On the night before Jack headed off to the well of Purification, Natasha sat down with him and came up with a plan of investigation. He would be stopping off at his Dungeon, and would also send her ahead to the Well of Purification. He would also keep that she was going off to the well a secret to the others as well. He hadn't liked that of course, but she managed to get him to see her point of view. So she was sent near the well in a small blue bubble that dropped her unceremoniously half a day from the well. She did this because she felt the need to keep her investigation completely pure from the others. Especially since she knew once he arrived he and the others would draw a great deal of attention to themselves.

Indeed, as she leaned against a wall in an alley hiding behind a bush, she overheard from a nearby window a few Order of Purification guards talking amongst themselves. They talked about a man who had broken a purification checking crystal and was in the company of several women. Deducing that they were likely talking about Jack, she heard them mention that they were needed to keep a look out for them and report anything suspicious that they were up to. This had proved her foresight correct, if she wanted to investigate this place unnoticed, traveling with Jack was not a good idea. Especially since she had already confirmed that a corruption cult was indeed active within the city.

As part of her investigation, she had 'acquired' several sets of monks robes from a local cleaning store. As each order of monks within the city had their own style of robes she had taken several robes from the shop. She was currently wearing a set of robes that belonged to the Order of Devotion, an order that basically served as lackeys to the other orders. They were commonplace, so they didn't stick out so it worked as a perfect outfit, especially in this place of intense political maneuvering.

Most people from the continent like herself had assumed that all of the monks that served the well were essentially all the same. However, she found that was not the case when she arrived. In fact she had never seen such intense power dynamics at play in any place she had been before. Each order was attempting to grab more power for themselves and deny the others the same. In her opinion each order behaved more like a gang then an actual monk order. The one that stood above all the other orders was the Order of Purification. None of the other Orders had the sheer power that one wielded. So the others ended up with basically scraps of what the Order of Purification gave them.

Technically each of the orders was supposed to take charge of a specific role. Though most of the stronger orders pushed the menial work down upon the Order of Devotion. For instance the Order of Cleanliness dealt mainly with keeping the city clean and the sewers functioning. They worked mainly at night and could usually be seen taking trash towards the well to be burned. Which thanks to the complete burning achieved by the well the smell of burning trash was not emitted. All totaled there appeared to be seventy different orders within the city. In her opinion each of them stank with the same stench of scum and villainy she had seen criminal groups have.

To be sure, they covered it up well enough with the pretense of ridding the world of corruption and helping those infected. Even so the foul dark hearts many of these so called monks could clearly be seen to her. For whatever reason this city had collected a huge amount of mal-adjusted folk who were clearly here on self-serving endeavors. It was no wonder to her that a corruption cult could gain such a following within this place. Hell she suspected most would be willing to sell their own mother into slavery if it got them what they wanted.

Part of the reason so many crooks infested this city was because of the nature of this city. Due to being outside of the law of the surrounding nations and the lack of oversight by any deity, a great many criminals fleeing justice seek refuge here in the city. While they still had to join one of the orders, it still allowed them to live freely. Even the laws among the monks were vague and often unenforced. As long as they didn't bring interest from the Order of Purification most could do what they want. Murder, assaults, robberies you name it occurred here. Yesterday she spotted a visitor being shaken down for money.

The poor man had come from far away to have his son cured from the corruption plaguing him. Only to have a few monks come up after wanting him to pay up for the privilege of that cure. He had to pay them all that he had on him before they let him go. Yet that had not been the worst thing she had seen in this city so far. While she was tracking a corrupted monk, she found evidence that someone had been murdered in an offset plaza. After using her Investigator skills, she eventually determined one of the monks had attacked a drunk visitor in a fit of rage and killed them. To hide the body, they took it to the well where it was burned with all of the other trash that night. From the evidence it was clear to her that this was not the first time he had done it.

Under every stone she turned in this foul city she found more vile things hiding. She felt overwhelmed, never before had she encountered a place so riddled with evil. She was unsure of how to help the few innocent people in this city if there were any. Perhaps this was an effect of being near the Well. Even if it did get rid of corruption, being so near to it cannot be good for the soul. Or were these foul individuals drawn here because of the corruption? She did not know, all she could do right now was focus on her job on tracking down the corrupted cult that lay within the city.

