7
Beyond the Devilfrosts, which rose like a terrible stony scar above the land, grassy plains and forests were replaced by tortured ground that spoke of some ancient cataclysm. The destruction suggested by the coastline around the Eyrie was written again a hundred times more intensely. Sections of the rocky, brutal landscape were heaved up into the air, revealing strata beneath lit by the bubbling lava forcing its way through the cracks in the world. The jagged iron architecture of jackalfolk fortresses clung to the few stable parts of the wasteland. Rivers with their headwaters in the mountains cascaded into lightless chasms in waterfalls wreathed in steam.
If the Devilfrost Mountains were a raised scar, the Schism of Centuries was a wide open wound. This chasm snaked unbroken for hundreds of miles, from the storm-lashed coast to the fringes of the Forgotten Morass. Even from this distance, among the lower peaks of the mountain range, the Schism was an obvious and savage testament to something awful that had happened here long ago.
The astonishing sight of the Known Realms unfolding before him was almost enough to make Fodrish forget his fear of the height. Almost, but not quite, because at that moment he was standing on the deck of an airship flying thousands of feet above the ground.
The airship, which spent most of its time docked in the upper reaches of the Eyrie’s spire, resembled an ornate wooden sailing vessel with an exceptionally complicated set of sails and various vanes and rudders projecting from its hull. It was held aloft by a combination of technical ingenuity and unspecified magic, and its captain hired it out for an extortionate price in gold to transport parties of adventurers on journeys that were ill-advised to take on foot.
‘Of course,’ said Bartholomeo’s voice from behind Fodrish. ‘You haven’t flown before.’
‘It’s not quite as common at level one.’
‘Captain Greybranch hasn’t lost a passenger yet. He says.’
‘How long do we have to go?’
‘A few hours. Greybranch can get us right up to the entrance.’ Bartholomeo leaned against the deck rail and peered over the side in a way that made Fodrish’s stomach clench. ‘You drove a hard bargain back there.’
‘And I’m not going back on it.’
‘I know, I know. I don’t think a Commoner has ever got so much out of a party of level sixteens. It would be one for the annals of legend, if any of us could ever tell.’
Fodrish took a nervous step closer to the rail. The Devilfrosts were slowly passing behind the airship, and Fodrish thought he would be glad to never see them again. In the distance he could just make out the higher peaks through a veil of stormclouds, illuminated by flashes of lightning. Atop one of them, Glacierheart the Frost Dragon and Hypoxia the Lich waited.
‘What will you do if you get past the Glacier?’ asked Fodrish.
‘Gods above, Commoner 0, you’re pushing it.’
‘That’s what all of this is about, though, isn’t it? Building your perfect world after level twenty. You must have imagined what you would do if you got there.’
‘When, not if,’ said Bartholomeo. It was impossible to tell if he was ribbing Fodrish, or being deadly serious. ‘Labelling anything as a matter of “if” means we have given up on attaining it. It is when I get there.’
‘Then when you get there.’
Bartholomeo sighed and looked skyward as if savouring a memory. ‘My own magical academy,’ he said. ‘I will be the headmaster, commanding a legion of students and researchers to create new spells and rituals.’
‘They will be NPCs.’
‘Most of them. But how long do you think a level twenty adventurer can be satisfied lying in the sun with a glass of elven wine? There is boredom even in paradise. They will seek something new, a way to work wonders, and I will give it to them. I could command anything from them to make the ages go past more quickly.’
‘You use people a lot, Bartholomeo.’
The Wizard shrugged. ‘Hard to break the habit of a lifetime. What about you? What will Fodrish Ablewright build for himself past the end of the world?’
‘I only found out about it a day ago. I won’t get there, in any case. I don’t know if I can even gain levels any more.’
‘If there is one thing being a Wizard has taught me,’ said Bartholomeo, ‘it is that nothing is impossible.’
Fodrish noticed a commotion in the rigging above him. The ship was crewed by several automata, diminutive humanoids made from carved wood and brass-cased clockwork, that moved with monkeylike speed among the ropes. One of the main sails unfurled and billowed with wind, causing the airship to begin a long, wide turn with its prow angled slightly downward.
