Everyone present at that moment was thrown away, rolling like twigs, and some were slammed against the wall.
At times a deep red, at times a dark purple of the night, a storm of miasma raged, swirling in the air.
The monsters, distorted beings manipulated by the Evil God through evil energy, possessed an affinity for evil energy.
As for those who were not monsters, malevolence was fundamentally poison.
Corrupted by evil energy, the mechanisms of life would go awry.
Merely being in a space with a high concentration of malevolence was harmful to the human race, but actively generating a more aggressive toxic evil energy was called “miasma”.
Amidst the raging miasma, the elves were spitting blood one after another.
The vampire stood at the center of the miasma storm.
With bloodshot eyes and blood smoke emanating from wounds on her arms and abdomen, she stirred up an evil wind with the miasma.
Her glossy black hair and maid outfit fluttered in the wind like fur.
She laughed.
Even if her voice was drowned out by the storm, she was undoubtedly laughing, roaring with laughter.
As if celebrating this moment, haughtily.
The gathered “Projections” disappeared into the miasma like smoke blown by the wind.
Though not holy energy, they were beings shaped as “Anti-Evil Energy”, and having been exposed to malevolence, they could no longer maintain their form.
The raging miasma continued to intensify, naturally not staying confined to the cave.
It permeated everything around, becoming a raging wind that blew out.
◇
Elves versed in magic, like birds and insects, noticed the disturbance at almost the same time.
It was hard to express the feeling in words, a stirring in the chest.
Fear, pain, and a premonition of destruction, as if a knife was being stabbed through them.
A moment after the Great Spirit Tree made an unpleasant noise, miasma erupted from it.
The calm, sunny sky was tainted with the purple of the night, erasing the dappled sunlight.
Birds and insects made noisy sounds, taking flight as if driven by the miasma, and quite a few were immediately overwhelmed by the miasma, falling down.
The nourishing soil, rich with life, around the Great Spirit Tree, began to transform into slimy, foaming mud reminiscent of human internal organs.
Elves who were unfortunate enough to be nearby collapsed before they could sense the danger.
Trees that partially caught the miasma like a breeze began to wither, losing their leaves like standing dead.
However, the trees directly hit by the miasma, especially the Great Spirit Tree at the epicenter, suffered more than that.
The forest screamed. It was the sound of creaking, twisting trees.
The once orderly and harmonious trees were gradually changing.
Twisting strangely, becoming blacker and blacker, they were dyed in a black that stirred up the anxiety of all living things. It was a sacred color called “New Moon Shade” by the followers of the Evil God.
The Great Spirit Tree spewed a storm of miasma from wounds in the cave at its base and various places on its trunk. It was a force similar to the smoke rising from a chimney in a human city’s forge.
Thick vines that coiled like spiral staircases, serving as passages, dripped red sap like blood and rapidly grew, entwining the Great Spirit Tree. It seemed to be sucking up evil nutrients from somewhere.
Certainly, it looked horrifying, not just in appearance.
The grotesque black trees had undergone a fundamental change.
Part of the chaos ordained by the Evil God.
A process towards the predestined destruction.
A transformation into a cursed forest, dreaming of the end where all things vanish into dust.
◇
And eventually, the wind subsided.
Elves were scattered throughout the vast cave.
Everyone — even non-combatants — had survived. The magic had no direct lethality.
However, that didn’t mean they were “unharmed”.
“Ugh, ugh, ugh…”
“Geha, geho…!”
“…Aaaah… Aaaaaaaahhh…”
Groans, coughing sounds.
Skin scorched by the miasma turned dark purple, some lost their vision, and others lost their voices.
Unable to even stand up due to the agonizing pain throughout their bodies, they could only writhe in the midst of spitting blood.
The pure radiance that had filled the Great Spirit Tree’s cave disappeared, replaced by a hideous darkness weighing heavily on everything.
The elves understood that this was fundamentally poisonous for them.
Still, they didn’t flee simply because they couldn’t move.
«Crimson Wrathful Heaven: Seven Generations’ Curse»
Retribution for the world. The cries of the oppressed.
This absolute contamination domain imprinted a curse on the world. The malevolence polluting the heavens and earth could only be counteracted by miracles of equal or greater magnitude; otherwise, it would continue to haunt for thousands of years.
The tragedy that befell them was a mistake that should never have happened in this world, a magical self-confirmation.
The embodiment of the single anger trampling over a small insect.
