DRAGON PUNKS NFT CHAPTER 05: Echoes of the Corridor

Thanks and shout out to @TagCash for helping with the headlined image concept!

Alice's lungs burned. She'd been training for months to get in shape for the biggest marathon of her life. Her muscles screamed and her bones ached. "You got this!" she thought as she pressed forward on a beautiful forest trail. The afternoon sun filtered through the canopy in scattered yet beautiful patterns. Her mind was racing with thoughts of competing in the marathon, her nagging boss, what to eat after, what emails needed to be checked. She was in no place to take in the natural beauty surrounding her as she made each stride forward.

Alice paused at a scenic overlook to adjust her headphones and finally take in the view of the bustling city below the mountains. “Beautiful!” she thought as she gulped back her water finally taking in the natural environment. The sun felt like a warm blanket and the cool breeze was just enough to make the temperature comfortable. It was a perfect day for training. Her music paused as an important work notification came in. She looked at her phone in silence. 

Finally peace and quiet she thought.  She found a smoothed out eroded boulder to sit on and take a rest, draping her headphones around her neck as she sat in silence listening to the sounds of nature and the quiet that surrounded her. As she caught her breath she sighed, closing her eyes to soak up a few moments of peace. “I really needed this.” She thought to herself with a calm smile on her face.

She got up to continue her run when an uncomfortable sensation hit her stomach. “That's odd,” she thought as she stretched her legs.

Suddenly something primal kicked in. A sensation of total fear and terror filled the quiet natural air. She couldn't explain it, but every cell in her body was telling her to run. A putrid stench filled the air that made her nearly collapse and vomit. She keeled over and wretched, putting her hands on her knees as she spat at the dirt. “What the hell is happening?!” Her ears began to tingle and ring slightly. 

She stayed strong and composed. She took a few deep breaths and kept running. "I cant wait to get home" She thought as she descended the mountain. Each stride more urgent then the last.

Behind her, something terrible lurked through the trees, its grotesque form defying natural order. A putrid fluid oozed from its body leaving sizzling trails on whatever it touched. Tattered wings snapped open and closed, it moved with jerky, unnatural motions, as if reality itself struggled to hold it together…

Still unaware of the creature's presence Alice gasped in pain, her voice barely audible above her own thundering heartbeat and the increasing ringing in her ears.

Her legs began to tremble as her nervous system overloaded. What started as a routine training day was turning into something out of a nightmare. It took all of her strength to stay upright. "This can't be happening!" She cried in horror. Her mind and thoughts were confused as her body trembled in fear, she staggered along the trail as fast as her fatigued legs would carry her.

Her mind wanted what her body could not provide. Her muscles gave out and she collapsed in the dirt, her freshly manicured nails dug into into the dusty gravel and dirt. Her body was at its limit, it was starting to shutdown for reasons she could not understand. For no reason she could explain she turned her head to look back at the forest behind her. She screamed in horror as a massive creature's eyes were locked in on her. Pupil less orbs of crimson and black. Its jaws snapped and parted to reveal rows of needle-like teeth dripping with blackish green saliva that ate through fallen leaves and brush upon contact.

The creature closed in.

The fear overcame her and Alice was paralyzed. Unable to move, her eyes locked on the creature in shock.

This is it, she thought. This is how I die.

The monstrous predator let out a horrendous screech that reverberated through the forest, sending birds scattering in a panicked flight. It coiled its haunches, preparing for the final lunge.

Alice struggled like a helpless worm in the dirt.

The nightmarish creature sprang forward... Alice closed her eyes not able to bare what she was about to experience.

And just like that.

It vanished.

One moment it was there, a horrific vision of corrupted flesh and fury, the ultimate predator. And the next... nothing. No sound. No movement. No monster.

Alice was in shock, certain her terror-filled mind was playing tricks on her. She sat up slowly, wincing at the pain in her stomach, and scanned the forest around her. Birds gradually returned to their perches. The forest seemed to exhale, tension dissipating like a soft morning mist.

"What was that...?" she whispered to no one. Her voice quivered.