‘Don’t let her heel!’ came the captain’s harsh, crunching voice from the aft deck. ‘These paying lubbers will go right over the side! Bring her down easy! Easy, ye swabs! Ye barnacled apes! She’ll not dive like a cormorant! She glides like a swan! A swan, now!’
Captain Greybranch stomped down onto the maindeck. He was a form of tree person, rather taller than a human, with asymmetrical wooden limbs that splayed into roots at the feet. His face was frowning and grave, with a mass of foliage approximating a beard. He wore a flamboyant coat of red material and gold brocade, and a tricorn hat balancing on top of his head at an angle. ‘She’ll give a smooth ride, gents, if ye let her,’ he said to the two passengers by the deck rail. ‘Just need to bark at the crew every now and again.’
Severina emerged from the state cabin towards the stern. As much as the height made him uncomfortable, staying in the cabin had made Fodrish queasy so he had stayed out of the cabins for almost the whole journey.
‘How long, captain?’ asked the Cleric.
‘Four hours to descend these thermals, lady Cleric,’ replied Greybranch. ‘Would I could get this crew to work quicker, but it would take a root and branch reforming to get them to turn over a new leaf.’
Severina joined Bartholomeo at the deck rail. ‘I remember,’ she said, ‘how it felt to see the world from above for the first time. I thought I could see to the ends of everything. Turns out it was just half the Redwood Marches. I’ve been at this so long, it all seems normal.’
‘Rather sentimental of you, Sev,’ said Bartholomeo. ‘I never had you as the nostalgic type.’
‘Impending destruction tends to focus one’s mind in unexpected ways.’
Bartholomeo chuckled. ‘There are no hellhounds headed our way. They would have been on us long before now.’
Greybranch stomped towards Fodrish and placed a gnarled wooden branch of a hand on his shoulder. ‘Ye look new to these parts,’ he said, furrowing his heavy brow. ‘Our destination is dangerous for the likes of ye. I should be turning back, lad.’
‘It’s standard NPC dialogue,’ said Bartholomeo. ‘You’re below the level for the Schism of Centuries. It doesn’t mean anything.’
‘I’ll stay to the end, thanks,’ said Fodrish to the captain.
‘I cannot blame ye!’ said Greybranch. ‘I would hate to return to port meself. I never was one to put down roots.’
The airship finally descended the hundreds of feet into the Schism, carefully swaying between the sheer walls and their thousands of harpy nests. A narrow ledge two thirds of the way down led to an inconspicuous cleft in the canyon wall, barely wide enough to admit a person. The airship let down its gangplank and the Company of the Crescent Moon, plus their low-level companion, gingerly made the short trip across it onto the ledge.
‘This had better be worth it,’ Reynard said as the airship began to ascend again, Captain Greybranch bellowing orders at the clockwork crew. ‘That bastard stiffed us for almost a thousand gold.’
‘It’s just the economy,’ said Asphodel wearily. ‘The Core Manual syphons off excess cash so it doesn’t get inflated.’
‘We’re here now. We can’t un-spend it.’ Severina looked back at Bartholomeo. ‘This is your show, Bart. What now?’
‘Now, he goes in,’ replied Bartholomeo, gesturing at the narrow rock cleft with his staff.
Fodrish walked a few steps along the ledge, and felt the dark potential of the unassuming cave entrance pushing him back like a hand in his face.
‘If something happens in there…’ he said.
‘Then none of us were ever here,’ said Severina.
Fodrish looked among the party members and saw little sympathy there, only impatience. He walked to the entrance and felt a cold wind blowing from it. Inside it was dark and cool, and he could see a door of carved stone set into the natural arch of the rock.
‘I’m… I’m going in, then,’ he called behind him. He put a hand against the door and after a hefty shove, it opened with the sound of stone against stone. Another hard push and it opened wide enough for him to squeeze through.
As he slid himself through the gap, he wondered if he was at that moment breaching the invisible barriers the Core Manual had set up around the world, dividing the Known Realms into places he could go and places he could not. He remembered the heretics at the cathedral, trying to crack open the structure of the world and tinker with the rules that underpinned it. He was doing what they were. He was ignoring the rules, short-cutting his way to a place he had no right to be.
