The great doors of the throne room swung open with a thunderous boom that echoed through the chamber. Through the entrance stepped five figures, none of them realizing that their own silhouettes had begun to act erratically against the torchlight behind them. Weapons in hand, battered and bruised, their stride was constant and cautious on their approach down the center of the room.

  Echoing cackles barely gave the group any pause. A fine attempt on Crayma’s part.

  At their head strode the Paladin missing his helmet, his silver armor dented but still blazing with holy enchantments. His shield bore fresh gouges from devious claws, and his warhammer dripped with the black sludge of destroyed undead. Every bit the hero, down to the square jaw and fierce saffron eyes of his lineage, the scowl on his face never faltered as he locked eyes with the Necromancer from afar.

  Behind him, the others advanced in a tight formation, a comforting testament to their skill that they had made it this far.

  The Cleric, in his shredded brown robes, bore a gash across his forehead that leaked blood down his dark face, but his eyes burned with righteous fury. The religious talisman in his trembling hand pulsed with white light, ready to heal his allies at a moment’s notice in this den of wolves.

  Her orb-staff crackling with power, the Wizard flanked her casting counterpart. Scorch marks decorated her long flowing scarlet robe, and her blonde hair was still smoking from the infernal carnage she’d inflicted on the undead. Her tongue lapped at her dry lips, tense muscles prepared for yet another fight.

  The Rogue seemed to melt between the false shadows even as he walked, leather armor split and torn in several places, a small crossbow in his hands. Every movement was fluid yet careful in the darkness, his face hidden beneath a brown cowl. From here, an impressive collection of throwing knives decorated his belt, and his black daggers swallowed the fire’s light to allow for the stealthiest of approaches.

  And finally, their dependable Warrior. Her sword was still bloody from the creatures she had cut down to reach this place, with steel armor that bore the marks of battle, the grip on her hilt remaining stalwart even here at the end of her journey. Eyes and a sullen mouth, that’s all that was visible beneath her helmet, scanning the room for threats.

  They had made it perhaps twenty paces into the throne room when the Cleric suddenly raised his hand, bringing the entire party to an immediate halt.

  "Wait…" He hissed, his voice tight with concentration, "I sense... Orie's mercy... The undead. They're everywhere. We're completely surrounded."

  The others tensed, weapons rising as they turned their heads round the seemingly empty chamber, but Amithaera could see the understanding dawning in their eyes as they realized the truth; the shadows themselves were full of watching eyes, and death lurked in every corner. Things were going to plan, step by step.

  Their leader stepped forward alone toward the occupied throne, his hammer still lowered but ready to strike. His voice rang out clear and strong in the chamber, "Amithaera! Foul Necromancer! I am Thaddias of the Iron Talons, and in the name of the Sunlit Orie, I call you to face judgment!"

  From her throne, Amithaera floated gracefully and landed on her feet, a small smile playing at the corners of her mouth. The arrogance of these mortals never ceased to amuse her.

  "Welcome to my tower, Iron Talons," she said, her voice carrying easily through the chamber. "I must admit, I'm quite surprised you made it through my defenses. Few have managed to make it this far.”

  The Necromancer's fingers flicked downwards, and the flames dimmed. Her dark domain had seeped into the room to swallow them whole.

  "I congratulate you on your journey… but I'm afraid this is where it ends for all of you.”

  Thaddias raised his hammer, holy light blazing around him like a second sun, the weapon serving as a catalyst for miracles.

  He growled out, "I offer you one final chance to surrender, Witch. Orie is on our side. You have no hope of victory. Yield now, and my hammer will grant you swift passage back to your Sulfur Lord's realm."

  Amithaera threw back her head and laughed, the sound echoing off the stone walls and reverberating into the party. The Wizard tensed in surprise as she continued, "Such a fanciful fantasy. I thought you were a Paladin, not a comedic little Bard.”

  As she spoke, wraiths began to emerge from the shadows that the party produced with their bodies opposite the flames, their spectral forms coalescing like smoke driven by malevolent purpose. Her own shadow stretched and writhed, growing to monstrous proportions behind her as dark power flowed through the chamber. The Iron Talons huddled closer, their fear becoming more evident, all except Thaddias.

  Amithaera bit her lower lip, enjoying herself and this confrontation already. They were no Golden Bells, but the Paladin was delightful to barb with. It was time for the finishing touches.

  "Do you see the Sun here? You speak of your weak vengeful gods as if they hold any dominion in these lands," she continued, spreading her arms wide and terribly. The dress worked masterfully. Her silhouette was haunting and enormous, giving Amithaera the appearance of a monstrous beast with wings.

  "You have come woefully unprepared to face the true power of the Undergods. I am the greatest servant of the Lord of Sulfur, and you are nothing but insects to be crushed beneath my heel! I am the end of all things, mortals. I am the end of you!”

  Behind the Paladin, the Cleric rolled his eyes at the grandiose speech, though Amithaera was too caught up in her own drama to notice the gesture.

  The chamber's torches were snuffed out by invisible forces and darkness creeped in from all sides, enveloping the Iron Talons. That was when their Wizard stepped forward, raising her staff high above her head and shouting, "Daylight!"

