Apparently, the cellar door Jagster and his compatriots opened did not actually lead to a cellar. Beneath the church was a large sprawling crypt that led deeper underground. The tunnels were pitch-dark. There were torches lining the walls, but none were lit.

Jagster, who’s goblin eyes quickly adapted to the inky blackness, could see, more or less, fine. He nudged Annette and Verys, who, being human, had no such luck.

“There’s torches on the walls,” he said. “About at your head height. Just feel the walls for ‘em.”

The two humans at front quickly acquired and lit the torches. This proved to be an easy task as they were covered in an oil and Verys had matches on hand.

The group seemed to relax a bit as the dim light flickered to life. Tiphone was especially calmed by the fire, as gnomes, while they could not see clearly in the dark like orcs or goblins, had excellent vision as long as they had a light source.

As they moved deeper in, the sheer walls were eventually replaced with rows of hollowed out spaces with stone caskets stored within. Seemingly to maximize space, the hollows were stacked as high as possible and covered the length of the walls.

“Um,” Verys began. “What is stopping these bodies from getting up and attacking us?”

“I don’t know exactly,” Jagster said. “I read somewhere that raisin' the recently dead is easier than the long dead, but I’m not sure if that is true or not.”

“Assuming it is,” Daphine said. “Why would a necromancer spend his time with bodies he can’t use?”

The question went unanswered and lingered in the air as the group kept moving. Why, indeed? What was this necromancer trying to accomplish?

Eventually, the group came to a long set of stairs leading deeper into the crypt. Even with the torches, they could not see the bottom of the stairwell.

“Don’t trip,” Annette said absentmindedly.

“Not funny,” Tiph responded.

“It’s kind of funny,” Jagster declared.

“Stop talking,” Verys said. “Listen.”

The group fell silent and did as requested. They heard moans and the shuffling of feet coming closer and closer.

“More of them,” Daphine said, stating the obvious.

Jagster frowned, closed his eyes and tried to focus on the sounds. “Three… No. Four of them in one group. More comin' after that.”

“I can thin them out with magic,” Daphine said. “But I need to be able to see them.”

“How good is yer vision in the dark?” Jagster asked.

Daphine frowned. “Not good, to be honest.”

Tiph squinted and then, after a moment said. “I can barely make out one of them. Are you sure there’s that many?”

“My ears never lie,” Jagster said, mildly offended. “In any case, Tiph. Think you can pick off the one you see? It's further ahead than the others. We want ‘em bunched up if Daphine is goin' to hit ‘em all at once with— Whatever she plans on doin’.”

Tiph dug into her pocket and picked out a small stone. She tossed it in the air, and it charged itself into the zombie. It slammed into its head with incredible force, blowing a hole that splattered half its brain onto the wall. The zombie moaned and continued to lurch forward.

“Take out the legs,” Jagster said, being the only other one able to see what happened.

Tiph launched another stone and a leg exploded, causing the zombie to collapse. It tried to crawl forward, but got stuck on the stairs, apparently not strong enough to pull itself, and eventually stopped moving.

“Done,” Tiph said.

“Right then,” Verys said. “I guess we hold our position?”

Jagster nodded, then, realizing that nobody could see him well in the gloom, spoke. “Probably should.”

The party stood still, waiting with bated breath for the zombies to get close enough for Daphine to act. Tiph and Jagster became increasingly unnerved as they could clearly see the shambling corpses moving towards the group.

Everyone, regardless of their seeing abilities, could smell the dead. The stench was so incredible, that everyone gagged. One or two wasn’t too bad, but these many at once was too much for the group.

“See them yet?” Tiph asked, voice shaking a little.

“Nothing yet,” Daphine said.

“Seriously?” Jagster growled. “They’re right there!”

“I don’t see anything but darkness…”

“Even I can see them,” Verys hissed quietly. “They’re so close.”

Annette nodded. “Do ya need glasses, Daph?” she whispered.

“No, I don’t need eyeglasses,” Daphine snapped, becoming frustrated. “It is dark. Now be quiet, I have to focus on this spell when I see them.”

The dead marched forward. There were three of them and, unlike the others, these were armored and armed with swords. The swords were strapped to their hands so the fumbling zombies would not drop them. They swung their blades forward haphazardly, seemingly unaware they were even holding them.

One came close to hitting Verys, who sidestepped it as it suddenly burst into flames. The other zombies also caught fire. They stood there, stunned and confused, then continued forward.

“Uhm,” began Annette. “The magic ain’t working!”

“Just—Give it a moment—,” Daphine said as she continued to focus on the spell.