The thought dissolved as he saw the chamber beyond. The ceiling was extremely high, hung with glowing orbs that cast a soft dappled light down to floor level. The walls were in strange curvilinear forms, like something grown instead of carved, decorated in vivid deep blue and gold. They encompassed a chamber large enough for a boss arena with a raised platform in the middle heaped with a glittering mass of treasure. Glowing runes he could not read lit up on the polished stone floor where he walked, as if keeping a record of his illegal footsteps.
‘So, you have prevailed!’ came a booming voice, echoing around the strange walls. The image of an elderly, sagely man in a Wizard’s robe and hat hovered over the central pedestal. He carried a gnarled wooden staff and his face hung with the weight of impossible ages. The image was translucent and glowing, projected by some permanent magical effect.
Fodrish called up information on the image, as if it was a Player Character. ARCHMAGE AETHILLIANIS, read the letters that appeared beside it.
‘You have laboured long on the path I set for you, an aeon ago when I yet walked these lands,’ continued the archmage. ‘Though I am long dead, I knew this day would come, and that brave heroes would seek out this place. You have defeated the Guardian of the Eternal Gates and found all six Godstones. You scaled the Devilfrosts and defeated Hypoxia, my old nemesis. You followed the Trail of Terror here, to the depths of the Schism of Centuries! I knew, one day, there would arise a band of adventurers equal to the task I had set. I knew you would come here, and I made sure your journey would not seem in vain.’
Fodrish approached the treasure. It almost burned his eyes with its polished beauty. Several chests bound with gold were surrounded by weapons: a long-handled axe, a bow made from a pair of spiralling animal horns, paired daggers with fat emeralds set into the crossguards, a golden staff covered in tiny silver hands. Fodrish stepped up onto the platform and carefully opened one of the chests, not certain if it might be trapped but as ever lacking the proficiency to check. It opened without any catastrophic consequences, revealing several velvet-lined compartments inside each of which nestled a bottle of a different-coloured potion. The next chest contained a heap of diamonds, rubies and black stones with flickers of crimson fire inside, high-level gems worth hundreds or thousands of gold pieces each.
‘The journey ahead is still sterner a test,’ said the Archmage. ‘And the path I set for you is no longer certain or constant. You will face enemies I cannot anticipate, and tasks for which I cannot prepare you. I hope these trinkets will help you overcome whatever obstacles the vicissitudes of time have placed in your way.’
Fodrish picked up the paired daggers, which were held in a pair of sheaths linked by a silver chain. The sheaths were of black leather with a complex scrollwork pattern which, on inspection, concealed countless grinning skulls. The weapons were lighter than they looked, and thrummed in his hands.
‘What are these?’ Fodrish asked the image, feeling faintly stupid to hear the words out loud.
‘The Heartrenders,’ replied the Archmage. ‘Forged from steel dug from the grave of a titan, and quenched in the tears of those bereaved by treachery. The very essence of revenge burns within their blades.’
Fodrish carried the Heartrenders towards the entrance, but paused just before the doorway. ‘Where do I go next?’ he asked.
‘Along this accursed canyon, brave soul, and into the Forgotten Mire.’
‘Why do they call it the Forgotten Mire if everyone remembers it’s there?’
The Archmage shrugged. ‘I forget,’ he said.
HIDDEN LORE BONUS, read the words that briefly appeared in front of Fodrish’s eyes. XP+10%, 24HRS. HIDDEN LORE DISCOVERED: 1/471.
Fodrish squeezed through the doorway back out into the short tunnel, and the Heartrenders went with him. The Company of the Crescent Moon looked at him in surprise as he emerged. Reynard jogged forward when he saw the daggers.
The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.
‘Come to Rey-Rey,’ he said with a grin, grabbing them and drawing one from its sheath. The blade glowed a faint green.
‘The Heartrenders,’ replied Fodrish. ‘They’ve got the essence of revenge inside.’
Reynard inspected the weapon, scanning the damage and other statistics too quickly for Fodrish to read.
WEAPON BOUND, appeared in red letters above the dagger in Reynard’s hand. Fodrish was familiar with the mechanic. Once bound to a player character, a magic item could not be used by anyone else.
‘They’re bind on pickup,’ said Ghorborosh.
