We entered the room and immediately saw the mountain of bones. The room was impossibly vast. The cavern's roof was hundreds of feet above us with blue glowing crystal dimly lighting the area. Bones, millions of them. Hell maybe billions. The arena looked to be at least a mile square if not more. In the center of this vast underground space was bones.

They were the bones of snow lions. They were piled in towering heaps forming a vast labyrinth of skeletons leading to a central mountain of calcium.

“What the hell is this?” I muttered out loud, not understanding what this was.

Warning! You have entered the domain of Grond, the God of Beasts.

Your Scale is suppressed in this area

Demigod Boss Mother of All Snow Lions already spawned.

Another player is already in this arena.

You are sealed in the arena with the monster. Fight well!

Before I had time to ask a question. An earth rattling roar echoed through the chamber. Several of the bones glowed and… okay I will try and describe this, but please understand what we saw was way more upsetting than words will convey. The bones assembled into skeletons that then quickly developed flesh and then skin. This formed lions that immediately assailed us.

This was much worse than the tunnels. First there was simply no end to this. Second was that we no longer had a safe front. Cats would spawn with every roar, and they were just as prone to appear behind us as they were to pop up in front. Then there was the fact that they were of higher Scale on average. Most of them were part of the prides at epic Scale. The next most common were the Alphas. On top of all of that was the maze. The piles of bone weren’t climbable. If you tried they would collapse under your weight and likely spawn a lion on your head. They were also too much to just smash through. Angelica and her hammer couldn’t and neither could I with the Juggernaut’s Bangle.

Brand dropped all pretext of restraint and fired grenades into the swarm of cats. I did my best to keep the barricades between him and the felines, and Angelica slaughtered them like she was trying to set the record. Honestly, she did carry us at this point. The confined spaces and her area of effect damage build allowed her to shine.

It was almost like someone planned that way.

Maybe it was hours, but it was probably 40 minutes but we slowly painfully slowly navigated our way through the maze. We got lost often, and dead cats had a bad habit of waking back up when the Mother of All Snow Lion roared.

I may have been half mad with pain, and possibly a little drunk, -I am not sure if I accidently selected the Buzzed condition once- but I was also killing an unreasonable amount of cats while chugging away at the titanic brew and lugging barricades about. My overloaded brain kept flashing back to the fight by myself against pride. Then it clicked.

“Stop moving forward!” I bellowed over the din while stomping on a half dozen lions.

“What!” Brand asked not understanding.

“We use the corpses to hop the walls! Build up and over!” I screamed back as a White shadow almost tackled me. I managed to dodge at the absolute last moment.

Angelica splattered it with a charge. “That will work!”

Things got much better after that. Yeah we had to build up a ramp, but the cats were coming to us at that point. Ten wall hops later and we found ourselves at the foot of the mountain.

Technically mountain wasn’t the right word. It was a stone deus several stories high with a spiral staircase and a truly impossible amount of bone stacked around it climbing the stairs sucked. If I had to guess, the deus was like six hundred feet up. That doesn’t sound like a lot, because as a horizontal distance it isn’t, but as a vertical distance that is like fifty stories. Yeah that is a bit short for a skyscraper, but that takes some doing, especially while under constant attack by lions without a guard rail.

I nearly went over twice as lions tried to tackle me. If you want to be particular I did fall off once, but that was eight steps in and shouldn’t really count, stupid Megaleo. With a lot of blood sweat and tears we managed to get to the top. Things actually became much simpler once we got above the majority of the bones. The lions were behind us and we just ran up the stairs.

The top of the deus was a sight. Seeing the massive room with the ocean of bones all arranged in a tremendous ring likely creating a colossal ritual circle was humbling base on the enormity of the effort involved. So many bones.

