Butch and his Demi-god family

Down from the watchtower, the path bends toward the dungeon... and the three shadow sentries Butch left at the ford stand waiting in the wrong place. They flicker like torn smoke, no longer guarding, but shuddering under a black creeping stain.

The corruption spreads along their limbs in thin, worming threads. It is not random rot. It moves with purpose, as if something has found the shape of Butch’s magic and is pulling on it.

One sentry turns its faceless head toward the party. Its outline splits, then snaps back together, and a dark pulse crawls through the ford-path behind it like a trail being followed.

The corrupted sentries begin to step forward, jerky and half-real, blocking the road to the dungeon.

Butch reaches into the stain with a steadying palm, and the black threads recoil from his grip.

His shadow flares wide across the stone, then folds inward, claiming the sentries as if they were loose pieces of himself.

The corruption peels away in ragged strips and gutters down into the cracks, leaving the three forms whole again.

The nearest sentry straightens, its head turning toward a dark line beyond the ford, as though it has smelled the hand that pulled it.