‘Quest and level reward stuff always is,’ said Asphodel. She pointed to Fodrish. ‘But they didn’t bind to him.’
‘Because they think he’s an NPC,’ added Bartholomeo. ‘How much is there?’
‘Enough for everyone, I think,’ said Fodrish.
Severina gave him a look. ‘Well?’
It took a long time to haul the whole trove out of the chamber. Not everything was as light as the Heartrenders. The chests were too heavy for Fodrish to carry so he had to push them along the floor. Along with the one full of gemstones and the other full of potions, there was a third with magically woven cloth and another containing bars of rare metals, both for crafters. Fodrish recognised some of the metals: Biolium, World’s Core Iron, Ferrofire. A blacksmith far more skilled than him could use them to create new magical items or enhance existing ones, if they had access to an equally rare forge.
The staff was a Charge of the Excruciator, which contained several bound spells that inflicted debilitating conditions on enemies. Severina took custody of it since these were divine spells, granted by the dark god worshipped by whoever had made the staff, and added the capacity to degrade the abilities of the party’s enemies to her own healing abilities. When the staff bound to her, the hands covering the staff clenched and flexed, an effect so disconcerting Fodrish found himself compelled to look away.
The polearm was a Sapphire Palace Guardian, once wielded by the bodyguards to a long-dead king. While Ghorborosh would not wield it in place of his ultra greatsword and tower shield, he could plant the polearm in the ground where it became a magical beacon exuding protective magic and increasing the effectiveness of his armour as long as he stayed near it. He had the ability to switch his weapon loadout in combat, which allowed him to draw his sword and shield once the beacon was up.
Though he would rarely, if ever, use the weapon directly against an enemy, Ghorborosh could not help trying some practice swings and stances. The rest of the party stayed well away from him as he swung the weapon’s blade in a glittering steel arc, to the hiss of its unnaturally keen edge slicing through the air.
The bow was Asphodel’s, of course. It was a Hunter’s Mark and its magic allowed a Ranger to place a debuff on a single enemy. Arrows fired from the bow could, if Asphodel willed it, automatically home in on that target for a greatly increased hit chance. The homing arrows did not even require line of sight, meaning Asphodel could spend a lot more time out of danger behind cover while still dealing out damage.
Asphodel tried the bow out on a stray harpy from the nests above. The scrawny winged creature must have been hundreds of feet above them, and when Asphodel drew the bow a tiny red target symbol appeared beside it. When she loosed the arrow, it curved on a shimmering blue trail to hit the harpy just below where one of its wings met its body. It tumbled lower and Fodrish could see its skinny limbs and filthy claws, and the snarl on its birdlike face. A second homing arrow punched through its neck and it fell like a stone into the dark waters flowing along the deepest reaches of the Schism.
‘Not bad, Asphodel said appreciatively. ‘I can work with that.’
Bartholomeo did not receive a weapon. Instead, among the handfuls of mundane jewellery and coins that Fodrish carried out of the chamber, he found a fist-sized statue of a griffon carved from ivory. Bartholomeo cast an identification spell on it, which revealed it to be a Golemwrought Servitor. The item bound to the Wizard, after which he whispered an activation word to it and it transformed into a full-sized, fully alive griffon.
The party had to hurriedly make way for the feathered creature, which was the size of a carthorse with an enormous span of eaglelike wings. It had a beaked head and the front half of its body was feathered. The back half resembled that of a huge panther, with short dark fur and clawed rear feet. It was already saddled and had a bit clamped in its beak. It flapped its wings as if stretching them, squawked once, and began to preen itself.
‘You don’t mind that it’s not a weapon, Bart?’ asked Asphodel. ‘You’ve had that staff for a few levels now.’
‘This is better,’ said Bartholomeo as he circled the griffon admiringly. ‘I can ride this instead of casting Fly. It saves me a spell slot. That gives me one more Accelerated Fireball. It’s a bigger damage increase than just a base power bump from a new staff.’
‘You sure?’ asked Asphodel, regarding the creature uncertainly.
‘I’ve run the numbers,’ replied Bartholomeo. He whispered the activation word again and the griffon was gone, the unassuming statue back in his hand.