A woman in a red robe stood in the center of another circle on the deus. Next to her was a lion roughly the size of a horse. The thing was skeletally thin. Its fur was dull, patchy, and mangy skin was more prevalent than not. The creature gazed at us with hollow sunken eyes. It tried to rise but it simply couldn’t. Despite its feeble physical form, runes of power burned around it. Each one was red and radiated a primal energy

The lady in red was one of those connected to nature types. Think less hippy and more hard core survivalist. She definitely wasn't the give peace a chancel type. The belt around her waist was laden with knives and a hatch. Her hands and arms were covered in ritualistic scars, and blood, probably from the Mother of Lions based on the chunk carved out of the cat's back leg. I was pretty sure this woman was lopping chunks off and snacking on it. There wasn’t any food elsewhere. There was also the fact that her face was hidden behind a mask made of a snow lion skull.

Shit I should be listening. I twisted the awl.

“...think you could challenge me? In this place of my god Grond’s Power?” she demanded. Her arms were held high making her robe flair out behind her and it was very impressive. I am sure she looked much larger to most predators.

“Can you even see through that mask?” I asked. Apparently the pain I had absorbed damaged my inner monologue.

The skull mask turned to my direction before turning back to Brand, “Is he slow?”

“Ableism? Really?” Brand chastised with that polite contempt British people have.

“Don’t give me that shit,” the priestess spat back all the grandiose tone and theatrical flare gone. “He is at least two sentences behind us. Besides you two are the sick bastards using a moron as a tank. I am offended. And one more thing-”.

“You clearly care deeply,” Angelica cut her off, “Not the point though. Step aside. We will kill what’s left of the boss and take the loot. You get to live, no hard feelings. Sound good?”

“Don’t cut me off you rude bitch!” the priestess shouted back. “I am the one in charge here. You have no idea the things I had to do to get where I am!”

“Grond, right?” I asked. Dammit Adora, I am not like you. If she doesn’t try and kill us, I’ll have to apologize.

The priestess spluttered for a moment, “Fuck you very much, you giant asshole!”

“Everyone focus,” Angelica said again asserting her most incredible power, being a functioning adult. “Just surrender.”

“Why would I do that?” the priestess asked, clearly planning something.

“We have you outnumbered,” Brand said. I could tell by the look on his face he knew he screwed up the moment he spoke.

“Are you sure about that?” The eyes in the skull burned with that golden light seen in predators' eyes at night.

The priestess stabbed the boss. It roared and every bone other than the priestess’s mask transformed into a big ole murder cat. Then they all charged me. What happened next could best be described as ‘too many cats’. We had to put so many back.

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

Frantic, a word that used to mean violently mad, as in crazy. Which is fitting because punching the hell out of a storm of lions on top of a massive sacrificial altar in a giant cavern in a dungeon just isn’t sane. Sadly it is also not that fun. Due to my Scale being suppressed it meant my punches were only inflicting my strength plus 1d6 extra damage rather than the normal multiple d12s I preferred. That said I found a clever work around. I kicked the jerks off the side. I am sure they’ll land on their feet.

Trouble is that Mother of All Snow Lions kept summoning more. Also, that Priestess was not surrendering. She blocked a blast from Brand’s shotgun with a hemisphere or red magic. Angelica wasn’t able to charge like most fights due to the tight quarters. So, instead she tried to just stab the lady in red. The priestess moved almost bonelessly and sort of folded out of the way of the spear tip. There was a flash of a bloody knife and Angelica was driven back, a deep cut on her arm.

Brand unloaded on the priestess, but two lions, eyes glowing, dove in the way to shield the woman. The priestess went on the attack. She moved unnaturally fast. She almost flowed over the bodies of the sacrificial cats, then she hit Brand low. The knife grazed his leg, but the man of mystery sidestepped the hatchet.

That is when Angelica brought the hammer down. The explosion of force launched dozens of lions off the side of the dais. It tossed me off too, but I springboarded off an Alpha and landed on the stairs. Luckily, that all happened so fast by the time I realized I had been in the open air about to fall to my death I was already stomping on a snow lion.