It had been hard to find them, the unique robes they were wearing did a good job at hiding the corruption from casual observations and even managed to fool that purity checker of the monks. Still she had managed to find several individuals of varying levels of corruption by using Examination. While effective at piercing their disguise it came with two major drawbacks. First was the speed. It took her a while to go through a crowd and got hard to keep track of which monks she had looked at and who she hadn't. The second was that some people could feel when she examined them. She had to slip away several times when she examined someone and they started to look around.

Most of the corrupted ones she found tended to avoid crowds and pretty much only interacted with other corrupted people. Which made finding the other corrupted a great deal easier. The first one she discovered was acting as a Monk from the Order of Light and had been going around replacing dull manalights when Natasha had examined her. By keeping track of her, she was able to discover more corruption around the city. Each was in differing orders, with different levels of authority. They also appeared to have numerous bases throughout the city, one that appeared to have burned last night. Which unfortunately had the effect of making most of the corrupted she had seen go into hiding making it hard to find more.

Even so, she had managed to track down a likely location of a hideout. In the manufacturing area of the city, there was a building that had been built for the Order of Healing's use. What they used it for was a morgue, where bodies were supposed to be kept until a ceremony for them would be held. At which point the bodies would be lowered into the well. Unsurprisingly the city had a fairly high death rate. Already while she had been keeping an eye here, at least two bodies were taken through the gated yard into the morgue.

As she was watching, she noticed a wagon with some rubble and stones come up to the gate. After pushing the signal crystal, the gate opened and let the wagon in. About fifteen minutes later the wagon exited the yard, with what looked like more rubble on top of it. She initially assumed that the wagon was going around collecting broken rocks from the earthquake from before but she spotted something wrapped in linen underneath the rubble. The wagon headed off towards the exit of the city, and as it passed she examined the puller and found he was corrupted. What was the corrupted cult doing with dead bodies outside of town?

What she really wanted to do was find a way into that morgue to take a good look around. So far she has had trouble nailing down any location where the true leaders of the cult had to be. What she needed to do was get into one of their bases and scrub it for information. However doing it forcefully would likely lead to them destroying the evidence. She couldn't enter casually either as on the door to the building was a large sign that said Official Business only. The visitors she had seen go up to the door had either only delivered packages or papers and had not gone inside. Even the people delivering the bodies did not go into the morgue.

The other big problem she was facing came from the building she was currently leaning on. It was a guard station for the Order of Purification, which made the choice for the corrupted base really bold given the intense hatred the Order of Purification has for corruption. The guard station was not a large one, as it held five guards at any one time. A few of which were currently playing a card game while on duty. Even if it was a corrupted base drawing the attention of these guards was not a good idea. Out of all of the Orders within the city, the Order of Purification were the only true Zealots within the city. Based on the way they acted at times, she suspected they had been subject to intense training which had effectively brainwashed the lot of them.

This had an effect in making most of them unstable mentally. Without solid proof of the corruption that was taking place no doubt the guards would be vicious in removing her from the morgue. While thinking she glanced towards her metallic arm and squeezed the fist. It felt odd barely able to sense what the arm was doing. The thought of going into another fierce fight brought a cold feeling down her back. It brought to mind the nightmares she has had daily since that nightmare at the castle. No, she did not want to get into another fight, especially with these zealots.

She took another look at the morgue while idly flexing her prosthetic arm. Sneaking into the morgue would be the best move, however the building itself did not have a great many avenues of entrance. It was two stories tall, and from the windows at the bottom edge of it, had a basement as well. The front had the only visible windows, all of which were blacked out by thick curtains. There was a side entrance in the yard, though she couldn't see into the yard given the fifteen-foot wall that blocked off the side yard.

However the wall surrounding that yard was in clear view of the guards. As such she couldn't slip over the wall to take a look without immediately drawing their attention. The gate only appeared to open from the inside as well so she couldn't enter through that way either. She had taken a look at the back of the building and found that the morgue was right up against one of the pots making shops. It was one that took the local clay in the region and made custom pots to ship out to trade for the resources the city needed. Slipping through that way was impossible as the shop had several different shifts that worked.

So that left her with little options to gain access to it for the moment. So she kept a lookout on it waiting for a good opportunity, and listening to the guards talking. Just as she was considering taking a break and getting something to eat, from the sky to the east came a brilliant blue beam of energy. It came down somewhere outside the city walls. Startled she could immediately tell it as energy coming from Jack, plus some divine source of energy. It lasted mere moments, but already the impact of which was immediate within the nearby surroundings.