‘Potion of Speed, Elixir of Greater Heartiness,’ said Reynard, who was going through the chest of potions. ‘What’s a “Draught of Thought Scouring”?’
‘Amnesia potion,’ said Severina, who was still trying to find a comfortable way to carry the Charge of the Excruciator without being pinched by its tiny hands. ‘Don’t drink it.’
‘Like a tabula rasa?’ said Reynard, hope on his face.
‘No, it just makes you stupid. There won’t be a tabula rasa in there. It’s a world drop, you never get them from level rewards.’
Fodrish looked through the chest of gemstones. He knew the value of mundane gems, like emeralds and diamonds, but not these. The diamonds were canary-yellow and the rubies contained tiny flickers of lightning. He picked up one of the black gems and held it up to the light. The fire inside it leaped and flickered, as if it was trying to get out.
‘Elemental Darkstones,’ said Bartholomeo, kneeling down beside Fodrish. ‘Worth about ten thousand. The Storm Rubies are even more.’
‘There must be a million gold pieces in here,’ said Fodrish.
‘With the coins and the jewellery, we’ve got two or three million,’ agreed Bartholomeo.
‘What can you buy with that?’
‘Upgrade a couple of sets of armour. Grab a spellstone or two.’
‘No,’ said Severina. ‘We’re not going back to the auction house. We need to do this fast. I want to spend as little time as possible carrying this junk around. We kill Hypoxia and ditch it, like we planned.’
‘Then we’re going there now?’ said Ghorborosh, unable to hide his excitement.
‘Absolutely,’ said Severina. ‘I’m giving the Core Manual as few opportunities to find us out as possible. We can’t trust Greybranch with this so we’re going to have to walk. I want a double-time march with rests every eighteen hours, use adamantium rations to ace those stamina checks. We’ll have to take the Ancient Rovers’ Path out of the Schism, then go through Goreharrow Pass to take Yeti Ridge and scale the North Face of Mount Skyshadow before we strike for Hypoxia’s peak.’
‘Or we could use the griffon,’ said Bartholomeo, brandishing the tiny statue.
‘Yes,’ said Severina after a pause. ‘Yes, we could do that.’
‘Who lays low my plaything?’ hissed the voice of Hypoxia. ‘My pet, my creation? Glacierheart may have fallen, but I shall raise it once more! And I shall do the same to you, when you are dead!’
Fodrish could not resist peeking out from behind the rock that served him as shelter. The scale of the battle against Glacierheart had been overwhelming and Fodrish had crouched in a terrified ball for most of it as fusillades of ice shards and stray spell effects had ripped through the air above him. His head rang from the dragon’s deafening roars and he ached from being thrown against the shaking ground. But the possibility of seeing the arrival of Hypoxia, a boss he should never have encountered, was overwhelming.
The immense mass of dragon flesh sank into the solid rock of the mountain’s peak as the skeletal figure, clad in its ornate robes and accoutrements of a mighty spellcaster, gathered a nimbus of dark power around itself.
‘The lizard went down in half the time!’ called out Ghorborosh. He stood apart from the rest of the party where he had been tanking the dragon, with the Sapphire Palace Guardian planted in the ground beside him. He was illuminated by the blue glow emanating from the beacon, and a small shield icon hovered beside him to indicate his increased armour. ‘Took half the healing, too. Hope you’re not working too hard back there, Sevvy!’
‘Don’t lose focus!’ retorted Severina, who was hanging back alongside Asphodel and Reynard. Bartholomeo was nearby, perched on the back of the griffon that had ferried the party to the mountain peak. Fodrish had made the journey, too, as there was no safe place in several days’ travel he could be left safely without a wandering monster preying on him. Paradoxically, he was safest where he was, on the mountainside lashed with the battle’s magic.
‘Poison going on,’ said Reynard, pouring a vial of bright green venom over the blades of his Heartrenders.
‘That work on undead?’ asked Asphodel.
‘’Course it does,’ said Reynard. ‘It’s Zombiebane. Holy water with black belladonna. Speaking of which…’ Reynard pulled the stopper from another bottle and downed the contents. His cheeks and eyes sunk into his face and his skin became an unhealthy grey. ‘Undead Form up,’ he said. ‘They’ll never see me coming.’
