Round 163

The walls' coordinated breathing stops abruptly, plunging the corridor into a silence broken only by the insidious pulse of the rhythmic hum emanating from below. Halie's arm flails again, her movements becoming increasingly erratic as the corruption creeps past the 98% mark. The pressure plates beneath them grind ominously closer together, the mechanism preparing to crush them between the walls in a matter of minutes if nothing changes.

Jeane's flame magic radius flickers visibly, dropping to 43% effectiveness under the strain of maintaining it for so long. Her wings tremble from the effort, arcane energy crackling along their edges as she fights to contain the corrupting influence seeping through the very stone around them. Every nerve in her body screams from the arcane strain, but her eyes remain focused on Halie and the approaching wall mechanism.

Halie's gaze locks onto Jeane across the narrowing space between them, a silent communication passing between two women who understand the horror of their situation all too well. The rhythmic hum grows stronger still, its pulsing cadence almost hypnotic in its insidious pull downward toward the stairway and whatever lies beyond.