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Damage dealt to a creature by a source with wither and/or infect causes that source’s controller to put that many -1/-1 counters on that creature.

Damage dealt to a creature by a source with neither wither nor infect causes that much damage to be marked on that creature.

Finally, the damage event occurs.

Damage dealt to a creature by a source with neither wither nor infect is marked on that creature (see rule 120.3). If the total damage marked on that creature is greater than or equal to its toughness, that creature has been dealt lethal damage and is destroyed as a state-based action (see rule 704). All damage marked on a creature is removed when it regenerates (see rule 701.19, “Regenerate”) and during the cleanup step (see rule 514.2).

Wither

The wither rules function no matter what zone an object with wither deals damage from.

Wither is a static ability. Damage dealt to a creature by a source with wither isn’t marked on that creature. Rather, it causes that source’s controller to put that many -1/-1 counters on that creature. See rule 120.3.

If an object changes zones before an effect causes it to deal damage, its last known information is used to determine whether it had wither.

This is the only instant or sorcery spell that has wither. It works like anything else with wither: If it deals damage to a creature, the damage results in -1/-1 counters; if it deals damage to a player or planeswalker, the damage behaves normally.