“You can handle it, right?” asked Elijah, glancing back at Ron. “I can’t understate how damaging it can be.”

“I’m fine,” Ron said.

“I ain’t,” Kurik muttered. “How ‘bout I just sit this one out? I can –”

“Don’t be scared, bro. It’s just a little death and decay. We’ll protect you.”

“I ain’t scared. I just don’t like it. That’s a valid feeling, by the way. Most people avoid death traps,” Kurik pointed out. “But you idiots just rush in there like you’re all invincible.”

“I don’t see you turning back,” Elijah said.

“Because you won’t let me!”

Elijah sighed, but before he could form a response, Sadie called the dwarf’s bluff. “If you feel that strongly about it, no one will force you to follow,” she argued. “You can go back to the camp and wait for us to finish this thing up.”

“That ain’t what I was tryin’ to say,” Kurik grumbled. “I’m just pointin’ out that this ain’t smart.” Then, almost under his breath, he added, “If I don’t go, you’ll all probably get yourselves killed.”

While that might have been true, Elijah suspected that Kurik just liked to complain. He’d done so about the cold, the biting insects that made their home within the jungle, and nearly everything else in the Trial. In fact, the only thing that hadn’t been the subject of his complaints was the influx of levels he’d gained. Still, despite all his grumbling, he wouldn’t let them go on without him.

“That goes for everyone,” Sadie said, standing over the recently opened passage. It had taken the combined efforts of Sadie, Elijah, and Dat to lever the giant slab of stone out of the way, and when they’d finally shifted it aside, they’d been inundated by powerfully death-attuned ethera. Elijah and Sadie had resisted it, but Dat, having much lower Constitution, had needed Ron’s intervention.

And Elijah knew it would just get worse the deeper they went.

If he was honest, he wanted to go by himself. After the tomb, he was confident that he could endure, but that confidence didn’t extend to his companions. Sadie would likely be fine, but Dat, Ron, and Kurik were all much more vulnerable. However, when he’d brought that up, they’d all rejected his proposition and insisted upon going into the tunnels.

He considered handing off the ruby ring he’d taken from the crypt, but that came with some problems none of them were equipped to confront. First, he had no assurance that it would help with the problem at hand. For all he knew, it would only give them a few extra attribute points. Useful, but not the game-changer they might need. But more importantly, Elijah was well aware of the existence of cursed items. The sword Carmen had forged for Roman had been one such item, and it had slowly driven the tyrant to insanity. Since then, he’d dropped that weapon into the ocean, but the lesson remained. Using an unidentified item was a good way to fall prey to just such a curse.

Or something much worse.

So, the ring, despite the possibility that it might be useful for their current situation, remained in his Ghoul-Hide Satchel. It would stay there until he had an opportunity to return to the Nexus Town and have it identified by Atticus.

“Well, if we’re going to go, we need to do it now,” Ron said. “I have a lot of ethera, and I’m pretty sure my Regeneration can keep up now that I’ve advanced to the second stage of Mind cultivation. But not if we waste time hanging out here.”

“Let’s get this over with then,” Kurik grumbled. Then, he looked at Sadie, adding, “But I ain’t leadin’ the way.”

She rolled her eyes, then descended the worn steps leading into the crypt. In her hand was the map Elijah had drawn from memory, and she held an ethera-powered flashlight between her teeth. Dat came second, followed by Ron, with Elijah taking up the rear. The chances they might be attacked from behind were low, but it was better to be safe than sorry. The formation had saved them on multiple occasions while trekking through dangerous areas, and Elijah didn’t expect that to change.

The steps descended for almost fifty feet before leveling off and ending in a tunnel measuring about ten feet across. To Elijah, it felt extremely claustrophobic, but he kept that discomfort to himself. Instead, he focused on the increasingly dense death-attuned ethera. It wasn’t powerful enough to do any damage – not yet, at least – but it did tighten his stomach into knots.