The dust settled to reveal the Priestess intact under the hemisphere of energy she used before. The bubble of force was cracked and dentented but it had stopped the blow. It was hard to tell but she seemed as surprised as the rest of us that she was still alive.

The eyes of a god are upon you!

Tread carefully

The weight of the domain seemed to increase. It wasn’t extreme, but it caused the hairs on my neck to stand on end. I was subtly slower, and my fists ached more with each impact. Claws seemed to dig deeper.

The priestess seemed to be having a reverse reaction with much higher severity. “Grond!” she screamed half terrified, half ecstatic. Quicker than blinking she was on her feet. Brand dodge the knife on instinct. Angellica wasn’t so lucky. The hatch slammed into her other arm, and bit deep. Angelica dropped the hammer and pulled the spear out of her inventory. She impaled the Priestess through the stomach. Lightning arc, and the explosion of thunder deafened me.

Somehow that flung Angelica back.

The priestess stood there impaled and burnt, but unbowed. She casually pulled the spear from her body. The wound bled profusely but she paid it no mind. She dropped the weapon before charging Angelica. The priestess was taking swipes at Angelica before the spear clattered on the stone floor. Holy shit, this lady was getting close to Celeste’s speed. I saw it for just a moment, but her shadow was the same as the figure carved into the doors. I don’t think we were alone anymore.

I had my own problems. A pair of White Shadows were in the mix of the Pride surging up the stairs. The regular snow lions, and even the Alphas were manageable in this domain, but now the Epic and Heroic Scale cats were outpacing me and I was forced to dodge more of the attacks. This was a problem because as Denise had pointed out my martial art only broke the action economy when I was blocking. I could only really effectively dodge about five attacks before everything started connecting. This meant I was back to being mauled. For about three seconds I tried dodging the attacks from the White Shadow, and blocking the Pride.

I needed to try something different.

I dropped the barricades by the stairs. This was arguably a mistake. The weight of the cats pushed the Barricade toward us. Quickly turning what was supposed to be a wall into a broom about to sweep all of us off the edge.

Angelica and the Priestess cleared the hurdle almost as an afterthought. Angelica was trying to pick up either her spear or the hammer, and the mad woman with the knife and hatchet kept trying to butcher Angelica the second she slowed down. This kept going on either side of the barricades without interruption. Brand made it over with a smart hop and juked a few errant attacks from the cats. That left me and the Mother of All Snow Lions being swept to the edge.

The boss looked at me and did nothing. Whatever this thing had been. Constant torture had rendered it… ready to die.

Willpower check… successful.

Emotional state kept under control.

Note: Repeated rolls will increase difficulty.

The things that get you. What I did was mostly to save my life, but I would be lying if some over-empathetic part of me didn’t do it to stop the stupid thing from dying that way. I pulled the barricades back into my inventory. This caused a surge of the lions, including most of the Pride and the two White Shadows to be swept over the edge. I managed to sort of crowd surf the killer cats enough to not be tossed over the edge. I got my feet under me and went back to trying to control the population.

The roaring stopped.

I took a moment to check and found the Mother of All Snow Lions still on the platform, still alive, but just watching me. Not sure what that was but my guess is it was no longer entirely on team Grond, or maybe it was simply no longer strong enough to keep roaring.

I needed to focus. We needed to do something about the priestess.

She had taken the time to cut Angelica up pretty good. Her health was in the red. The priestess had also managed to push her to the edge. With nowhere to run Angelica blocked the strike from the hatchet. She dodged a slash of the knife but that left her open from the followup.

A split second before the knife would have gutted Angelica, Brand shot the blade, shattering it. As the priestess charged him, Brand kicked the hammer toward Angelica. He tried to gun down the priestess but both his pistols clicked empty.

This was the moment.

