to hide his amazement at the sheer POWER of the combined effort... but he's left a bit wide-eyed regardless. As Aoko approaches, his transformation comes undone. The Fanged Panda form shrinks and withers into a shimmery light that's sucked back into his body and vanishes without a trace, leaving him back to normal. Somehow, his clothes did not rip despite needing to grow three or four times to accomodate that change... "Ahaha... this is the basics of Demon Spiritualism arts. My Fanged Panda is a decent enough Demon Spirit for a job like this." Nevertheless he isn't going to just stand there and do nothing. As soon as the... EXPLOSION is over, Nie Li sets about examining the thing's remains for any bits and pieces... there's gotta be SOMETHING worth looting from a creature like this, right?
Tomoe	Tomoe has taken a beating but she's not dropped yet, she's still standing when the thing is vomiting more corrupting and other bad things? Tomoe is going to pull back before she gets covered in horrible vomit goo. She gets away from that, and she's able to have done some damage from her spell, followed by the more skilled casting abilities of Lezard and Aoko the beast finally goes down hell whatever Nie Li did was pretty damn impressive. She deploys her shield into the ground propping some defence ability to tank most of the explosion but she's a bit harmed from it and things seem to be a lot better now that the thing is dead. "I never want to fight something like that again if I can help it."
Lezard Valeth	The aftermath of the destruction of the beast is... satisfying. It's nice to have something to deal with that actually dies when you kill it for a change. Lezard doesn't object as Morgan inevitably moves in to enact his purifying ritual, the Phiosopher's Stone rippling back into its normal book form beside him. "The malice has been significantly purified in the area." Lezard comments. "That was the entire point, was it not? To force it to conentrate so we could more quickly cleanse it. Though I think in the future we could find better ways to do this. It was an excellent initial experiment, however. My compliments, Aoko." Lezard sweeps his cape with a dramatic motion and walks forward. "If you want to not battle anything like that again, I recommend simply leaving and not coming back." He says to Tomoe. "That is likely only a small fraction of the filth that will have to be destroyed to recover this world." He stops at the entrance, turning back to the others. "The way forward should be clear, now, correct?"
Morgan Berselius	Well! Provided nobody decides to gank the shadow-man holding onto the crystallized orb of evil and misery, everything seems to have gone... Not /according/ to plan necessarily, but certainly better than it could have. The dragonpede didn't escape to begin reproducing enmasse in the wastes or something like that, for instance. "No, Rahu's not going to be that easy to put back together," Morgan answers to Aoko. "That just helped... relieve the pressure, you know? When we do get around to start reassembling him, there won't be so much of this crap to muck things up. And we should probably be able to head deeper into the temple more safely, now." Without becoming afflicted by horrible corruption-plagues, hopefully. Morgan nods to Lezard at that, "Yeah. Should be. Provided that we didn't accidentally collapse everything past the door with all that, we should be able to get into the inner sanctum now. From there... Well, we'll have to see when we get in." He glances over to Tomoe then. "It's like Lezard said. Othrys... It's not in a good sort. That thing was at least close enough to human for us to comprehend properly. I chose this spot partly because it's far enough away from any of the Titans, but we'll need to deal with /them/ eventually, too. And this far in, there's all kinds of Malice sitting around that'll need to be cleared." "You asked why so much pooled here earlier, right?" Morgan asks, moving back towards the ruined temple. More of those shadows race out and begin shifting rubble out of the way. "Part of that has to do with the function of these temples. They act as conduits to amplify people's connection to the gods, you see. Their divinity permeates the place. Malice, it has a sort of... intelligence to it. It's suffering in a way, too-- so it naturally pools in places that might bring it comfort or ease its pain." "Add to that the fact that many of the gods used to encompass those kinds of emotions within their purviews, and either aren't or /can't/ anymore, it just sort of... pools in holy places, like this one." Morgan shrugs and shifts the last of the rubble out of the way, clearing the staircase that leads deeper into the sanctum. It's... ...Kind of gross in there, but for other reasons. It looks as though the Dragonpede's old body is just sort of lying there, discarded like a shed skin in the corner of the room. Aside from that, its various body parts are still strewn about, skeletonized but potentially still worth something if you're into making stuff out of horrible malice-monsters.
Morgan Berselius	"We should probably hold off on pushing deeper for now though," Morgan says to the others. "I'm /still/ picking crystal out of my everything, and I'm sure you guys need a break too. Good job though, would've taken me months otherwise, and heaven knows what could have happened then." "I'll try to scope things out ahead of time, figure out what we'll need to do down below," he sort of jiggles the blackened malice-orb like a snowglobe. "And finish purifying this in the mean-time. I'd be happy to answer questions though, if you guys have any."