And then there was that same cold that felt so pervasive within the bounds of the Spires of the Fallen.

“Incoming!” hissed Sadie. Only then did Elijah hear the muffled sound of footsteps. Then, he narrowed his eyes and looked past Sadie, but all he saw was darkness – until a zombie appeared out of the shadows. It moved like lightning – far more quickly than the ones aboveground had – and it was on Sadie in an instant. Fortunately, she was ready for it, and her sword had no issues bisecting the monster.

Then, another appeared. And another after that. In seconds, the entire hall was blocked by densely packed undead – all reaching and clawing at Sadie. She’d clearly used Call of the Crusader, keeping their attention locked onto her. Meanwhile, Dat had opened up with his crossbow, sending glowing bolts down the hall to slam into the monsters’ heads. Every shot hit with enough force to burst their skulls like overripe melons.

Being in the rear, Elijah had no choice but to use his spells. So, he tossed out one Storm’s Fury after another, adding Healing Rain into the mix so he could ease the burden on Ron’s store of ethera. He’d also held out some hope that the zombies would react poorly to the influx of vital energy, but to his disappointment, they seemed entirely unaffected by Healing Rain.

What was effective was Nature’s Rebuke.

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Nature’s Rebuke

Curse an entity to endure the power of nature, doing damage over time. Triple damage against unnatural creatures. Lasts two minutes.

They were strong enough that the spell didn’t melt them immediately as it had with the vampires back in the Magister’s Estate tower, but it was clear that they were unnatural creatures. As such, they felt the full weight of the enhanced spell. As the seconds ticked by, the creatures’ flesh sloughed off and some of them collapsed. With Sadie and Dat steadily cutting them down, it was only a few minutes before the hall was clear.

Elijah watched as the fallen zombies rapidly decomposed until even the bones disintegrated. Focusing on One with Nature, he could barely sense threads of deathly ethera racing down the hall and into the darkness.

“Damn,” he said. “Is that normal?”

Sadie shook her head. “No. Body disposal is a big issue in Hong Kong,” she answered. “Disease is a problem.”

“What do we think it means?” Ron asked.

No one had a response, but they all agreed to keep going. The plan hadn’t changed, just because there were a few zombies in the tunnels. In fact, they’d expected a fight, even if they hadn’t known which form their enemies might take.

“Do we think these are the same zombies that come out when someone messes with the crystals?” Elijah asked.

“There’s no telling, bro.”

It was an interesting question made even more so because, according to Dat and Sadie, these weren’t normal zombies. “They act the part, but they seem like magical constructs,” Kurik said.

Elijah shrugged. “Maybe.”

After that, the group continued on, and they were forced for what felt like every step. The zombies weren’t particularly powerful, but that changed the deeper they went into the complex. As the power of the deathly ethera rose, so too did the strength of the zombies. At the same time, the group was subjected to increasingly degenerative conditions. It never reached the level of the deepest part of the tomb, but Dat and Kurik were particularly affected.

Ron took care of it, but Elijah suspected that he couldn’t keep it up indefinitely – especially if it got worse. So, they were on a bit of a timer, even with Elijah using his own healing spells to shoulder some of the burden.

On and on they went, and Elijah’s map proved to be invaluable. Without it, they would have quickly become lost. However, the labyrinthine tangle of tunnels did create another issue. Each time they reached an intersection, the possibility of being attacked from the rear increased. So, Elijah had to keep his attention split between the ongoing battles at the front of the procession and the potential for an attack from the rear.

His diligence proved warranted when, after a couple of hours, a group of zombies rushed him. He couldn’t afford to shift into his animal forms – not and keep up the healing that was necessary to keep everyone from succumbing to the decay – so he wheeled around and met the zombies in his natural form.

But it gave him a perfect opportunity to use his newest ability:

Savage Might

Embrace your bestial nature, temporarily enhancing your physical attributes by 33%. Duration based on Ethera attribute. Current: 31.1 Seconds. Cooldown based on Constitution. Current: 68.3 Minutes.