She climbed to her feet sobbing, brushing dirt and leaves from her body with trembling hands. She scanned where the creature had been, the air shimmered briefly—like heat rising from sun-baked asphalt—then settled back to normal.

Alice approached the spot cautiously, every sense on high alert. Nothing seemed amiss, except for the deep gouges in the earth where the creature's claws had been moments before. The edges of these gouges were blackened, as if burned by acid.

"It's just... gone?" Alice murmured in disbelief. Relief flooded through her and she let out an uncontrollable scream of terror as her only way to process what she had just witnessed. She was in shock.

***

The beast let out a roar of confusion that echoed through the swirling chaos of the Space Time Corridor. An interdimensional place outside of any physical reality. One moment it had been lunging for its prey, the next it was tumbling through a tunnel of pulsating energy and fractured light. Anger and ferocity flowed through its veins.

The Corridor between worlds was not a place meant for creatures of flesh and blood. Reality bent here, twisted into impossible geometries. Colors existed that had no names or descriptions. Time stretched and compressed unpredictably.

The creature's wings flailed uselessly against the non-air of the interdimensional space. Its corrupted body contorted, an affront to natural law, it writhed in agony as the Corridor's energies pressed against it from all sides.

Then something moved in the chaos. Something with purpose closed in.

Sayonara Rex had been tracking this particular abomination for many cycles across multiple worlds. The corruption it carried was spreading like a plague throughout the multiverse, infecting other species wherever it went. It was Sayonara Rex's mission to stop it.

Rex was a dragon warrior from a highly sophisticated yet intense volcanic world. His scales glowed like orange magma. His face was hidden behind a protective mask. His eyes carried an intense glow.

Dragon Punk #121

Rex's form materialized more fully, he wore a leather jacket with magic rune symbols that pulsated in rhythm with the Corridor itself. His magma scaled skin was protected by an advanced technology. In one hand he gripped a katana like blade that cut through the fabric of reality itself as he moved; in the other, a stabilizing device anchored his form within the Corridor's fluctuating currents.

The monstrous being sensed his presence and twisted towards him, its disorientation immediately replaced by hatred. It recognized Rex as the hunter who had pursued it across worlds.

"End of the line," Rex growled, his voice distorted by the Corridor's physics. "Your corruption stops here."

The creature unfurled to its full size, the corruption within it actually drawing power from the Corridor's chaotic energies. Its form began to shift and grow, adapting to this impossible environment faster than Rex had anticipated.

Not good, Rex thought grimly.

The monstrosity struck first, moving with impossible speed. Its tail—now elongated and tipped with a barbed stinger that hadn't existed minutes before—whipped toward Rex's head.

Rex ducked and rolled through a patch of slower-moving time, the tail passing harmlessly overhead. He countered with an upward slash of his blade, scoring a deep gash along the creature's underbelly.

Corrupted fluid sprayed outward, freezing instantly in the Corridor's void before shattering into countless crystalline shards that hung motionless in suspended space.

The beast shrieked, the sound distorting into something that threatened to crack Rex's protective gear. It lashed out with claws that left tears in the energy fields—jagged wounds in the Corridor that then leaked strange dark colored corrupted energies.

"You're making everything worse!" Rex snarled, dancing backward through fluctuating gravity. "The Corridor can't take this kind of damage!" 

Around them, the interdimensional tunnel began to destabilize. Sections collapsed and reformed in unpredictable patterns. The boundaries between worlds grew thin, translucent windows appearing and disappearing randomly—glimpses into countless realities.

Through one such window, Rex caught a fleeting image of the human woman Alice that the beast had been hunting. She was standing in the forest crying, looking confused but alive. Good he thought. His Frequency Tachiom Matrix Disruptor had worked just in time.

The momentary distraction however cost him dearly. The creature's tail connected with Rex's side, piercing his armor and sinking deep into his flesh. Pain exploded through his nervous system as corruption began to spread from the wound.

The creature smirked and turned its gaze back onto its original pray. "Nooo!" Rex cried out. "Don't you dare!"

