The silence after the brutal fight was more deafening than the battle cries themselves. Amidst the ruins of the old bell tower, under the now-dimmed silver light of the dying Pillar of Purification, five figures stood panting among the three corpses of The Purifiers. Victory tasted like ashes in their mouths. The air reeked of blood, ozone from the dissipating holy energy, and the unnatural silence of the defiled forest.
Nihil stood upright, but it was a lie held up by sheer steel will. The Purifier's silver sword had pierced his left shoulder, and though he'd pulled it out, his wound wasn't closing. No black dust from `Void Reconstruction`. Instead, the edges of his wound glowed with a faint silver light, as if the wound itself had been blessed, refusing to heal. A burning, cold pain lanced through every nerve on that side of his body, not ordinary physical pain, but a constant conceptual assault.
