Ukhu Pacha was the Quechua realm of the dead, ruled by a death god named Supay. I still wasn't 100% clear on the difference between Inca, Quechua, and Maya. My Arizona Strip public education had done a fairly decent job covering the history of the tribes more native to our region, like the Paiute, Hopi, Navajo, and even invaders like the Apache, but not much farther south. I'd been studying up on the encounter itself, and knew we would be fighting alongside Jaguar warriors and acid-spitting llamas.

"Why acid?" Mitch asked, scratching his head as I briefed the team.

"Llamas are well known for their spitting," Annie said, "and I guess that's a good way to weaponize it. Anyway, they're on our side, so we don't have to worry about it."

"I have a feeling that we definitely need to worry about it," Javier said. "My grandpa used to farm llamas, and they were vicious, even when you were bringing them their food. He had alpacas too. Now, alpacas are nice!"

I held up a hand. "Not important. There will also be demons of various sorts on our side. This will be a final boss fight, so he'll have plenty of health and quite a few tricks. We're going to help out as much as we can. With luck, the Proxima team won't be prepared. This is a sealed boss encounter. That means if we kill one of them, he can't come back. Our focus is going to be killing them before they can take down the boss."

The first attempt that a team made against a boss was usually pretty easy to counter. I was only worried because it was clear our enemies were coordinating. One slip-up by me or anyone else on our side, and the whole house of cards could collapse.

"Let's go," I ordered. “We need to get this done so we’re able to support everyone else."

We ascended a ladder from the kobold tunnels out into bright Andean sunshine. Wind rustled my coat and hat. I pushed my hat a little more firmly down on my head as we took in the surroundings.

We stood atop a mountain which had been flattened and paved with stones fitted neatly together. Below us, the mountain fell away in steep terraces. The terraces were clearly agricultural. Neat rows of crops grew. It was a little too far to make out what they were. Just green shoots sticking out of the land.

"I thought this was a death realm," Mitch said, as we stumbled forward.

"It has aspects of rebirth as well," I said. “Been doing some research on this one since we knew it was coming.”

A little farther ahead stood a stone wall with a gate opening and beckoning us. "Through there," I guessed. And we hurried forward.

Beyond the stone wall was a wide courtyard. In the center of the courtyard rose a stone pyramid consisting of four tiers, each about 15 feet above the next. The fight was taking place on the top two tiers of the pyramid.

"Let's get in there!" I shouted as we rushed forward.

"Wait!" Mitch shouted, and I backpedaled so fast I crashed into Lara and took her to the dirt. Javier wasn't quite so fast to react. He ran forward and tripped the explosive trap that Proxima's team had left behind for us. Javier exploded in a zillion pieces.

A minute later he texted. Sorry. The respawn put me on a lower terrace, it’s going to take a couple minutes to climb back up.

"Alright, try not to get dead," I told my people. "Mitch, any other traps?"

"Let me go first," he said. "I'm not as good with traps as Brown is."

He walked forward slowly. I kept my head on a swivel, watching for a back line Proxima might have left. Mitch set foot on the first step of the pyramid. He paused.

"Definitely a trap up there. I'm going to try to disarm it." A second later, he shook his head. "Can't disarm it. It's too advanced for me."

"But we don't want to just set it off."

"No, that would be not great," he agreed. "What do you suggest?"

My eyes darted around the courtyard to the rows and rows of snarling, animal-faced sculptures lining the place. They had the heads of various animals—eagles, lizards—with the body of human men. It was interesting how a concept like that could vary based on the art style. Egyptian gods had the same kind of body plan, but these looked nothing like the statues of Horus or Isis that I had encountered when fighting in Egypt.

"These look like adds that come to life in a later phase,” I said. I crossed to them and examined them. Sure enough, my allied status let me spot that these were minions of Supay to be called to his aid. I touched one and a menu popped up.

[Do you wish to manually activate this minion?

Yes/ no. Minion will be unavailable for activation during later phase.]

"Yes," I said.

The statue, which had the head of a snake, roared to life. It turned to face me, raising its hands in a clearly questioning gesture. I pointed to Mitch. "Go where he sends you.”

Mitch directed the minion straight into the trap Proxima had left. It exploded and destroyed the statue-minion.

"Okay," I said. "Find the next trap."

