With a sinuous tilt of his shadow-shrouded head, the figure peered down at the valiant trio. A smirk curled the corners of his lips, unfurling into a cacophony of scornful laughter. "Ah, the would-be saviors," he sneered. "Many have sought to halt my ascent. All have faltered." Lyrielle, her spirit ablaze with indignation, cast her gaze upward. "What fate has befallen Lorion?" she demanded. The dark elf's eyes gleamed with malice. "Patience, child. The hour to unveil your kin is nigh MUAHAHAHAHA!" His evil laugh bellows out over the darkened temple.
Lyrielle's voice, a tempest of wrath and sorrow, pierced the charged air. "Was it your hand that wrought my mother's demise?" Her hands moved with lethal grace, unsheathing twin daggers, their blades whispering promises of retribution. "The stench of death clings to you, necromancer. This day shall be your last!" she vowed.
Zacarya, with a bowstring taut as his resolve, hesitated. The need for knowledge outweighed the urge for vengeance. "Speak, fiend. Why do you defile this realm? Your origins are a mystery, yet your presence here is an abomination," he intoned.
Enai, ever vigilant, rested a hand upon the hilt of sword, the metal yearning for battle. His armor lay dormant, a silent sentinel awaiting the call to arms. He perceived Zacarya's intent to unravel the enigma of the Morasu elf and held his breath, allowing the interrogation to unfold.
The necromancer's countenance, etched with contemplation, regarded the frost elf with a flicker of interest. "You know of me, yet understand so little," he mused, his voice a chilling harbinger of the darkness to come.
"So it unfolds," the dark elf intoned, his voice a serpentine hiss that slithered through the air. "Your demise is but an echo away, and yet, I shall grace you with a parting curse." His eyes, twin abysses, gleamed with malevolence. "Behold, a power greater than mine stalks the marshlands of the east, towards the Long Spear tribe's sanctum. But you shall not live to see the tomorrow, for Salaria's sun sets upon you this day. My master, the harbinger of decay, marches with an inexorable legion of the dead."
A cruel mirth danced upon his lips as he regarded Lyrielle. "Your mother, ah, she delved too deep into the shadows that cloak my being. A pity, her arcane prowess could not discern the venom I wove into her fate—a bacterium, my own vile creation, that snuffed her light." His gaze hardened. "Shall we begin this deathly dance?"
Zacarya, his spirit unyielding, drew his bow with a whispered spell, loosing an arrow that cleaved the air towards the necromancer's heart. But with a flick of his wrist, the dark elf conjured a bulwark of bone, deflecting the missile with ease. A smirk unfurled on his lips as he raised his arms heavenward, invoking the eldritch words, "Mo'rasan, D'elvo Hu'rran!" The very marrow of the earth heeded his call, as skeletal warriors, bound by necrotic sinew, rose to form a ghastly phalanx.
From the shadowed recesses, the decayed visage of Lorion emerged, his jaw agape in silent torment, his scalp bereft of life's warmth. The necromancer's command was a siren's call to the undead. "Rise, my grotesque darlings, and feast!"
As the horde converged, Enai's armor sprung to life, encasing him in a resplendent shell of Tion mithril, each segment locking with the precision of destiny's hand. Lyrielle, her senses heightened by the crushed herb's essence, brandished her blades, their edges singing for vengeance. Zacarya, undeterred, nocked another arrow, its tip ablaze with arcane fire. With a chant that split the silence, he released it, sending the flaming harbinger straight into the hollow chest of Lorion, seeking the heart that once beat with life.
In the grim dance of death, the creature that once bore the semblance of a man now groaned with the hollow voice of the grave. It lumbered forward, relentless in its pursuit. Zacarya, his resolve as unwavering as the ancient Whispering trees of Lilivia, ignited another arrow with the sacred fire of the phoenix. With a swift motion, he released a trio of fiery bolts that soared through the air, striking true and felling the abomination.
The horde pressed in, a macabre tide of decay, as the necromancer's voice thundered through the crypt. "K'erin S'efian Cor'io!" At his command, the undead's eyes blazed with an eldritch purple flame, their maws expelling a torrent of violet inferno towards the heroes. Yet, with the grace of the wind itself, they evaded the deadly embrace of the flames, their movements a ballet of survival.
Enai, his voice a conduit of power, chanted the ancient words to awaken his blade. The sword burst into life, its edge a line of fire in the darkness. He danced amidst the dead, a whirlwind of light and steel, severing the unholy bond that tethered head to body, sending bones clattering to the stone below.
Zacarya, his brow furrowed in concentration, unleashed a volley of flaming arrows. They found their mark in the eye sockets of his foes, yet the undead marched on, undeterred by the flames that should have been their bane. A new strategy was needed, and quickly.
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Lyrielle, a tempest of fury and might, charged the encroaching ghouls. Her daggers, extensions of her will, plunged into the skulls of her adversaries, each thrust a sentence of eternal rest.