The Head guard came charging out and swiftly ordered three others to come with him and they charged in the direction of the beam. Figuring it was from one of the other Users of Jack, she hoped they would get out of there before the guards came. Shortly after that the door to the morgue was thrown open and a hobbling figure came outside along with two others. This figure was completely covered with heavy robes, and she could tell that his body wasn't shaped right. This individual looked off into the direction of where the beam had come down and loudly cursed. As it did so she took the opportunity to carefully examine it.

Even with the robes hiding his affliction with corruption she could tell he oozed of it. Whatever had happened outside of the city had really upset this thing and when one of his companions had attempted to calm the thing down, Sineo slapped them down and began to viciously kick the monk over and over. This however served to attract the attention of the two remaining guards in the station. They came out and called out towards Sineo ordering him to stop and present himself to them. The hunched figure stopped cursing and kicking and turned its attention towards the guards. It appeared at first to obey with subservience to the guards and began to speak in polite tones to the guards.

The guards had come closer until two long misshapen arms came out from the robes and grasped each guard's heads. It was brief but all of a sudden she felt an intense pulse of corruption that left both men shrieking in pain. Afterwards, the two guards looked to be in pain, but did not move a muscle. Then Sineo shouted at his colleagues to get inside, then went into the building followed by the two guards who walked in a daze after the corrupted monster.

It had occurred in a matter of moments, and looking around she spotted several monks dashing off likely to report what just happened. Did it just act out of anger? No, she was getting a bad feeling that whatever had happened outside the city had severely affected the plans of this foul monstrosity. If that was the case, what would it do by drawing the attention of the Order of Purification to it? Unless it thought it had already been compromised. In which case then it would be getting either ready to flee the base or worse.

Either way this was a great opportunity for her to slip inside the building unnoticed. Although she definitely had to take care not to run into the likes of that thing. Casually walking across the street while glancing around she found that no one was looking at her. Reaching up with her fake arm she twitched her shoulder and a grappling line shot out of the arm and caught onto the ledge. The climbing aid was one of the many functions that had been placed into her new arm thanks to Falaen. The cable had a limit of at most thirty feet and had a weight limit as well. Still it allowed her to quickly pull herself over the stone wall and into the yard.

When she landed, she took a quick look around and saw that the yard was a complete mess. Weeds that stood at least half her height had taken over the majority of the yard. The single tree in the yard was dead and looked right about to fall over. The wall of the morgue on this side had a few more windows, though all were blocked by thick curtains with the exception of one that looked to have been recently boarded up. A set of stairs led down into the morgues basement, but those doors were thick and looked to be unopenable from the outside. Making her way to the boarded up window, she found that the grass underneath was littered with glass. Most likely the window had broken in the earthquake.

The boards that had been nailed to block the window had not been placed on well. So with little effort on her part, she was able to pull off a few of the boards. When she felt there was enough of a gap to squeeze into the room she peered into the dark room. From the outside it appeared to be some sort of storage room. Slipping inside she activated a mana stone within her artificial arm and a soft beam of light came out of her palm. From the dust in the room, it appeared nothing had been touched in the room for a while. Odd equipment here and there could be seen under some clothes.

Keeping the beam low in power so as not to draw attention she slowly made her way to the other side of the room to the door. As she went, she detected a hint of corruption in the air, but it was incredibly faint. When she got to the door, she listened to it for several moments before she felt safe opening it. Cracking it open while shutting off the light she peered out and found that it was a shabbily lit hallway that looked as if it hadn't been cleaned in years. Mold and Trash lay rotting along its edges and foul stains dotted the walls and the smell made her gag. Not seeing anyone she slipped out silently into the hallway.

To her left went towards the entrance with a few doors, one of which was opened and from the light inside she could see someone moving about. To her right the hallway went to a T intersection. Taking the right-hand side she had gone several steps when she heard someone start to approach from the intersection. Before they could reach the hallway that she was in, she slipped into a side room quietly closing the door behind her. The lights were not on in this room, and it was incredibly chilly in here. Turning on her flashlight she was nearly startled when she came face to face with a dead body hanging from the ceiling.

It was held upside down by a few hooks, as were a few other bodies. A series of tubes were inserted into the bodies draining blood into a series of barrels which oozed with grime and decay. There was a thick metallic smell to the air and feeling a bit unnerved she quickly looked around the room for a hiding place just in case someone decided to enter this place. There were some free standing cabinets that she could slip behind if she needed to. Opening them, she found they were filled with old rusting tools that looked to be for preparing the dead.