He felt his power soar as he brought the Feral Spire to the fore. As he swung it, he used Nature’s Rebuke, then activated Storm’s Fury just before he made contact with the first zombie.

“Attack from the rear!” he shouted as he made contact. Lightning arced through the monster, and the sheer strength of the blow sent the zombie crashing into one of the walls, where its bones snapped like twigs. Elijah didn’t pause to watch it, and as he spun, launching another attack at the next attacking zombie, his Jade Mind whirled to cast one spell after another.

Nature’s Rebuke cast quickly, and it didn’t even require aiming. However, using Storm’s Fury to augment his physical attacks required precise timing. Thankfully, his powerful cultivation paid off, giving him the ability to think along multiple threads at a time – and with far more brainpower than he would have thought possible. The results were shocking.

Elijah had never been a savant with the staff. He felt comfortable enough using it as a weapon, but he knew he was no expert. However, with how quickly he could process information – along with the sometimes forgotten Haste effect of his Sash of the Whirlwind – it felt like the zombies were moving in water.

He crushed one skull after another, while the back lines succumbed to Nature’s Rebuke. All the while, he kept Soothe and Healing Rain up on his most vulnerable teammates. For a moment, he wondered why he was fighting alone, but then he realized that even more zombies were attacking from the other direction.

They were being pincered, the timing of which suggested that it was no mere coincidence. Still, there was nothing Elijah could do with that information. At present, he had an all-important job – deal with the zombies – so that was what he did.

One after another fell before him, and for a while, he felt almost invincible.

Then, Savage Might wore off.

He stumbled at the sudden weakness, and he caught a claw to the face for his trouble. Another monster latched onto him with its four arms, and yet another wrapped its long, tail around him like a particularly muscular boa constrictor. Elijah had no choice.

He shifted into the Shape of the Guardian.

The sudden influx of size broke him free of the zombies’ grasp, and Elijah lashed out with his long, ape-like arms. He had to crouch to fit into the tunnel, but with Iron Scales active, the undead creatures couldn’t penetrate his hide. So, he laid into them without fear of reprisal, but even with the extra attributes from his powerful form, the sense weakness persisted.

He fought through it, and with the triumvirate of his spirit – dragon, beast, and human – pushing him forward, he could harness his power better than ever before. It wasn’t quantified by attributes or cultivation, but as Elijah let it envelope him, he realized that it was just as impactful.

Zombies fell in droves, and vaguely, he was aware that his companions were fighting just as furiously. Yet, Elijah knew that they would all fall if he didn’t protect the rear. So, with his power driven to new heights by a spirit he didn’t fully understand, he bent his will to the task at hand.

Over the next few minutes, Elijah lost count of how many zombies he slew. Dozens, at the very least. Maybe hundreds. It was impossible to tell, because each time one fell, the bodies were beset by powerful decay that removed all evidence of their previous existence.

With a roar, Elijah shoved his claw through a zombie’s chest, then ripped out its spine. Predictably, the body fell, and he swung the dangling skull at another of the undead. The head shattered, burying hundreds of bone shards in the other creature’s face. Elijah followed that up with a massive backhand that finished the job.

And then, everything went silent.

He panted, his breath misting in front of him. Suddenly, he felt so cold. So exhausted. He wanted nothing more than to drop to his knees and rest.

Warmth enveloped him, and the feeling faded. A second later, he let his bestial form fall away, and he cast his own healing spells. They combined with Ron’s, and in moments, he was back to normal, though with a deep-seated fatigue that no amount of healing could banish.

But when he looked to the front of the group, he was happy to see that everyone else was safe. Sadie bisected the final zombie in that direction, and just like that, they’d won the battle.

“Shoulda never come here,” Kurik grumbled. Then, barely audibly, he added, “But no, I gotta be a hero. A damned idiot, I am, and make no mistake about that.”