  Brilliant radiance exploded from the crystal atop her staff, banishing the encroaching shadows and revealing the true scope of Amithaera's forces.

  The Warrior gasped loudly as she saw the skeletons standing guard along the walls, their steel weapons sharpened and prepared to gore flesh from bone. Zombies shuffled forward from behind the pillars to rip them to shreds. The Wraiths that had been birthed out of their shadows took flight and circled overhead like vultures, screeching violently.

  Amithaera’s goblins began to file behind the greater forces, flanking the bone behemoths stomping toward the party of doomed fools.

  “Hold fast!” The Warrior shouted out, keeping near to the Wizard to protect the defenseless caster.

  Thaddias roared his battle cry and charged forward, shield blazing with power and cracking a zombie into a bloody viscera. His hammer connected with the second zombie in his path, and the creature exploded in a shower of flaming bits of flesh.

  "For Orie!" The Paladin bellowed, caving in the head of another undead with a smite that lit up the entire chamber more than the Daylight spell for a split second.

  The Rogue vanished into the shadowy blind spots cast by pillars, between one blink and the next, his form becoming one with the darkness as he sought advantageous positions for his strikes. A goblin shrieked and leapt as throwing knives found their mark in its side, and another skeleton found its skull separated from its spine by daggers that seemed to appear from nowhere.

  Weaving destruction with spells and sorcery, the Wizard lobbed a sphere of orange flame at a cluster of zombies, the explosion vaporizing a piece of that horde and sending Veratreez diving for cover behind a pillar, clutching tight the mace in her little hands. Amithaera glanced at the tiny lieutenant before glaring at the Wizard. Both women met eyes, but only the Wizard attacked.

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  "Eat this! Lightning bolt!" The crackling energy lanced toward Amithaera, but the Necromancer gestured dismissively and the bolt reflected off her magical barriers, redirecting harmlessly into the ceiling. A singed black mark spread across the ceiling.

  In response, the Necromancer cast her Fog of Death, letting loose a pitch-black smoke from her fingers that began to settle down on the party. Each breath of the fog would burn their lungs and prick at their constitution.

  With a blazing talisman in hand, calling down blessings and healing miracles, their Cleric moved through the melee like a beacon of hope. Holy energy sewed shut bleeding wounds and regenerated energy for another murderous swing on the undead. Amithaera even respected how quickly he had begun to dispel her necrotic smoke, the man chanting, "Orie protect us! Dispel this cursed fog!”

  The Warrior held their rear, defending her squishier companions. Each swing of her bloody sword moved in deadly arcs that no undead could push through. Skeletons shattered against her blade, and even the wraiths gave her a wide berth. One heroic goblin took a bite out of their Wizard, only to be yanked away and skewered by the swordswoman.

  For her part, Amithaera remained on her throne, watching the battle unfold and calculating the cost of this battle. She let her minions take the brunt of the assault, testing the adventurers' capabilities while conserving her own strength.

  It was time to batter their morale.

  "Is that the best you can manage?" She called out mockingly as Thaddias' hammer reduced another skeleton to bony charred splinters.

  When the Wizard launched another lightning bolt, this time toward Veratreez, Amithaera casually deflected it without even acknowledging the goblin's presence. The gesture was so dismissive that it bordered on insulting, as if saving her lieutenant's life was merely an afterthought. With a trembling nod to her mistress, the little goblin returned to the battle.

  Gradually, the tide began to shift. The Iron Talons were turning out to be a force to be reckoned with.

  The Paladin crushed a behemoth’s arm with a singular swing, yelling with righteous rage to conjure up a flurry of impossibly quick strikes and reducing the poor monster to stumps on the ground. Their Warrior grabbed a Wraith’s heart right out of its chest and pelted a skeleton’s head right off with it. A holy wall flung a horde of minions into the air, cast by the Cleric as he became surrounded.

  Still, Amithaera watched patiently.

  One skeleton, eager to join the fray, tripped over a pile of chains that had failed to be hung properly earlier, tumbling into three of his allies and creating a pile of confused bones that Thaddias quickly reduced to ash. Their Rogue was surprised by a hidden goblin, who enthusiastically leaped at the man with its crude sword drawn, only to be punted across the chamber by the adventurer’s boot.

  Petyr, the young vampire, chose that moment to make his dramatic entrance, swooping down from the chandelier above with his cloak of inky smoke billowing behind him. It was the Cleric that blasted him with a ray of burning sunlight, catching the vampire mid-flight.

  In a panic, he transformed into a bat for safety, still so very much on fire. The little squeaking fireball crashed to the ground and flailed desperately, prompting Crayma to rush over and stomp out the flames while frantically apologizing.

  Proud of his attack, the foolish Cleric didn't notice the legless zombie that had been crawling across the floor behind him, unspotted by anyone else. The creature's teeth found his ankle, and the Cleric stumbled with a cry of pain and surprise. Out of divine mana and exhausted from the prolonged battle, he tried to imbibe his potion to restore himself, only to have it shattered in his hands by a brave Wraith that was immediately slain by the Wizard.

