The dungeons beneath the palace of Lich King Araxesendenak in Phyrexes, capital of Xeladre, were considered curious. Much like their creator—though few would admit either to the undead monarch’s face.

They were clean, for starters. In a day when the height of dungeon fashion was dank cells and rusted bars, those beneath the Calcified Fortress were well-lit and spider free. Mana lamps hung at regular intervals on plaster walls over stone and bone, still sturdy and just as difficult to tunnel through, but painted in muted earth tones and cheery autumn colors like you might find in one of the more well-to-do art galleries in the capital.

The cells themselves were similar affairs; spacious and furnished, with a practical bed and chair, a desk with a reading lamp, and even an enclosed commode for the privacy of the prisoner. There was even a regular meal schedule, and the meals were, if bland, at least nutritionally balanced and well-portioned.

When construction had first begun on the Calcified Fortress, the chief engineer on the project had approached the lich king with questions in his mind and on his lips, all centered around why in the nine hells Araxesendenak wanted a pretty dungeon.

“It’s quite simple,” the lich had replied in his nasally voice while washing viscera—left over from gathering resources for his throne room—from his skeletal hands. “To give them hope.”

The engineer had blinked a couple times, clearly not understanding.

“You see, my boy,” Araxesendenak had said, taking on almost grandfatherly airs, “you place a man in a prison cell, feed him rats, making him count the rust spots on the bars and number the stones in the wall, and you steal from him any hope of rescue or escape. But, you put a man in a well-lit cell, feed him, clothe him, and give him a place to rest up, and that flame of hope will remain kindled. He’ll believe, deep in his heart of hearts, that he might get out.”

“And that’s a good thing?” the engineer had asked.

“Of course,” Araxesendenak had said with his death’s head grin. “It’s no fun to torture a hopeless prisoner. No fun at all.”

And so the dungeons had not only been built to resemble a mid-tier roadside inn, they had been maintained as such over the hundreds of years as well. Everything was clean and well-lit; the mana lights changed out monthly to prevent them from burning out, the hinges on the heavy oaken doors oiled weekly to ensure smooth operation, and the masonry reinforced every five years to prevent erosion and moisture encroachment.

But beyond Araxesendenak’s philosophical musings on the nature of man, the other reason for making the dungeons as they were was simple efficiency. A well-ordered dungeon was a well-functioning dungeon, as Lich King Araxesendenak had remarked more than once.

And part of it, king Araxesendenak had explained once, was he simply enjoyed the look of confusion on a prisoner’s face when they saw the dungeons for the first time.

The processing of prisoners was just as orderly. First they were taken to the strip-out room, where skilled mages would remove any trace of magic or lingering status-effects from the prisoners, as well as any items of power or enhancement.

After that came the dressing room, where prisoners—freshly nude from their time in the previous room—were given the rough but serviceable clothing that would be theirs for the duration of their stay.

And the last stop before the actual dungeon cells was a small unassuming room at the very end of the hallway. And within that room, Giichi waited.

* * *

Ch1Sc3 - Sam

Alone, unarmed, head still reeling from the events of the past ten minutes, Samuel James Tolliver was fighting with all his might.

Specifically, he was fighting with all his might to die, while a dozen skeleton guards now in varying states of disrepair fought just as hard to keep him from killing himself.

It was an odd situation, thought that small portion of his mind that always seemed detached and clinical at moments like these as he tried to ram a spearhead into his eye socket only to have it torn away and flung down the corridor by one of his foes. Most captives in his situation would be fighting to escape, or perhaps to just deal as much damage to their captors as possible before the inevitable.

Although technically, Sam was fighting to escape. It’s just that in his case, as Guardian of the Last, death was not a finality but more of a passing nuisance. Upon perishing, he would not shuffle off this mortal coil, but would instead be reincarnated in an extra-planar space known only as the White Room, where he would wait scant minutes before being re-spawned near Cora, the dungeon-core-turned-golem woman to whom he was bonded.

It should have been simple. It should have taken his captors completely by surprise when he’d first lunged for a skeleton’s belt knife and tried to open his throat. It should have been.

But it hadn’t.

And now it was a running battle as he was dragged, kicking and punching, from the upper levels of Lich King Araxesendenak’s palace down into the dungeons beneath. A trio of skeleton guards, armed and armored to the teeth, clung to each arm as he thrashed. Two of their number were already down and re-dead in the corridor behind them, one with a crushed skull from a powerful headbutt from Sam, the other with a stomped spine where Sam’s boots had caught it napping.