The necromancer, his patience frayed like the edges of reality, scoffed at their efforts. With a spell of "Loxian, cor'novio," he summoned the bones of the fallen to his call. They swirled around him, coalescing into a massive spike of ossified wrath which he hurled with a sorcerer's precision. Again, he invoked the incantation, and a barrage of bone spikes rained upon the heroes. They darted and weaved, a symphony of agility, each movement a defiance of the necromancer's will.
In the twilight of the battle, the valiant warriors vanquished the last of the skeletal horde, leaving only the sinister Necromancer, master of the macabre. With a flourish of his dark cloak, he conjured a barrage of bone spikes, launching them with deadly precision. One spike, aimed with malice, struck the noble Enai squarely in the chest, but his enchanted armor repelled the assault, sending him hurtling into the ancient stone pillar.
Lyrielle, the Tion medicine sage proved she was a valiant warrior as well., sought refuge behind a nearby column. A spike, infused with dark magic, pierced the pillar's hardened surface, and another lodged above, forming a precarious ladder of bone. Zacarya, the agile squire, seized the opportunity, ascending the spikes as a flood of memories besieged him. A childhood tale whispered by the hearth, a story of the Morasu Dark Elves' hidden frailty to the siren call of void magic, surged to the forefront of his mind. With a defiant cry, "Thelion Anu'ul!" the tips of his arrows ignited with a radiant purple hue, the essence of void magic sanctioned within the realm of Salaria.
As Enai regained his composure, his blade ready for retribution, he charged at the Necromancer, who was fixated on Zacarya. The Necromancer, undeterred, unleashed a duo of bone spears. The Dark Elf, with a dancer's grace, evaded two of the enchanted arrows, but the third found its mark, embedding in his chest and unleashing a torrent of ichorous black blood. His agonized scream echoed through the chamber.
Simultaneously, two bone spears sliced through the air towards the young Ice Elf. Zacarya, with the agility of his lineage, twisted mid-air, narrowly avoiding the first spear. Yet, fate was cruel, and the second spear struck true, impaling him against the wall, the cold bone of the spear biting into his flesh, as he was pinned like a butterfly for eternity's collection.
His wail tore through the silence of the crypt as the bone shard buried itself deep within his flesh. At that critical juncture, Enai emerged from the shadows, just as the Necromancer poised to unleash a fatal blow upon Zacarya. With a swift arc of his blade, Enai executed a flawless strike, severing the head of the vile sorcerer. The final bone spear, unsent, clattered to the ground, its dark purpose unfulfilled.
Enai's boots struck the stone floor with purpose as he approached Zacarya, his sword now a dark canvas painted with the Necromancer's sanguine essence. With a deft flick, he cast aside the vile ichor and hastened to his comrade's side. "Zac! Don't move, I'm coming over to you" he implored, his voice echoing in the hollow chamber.
Summoning Lyrielle with a desperate cry, she arrived with the swiftness of the west wind, her medicinal satchel clutched tightly. Her assurances were a balm to their spirits, yet the wound before her gaped menacingly, a maw of shadow and pain. From her pouch, she produced a vial of obsidian dust, the clotting agent of the ancients. "We must staunch the flow, Enai, and swiftly transport him to Lurg if he is to see another dawn."
Together, they extracted the spear, Zacarya's groans a grim symphony to their urgent task. "Time is a thief, and we its unwilling victims," Lyrielle murmured as she sprinkled the dust upon the wound. Grasping one of Zacarya's arrows, she urged, "Invoke the incantation, Zac, to kindle the powder."
Silence hung heavy as no words came forth from Zacarya's lips. Enai, gripped by fear, shook him, his pleas for awakening a desperate litany. Lyrielle, her eyes closed in silent supplication, whispered a prayer to the ancients. Opening her eyes, she declared, "One path remains to us." She administered Borian root, a potent stimulant, and Zacarya's eyes snapped open, his breaths shallow and rapid, his lifeblood ebbing away.
"Conjure the flame, Zac!" Lyrielle commanded. With his last vestige of strength, Zacarya uttered the incantation, and the arrow blazed to life, allowing Lyrielle to sear the wound closed. Stability returned to Zacarya, a fragile peace in the eye of the storm. To ease his suffering, she offered elderberry, its soothing properties a gentle embrace.
"We cannot venture forth with him in this state," Enai conceded, his gaze heavy with concern. "To Lurg we must return, for the safety of our kin and the mending of our brother."
"Elves are blessed with the resilience of the Kiov bulls, their wounds mending as swiftly as the seasons turn. Yet, before we embark on our journey, we must scour these hallowed halls for omens and artifacts that whisper of the future. A master necromancer, shrouded in the darkest of magics, marches towards the Long spear Tribe. Alas, my powers wane before such a foe. They stand as the mightiest kin north of the Sanguine River, their spears a forest of defiance.
Upon our return to Lurg, I shall dispatch a group of scouts to the tribe's majestic capital. Their mission: to shadow and chronicle, nothing more." Enai, with a solemn nod, acknowledges the weight of our task. He lifts Zacarya, cradling him with the tenderness of a brother, and lays him upon an altar of stone—a respite from the cold embrace of the earth. There, Zacarya shall rest, while we delve into the crypt's secrets, seeking tools and talismans to aid us against the encroaching darkness. Lyrielle nods in agreement.