The creature lifted the impaled Rex closer to its snarling jaws.

An evil grin crossed it's face as if it was mumbling a crawling snarl “I win”.

In a split second the creature's disfigured right hand pierced the Corridor to earth, to Alice. His large rotting claw hand materialized next to the crying Alice before she could even react to its sudden presence. Its large rotten fingers wrapped around her neck.

All he had to do was pull her in and it would be over.

“WEAK!” it said in a low blood curdalling voice.

Rex wasn't going to give up that easily. 

He shucked off his mask and opened his mouth and bit down on the creature's stretched out arm with all his might severing it from its body. The portal closed as the arm was severed.

In Alice's world, the creature's arm still clang to her neck as it collapsed to the ground oozing neon acid blood and a black tarish like slime. She couldn't breathe as the disfigured hand was locked around her neck. The creature's arm was almost the size of Alice herself.

She desperately faught to rip the fingers of the beast off her neck. Her vision slowly began to fade. 

"Argh!" Rex roared, slashing desperately with his blade, severing the barbed tail embedded in his side. The monstrous beings jaws snapped nearly missing Rex's face, it recoiled, as its severed tail fell into the voids of the Corridor.

Rex stumbled backward, one hand pressed against his wound. The corruption was spreading faster than his body's defenses could contain it. Black veins began to spider outward from the puncture. He needed to end things quickly or risk becoming corrupted himself.

The horrifying predator, sensing his weakness, gathered itself for what would surely be a killing blow. Despite missing an arm and tail, its form seemed to grow larger, darkness coalescing around it as it fed on the Corridor's energies.

Rex reached for the device in his jacket pocket—a last resort. The Time Disruptor was a dangerous tool, unpredictable, and hard on his body even when he wasn't wounded. But he had no choice.

"This isn't over! ," he challenged through gritted teeth.

As the corrupted hunter lunged, Rex activated the device.

The Corridor around them splintered into a thousand doorways, each leading to a different world. Rex's form blurred as he began bouncing between dimensions in rapid succession—a desert world with plains full of sand tornados, an ocean planet where gravity ran sideways, a metropolis built entirely from living plant like creatures.

The beast howled in rage and followed, tearing through each dimensional barrier with brutal efficiency. Each barrier it shredded released a shriek like tortured metal.

Each jump weakened Rex further, the corruption spreading from his wound leaving a trail of tainted energy across the multiverse. His vision blurred. The pain was becoming unbearable. But he had to keep moving, he had to shake the creature off his trail.

Jump. A world of endless twilight where shadows moved of their own accord.

Jump. A realm where thoughts became matter, briefly manifesting his fears as twisted sculptures.

Jump. A void filled with sentient stars that recoiled from his corrupted presence.

The hellish creature was always just a step behind him, relentless in its pursuit, its roars echoing across dimensions.

With his strength failing, Rex made one final, desperate leap—putting every last bit of energy into a blind jump toward the furthest world his device could reach.

The landing was rough—a bone-jarring impact on a surface that felt like frozen glass. Through fading consciousness, Rex registered a landscape of towering crystal formations that refracted light into impossible patterns. Beautiful, in a cold, alien way.

He sighed in relief. 

The device in his hand sputtered, its circuits overloaded from the wild dimensional jumping. Blue sparks danced across its surface before it went dark.

Darkness crept in at the edges of Rex's vision as the corruption continued its spread through his body. The black veins had now reached his neck, each pulse sending waves of agony through him. His last conscious thought was a desperate hope that the trail of corruption he'd left across the multiverse wouldn't lead the terrible hunter here too quickly.

Within a fleeting moment his vision faded to blackness as his body went into shock. The soft purple grass wrapped around him like a magical blanket, light pulsating as if it knew to begin cleansing his body from the corruption. 

Xylith Tearlock looked curiously to the purple grassy fields from the top of his study in the Resonance Spire Tower. "Another traveler has arrived! We must tend to him at once!" He said as he motioned a hand gesture to one of his subordinates.

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DRAGON PUNKS NFT CHAPTER 05: Echoes of the Corridor