‘My children. My minions,’ came Hypoxia’s scratchy, shuddering voice. ‘You will join them. In death, you shall find your purpose!’
‘Adds incoming!’ called Severina. ‘Keep them controlled! Remember, dome, then incantation!’
‘Dome, comets, incantation, got it,’ said Reynard, before vanishing into a churning pool of blackness.
‘And try not to fireball me,’ shouted Ghorborosh as the griffon beat its wings and carried Bartholomeo into the air.
‘I promise nothing,’ replied the Wizard.
Armoured skeletons were clambering from their hiding place within the mountain’s peak. Fodrish knew better than to wonder how they could climb out of their graves of solid rock, or why Hypoxia had waited this long to summon them. The Core Manual worked by its own rules.
The lich held out her bony hands and blue flame flared in her empty eye sockets. Bolts of ice streaked down from the sky around her, slamming into the mountain peak around Ghorborosh.
The boom of the impacts made Fodrish duck down again, and shards of ice shattered against the rock a moment later. The clash of steel on steel and the keening of the cold mountain wind reminded him of the first time he had stumbled into the midst of these adventurers, confused and afraid as he and his fellow NPC soldiers were deposited in the middle of the battle.
Instinctively, his hand closed on the only weapon he had: a royal sceptre topped with a golden eagle wearing a silver crown. It was a piece of mundane treasure to be sold for gold pieces, but it could also function as a club and Fodrish’s sole weapon proficiency meant he could at least swing it without it falling from his uncoordinated hand. He glanced past the rock and saw a pair of skeleton warriors exploding into fragments of bone and armour as Ghorborosh swung his ultra greatsword one-handed through the crowd assailing him. Three skulls pinged off three more skeletons a moment later, with the slash of darkness behind suggesting Reynard was carving through them unseen.
Severina aimed her wand at Ghorborosh and a stream of healing bolts poured into him, with green numbers popping up above the warrior’s head. A volley of arrows from Asphodel split into dozens of tiny projectiles and impacted in a wide circle among the skeletons, causing a storm of damage numbers that momentarily turned the air above them solid red. A series of glittering magical bolts hammered into Hypoxia from Bartholomeo’s outstretched hand, and Hypoxia reeled indignantly as damage was inflicted on her oversized skeletal form.
It looked under control. It looked like it was going well. Fodrish had barely any experience of what such a battle looked like, but the panic he had sensed among the Company of the Waning Moon during the first battle was not there. Severina was not screaming at them to reposition or focus, at least not as much as usual.
‘Putting magic vuln on her!’ called out Severina. The Charge of the Excruciator pulsed red in her hand, its tiny metal fingers groping at nothing, and a red-black energy gathered around Hypoxia’s skull. A debuff icon in the form of a down arrow appeared next to the lich. While the debuff remained, she would take more damage from magic attacks.
‘Fireball out!’ shouted Bartholomeo as soon as the effect was in place. A huge ball of boiling flame appeared between his hands and he hurled it down towards the skeletons. Ghorborosh ducked behind his shield as the fireball impacted, blasting apart the skeletons at the epicentre and sending a fearsome wash of heat across the battlefield. Fodrish dropped back behind the rock, away from the heat that felt powerful enough to singe his hair off.
‘Brothers, to me!’ yelled Ghorborosh. Fodrish peeked around the edge of the rock to see six soldiers appearing around the Fighter. Six genuine NPCs this time, not five soldiers and one confused blacksmith.
‘Now the rage of the ancients be upon you!’ came Hypoxia’s voice, magically amplified to ring between the mountain peaks.
‘Comets incoming!’ shouted Severina. ‘Dome’s going up!’
‘Brothers, hold them back!’ ordered Ghorborosh to the NPC soldiers as he hurried backwards into the hemisphere of green energy that Severina created around her. The dome was wide enough to pass over the rock where Fodrish hid, so he didn’t have to risk a break from safety to get beneath it. A moment later, as the soldiers clashed swords with the skeletons, the battery of icy comets appeared in the air above the mountain and streaked downwards on tails of blue energy.