Along the back wall were stacked barrels that looked to be filled with sealed blood. Upon each had a marking that upon closer inspection revealed to her that they were going to be sent elsewhere for what purpose she didn't know. But from the markings it looked like three different places in the city would be getting these blood barrels. A few of the barrels had a bit of corruption coming off them but overall this room did not have much corruption. Finding nothing else she went back to the door and after making sure that no one was in the hallway she went back out.

Heading to the intersection she looked into two more rooms she passed on the way. One was another storage room, this one for caskets and the like. The other room looked to be a room to store bodies that they recently got. As neither looked to hold what she was looking for, she continued on to the intersection. To her right was a hallway that had three more doors down it and to her left was a stairwell that went up to the second floor. Deciding to finish checking this floor first before heading up she made her way down to the first door and heard two people speaking from behind it.

"How are you feeling?"

"Like shit man, I think he broke several of my ribs when he was kicking me."

"You're lucky that's all he did. If he was using his full strength, you would have been a bloody pulp bag. What were you thinking when you spoke out to him like that? You knew he was relying on that Ritual. Now that it's destroyed, he's lost his only chance of gaining access to the Lord's core group."

"I wasn't thinking, I just saw that he was drawing the attention of the guards and I don't want to deal with the Order of Purification."

"Still you are lucky that those two fools came along or he would have played with your body like he is doing to them down below."

"Yeah, but I think it's time we leave for one of the other groups. He's gone mad, I think he's going to activate that pet project of his."

"Damn, in that case I don't want to be here when it goes down. I'm not yet ready to give my body over to Lamia quite yet. Here help me get my stuff ready and we'll leave."

The conversation ended, and she heard them begin to move about in the room, with some groaning from the injured one. Continuing on she went to the next door and opened it to find that it was a small chapel. Unlike the rest of this place, this room had an outright pleasant smell to it. Like a field of wildflowers almost. Though there was a noticeable layer of dust on everything making it clear no one had been in here for a long time. Stepping in she went down a pathway between a series of benches that were set up facing an empty space. This space was likely meant for a statue of a god, but it was gone for some reason.

Going towards the altar in front, she found a brass plate was attached to it, and wiping it free of dust found the name Letum engraved. This made sense for a morgue to have a small space for one of the gods of death, though she wondered why the statue had been removed. Stepping back she turned around and noticed a flash of light as something reflected her flashlight under one of the benches. Curious she bent down and through the thick dust picked up a sheathed blade.

The blade was perhaps four inches long with a black handle. After a second it clicked in her mind that this was in fact a ritual blade known as an Athame. Some temples used them for rituals to their gods, though usually not actually meant for cutting. Curious she examined it and a blue screen popped up.

Sliding open a slot on her arm she slipped the small blade into it and put the sheath into her inventory. It would serve as a good sneak attack weapon, especially against spirit monsters. Even a sharp dagger could be useful against the right targets. The mechanism in her arm could either launch the blade or stab it out depending on how she flexed it. There appeared to be nothing else within the room, so she moved back to the hallway and to the last door of the hallway.

It was a thick looking door that had a strange glowing lock on it. After looking at it for several moments, she determined that it was a magical lock that needed a specific key to allow access to it. Not having the key or being able to force her way in, she decided to sneak up to the second floor. The stairs creaked a little as she climbed making her nervous but she got to the upper floor without much trouble. The upper floor was set up in a simple way, with the hallway taking a L shape.

On the right hand way was a door that led into what she assumed was a kitchen. However, the stench of corruption was thick in this room and the things growing from the walls and the roof made her not want to enter. Especially after a thing that looked like black mold opened something that appeared to be a fully functioning mouth and began to chomp down on its neighbor. Nothing looked particularly of interest either, so she continued on to the next door.

It was locked with a regular lock, so she used a set of lockpicks to jimmy the door open and found it was a bedroom. From the corruption levels in this room, it was clear it was Sineo's room. The bed was completely warped and worse tentacles and the like seemed to be growing from it. But other than the disturbing bed, not much was in the room. As fighting the bed wasn't something she wanted to do, she moved on to the last room on the upper floor.