But there were a dozen more in the corridor, each one clinging to him, weighing him down, forcing him to walk even as he called on all the powers at his disposal to fight back.

One of the skeletons clinging to his hands stumbled over an unseen obstacle, and loosened its grip ever so slightly. Immediately Sam’s hand opened and he Called for his weapon. Thumb Bane, the heavy darksteel warhammer once owned by his father and now bonded to Sam, appeared in his grasp by magic, and he felt the power of the weapon surging up, ready and eager to be used.

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Two of the skeletons immediately let go of his legs and fastened onto the hammer itself, trying to wrest it from his grasp. And they might have succeeded too, were it not for the peculiar Deathgrip power that prevented anyone not of sufficiently high level from taking the weapon from him.

With his legs now freed, he lashed out and kicked the nearest skeleton right in the knee joint, shattering bone and ripping cartilage, sending the undead monster tumbling to the ground. Another one pinwheeled into the nearby wall when Sam’s kick caught it right in the sternum.

And still they clung to him. Still they tried to drag him down, and denied him any opportunity to end his life and escape from this damned place.

One skeleton lost its grip on his non-hammer arm, freeing Sam’s hand for a split-second. Immediately Sam wove the casting symbol for Indiscriminate Justice, an area-of-effect attack that he’d purchased almost a month before. He twisted and stomped down with his left foot. The heel struck the ground, and the ability triggered, blasting out a ring of force that slammed into the skeletons and sent them flying backwards.

Unfortunately, none of them released their grip, so as they were flung back, they carried him with them. All of them went down in a tangle of arms and legs, flesh and bone alike. Sam swore and struggled, thrashing on the ground like an overturned beetle, trying to dislodge their grip just long enough to—

The hammer suddenly came free of the grasping hands, and he whirled it once, twice, three times, smashing a skull with each strike. And just like that he was free of grasping skeletal digits. He leaped to his feet, breathing heavily and swearing a blue streak. Hesitating only for the instant it took him to realize what his next move needed to be, he drew back the hammer and sent it careening right at his own forehead, intending to bash the life from his own head in one fast, strong stroke.

A dainty hand appeared in between his forehead and the hammer, and Sam nearly went ass-over-top as the weapon stopped dead in its swing and the momentum tore down his arms.

No! Not again!

“You know Tolliver,” said a nasally dry-as-dust voice from somewhere behind him, up the corridor from which he’d come, “I didn’t expect you to go quietly, but I must admit I expected even someone as thick-headed as you to understand when you were beaten.”

The voice of Lich King Araxesendenak galvanized Sam, and instead of looking back to where the voice came from he quickly activated as many of his abilities as he could weave the finger-signs for. Guardian’s Wrath joined Bite Their Kneecaps Off and a handful of other offensive abilities. He felt magical power surge through his veins, and he reared back and kicked out at Cuthbert, Araxesendenak’s little manservant, with every ounce of strength he possessed.

The little man gave out a soft ‘oof’ and stumbled back, and miracle of miracles the grip on Sam’s hammer faltered and fell away. He swung the weapon back, activated his Guardian’s Wrath again for a second strike, and brought the heavy weapon down in a brutal over-hand strike that would have shattered steel.

The hammer struck, and stopped as if it had just hit God’s own shield. The reverberations howled up Sam’s arms and the pain made him gasp and loosen his grip on the shaft. This time the little man’s hand that blocked the strike was pitch-black and glowing with an eerie kind of non-light. Sam stared as Cuthbert rose up from his kneeling positioned, eyes glowing the same color as his hand.

“Cuthbert,” said Araxesendenak from behind Sam somewhere. “I do believe our guest needs to be taught a lesson. If you please?”

The skeleton guards swarmed over Sam again. He felt Thumb Bane’s haft tugged from his grasp—not violently or suddenly, but with a steady inexorable pressure like a gnomish steam winch slowly winding its main cylinder. He struggled as even more skeletal guards, summoned from some recess of the fortress, piled on top of him, unable to do anything as Cuthbert turned and held out the hammer head-first to the grinning lich.

“An Heirloom Weapon,” Araxesendenak said, walking up and tilting his head to study the hammer more closely. “You don’t see these very often. Few mortals are capable of returning from death, fewer still able to carry their weapon with them when they do.”