Each bolt of frozen power slammed into the battlefield or impacted against the dome. The sound was like a dozen peals of thunder in quick succession. Severina fell to one knee as the mountain shook and vivid cracks spread across the dome’s surface. Chunks of ice spilled through the dome and across the rock. The ground shook again and Fodrish sprawled to keep from being thrown off his feet.
The dome flickered and died out. Asphodel helped Severina to her feet as Ghorborosh rushed out again to engage the skeletons.
‘Comet spam’s done,’ said Severina. ‘Incantation’s next.’
‘We know,’ said Asphodel. ‘We’re on it.’
‘Don’t get over-confident,’ continued Severina. ‘Stay-’
‘Stay focused,’ said Reynard as he vanished once again. ‘We know.’
More magical volleys hammered into Hypoxia, who was rendered almost hidden by the storm of magical effects erupting around her. Fodrish could just glimpse the conjured book in her hand and the flare of dark energy around it.
‘Who are you to stand before a monarch of the dead?’ bellowed Hypoxia. ‘For only the most persistent of foes I reserve the Incantation of Oblivion! Savour this moment, for it is the last and greatest honour you shall receive!’
‘Here we go,’ said Severina, more to herself than to anyone else.
The black sigil appeared above Bartholomeo. The Wizard swooped low on his griffon and alighted on the mountaintop near Severina. ‘I can put up Aura of Recalcitrance,’ he said. ‘But it won’t be enough.’
‘Shields and heals up on Bart!’ said Severina, casting a rapid sequence of spells with complex gestures to an accompanying flare of spell effects on Bartholomeo. ‘Ghor, you’re without for a while!’
‘Got it,’ replied Ghorborosh. ‘Turtling up!’ The Fighter’s skin took on the appearance of steel and multiple icons appeared around him to show increased armour and resistances, improved parry, higher health regeneration, and more. ‘Can’t draw as much aggro, watch for the adds!’
‘Rot your soul!’ intoned Hypoxia, her voice a dreadful dark echo. The sigil burst over Bartholomeo and the storm of dark purple damage icons was met by the green healing numbers from Severina’s many layers of spells. Bartholomeo reeled, grabbing onto the pommel of the griffon’s saddle to stay on its back.
Then the storm passed, and the stream of healing numbers went unopposed.
‘Made it!’ exclaimed Bartholomeo. ‘I’ve got even less HP than Asphodel. We can heal through it!’
‘Adds loose!’ shouted Reynard from the midst of the skeleton warriors. A pack of them had broken away from the melee, no longer held by Ghorborosh’s tanking abilities or his NPC soldiers. They ran off in all directions, each one homing in on a different party member.
Asphodel speared two with a pair of arrows loosed at the same time. Severina’s Wand of Lesser Healing ripped through another, the healing magic working the opposite way on the undead creature.
Fodrish watched as Bartholomeo made a simple gesture with one hand that lifted a skeleton off the ground and flipped it off into the abyss beyond the mountaintop, to plummet into the darkness.
He heard the clatter of bone and steel nearby and saw two skeletons bearing down on him, their empty eyes and rictus grins framed by ancient armour.
Fodrish turned to face them with the sceptre held up in front of him as if he could hide behind it. Each skeleton had a rusted scimitar and a rotted wooden shield. They flanked him, one on each side, and jabbed at him to the sound of bones clacking against steel.
‘Help!’ yelled Fodrish. ‘They’re on me!’
He didn’t know if the adventurers heard him. He was too busy focusing on the skeletons lunging and circling, trying to keep the sceptre between him and their blades.
Dodge and counter-strike. Fight smart.
A blade slashed out at him. He met it with the haft of the sceptre, and the jarring impact threw it from his hand.
They were only skeletons and tradition held they were not much more of a threat than giant rats. But they were level sixteen skeletons, and he was level zero.
The next lung brought the skeleton’s blade in a sideways arc at chest height, and sliced deep between Fodrish’s ribs.
He was aware of pain, but it was not like a burn from the forge or a cut finger from a jagged edge. It was something more intense and profound, not pain at all but a certainty of an appalling ruination being done to him. A fundamental disruption, a dislocating from reality, as awful as pain but utterly different.
It was the feeling of his body being ripped apart.
Pain, recognisable and real, flared intensely in his chest like a caged fire. It was his heart being cut through and failing.
It was the feeling of death.