Legion
Noah tackled Shannon, forcing her to the ground as the gargantuan mass that was Kaisen exploded. Mana surged out in all directions like flames, and black blood flooded the streets of Welindar, washing over buildings, people, and fiends. The entire city was saturated with malevolence. Noah and Shannon ran for cover while holding their breath. The mana burned their skin and made them feel sick. They ducked into the palace, searching for a place free of contamination.
In the city, Valia and Tysinger saw the approaching wave of darkness coming like a volcanic ash cloud. "Not quite according to plan, but this should still get things moving," said Tysinger, then turning to Valia. "If you manage to survive, think about my offer. I'm sure we'll meet again. For now, I suggest you start running." Valia took his advice and took off in a sprint, using her super speed to outrun the wave, while Tysinger calmly let himself be enveloped.
As the darkness spread, what were originally screams of terror from the public became monstrous snarls. Men, women, and children exposed to the contamination began to transform. Inside their bodies, countless microscopic parasites were waking from their dormancy and beginning to release their venom. For weeks, the Pack had been spiking the local wells with parasites, each lying in wait for the signal to activate and bond with their hosts.
Kaisen's mana served as the trigger that awoke them, acting like the generator from Carthace's prison. Only those who drank from the royal wells, routinely sanctified by Nell, were free of the parasites, while everyone else took on monstrous shapes. Their bodies swelled as their muscles grew, and their skeletons changed form, deforming and mutating as the entire population of Welindar, from infant to elder, was turned into fiends.
The power changing their bodies also ravaged their minds, stripping away their personalities and thoughts. In their place was the will of Kaisen. It was not a conscious sentience, but an order ingrained into their gray matter: destroy Uther. Moving as one, the army of fiends filled the streets as a rabid mob, shaking the city with their combined footfalls. They swarmed out of Welindar, joined by the fiends Kaisen brought with him, all heading south. The Profane were on the move.
With the city emptied of its inhabitants, all was quiet, save for the crackling of flames as countless buildings burned. Everything had been painted black by the explosion, saturated with dark mana. The air was thick with smoke and caustic energy, but a voice still cried out. "Noah! Shannon!" It was Valia, walking to the streets. "Noah! Shannon!" she hollered again, receiving no response. She hurried towards the castle, hoping they were there and also that they weren't. The castle had been at the explosion's epicenter, and fear gripped her heart as she fought not to imagine them dead. "Noah! Shannon!"
She tried to pick up the pace, but it was difficult. The city was heavily polluted with Profane energy, attacking her body like radiation. She had reinforced her body with magic, but her muscles hurt, and every breath was a wheeze. There was no way an average person could survive this level of exposure.
"Noah! Shannon!" she tearfully shouted as she reached the palace.
With every step she took, every moment of silence, her terror grew exponentially. What if they were no longer in the city, having joined the armies of the Profane? She had seen Utheric soldiers among their ranks as they stampeded out of Welindar, corrupted and turned into ravenous abominations. If they had been infected and become mindless horrors like all the others, they might as well be dead, and she had lost them. First Valon and now Noah and Shannon. What more could be taken away from her?
"Noah! Shannon!"
"Valia!" she heard, making her heart soar.
She rushed inside, meeting Noah and Shannon halfway to the great hall, with the two wearing decontamination suits from Noah's operations. The three hugged each other tightly, each filled with relief.
"I can't believe you're alive! How did you survive?" Valia asked.
"We sealed ourselves up in the original lab. It's airtight, so it kept the mana out, and most of the surviving equipment and supplies were stored there," said Shannon.
"Come on, I've whipped up a cleaning solution. We need to wash all that residue off," added Noah.
They brought her to the former evidence room, where Valia was scrubbed from head to toe with a special potion that removed all of the dark energy clinging to her and her clothes.
"What going on outside?" Shannon asked.
"The entire city has been emptied. That explosion turned every single person in Welindar into a fiend, and they've swarmed out of the city."
"By the spirts, no! This can't be happening! All those people!" Shannon exclaimed.
"Which direction did they go?" Noah asked,
"They appeared to be heading south."
"Towards Colbrand. It's just as the Liege requested of the Profane, an army that would destroy Uther. He's gotten his wish."
"Noah, Uther must be warned. An army that size composed entirely of fiends? Everything will be destroyed. It would take every single soldier and knight in the country just to try and hold them back!"
"It's too dangerous out there to do anything right now. You barely survived returning to the castle. We need to wait for the sun to rise and burn away some of the contamination."
"What about Prince Lupin?"
"He's either dead, with the Profane, or hiding somewhere safe. Either way, his options are the same as ours. I don't like it either, but all we can do is wait."
They remained in the evidence room for the rest of the night, patching themselves up and waiting for dawn. While they waited, Noah wrote a magic formula to clean the air and help maintain their quarantine. Outside, Welindar was a sea of flames. The fires were spreading unchallenged, and as the contaminated wood burned, it released more toxic mana into the air. By first light, most of the city was reduced to ash. Finally, the sun started to rise, and much of the lingering mana disintegrated. The ground and rubble remained tainted and would stay that way for a long time, but the sunlight sterilized the air and made it breathable.
Eventually, the trio dared to step out of their bunker. The inner palace was still contaminated, so they quickly got outside under the sun's rays. What waited for them was a scene of darkness and destruction. All of Welindar was now cursed earth and devoid of life. Even the weeds growing in the street, if not outright killed by Kaisen's mana, were left twisted and evil.
"How? How did this all go so wrong?" said Valia, walking past the destroyed buildings. "We came here to stop the Profane, to save these people. How did we fail? How did we lose everything? Even when we win, we lose."
Nearby, Shannon dropped to her knees, staring at a footprint in the ashes. It was small, made by a child, probably still growing all their baby teeth. The toe marks were spiked from the child's claws, grown as their body became a tool of the Profane. "I thought I had avenged my tribe and made things right, but all I did was doom this city and everyone in it. That arrow might as well have pierced the heart of every man, woman, and child in Welindar, and I'm the one who shot it."
"It wasn't your fault," said Noah. "It wasn't any of our faults. This was always their plan, it's what they do. They corrupt and destroy. We can either sit around and mope or do something. We still need to find Lupin and warn Uther about what's coming."
"All the messenger birds are dead, and I can't outrun an army of fiends," said Shannon.
"I can," Valia replied.
