The air in the villa's grand hall thrummed with latent energy as Lin Fan raised his hand, tendrils of inky black mana coiling around his fingers like living smoke. This was no ordinary magic—it was the accumulated essence of Dormammu's dark dimension, siphoned from the Ancient One herself during their final confrontation. A power that had sustained Earth's former Sorcerer Supreme for centuries now danced at his command.
Psylocke felt the shift in the atmosphere before she saw it. Her psychic senses screamed warnings as the shadows in the room deepened unnaturally. The katana at her hip vibrated in its sheath, responding to the surge of mystical energy.
"You're joking," she said, her voice tight. The purple energy around her hands flared defensively. "That corruption..."
Lin Fan's smile never reached his eyes. "Observant. Let's see if you're as strong as you are perceptive."
With a flick of his wrist, the dark mana surged toward her.
---
Psylocke's world exploded into pain.
The dark energy didn't just attack—it invaded. It slithered through her synapses, whispered in the recesses of her mind where even she rarely ventured. Visions flashed behind her eyelids:
*A throne of screaming souls*
*The smell of burning dimensions*
*Dormammu's voice promising power beyond measure*
Her knees hit the marble floor with a crack. The psychic katana materialized in her grip instinctively, but what good was a blade against something already inside her?
Across the room, two figures observed from an ornate balcony.
Sebastian Shaw swirled a glass of 40-year-old Macallan, amber liquid catching the unnatural light. "She's lasting longer than most," he remarked, watching Psylocke's muscles tremble with exertion.
Emma Frost didn't bother with a glass—her full attention was on the psychic battle unfolding beneath them. "Her mental architecture is...unusual," the White Queen murmured. "All sharp edges and kill zones. Like her mind was designed for war."
---
Psylocke's fingernails dug bloody crescents into her palms. The Dormammu sigil now burned crimson on her forehead, its jagged lines pulsing in time with her heartbeat. Black veins spiderwebbed from her eyes, making her look like some gothic nightmare.
"Fight it all you want," Lin Fan said calmly. "But this energy has broken better minds than yours."
Psylocke's response was to spit blood at his feet.
Then she did something unexpected—she stopped resisting.
The dark mana rushed in triumphantly...only to slam into a psychic killbox Psylocke had prepared at the core of her consciousness. Every invasive tendril found itself impaled on razor-sharp thought constructs, trapped in a labyrinth of painful memories and sharper regrets.
Lin Fan's eyebrow arched. "Clever girl."
---
The Mind Stone flared to life on his gauntlet, its golden light cutting through the metaphysical darkness like a scalpel. Where the dark mana corrupted, the Mind Stone excised—precisely removing Dormammu's influence while leaving Psylocke's psyche intact.
Emma Frost stiffened. "That's—"
"That Artifact interference," Shaw finished, his glass freezing halfway to his lips. "Our host continues to surprise."
Down below, Psylocke gasped as the corruption evaporated. Her psychic blade reformed in her hand, its purple edge sharper than ever—not enhanced by dark magic, but refined by surviving it.
---
Lin Fan studied her with new interest. "Most people beg for mercy when the corruption takes hold. You weaponized it."
Psylocke wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. "I'm not most people."
From the balcony, Emma's voice slithered into her mind: *"Such potential wasted on a mercenary's path. The Hellfire Club could—"*
Psylocke's mental rebuff was immediate and violent. *"The only club I'm interested in has a blade through its heart."*
Shaw chuckled as Emma's nostrils flared. "Told you she'd be fun."
---
Lin Fan was already walking away. "We leave for Xavier's at dawn. Try not to kill anyone before then."
Psylocke watched him go, then turned her gaze upward to where Shaw and Frost stood. Her psychic blade flickered in challenge.
Emma responded with a diamond smile before teleporting away in a shower of crystalline fragments. Shaw tipped his glass in mock salute before following.
Alone in the ruined hall, Psylocke finally allowed herself to shake. Not from fear—from adrenaline. She touched her forehead where the sigil had been. The skin was smooth.
But something had changed.
And when the morning came, the X-Men would see it too.
---