It took us eight more minions to disable them all and reach the second terrace from the top. Here, half of Proxima's team was fighting against Jaguar Warriors.

I was pretty sure Jaguar Warriors were an Aztec cultural thing, not Quecha, but tell that to the reality engine. In this case, they were actual jaguars standing on two legs, wearing gold loincloths and elaborate sun headdresses, and wielding obsidian-tipped spears. They were locked in combat with members of Proxima's second-best progression team.

"Focus down the miners,” I ordered, and we sprang in. To my surprise, all of Proxima's warriors had about three times as much health as I had expected, and my shots weren't doing the usual damage.

"Who's got a better Inspect?" I called.

"I do," Annie yelled. "Oh, I see. They're all wearing buff belts. Those are expensive," she said. "They're belts of might. It gives them extra big health pools and a damage resistance buff."

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"Of course they do," I muttered. "All right. We'll do this the hard way. Focus fire on my target!”

It was taking much too long to get through them. We had taken down two, when I glanced at the top of the pyramid where the boss was fighting. I couldn't see much of the fight, but I could target the boss. He was already at 40% health. That was a lot lower than I liked.

"Anyone get a read on when we're likely to toggle a phase changeover?" I asked. The statues below had not yet come to life and charged in, which meant there was definitely at least one new phase to this fight.

"Want me to race in there and check it out?” Lakshmi asked. "I'll probably get pretty close if I put up a shield."

"No, we need you here on heals.” I took careful aim and shot a lizardfolk woman who was carrying one of those crystal healing staffs.

I hadn't seen any sign of the Proxima team leader. He must be up top with the boss. "Hester, you go. Take a look and try to throw one of your debuffs on the raid."

Hester was a [Non-ironic Beat Poet.] Her bag of tricks was one of our weirdest and most versatile. She didn't get along very well with most of our other raiders, and I had to take her aside occasionally to remind her to follow orders, but she understood the seriousness here.

She raced up the steps. “Tossing in [Unaccompanied Sonnet],” she yelled.

That was a wide area debuff that claimed to “force the targets to examine their unexamined assumptions and deal with their innate prejudices in a healing fashion”. It actually just reduced their dodge chance and gave them a nasty little damage over time effect that wouldn't go away unless specifically healed.

A moment later, Hester reported, "I'm seeing that he'll kick off the next phase at 33%."

I wanted to be there for that. These phase changes were one of the places where disruption was most effective. "Focus fire on the lizard woman," I shouted to everyone around me.

We dove in on her. I almost felt sorry for her as we broke through her shields and healing and chipped away at her health until she dropped.

Then I raced for the steps, ignoring the other Proxima warriors. They looked like they wanted to stop us, but they stayed to fight the Jaguar warriors, and I knew why. There was a fight mechanic that said if the Jaguar warriors were left alone on this terrace, they would begin raising an army of the dead to come to Supay's aid. That would inevitably mean a wipe. It was a mechanic designed to split up the raiding party. Right now, it was working well for us.

Up top, nine Proxima fighters surrounded the boss, a ten-foot tall monstrosity with a jade green body, golden ornaments at his wrists, ankles, neck, and ears, and an oversized head with a fixed laugh painted across his terrifying visage. Supay, lord of this underworld.

The Proxima team leader, the bear man, was right up front exchanging blows with him. Supay wielded an enormous two-handled wooden club with spikes of obsidian jutting out from it. Its handle was inlaid with gold and jade. The god brought it crashing down onto the bear, who materialized a shield to catch the blow, threw the club back, then dissolved his shield and rushed in with a short energy sword trying to stab the boss in a vulnerable region for extra damage.

Most of Proxima's team leaders also served as tanks, I had noticed. I wasn't sure if that meant anything, or if, like the orcs, most of Proxima's teams liked to know they were taking orders from someone in the thick of things.

The boss was at 36% of his health pool. We had very little time until the next phase began. I marked one of the support casters, a space elf female, with a golden crown and a rod in her hand. She alternated between casting fireballs and some sort of team buff.

"Take her down," I ordered.

We attacked. Her health pool stubbornly refused to twitch for the first few hits. Then whatever shield she had disappeared, and she began losing health. Just as we killed her, the boss gave an ear-piercing shriek and dissolved into raindrops that splattered the whole area.

For a second, I thought we'd lost, that somehow despite the fact that the boss still had a third of his health, Proxima had defeated this encounter. Then I realized we'd pushed him over.