Annette shoved a flaming zombie into the wall, catching her arm on fire in the process. She quickly patted it out as it began to sting furiously.

“I don’t know if we have a moment,” Verys said as he kicked a zombie’s legs from beneath it.

The zombie collapsed and rolled down a few steps. It attempted to stagger to its feet, but its burning and damaged legs gave out beneath it. It continued to crawl forward as the fire burnt away its flesh.

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The other two undead, despite burning away in magical flame, marched into the melee. Annette and Verys struggled to hold them back without getting slashed to bits by the undead’s wildly waving swords. They swung with their own blades, but mostly hit armor, which clanged loudly, echoing in the stone staircase and exciting the dead below.

Jagster prepared to charge into the melee to assist and Tiph began to frantically dig in her pockets for more stones to launch. In that moment, Daphine held up her hand to stop them.

“I’m done.”

And so, she was. As soon as she said this, the burning dead began to glow with incredible light and then, simply, burst. They exploded into chunks of burning flesh that quickly turned to ash.

“Gross,” Verys said, shaking off burnt flesh that splattered all over him.

“But efficient,” Daphine said, somewhat smugly.

“It would’ve been if you were faster,” Jagster pointed out, equally smugly.

“Well, either way,” Annette began. “We appreciates ya.”

“Appreciate,” Verys corrected.

“Yeah. That’s what ah said.”

“We’re not done yet,” Tiph said pointedly, which Jagster nodded in response to.

“There are more,” Jagster said. “I don’t think they’re movin'. Sounds like they’re waitin' for us at the bottom of the stairs.”

“Great,” grumbled Verys unhappily. “How many times can you do that thing, Daphine?”

“Once a day.”

“Great,” he repeated. “Any other tricks up your sleeve?”

Daphine shook her head. “Unfortunately, I only recently learned how to use the magical energies of my bloodline. I haven’t had time to practice much.”

As the others spoke, Jagster set down his sword and began to dig in his bag. “One second,” he said. “I have somethin’ that might be useful.”

He continued digging for moment and then pulled out a vial of fizzling clear red liquid. Satisfied, he slung his bag back over his shoulders and tugged at Annette’s functional sleeve.

“What’s up, Jaggy?” Annette asked, choosing this moment to try a new nickname.

“First of all, never call me that again. Second of all, throw this down the stairs as hard as ya can.”

Jagster handed the vial to Annette who eyed it curiously for a second. Verys looked over her shoulder and then breathed out “Is that what I think it is?”

“Alchemist Fire,” Annette muttered, more to herself than to anyone else.

“Yeah,” Jagster said, picking up his sword and finding himself mildly surprised Annette recognized the substance. “No good for movin' targets. But a bunch of deados standin' around like fuck-faces? Perfect.”

Annette nodded, swung back her arm, almost hitting Verys in the process, and hurled the vial with as much force as she could muster. After an agonizing second, the vial crashed into the floor below and burst into a violent flame.

The fire spread rapidly, revealing the dead below. There were at least half-a-dozen of them. They were too stupid to run or put themselves out, thus the fire spread from one zombie to the other unperturbed.

“This might take a while,” Jagster said, sitting on the stairs and admiring the warm glow. “So, we should probably wait here until the dead are—well—dead.”

“That isn’t a good idea,” Daphine said, with concern in her voice. “Look. They’re moving.”

And so, they were. As if directed by an unseen force, the dead lined up side by side and began to march forward. Soon they were filing into the stairway and moving at an incredibly quick pace, for zombies, towards the party.

“Oh, crap,” Jagster said, shooting back to his feet. “They’re doin' a suicide charge.”

“Which means?” Annette asked.

“It means we retreat,” Verys retorted, spinning around 180 degrees and starting to run upwards, shoving the others out of his way. “Now!” The rest immediately followed suit.

“Thanks for making things worse,” Daphine huffed to Jagster between heavy breaths. She was not the athletic type and did not take to running well.

“Eat my whole ass,” Jagster spat out in response as his fleet goblin feet overtook her, despite his smaller stride.

“Disgusting,” Daphine panted out after a wheezing breath.

“Yeah, love you too,” Jagster said with an eye-roll. “Anyways, I have another idea.”

“You and your cursed ideas,” Verys grumbled from somewhere ahead.

Jagster charged up the stairs as fast as his stubby legs could carry him, which was surprisingly quick given his stature. Like most goblins, Jagermick Rollinrock was far speedier than he had any right to be. Jagster slowed down as he came side to side with Tiph, who was propelling herself up the stairs five steps at a time using her telekinesis. Jagster grabbed her shoulder to get her attention.