I wasn’t fast enough. The hatchet buried itself into Brand’s chest as my hand touched the Priestess. I felt the rush of air as Angelica’s hammer swung just over my head. The blast of thunder behind me was enough to push the Megaleo behind me back. Its attack grazed me rather than sending me flying. Angelica’s spear also skewered the head of a White Shadow behind Brand. The priestess didn’t try to pull free of my grasp, instead she stabbed me in the neck.

Attack from Rebecca Priestess for Grond (Snow Lion Aspect) successful.

You take 15 points of damage

You are immune to the Severed Vocal Chords condition

You are now bleeding

Titanic Regeneration plus 12 hit points

HP: 237/240

The knife hardly hurt as it pierced free of my neck. Rebecca didn’t slide the blade out. She ripped it toward her. The entire length of the blade parted my flesh. That did hurt, a lot.

I tried to scream but only a gasp of air came out. I willed the Vitae to mark Rebecca

Rebecca is now Gore Soaked

She is causing the Blood Frenzy condition.

…They are coming for her!

“I am sorry,” I communicated. That was weird. No actual sound came out but some aspect of my titanic physiology or maybe the Universal Communication trait won’t be denied by petty things like my neck being almost chopped off. My head certainly wasn’t lolling after the tendons were cut either. It was almost like my existence invalidated natural laws of existence. Everyone also heard it clearly is the main point though.

Angelica didn’t slow down. Her hammer crushed another White Shadow. Brand, having taken the spear, warded off three cats and grievously wounded a fourth. I let go of Rebecca.

The cat’s tried to swarm her, but she seemed to mentally push them back as she waved her arms and screamed, “Stay Back!” she ripped the mask off her face and looked at me, “Vitae?”

The lions slowly pressed closer to her. Some did try and kill me, but Angelica was very good at Whack-A -Lion. She was definitely going to get the high score.

My neck slowly knitted together, “I am sorry.” I was too. Another part of me was horrified. Not even a day after realizing this was one of the worst ways to kill someone I could think of, and I was using it on a person. Why hadn’t I marked the damned boss? ‘Because the grim acceptance of death in its eyes reminded you of Marnie’ a foundationally honest voice replied before I could avoid it. ‘Because you were able to connect more with the tortured monster than that woman.’

I sort of expected that realization to hit harder. Don’t get me wrong. I didn’t like it. I didn’t know Rebecca, and yes she tried to kill us but as the cats pressed in closer and she backed up to the edge of the circle I became perfectly aware I had killed someone. That is an odd realization. Maybe it was adrenaline or maybe it was seeing Rebecca injure Angelica and Brand. Maybe it was her literally cutting my throat, not sure why that didn’t do more damage. The realization was that seeing her die wasn’t going to bring me any joy, but it wasn’t going to bring me any pain either.

That felt wrong.

“I said back!” Rebecca screamed at a Cat Sith that had slunk through the horde of lions.

It kept creeping closer.

I wasn’t going to just sit there and watch. I turned to the Mother of Snow Lions. She was still watching me. Still helpless. Still alone. I moved to it and pulled the awl out of my inventory. As I approached, the tormented creature exposed its neck. It… it wanted to die. It wanted me to end it. Brand was shouting something to me, probably to hurry. Angelica was still keeping me clear.

I knelt next to the Mother of Snow Lions. I placed one hand on the back of the boss’s head. The entire body was withered and feeble. With the other slammed the awl through the thing's eye through the back of the socket and into the brain. The thing died instantly, but the light of the runes faded more slowly.

Prompts flashed in my view but I dismissed them. I turned to find Rebecca still alive, but covered in burn scars from the Cat Sith. The lions were skeletons again, the flesh simply vanished from the bones. The horrifying mess from the ones we’d slaughtered remained. The stone circle was painted in blood

Brand had lost his feet at some point and was kneeling with the hatchet still buried in his torso. He held a pistol on Rebecca, “Surrender…” he managed.

“No, I must…” Rebecca started her voice desperate.

She never finished.

Brand pulled the trigger.

…better than the Lions I guess.