Sam had no words, only a snarl of outrage and a renewed struggle.

“Now, if memory serves,” the lich king continued, “it requires at least a tier seven Destruction spell to even make a dent in one of these things… No, I tell a lie. It needs a tier eight spell, doesn’t it?” the violet eyeflames dimmed for a moment in thought, then brightened again when he switched his gaze over to Sam. “Let’s make it a Tier 9, just for completion’s sake, shall we?”

What? Sam’s eyes bulged.

It happened in the space between heartbeats. One second, Cuthbert was holding the hammer out to the lich like a lollipop on the end of a stick. The next, Araxesendenak had snatched the hammer up, placing his free hand on the head. A word of power came from the lich’s throat. There was a blinding flash and a crack like the vaults of the earth itself being torn asunder. And the old warhammer’s darsteel head cracked and shattered like dropped porcelain.

“No!” The denial tore itself from Sam’s throat even as the shards of darksteel dribbled to the floor. The haft of what had once been his warhammer hit the flagstones and bounced with a hollow thud, the metal of what had once been its head making a gentle pitter-pat in contrast.

“Much better,” Araxesendenak said in a smug tone. “Honestly, Tolliver, I would have expected you to accept your fate with more grace than this.”

“Then you’re dumber than you look,” Sam growled past the skeletal forearm that had gone across his throat. Inside, his mind was gibbering. Thumb Bane, the hammer that had taken him through dozens of battles, that had been his trump card against so many foes, that had been handed down to him by his own father… Gone? Just like that?

And now… The lich king clearly expected Sam to be reduced to blubbering incoherency—dear god Araxes’ vocabulary was rubbing off on him, one corner of his mind reported.

Well, damned if he was going to give the lich that kind of satisfaction.

“What,” he growled, summoning up what he could of his anger. “You thought that just because you ripped me across half a country without so much as a warning that I’d just bend over and—“

And then the lich waved an almost negligent hand, and a magic spell settled over him, and Sam found himself utterly immobilized. He felt the little haptic buzz at the back of his neck that told him a notification was awaiting him, and it appeared on his glasses a moment later, visible only to him in white text on a blue background.

You have been Paralyzed. You may not move or speak, but the caster has generously allowed you to continue breathing. Be grateful.

At least the lich hadn’t taken his glasses, Sam had time to think. He had no doubt at all that had Araxesendenak realized what the magical spectacles were and could do, he would have found some way to turn them to evil purposes.

The lich was kind of a dick like that.

“I’d rather hoped,” Araxesendenak said as he ambled forward like a man without a care in the world, “that you would have recognized the futility of your situation and approached it with at least a modicum of decorum.”

Sam spat a silent curse, but otherwise was able to offer no resistance as the skeletons around him levered him back up to a standing position.

“What,” Araxesendenak said, sneering. “No pithy rejoinder? You disappoint me again, Tolliver. I recall your penchance for wit back in the dungeon. Has it deserted you now?”

Cuthbert coughed into a closed fist.

“My lord,” he said in a bland almost completely inflectionless voice, “the paralysis will render him incapable of speech.”

“What?” Araxesendenak’s violet eyeflames winked off and on in what Sam had come to recognize as a blink. “Oh. Oh of course. Silly of me.” A bony hand was waved. “There, you now have the ability to respond. Feel free to utilize it.”

Sam considered and discarded a dozen different defiant statements. None of them seemed equal to the occasion. So instead, he fell back on an old standby. He stared the lich king right in those glowing eyes, took a deep breath, and stuck out his tongue and blew a raspberry at the ancient monster.

Araxesendenak blinked again.

“Ah. Yes. Quite.” The undead king heaved a dusty sigh. “I suppose I asked for that one.”

”Perhaps it is time to be less gentle with him”, said a feminine voice out of thin air somewhere above their heads. The voice of the Failstate, Sam remembered.

“I do believe you’re right,” Araxesendenak said. Turning to the skeletal guards, he commanded “Take him to the tattoo room.”

“Not the strip-out room, my lord?” Cuthbert asked as the skeletons started to drag Sam away again.

“No Cuthbert,” Araxesendenak said, never looking away from Sam. And after a second, the ancient monster’s grin widened. “No, let us ensure that our guest receives the full brunt of our hospitality before we rob him of his dignity, shall we?”

“As you say, sir.”