Overcome

Finally, as it was getting more and more hard to keep the corruption out of the loop the Tuphor spirit did what it thought was best under circumstances. It let the gates connecting him and Zeph wide open to the curse energy. 

The old man was first to notice what it was doing. He exclaimed in surprise and wanted to stop the little spirit but before he could prevent this suicide move by the tree spirit, it vanished from its virtual world back to its own white expanse of the virtual world. 

The sudden departure caught the old man off guard. He immediately tried to resummon the spirit back to his world but soon found that some energy barrier was actively blocking his reach to the spirit Flute.  His face turned grim as it didn't take much genius to realize what was happening right now. 

It was the Tuphor tree's way of saving the Zeph. He had finally crossed that last stage of self-sacrifice and now was literally doing anything for the life of Zeph.