It was a mixture of what appeared to be an office and a records storage. The office was surprisingly well kept, though there was some dust on the records area, though one path through the rows of shelves looked remarkably clean. Following that path, it led to a certain set of shelves with a multitude of boxes on each. Looking them over, she found a box that lacked dust like the others and pulled it off the shelf and opened it. Inside was a set of vials and potions. Looking them over she found that each were corrupted potions that would provide various buffs to the drinker in return for gaining more corruption.

She returned to the office portion of the place and looked at the bookcases that were next to the desk. Most of the books on the shelves looked to be complete rotting messes that would likely crumble if she so much as touched. A few books looked to be in better shape, and she pulled them down to take a look through them. They varied in topics somewhat, but mostly dealt with the history of the well and its surroundings. One book looked particularly well used so she pulled it down and opened it. It was titled 'History and Usage of Various Sigils of the ancient peoples."

As she flipped through the book, she found that several pages had been completely torn out. From the context of the remaining pages, she figured that the pages that had depicted several sigils had been removed for some reason. The only sigils that remained in the book were partial ones that the author could only speculate on the usage of. Not seeing much else she was about to close the book and return it when a piece of paper fell out from it. Shelving the book, she picked it up and took a look at it. On it was a drawing of a symbol that on one hand made her eyes hurt, yet at the same time had a strange beauty to it. It was as if she was getting a peek at some kind of truth that she had not known before.

She examined it and a blue screen quickly popped up.

Not seeing a reason not to have access to fire energy sounded like a good idea. So she thought yes and directed the rune to be placed upon her artificial arm. A warm orangish light appeared onto the back of her metallic fist. She watched in fascination as it slowly engraved a rune onto it. While it was doing so, she suddenly realized that she was feeling a stronger connection to her arm. It felt as if it was truly part of her, as if it was flesh and blood like her other arm. However that feeling died down as the rune finished and stopped glowing after it's appearance. Even so, the arm didn't feel the same as it once did.

She then put the piece of paper with the rune into her inventory. Perhaps some of the others would like to take a look at it. Maybe they can figure out some other runes from examining it. Going over to the desk, she looked over the top of it and found an open journal. Flipping through the pages she found that the handwriting grew worse over time and in the later sections she had trouble making out passages. It was the journal of that Elf Sineo, and described his journeys and search for power. He, of course, never mentions corruption within the text or anything that would obviously give him away of being part of the corruption cult.

In one passage he talks about having become the caretaker of the morgue which would present him an opportunity to gain access to something illegible. He also mentions finding an odd puzzle in the morgue that he couldn't solve. Later on he mentions finding the necessary steps to greatly increase his power, and in another passage mentions finding a series of symbols from ages past with incredible strength. So far he stated he managed to use one of them to enchant a hammer to grow vastly in size. Though as the entries became newer, he began to ramble on writing insane things. The last entry was just him wanting the great serpent of oblivion to devour him whole.

The rest of the desk was a mess of spilled ink and other pieces of paper that didn't seem to be useful. Starting to go through the drawers she found more junk papers that dealt with running of the morgue, at the bottom of those she found several brass pieces that seemed to be part of something. Picking them out she realized they were part of what was an interlocking puzzle. It was tough to figure out how each of them was interconnected, but she managed to assemble them into an odd looking diamond shaped thing that had a spinning piece in the middle of it. Not sure of what to make of it, she examined it.

Unsure of what to make of that last part of the message she glanced up and was startled to find a cloaked figure standing right in front of her. He was a towering presence whose hooded cloak completely hid their features. In a deep gravelly voice it said "I am Letum and I heard the calling of a puzzle I thought had been long lost. This place has long forsaken my teachings, so I was surprised when I managed to feel stirrings of my artifacts within this place. Now that I am here, I am glad to see a follower of my friend Jack here to bring justice to this dark spot of the world. I was unaware how fallen this place has become, it brings me no joy to see the state my first temple lies in."

Feeling the intense pressure from the deity in front of her, she bowed her head respectfully and said "I greet you great god of death Letum."

"Do raise your head, while your respect is appreciated, all are in fact Equal in the end. I am simply a guide to help them along." It said.

She nodded still a bit unsure of what to say to this entity before her. "I was under the impression that gods are not allowed to be within the confines of the city."

"Most yes. They signed the agreement to stay out of this city, however I am the sole exception as death is everywhere. Still my actions within the city are quite limited. In fact I am speaking to you through a vision granted to you by the puzzle. You are in fact right now just staring at the puzzle silently in the real world."

