Corruption Info

[frogfear]

Corruption

Stage 1

• Insomnia - Willow will begin to have trouble sleeping, leading to her being particularly restless when it comes to her Wolfwalker form.



• Difficulty Focusing - As the insomnia progresses, Willow will begin having difficulty focusing, and some mild confusion. This may lead to her being more prone to mirroring the emotions of those around her due to not being able to center her blood magic abilities.



• Impulsiveness - Impulsive decision making may lead her to be more reckless with using blood magic, or what blood magic she's more willing to learn or experiment with.

Stage 2

Insomnia - There will be an increase in Willow's insomnia, and restlessness, and what sleep she does get will not feel restful.

Impulsiveness - She will become more and more impulsive as well, and become more willing to experiment with more dangerous, potentially corrupting magic.

Time/Memory Loss - Willow will stop being able to remember her time spent in her wolf form, and draw the conclusion that the effects of Robyn's bite has passed. She won't be able to offer a rational explanation why, but will refuse to consider alternatives.

Stage 3

Time Loss/Insomnia - Willow will stop sleeping all together, and begin losing track of large chunks of time, where she won't be able to recall where she was, or what she was doing.

Hallucinations - Shortly after she stops sleeping, she will begin to suffer from 'visions' without attempting a spell from her own world. These may range from attacks perpetrated in wolf form to the sorts of magical attacks she was responsible for in the past as Dark Willow. During these hallucinations, her eyes will become black.

Paranoia - As she experiences hallucinations of what she believes she's doing to innocents, she will become increasingly paranoid as she tries to search for a solution on her own, causing her to withdraw from the people around her, both out of fear of how they might react if they find out she's been harming innocents, and out of fear of harming someone she cares about.

Stage 4

Physical Changes - Her hair and eyes will turn black, and her skin will turn pale. Late in this stage, her black veins will be visible under her skin as well.

Emotional Instability - Willow will develop a lack of fear, even in dangerous situations and show a disregard for her own safety, and the safety of those around her. Extreme emotions that will lead her to tend to be unkind and potentially violent to anyone who disagrees with her.

Vengeance - Willow will become aggressive and begin to magically target those who she believed have wronged her in some way, regardless whether the slight was real, or perceived.

Insomnia/Wolfwalker - Late in this stage, Willow will become exhausted enough to sleep, but her wolf form will also turn black and be far more aggressive, and likely to attack. Beasthood will be imminent at this point.

Beasthood

Image (CW: Blood)

Willow will not be able to use magic while a beast. She will still target those she knows in particular over strangers, but she will attack anyone else who gets in the way as well.

code @ efryndiel

Comments

[frogfear]

Throwing some ideas down so I don't lose them.

Willow's magic is nerfed, not just due to the times that she has either consciously or not indicated she doesn't want that kind of power any more (sacrificing her own egg, some of the things she's said both at home in Deerington), but due to her own fears around corruption. She's seen what happens when she goes dark, and she knows it's tied to magic. It's a bit of a throwback to early season seven where she experiences anxiety around using spells and admits she doesn't trust the power she has. She pushed through it in Deerington because of the times it came down to do or die, and the knowledge that Deerington was a dream, but she can't manage to do the same thing in the real world that is Trench, especially given the issues revolving around corruption.

Her experiences in November (several encounters with Zealots in the streets, and nearly being bled to death at the Sleeper Farm) are what sets her back on the path of "I need to use magic or either someone I love, or myself, is going to die." This is ultimately what causes her to dive into the "how do I fix this?" aspect of her research rather than "why is it happening?" She doesn't want to die again herself, of course, but she's also outright afraid of what might happen if someone she loves dies based on her history (Dark Willow absolute chaos after Tara died, going dark and Ford's attempted murder after Ozpin died the first time, then regrets over breaking Julia's egg on impulse after Ozpin died the second time). This will play into her willingness to do whatever she has to to find ways to keep the people around her safe, including accepting help from sources she doesn't particularly trust.

Her Wolfwalker status ties into her anxiety around her own darkness too. Thanks to Mebh, she understands why it's happening, and is a little more comfortable with it, but still finds it hard to fully trust it after her experiences in Sunnydale. She shows some signs of accepting that this is part of her life now, but she still doesn't want it, and still considers it a curse (downplaying a little in her conversation with Vyng that it's essentially inconvenient shapeshifting). She still pushes this part of herself away too, just like her separation between herself and 'Dark Willow' which is why corruption initially manifests as insomnia, and progresses to flat out denial that she still is changing when she starts not being able to recall what happens when she's in wolf form once she reaches stage two. It's manifested attempt to detach herself from the aspects of her personality she doesn't like, and isn't comfortable with as well as an attempt to give herself permission to try to start using magic properly again.

Stage three starts pulling into her own fears of what could happen in a worst case scenario. She's not sleeping at this point, so she is not changing into a wolf, but with a complete lack of sleep comes hallucinations, paranoia, impaired judgement/poor decision making, etc. She realizes she was wrong about not changing before, after she begins to hallucinate about harming innocents either as a wolf, or as Dark Willow as the darker aspects of her personality she's been trying to deny start to become more apparent. She might start to think it was a mistake to try to regain her use of magic, but decide she's in too deep and doesn't feel like she can ask for help, especially not from the people who know her history. This will drive her to isolate herself from the people she cares about, both because she's afraid of hurting them, and doesn't want to feel judged by them, or lose their friendship/respect.

Willow originally went dark at home because of her grief and rage over Tara's death. In Deerington, it was a number of factors - complicated grief after Buffy and Giles went home combined with the news that Ozpin had died and not returned as expected, and might not return at all, in addition to the bite of a Deerington creature (floral rat) that caused the victim to go rabid over significant relationships, regardless whether it was platonic or romantic. Coming down from it in both cases meant dealing with the grief over those losses. In Trench, I'm aiming for reversing corruption to come more from Willow accepting who she is as a whole, as opposed to trying to separate herself into Light vs Dark and Sleeper vs Wolf, which will allow her to begin using magic properly again completely, with either blood based magic taking a back seat, or changing entirely from Paleblood to Darkblood.