02 The Creeping Light

(Only in the Lightcrept tag for posterity - this being is the corruptor of all Lightcrept characters.)

Out of a sea-cave shone forth a green glow,  which shifted and undulated through shades of fern and forest, avocado  and olive, and into lighter shades of moss and mint. The glow was both  offensive and captivating: it called out to the eyes like a beacon,  demanding to be seen, but if gazed directly into caused spots and  blindness akin to that of the sun. The light itself shifted, dancing as  if cast by a large fire on a particularly windy day, reaching out  towards shadows and then retreating just as quickly. To dally too long  near this cave was to become hypnotised by it.

Over time, something took shape within the light, somehow emerging out  of it. As the light changed shades, this shape did not, slowly darkening  into a deep pine green. The shape solidified, no longer emitting light,  in the form of a round mask. The mask’s eyes opened, two wide puddles  of olive and mint. From the back of this mask flowed glowing green  light, gushing at first like water but gradually congealing in a similar  manner to blood. It formed a gelatinous mass, vaguely $species in shape  with elongate limbs and ankles that turned the wrong way. The mass  darkened as it solidified into a deep olive, but from the centre of its  back and chest flowed that bright, watery liquid as if bubbled up from  springs unseen.

The resultant creature rose up from a pool of translucent, lime-tinted  water. It writhed impossibly, twisting in a manner only something with  no spine or muscle to hinder its motion could twist. As it twisted, the  hardened sections cracked and broke, forming many tiny islands in its  thickening slime. Its glowing eyes turned, leaving streaks of light in  their wake, spots of bright blindness in the vision of any onlooker. It  was like staring into two miniature green suns.

Bright liquid-light pooled forth beneath the snout of the mask, forming a  dripping lower jaw. This opened, and the creature spoke, though it did  not move its mouth to do so.

"What are you that seeks the Creeping Light? Dare you taste my essence? Would you risk my touch? Take it, yes, take me into you. Feel the light creep into your eyes. Let it flow through your veins. Soon it will creep through your flesh, and then you will be so much more"

The twisting  thing dissolves its mouth, pulling the liquid upwards to form large,  floppy ears. It's practically a charicature, signalling that it listens  for a response. The ears drip loudly into the pool below, while it  continues to writhe impossibly in the air, unheeding of such petty  things as gravity.

The Creeping Light is a sapient, near-omnipotent but not-omniscient writhing mass of liquid-light. It can shape itself into whatever form it likes, and though it does have favourites, it especially enjoys serpentine or eyanesque forms. Its concept of anatomy is loose - literally. Being liquid, it can't hold itself together forever, and tends to drip into a rather elongate form of whatever it's impersonating. Not that it matters - it could just as well be a writhing, shapeless mass, but that tends to make folks uncomfortable. It used to be trapped inside the superdense lump of proto-matter the Inner World itself was created from. It is a member of a trio of corruptor gods and is relatively measured and careful in its decisions and responses to things. 

There are many reasons a lot of the residents of the Grove get  progressively weirder the longer they live here, and the Creeping Light  is one of the biggest of all. It shines into the dark, enticing those  who don't know any better.  It pools for the thirsty where previously  water was not.

Don't look at it.

Don't drink it.

Speak to it with your eyes closed and your mouth covered, but breathe easy knowing that it and the Rising Mist can never be together.

Of the three corruptors, the Creeping Light is the most active and the least malicious.

Dragon.