"I am honored that you would deem to speak with me, however I did not solve your puzzle knowing it was yours."

"The puzzle is just a means to an end. You solved it because you could, and because you could here I am. That is just one of the mysteries of the world. What matters is that I see you are working with Jack to clear this corruption scourge from this area. I sense you are a recent recruit of Jacks?"

"I am."

"His aura is fresh upon yours." Letum sighed and said "I have in fact another reason for coming here then to simply find out who had solved this puzzle after all this time. I also sensed when one of the artifacts I created was unsheathed, that Athame that is currently in your possession. I created it and its twin for this temple. Unfortunately, when I lost touch with this temple, they had gone missing from my sight. Now that I have returned thanks to your efforts I am saddened to find the other Athame is currently being used for foul purposes."

His voice turned annoyed at this last part and he continued "If I could, I would go done and rip it from its very hands. Unfortunately that goes against the contract I have signed for non interference with this city. However, you are not bound by the restrictions I am, so I ask you to find the dagger and destroy it."

She frowned and said "Great Letum, I must express that while I am willing to aid you, I in fact do not have the strength to go up against this Sineo. He is powerful and would tear me apart should I fight him. Jack or maybe one of his other Users would be a better choice to complete your task."

"Do not worry about that. I am not asking you to defeat the corrupted beast, as he will die today by another hand. Already I can sense his demise approaching." He said glancing past her towards the distance. "This Sineo is working on something quite foul that would prove dangerous for you and the rest of this city. Retrieve the Athame and stop his plans. All of this is within your capabilities I foresee. Do not underestimate what you are capable of Natasha Scarlet."

When the god said that a blue screen appeared letting her know she had just gained a quest.

"To reach that foul menace in time, you will need what is hidden in there." He pointed towards the desk and then said "Farewell Natasha, and I wish you a long and enjoyable life." With that final message the vision ended and she found herself standing in the room alone staring at the puzzle in her hands.

Being not overtly religious her first instinct was in fact to refuse to go along with the whims of this God. Even if it would be unwise to do so, she hated being manipulated into doing things. Still she was worried about what this Sineo could be planning, and while it looked dangerous, the rating was just barely within her capabilities of doing. Though it would still be difficult and if she messed up she would likely die. Plus she suspected from the glance that Letum gave, was an indication that a powerful order of Purification individual was on their way.

Which meant she did not have much time. Going to the desk, she quickly looked through the remaining drawers. However, the rest of them didn't seem to have anything greatly important in them. On the bottom drawer she noticed there was something odd about this drawer and after closer inspection realized that it in fact was a false backing to it. Finding the way to open it, she found two objects within it. One was a book that she glanced through and found was written in some sort of code, which she tossed into her inventory to look at later. The other object was a strange key that radiated magic.

Clearly this was a backup key that went to the locked door below. Taking it she quickly made her way back down only to pause when she saw the two grunts moving a large bag. The injured one was having a hard time dragging the bag towards the exit. When they were a ways down the hallway towards the exit, she slipped down the hallway to the locked door. All she needed to do was raise the magical key to the doorway making it click open. When it did so she was struck in the face by the overwhelming stench of corruption.

It nearly made her vomit on the spot so intense it was. She pulled out a piece of cloth and fashioned a makeshift mask to cover her face. Then she began going down the stairs. As she went, she saw all along the walls were various sigils that were meant to keep most of the corruption contained within the basement. The corruption had been in this place a long time as it had begun warping the very steps she was on. The steps were growing fleshy bits that reached out towards her when she quickly passed them.

Even the manalight that were attached to the ceiling were putting out an unpleasant shade of light that made her feel uncomfortable in it. When she got down to the bottom of the stairs, she found that she was now in a room filled with small cages with the twisted remains of people. From the looks of them, each had been tortured to death. There were four ways out of this chamber, with one of them being the doors that lead outside. Sneaking to the closest one she found a room filled with jail cells.

In one of the rooms was one of the guards from before who was no longer in a dazed state. However, he was really roughed up and was laying in a groaning heap on the floor. The other two cells of this jail were empty, though from the bloodstains she had just missed some of their occupants. Quickly she found a set of keys to the jail cell and unlocked the door holding the guard. Opening the door, she went up to him and checked on him. He was quite wounded and confused, she said "Shh I'm here to help."