Tiph, in a panicked state, whipped around and punched Jagster in the nose. Luckily, she wasn’t particularly strong, so outside of being unpleasant, she caused no real damage. Frankly, the surprise was more devastating than the blow itself.

“Ow,” Jagster cried out. “Chill. It’s just me.”

“Oh, sorry,” Tiph said, not sounding sorry at all. “You startled me.”

“Clearly. Okay. I have a plan. Tiph. I need ya to throw me over the zombies.”

Tiph flexed her arm to display her minuscule muscles. “I cannot. I am not strong enough.”

“With your powers, dumbass.”

Tiph’s face skewed unhappily. “Rude,” she said. Then her face softened a bit. “Okay. I will try.”

“Is that a good idea?” Annette asked as she came up beside the goblin. “If Tiph misses you’ll land on top of a flamey zombie.”

“In that case, I guess I’ll die,” Jagster said with a smirk. “Wouldn’t that be a hassle?”

Annette blinked. “You are a crazy guy.”

“Yes, he is,” Tiph said. “It will get him killed. Probably today.”

“Oh, shut up,” snapped Jagster as he turned around to look at the marching dead. “No time for yappin’. Let’s do this.”

Tiph nodded and closed her eyes. There was a crackle of energy in the air as Jagster started floating. Then, without warning, Jagster was launched into the air with such incredible speed he was amazed his neck didn’t snap from the whiplash. Before he knew it, he was falling towards the swarm of burning dead.

Don’t land in the fire, Jagster mentally chanted to himself over and over. Don’t land in the fire. As he fell, he suddenly felt his feet burning. Oh no, I’m going to land in the fire!

Jagster crashed into a flaming zombie’s head, caving it in. As it fell down into the rising fire, Jagster pushed with his legs, leaping over the licking flames. He tumbled into the ground awkwardly and fumbled to stay on his feet, almost twisting his ankle in the attempt. The shock of his landing pounded through his legs painfully, but nothing broke.

He quickly whipped around and cleaved a leg off the nearest zombie, being careful to avoid the flames that covered the creature. The zombie collapsed to the ground, allowing Jagster to slice off its head in a single blow.

Jagster leapt over the burning corpse to the next zombie, feeling the fire attempting to bite at his feet through his boots. He landed and sliced behind the knee of another zombie, causing it to lose its balance and tumble down the stairs. Its body splattered on the stone ground below, the burning corpse shattering into crispy and red chunks.

Jagster continued to chop through a few more dead, as they weren’t facing him and were too slow to turn around in response. He had disposed of five in total before they were able to shamble in his direction.

With the dead coming towards him, blades swinging and bodies still burning, Jagster was faced with a choice. He could run further down, hoping the remaining undead chase him until they burn up. Or, he could stay and stand his ground, hoping the others come to his rescue.

Jagster did not have long to contemplate his choice when it is made for him. Just as Jagster was about to make his decision, Verys Nelt charged past the thinned out group of zombies towards Jagster. A zombie took a swing at Nelt, narrowly missing him. Another bumped into him, causing his sleeve to catch fire. He quickly patted it out and scooped up Jagster.

Verys ran down a few steps to get Jagster to relative safety. Meanwhile, behind them, Annette took this opportunity to push forward. She, not skilled enough with a blade to get past the zombies’ armor, savagely kicked one down the stairs. It, like one Jagster disposed of, tumbled down the stairway, ripping to pieces as it went before splattering on to the ground next to the other one.

A zombie swung towards Annette with its sword. She tried to dodge out of the way but lost her footing causing the blade to dig into her shoulder. Before the zombie could push the blade further, potentially taking an arm in the process, its arm suddenly exploded as a small stone tore through it at an incredible speed.

“I have your back,” Tiph called down, as she dug in her pockets for another pebble. “Get to Jagster to see if he can heal you!”

Annette, sword in one hand and putting pressure on her profusely bleeding wound with the other, nodded and complied. She leapt past the remaining two zombies, leaving them to Tiph, and made her way to Verys and Jagster.

One zombie turned to follow her, but its leg burnt away, and it collapsed. It tried to crawl, but its arms came off in the attempt. Soon, it stopped moving entirely.

The last one, seemingly a fresher corpse and much quicker, charged at Annette, only to have its head blown apart by one of Tiph’s stones. Though still “alive”, it could not coordinate itself without a head and just tripped down the stairs. It survived the fall but burnt to death before it could get up and head back to its prey.

Woozy from her wound, Annette stumbled. She released her neck to hold herself up with the wall and, with the pressure gone, blood spurted everywhere, spraying like a mist on to the wall and stone steps. She took a knee and propped herself against the cavern wall just as her eyes began to roll into her head.