There was far more light inside than one would think. Each soul shining its bright light inside holding on desperately to life. There’s more to it than that. Carl thought, and he was proved right. There was a frantic desperation to the trapped souls now. As they had been swallowed by the amalgamation it seemed the souls were intent on harnessing their essence, shining with invigorated fervor it felt like fighting an army of corrupted angels.

The inside contracted the walls of souls with hands outstretched trying to hold onto the trio, falling ever deeper. Lixiss was the one to prevent their fall, a web conjured with material produced. The souls immediately grabbed at it trying to rip it apart, but the net of the web gave them fighting ground and the trio took that advantage.

“Alright if you have any hidden skill, or anything you learned in the years since our last time together now would be the time to use it! Agazuul shouted, more so due to battle stress than noise, which sounded strange in the otherwise deadly silence that persisted in Tartarus.

“There is one thing but I haven’t tried it.” Carl said aloud instead of thinking it, immediately regretting his doubtful tone.

“Do it!” Agazuul shouted, anger palpable. He used a dual sword technique, his one sword only blocking the incoming souls making their way onto the web while the other infused with the very essence of godblood sliced through the souls, his right arm bled the cost of that very magic. The blood or its significance to life emboldened the trapped souls causing them to lash out more. Lixiss sprung back and forth her massive body quick, powerful but graceful on the web; her sword slashes arced wide, capable of taking out up to four incoming souls with every swipe. The spider Carl came in on was almost immediately ripped apart by the souls, while Agazuul’s flaming mount threw them around like training dummies. Meanwhile Carl just held them at bay, using his burgundy blasts of flamelike energy. There’s little chance of this going right, for one I’m not sure of our current position and that does play a part in the spell.

“I might be the one teaching you magic, bestowing unto you wonders but it is fear that you call master.” Kahmin said, his tone serious.

“You’re right…” Carl mumbled, his whispers carrying over the silence as the blades slicing through souls never made a noise of impact.

“Huh?” Is all that Agazuul had time to mutter before it became clear. Carl held his left hand flat while gliding his right hand across it in a circular motion, an arcane circle appeared and Carl stretched it wide enough for even Lixiss to fit through, his eyes were closed for the casting of this focusing on a tethered arcane line where the other portal should come out to. He shoved the portal away from him, gesturing it even wider, before gesturing it to come close. This all happened in a few seconds, the motions quick but precise. The portal rushed towards the trio shouting them out the other end. Carl had drawn a diagonal line as far as he could, unsure of their current location. The portal they shot out of had them ten meters above the air, three meters further than the edge of the river Styx; where the rest of the party stood in shock unsure of what to do next.

Blood droplets fell onto Carl’s face, a red feather floating down. Agazuul shouted some strange words and just before the trio hit the ground they drifted downwards as gently as a feather. The soul giant tried to grab at the party but it seemed that it could not leave the confines of the river Styx.

“Why in the nine circles of hell didn’t you do that from the start, it didn’t seem like that spell had a limit to the amount of persons.” Lixiss said as the souls that came with them were dragged by an invisible force back to the river as they desperately dug their incorporeal hands into the ground trying to hold on.

“It did have certain limits.” Carl said, his eyes turning burgundy with slits looking back over the river.

“It was too far to cross, and I have only cast the spell in practice.” He continued trying to sound sure of himself.

“You still should’ve cast it before we got swallowed by a giant made of souls!” Lixiss huffed, before passing him by and taking the lead.

“I don’t have a mount anymore…” Carl said, before realizing the party didn’t care much as each got up onto their mount and set to following Lixiss.

As they traveled on for quite a while Carl began to grow tired from his fast pace keeping up with the mounted party; a strange thing started to occur. There was a white noise amidst the otherwise silent landscape as the air grew perceptibly thinner making any efforts that much harder.

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“The air here is thin, too thin to ever sustain any mortal’s life and yet as it seems it is perfectly capable of carrying the moans and hisses of the dead with ease.” Agazuul quoted, as if reading Carl’s thoughts. Lixiss made a gesture and while Carl was apprehensive at first he took the kindness offered and climbed on her back.

“Our next challenge shall be the Palatium hills.” Agazuul said.

“Care to fill us in or will you hit us with another religious quote? Oh pious priest of Orcus.” Eira asked sarcastically. Gileon deciding that moment to eat made it seem as if he was on the front seat to a bout.