He mumbled incoherently, and she reached into her inventory to pull out a healing potion. Forcefully opening the man's mouth she poured it down and the guard barely managed to choke it down. With that down she picked him up and had to basically drag him towards the exit doors. They were barred from this side, so she took a moment to get them free for when she needed to escape from this place. When she was done with that she said to him "I will be back for you, keep out of sight okay?"

The guard confusedly nodded, and she snuck to the next door where a disgusting red glow was emanating from. The glow she saw was from a massive sigil that had been carved into the stone of the floor, in the center of which the true corrupted form of Sineo could be seen. With his cloak off, she could see what exactly the corruption had done to the Elf's body. So twisted had it become not one part looked to have originally belonged to the Elven race. The skull or what had once been a skull was more or less just a mass of teeth with eye stalks poking through. The body was somehow even worse as fangs jutted out here and there and unsightly orifices that pulsed and oozed dotted it's body.

Sineo was dancing along the sigil letting out a song that frankly made her want to vomit from listening to. He paused along one wall where she saw what remained of the other guard. He reached out and petted a black mass that was using the remains of the guard to essentially grow a fleshy cocoon around its spiritual body. From the rotting remains around it, it looked like this was not the first time it had done so. Sineo returned to dancing and passed what she recognized as the twin to the Athame in her arm. It had been struck into the middle of the sigil.

From the lines of the sigil it was clear that Sineo was using this blade as a powerful point in the sigil. Examining the sigil she found what exactly was this corrupted beings evil plan was. The sigil in fact was not very complex, all it was was a simple detonation sigil that when it was fully powered would cause an incredibly massive explosion. This would cause major damage to the city, but the more dangerous element of the sigil was barrels filled with corrupted blood. Should the sigil finish it would send this corrupted blood into the surroundings completely contaminating a huge swath of this city.

Sineo had apparently long ago finished this sigil, right now he simply seemed to be waiting. What he was waiting for soon became apparent when there was a massive crashing sound from above, and seconds later the roof broke open and a towering figure in plated armor came falling through. It had a massive red stonish blade that was glowing fiercely. Standing up from it's crouched landing it began to walk towards Sineo. The corrupted man let out a laugh of pleasure and chucked a stone at the sigil. "Finally, you have come Lord of Purification. Today is the day when Lamia will feast upon your flesh."

The figure did not speak, it only leaped forward towards Sineo striking towards him with heavy blows. Sineo merely cackled and responded by throwing out spells and using runic symbols in the air to block the monks' attacks. However, it soon became clear that Sineo was no match for this figure as several fleshy chunks were sliced off of him causing him to screech off him. Even so when he recovered, he let out more insane laughter and she saw why as the sigil began to glow deeper. The stone that he had thrown earlier had started the process of powering up the sigil. It was now only a matter of time before it blew.

Using Examination on the sigil provided little clues on how to stop it, and the only thing she could think of was wrenching free the corrupted Athame. The issue would be getting to it. The whole room had become the pair's battlefield making it extremely dangerous for her to cross. The sword strikes and spells being thrown out would kill her outright if they were to hit her. She took a deep breath calming her nerves and then dashed across the battlefield towards the center of the sigil. Both of the fighters naturally noticed her appearance. The monk simply ignored her and continued to harass Sineo. Sineo, however, saw where she was headed and attempted to send a powerful spell her way only for it to be deflected by the purification monk.

Just before she was able to reach the Athame she was suddenly hit in the side by the fleshy mass of the Dark Spirit. The terrible blow threw her across the room, and she struck the wall. Thankfully nothing broke, but she barely was able to stand up in time to block another of the strikes which sent her tumbling back again. When she rolled to a stop, she found it had opened it's distorted maw and was biting down towards her. Raising her artificial arm she jammed it into its mouth and said "If you want to eat something, eat this!"

She flexed the controls in her arm and the Athame blade that she had placed within it shot free and pierced itself deep within the skull of this flesh cocoon the dark spirit had created. The spirit instantly reacted by letting go with a screech of agony and wheeling back. Now free, she glanced back towards the sigil and saw that it was almost ready to pop. Trying to stand she found her legs didn't have any strength from the brutal blows, so there was no way she could make it in time. At least not her body, she thought, glancing towards her arm. Roaring out she poured magic into the rune on her hand and then unleashed the limiters that were put upon the grappling hook.

