Corrosion.

It begins small. Invisible. A faint tarnish, a discoloration on the surface. You don’t notice it at first. You think it’s harmless. You think it will pass.

But it never does.

It spreads. It eats. It devours. Quiet at first, and then relentless, until what was once strong… is nothing but rot.

That is you, Nox.

The first time I met you, years ago, I knew. I looked into your eyes, saw the way you handled your “experiments,” and I knew—one day, if I wasn’t careful, you’d get under my skin. You’d burn me. That’s what corrosion does.

And so I kept my distance. That’s why we stayed apart in OSW. Because I knew. Your toxicity, your poison, your laughter at other people’s pain—it was going to destroy me.

But then Destructo, The Burned Man, they started clawing too close to the truth. And suddenly our purposes aligned. I stepped closer to you than I ever intended. I thought, maybe, I could control it. Maybe I could use the corrosion, hold it in my hands, bend it to my will.

But that’s the lie corrosion tells you.

I left my senses for power, and I let you in again. And the moment I did? It spread. It ate away at me, like acid through steel, until there was nothing left. And then it exploded. Like a bomb. And it left me for dead.

I know what corrosion feels like, Nox.

I know what it does to flesh. The way it eats, slow and sharp all at once. The way it crawls across your skin like fire and ice together. The way it steals the breath from your lungs, the way it screams in your veins. I’ve lived it. I’ve felt it.

And now you threaten my son with the same fate.

My boy. My flesh. My blood. A child who has done nothing but breathe. And you dangle him above an acid bath, laughing, knowing what will happen if I don’t lay down and let you pin me.

But listen to me, Nox.

I will not let him feel what I’ve felt. I will not let him know what corrosion tastes like. I will not let the poison you call joy touch him.

Because someone must stop you.

Someone must be the barrier.

Someone must be the one thing corrosion cannot eat through.

And that someone… is me.

Do you know what stops corrosion, Nox? It’s not fire. It’s not acid. It’s not more poison. It’s resistance. It’s coating. It’s the shield that refuses to let the corrosion in.

That is what I am now. I am the resistance to you. I am the line that you cannot cross.

You’ve spent your life laughing while you burn everything you touch. You’ve spread your rot through men, women, children, anyone unlucky enough to fall into your orbit. And for too long, I let you. For too long, I convinced myself I could manage the corrosion. That I could survive it.

But I won’t just survive you anymore.

I’ll end you.

For me. For what you did to my body, my mind, my soul. And for him—for my son.

And you, Nox, will rust away.