“What are the Palatium hills?” Patrik asked.

“It’s what keeps us from the desert. A ring that surrounds the Asphodel desert and makes it difficult to get in, made of stone and inhabited by deadly shadows.” Agazuul answered but it was clear that he tried his best not to resort to quoting books he’d read on the matter.

“Well that just sounds brilliant, doesn’t it!” Gadraek shouted, eager to rile up the party for battles to come. It didn’t take, Mirva in particular had a dark look about her.

The path to those hills started to seem endless, as they traverse the wasteland they come to quite the difficult situation. The horizon before them reveals a labyrinth of gravesites, large stone blocks and mausoleums.

“A graveyard for giants…” Mirva mutters, harder to hear over the constant white noise of the corporeal undead. The red light above them started flickering, petering out.

“Overhead a blood red star lights the realm, changing phases seemingly at random, giving little light.” Agazuul quoted as if to help.

“With all due respect…Oh that’s right! Absolutely none whatsoever. I would kindly ask you to fuck right off!” Eira shouted, his anger biting harder than his sarcasm.

“OI, you did not just say that to Agazuul!” Gadraek shouted back, getting red in the face with anger.

“Wow, take it back a step, Gadraek.” Gileon said, putting his mount next to Gadraek’s.

“Knock it off, all of you!” Lixiss shouted. She pointed towards the labyrinth.

“We’re about to go in there and find our way through and we’re going to do that together.” Lixiss said. “Or we die.” She finished.

They quietly obliged. The structures rose beside them, the scale of them immense, in the shadow of them it was pitch black. Carl stretched out his hand to the right of him and couldn’t even see where his hand had gone. Carl's eyes turned to slitted burgundy and in that darkness he saw things move, as if lit by the blood star. There were shadows in that darkness. Shadows belonging to none of the party and they quickly took on shapes of giants.

“Watch out!” Carl shouted, nudging Lixiss to move away from an attack, but even that came at a cost. An unnatural screech was heard reverberating between the two giant grave markers they traveled through. Carl saw the shadow wyverns as they dove in.

“Get out of here, quickly! Into the light!” Carl shouted, hoping they’d make a run for it.

Instead Agazuul lit his blade with fire and dismounted his fire wolf making it circle the group while flaring its flames. Agazuul threw his left-hand sword to Patrik after casting a flame wreath spell upon it. Agazuul had made his small mote of light into a circle of fiery protection. The shadows which had taken on a three-dimensional form at this point were easy enough to spot and didn’t seem too eager to jump into the flames, but like everything in this realm; their hunger was too strong. Carl stood amidst the circle blasting back the shadows that dared come too close.

“We’ll need something a bit more potent, Carl!” Lixiss shouted. Patrik slashed at the shadows keeping them at bay reminding Carl of the wyvern fight, he looked over to Agazuul who gave him a reassuring nod. Quick thinking on his part. He never saw that part of the fight but trusted my information. Eira doused her battle axe with oil before holding it above the flame wolf as it ran past. Gadraek did the same for his greataxe. Gileon took the middle of the circle and started laying out his components in a quick fashion, drawing on the flame of the fire wolf to light the flames of candles upon a seven pointed star.

“Alright! Just keep them busy for a while.” Agazuul shouted. Lixiss slashed in wide arcs each of her blows almost breaking the shadow apart before it reformed itself each time the form became more jagged and weak. Mirva’s attacks did little to dissuade the shadows from attacking her and soon a shadow wyvern had her in its grasp, causing the circle to break apart. Carl quickly threw a blast on the shadow wyvern pushing it even further away.

“What are you doing?!” Eira shouted, slashing his battle-axe at Carl. He missed, that was close.

“Why did you slash at me?!” Carl shouted pointing in accusation. He saw the blood then and as he uncurled his pointing fist he noticed he was missing his pinky and ring finger on his left hand. The world was already red, so it was hard for Carl to realize the mistake he was about to make. Fire enveloped Eira. It was a horrible scream, one reserved for the most excruciating pain. There was shouting all around now. Some from far above, there was shouting behind him and within his sight; none of the noise uttered formed into words. There was one person who didn’t shout but whispered, the bright fire amidst the darkness. Shortly after there was a sharp pain, his feet had left the ground; a warm liquid ran down his chest and he could not utter words or crane his neck to inspect what had befallen him.