Her metallic arm blazed forth in a furious orangish red glow of flames and she fired the hook at the corrupted Athame. The force of it leaving pushed her arm back, and it shot out with a mighty boom. It raced across the room and then slammed into the Athame. The Force of the blow caused the blade to bend then snap. When it snapped it let out a blast of divine energy that destroyed a section of the sigil. However, the energy in the sigil didn't fade; rather it went wild and then her world went white.

There was a ringing in her ears as she came to coughing out dust. She was covered with rubble and dust and quite frankly hurt all over. Several ribs felt they might be fractured and her mechanical arm was bent and beaten. The grappling cable had been shorn off as well. Looking around she realized she could see daylight coming in from above, she was in what remained of the basement. She was hurt really badly, she was down to fifteen HP at the moment, though she was lucky. It appeared to her that when she had stopped the sigil from completing it had released all that pent up energy as an explosion. Thankfully it was not a controlled explosion, so it did not cause corruption to spread out.

As she forced herself to her feet, some rubble near to her shifted and a fleshy mass that had once been Sineo emerged. It looked around and screamed in pure anger. "You fucking cunt! You're the bitch that ruined all my plans aren't you? I bet you were the one who destroyed my ritual too! I'm going to rip apart your body while keeping you alive. When you can no longer feel pain, I will then use your soul as my personal cocksleeve!"

Even though it was injured, it was still able to move unlike her. Still she attempted to flee on unsteady legs. It reached out towards her with a melting flesh hand when there was a bright flash of red and it was sliced off. Emerging from under some rubble was the armored monk whose armor looked battered. Sineo screamed in pain, but was silenced when the red stone blade sliced through him several times causing the thing to burst into flames. Within seconds the corrupted elf was no more, just a pile of ash.

Before she could relax, however, the armored monk then raised her blade towards her neck. She could feel the sharp blade pressed against her skin and while she could not see into the helmeted face of the monk, she knew for certain that should she make the wrong move here that she would be killed.

Wondering what to say that would allow her to keep her life, an oddly cold presence of divine energy appeared behind her. The monk's attention shifted to looking behind her and the blade dropped from her neck and she released a sigh of relief. Glancing back she found herself almost dropping to her knees as she found herself looking at what had to be a true avatar of Letum. For a long minute the monk and god simply stared at one another before the monk turned around and leaped up and out of the basement.

Letum shook his head and then turned towards her. "I thank you Natasha Scarlet for your great service. This city would have suffered if it was not for you. For completing my task, I shall grant you my blessing." From beneath the robes of the Avatar came a bony hand and it poked her forehead.

She felt a great chill pass over her and then warmth began to flood into her. Looking down she was amazed to find that her injuries were healing fast. "The world is filled with loose life energy and has no owner, it's just waiting to be recycled. The blessing I have given you allows you to tap into that energy to heal yourself. Do be aware that your healing depends on how much loose life energy is in the area when you activate it."

A Blue screen popped up letting her know a bit more.

"I thank you Great God Letum. I am honored to have received your blessing."

"As I am to have granted it. Use it wisely." Letum said then glanced towards the direction that the monk left. "Help this city the best you can, but do be careful. I have no desire to see you cross over before your time." Letum said with a wave and then he disappeared in a strange grey mist that wrapped around him and then he was gone.

With silence dominating the remains of the basement, she realized that she could hear the sounds of combat coming from above. It sounded like an absolute madhouse out there. As she began to look for a way to climb out of the basement, she found a glowing marker coming from Jack. It was letting her know exactly where the remaining rewards for the quest were. It led her to a fallen wall behind which an old chest lay. It looked to have been long hidden, and thanks to the sigils keeping the corruption in the basement had been untouched by corruption.

Opening it, she found a beat up book in which were four runes in it, along with a brass plate with another rune engraved on it. The last thing that was in the chest was a strange orb that radiated a dark energy. It consisted of moving circles that she could turn, and on each section were numerous symbols. She would examine them later and placed them into her inventory for now. As she looked around, she found the remains of the flesh cocoon. She wondered if that Dark spirit had survived the explosion. Digging through the flesh she recovered the athame and placed it into her inventory.

As she climbed through the rubble and eventually found the old exit out to the yard. Right before it she found a confused looking guard monk who was now completely awake, and he looked at her and said "Where am I? What happened here?"

ElKriJa

Thank you for reading my Story. I hope you enjoyed this chapter. I recently realized that I have a lot of female users compared to male users. So I think the next few Users that Jack gets will like be guys. When that happens will be much later.