The raindrops splattered down around us, hitting the stone of the pyramid. Wherever they fell, a sprout of green shot up.

There was an altar in the center of the terrace, covered in dried blood. When the drops of rain fell on it, small bubbles began to form, like brown pods. They grew rapidly, six of them.

At the same time, I heard shouts down in the courtyard as the animal-headed warriors came to life. The green shoots all around us grew and grew, reaching as tall as my shoulder in two seconds, then past my head. They put out leaves, and a moment later, I recognized them as corn.

The corn formed cobs wrapped in their husks. Meanwhile, the pods on the altar began to burst, and from each came a three-foot-tall, fully-formed man or woman, dressed in beautiful woven robes with feathery headdresses and carrying weapons. They rushed in and began attacking Proxima's warriors.

"Anyone got eyes on below?" I asked.

Mitch called back. "Proxima warriors are engaging the adds at the second terrace. They're badly outnumbered but holding their own."

Damn. So we probably wouldn't get reinforcements up here just yet. I debated. I didn't know what was next. I had a couple of aces up my sleeve, but if I used them, they wouldn't be available later.

I messaged Juana. Phase changeover. I've got a second before things really heat up again. How's it looking?

She replied in my earpiece. “All the kamikaze were successful. Teams foiling the other two-bosses-left attempts now. Your grandpa's making progress on his, but not done yet.”

“So you need reinforcements sooner or later?” I switched to subvocalizing instead of the message system.

“Sooner, I'm afraid,” she confessed. “And Shad?”

“Yeah?”

“The team in our instance, just took down another boss. Our spy got a good look at them. Your friend Mak'gar is leading. They're scary. They've got more equipment than I've ever seen. It's a multi-species team, including some that our spy had never seen before.”

My blood ran cold. I needed to be done here to get back and help out. But at the same time, what if I used up my best abilities now, and then needed them to stop Mak'gar?

"Focus fire," I shouted and dove forward.

Annie screamed. I turned in time to see three of Proxima's warriors converging on her. They skewered her with their energy spears, and before I could intervene, she was gone. It would take at least five minutes for her to get back, and by then this might be over.

I shot a barrage into the first of them, reloaded with boom rounds, shot, knocked one clear off the pyramid.

I shot another, but the warrior ducked my round and maintained his footing even in the explosion.

The green shoots of corn spread their tassels skyward. A moment later, the ears dropped to the ground. They were drawn together into an enormous pile beside the altar. A moment later, Supay was back, stepping out of the pile of new corn, as tall as before, but this time, wearing a cloak of corn silk.

The bear warrior from Proxima moved to engage him.

"How are we doing?" I asked my team. "I've lost vision on the fight."

“There are six of Proxima up here. Four down below,” Mitch reported. “The adds were powerful, but they're down now. The Proxima miners down below are swamped with what’s left of the jaguar warriors.”

"Everyone form up. We’re dropping back to the lower terrace," I said. I headed for the stairs. Just like Mitch had said, the four Proxima miners were dealing with over a dozen jaguar warriors. The miners — three foxes and a badger — were struggling to keep the warriors’ attention on them. Every time one wasn’t attacked for a couple seconds, it would break away and start channeling the zombie army spell.

I charged in and marked the first target. One by one, we took out the warriors. I almost wished Mak'gar could be here to see this. Yes, we were interfering with another team's attempts, but this was the most straightforward and honorable fight I'd had yet. No tricks, just straight-up combat.

Except each enemy we downed freed up a couple Jaguars to go back to channeling. As we engaged the last of the fox-women, the whole terrace started rumbling. The fox-woman cried out and die, as the pyramid began to shake violently.

I heard Supay bellow, “Face my wrath!”

A wave of zombie mummies poured up the steps from the lower terraces. It was so sudden and terrifying that I threw up my arms to protect myself. The wave broke around us, flooding past and up the stairs to the top tier.

I had to see this. I trotted up the steps after the last of the mummies. By the time I had a view, the bear warrior was the last standing. He saw me just as the wave of mummies hit him. He vanished under a pile of bodies, flailing and grunting in protestation.

Supay laughed as the last of Proxima despawned. Then the Quechua god of death raised his club in salute to us before dissolving.

I took a deep breath and turned to my team. "No time to waste. Let's get back right now. Juana, where do you need me?"