  Amithaera seized the moment, casting a dimensional tear in the middle of the Iron Talons, rising and stepping down from her throne. A monstrous groan rose from the tear in space, followed by black tentacles that slithered out and reached out for unlucky prey.

  The Iron Talons had to move now before the Sleeping One found its mark and dragged them beneath to be snacks.

  Her hand taking the Cleric’s, the Wizard pulled her zombifying friend out of danger before a lumbering bone behemoth slapped her into the air. Its massive hand then grabbed the throat and head of the Cleric, trembling as it pulled.

  "No!" The Warrior screamed, rushing through the swinging tentacles towards the Cleric, unable to stop the monster from tearing the man’s head from the rest of his body.

  She cut at the behemoth, ducked under its massive swing that broke into the very expensive pillar beside them, and pierced its body. It grabbed her midsection and received a sword through its skull, but that only served to enrage the monster.

  Freeing herself, the Warrior readied herself for the charging abomination.

  The duel was vicious and brief as the Warrior's blade found its mark again and again, chipping away pieces of the construct's frame. Its overhead swing barely missed the woman’s form and opened it up to a dismemberment by her sword, which she followed by stabbing its undead heart.

  Re-death followed the behemoth, but not before its broken bones jutted out like spears and opened a deep gash across the Warrior’s thigh. She fell weakly, shaky blood-covered hands reaching for her pack.

  Seeing his friend fall, Thaddias let rage overcome his senses. He rushed at Amithaera, cracking his shield against Crayma trying to defend his mistress, pushing past skeletons that raced after him and swung at the Necromancer.

  The Necromancer caught the head of his warhammer in her hand, stopping it just as effortlessly as a wall would. He hadn’t expected that, eyes widening in the realization that he was outclassed, taunted by Amithaera’s smug grin. Before he could utter anything, her hand reached out to grab his face and sizzled infernally on his flesh.

  “AHH!” The Paladin screamed, pulling away, blind and burned. He stumbled right into the crowd of skeletons, who began to yank and stab at the exposed areas between his armor.

  Thaddias howled in fury and raised his hammer upwards, calling upon the full power of his goddess to smite his enemies, “ORIE! GRANT ME YOUR LIGHT!”

  Orie replied with a thunderous ray of light that pierced even the Tower’s ceiling, coating the man with a vibrant light for a split second before a tremendous explosion shook the area around him. The blast incinerated every undead creature that had mobbed the unfortunate fool, but when the smoke cleared, Orie’s blessing had proven to be too much for the Paladin’s mortal form.

  Only his empty armor remained, a pile of gray ash within. Amithaera cackled at the sight, looking down at Veratreez still covering her face in horror from witnessing the horrible fate that befell the adventurer. She undid the dimensional tear in the center in between laughs, trying to catch her breath.

  Her laugh ceased suddenly, senses tingling at the approach of something lethal.

  Without even turning around, the Necromancer's arm reached out to her side and caught the sneaking Rogue by the throat, lifting him off the ground with supernatural strength. She had been expecting him and this final desperate gambit.

  He was choking, flailing, glaring at the woman that was appraising him like the meat he was. His dagger failed to pierce the ward that had surrounded her arm, leaving her torso exposed.

  One last trick.

  As the man dangled from her grip, he let his final dagger drop from his raised hand, catching it smoothly with his free hand below in a move that should have driven the blade into Amithaera's heart, just as he had practiced a thousand times.

  But the woman caught his wrist before the blade could strike home, her violet eyes gleaming with amusement.

  "Clever," she acknowledged, just before a dozen skeletal hands reached up to drag him down from her grip.

  Veratreez and several skeletons converged on the Rogue, pulling his own knives from the corpses of zombies and turning them against their former owner. He screamed in pain while a dozen minions stabbed down at him, soon muffled in his own sputtering blood.

  A bright light caught Amithaera's attention, seeing the wall of flame that had been conjured forth by the Wizard. It was heading right for the minions that had slain the Rogue just now.

  Amithaera cast a Mage Hand to turn Veratreez’s head toward the incoming fire, prompting the little goblin to yell, “BACK AWAY! BACK AWAY!”

  The Necromancer’s ward glimmered and shook as the flames surrounded her, keeping her very much alive. She stepped forward to meet the Wizard in a duel of magic. Fire affinity against her master's Void magic, a fine test to prove her superiority over lesser beings like this Wizard.

  The adventurer vanished into mist and appeared just before Amithaera, slamming her hands together to Thunderclap the villain before her.

  Her eardrums shook with pain, distracting the Necromancer for a moment. The damned Wizard raised a finger to the woman and cast Disintegration, green magic suddenly fizzling away when Amithaera Counterspelled the attack at the last second. That was a large expenditure of mana on the adventurer’s part.

  Knowing this, the Necromancer grabbed the woman’s chin and used her other hand to cast Confusion directly onto her.

  Amithaera laughed as she shoved the Wizard away, watching her stumble around without a focus to steady herself. The finger came back up to cast more of her Disintegration spells, only managing to turn an unlucky goblin to dust. The Necromancer vanished within an Invisibility cast.

  Her minions rushed to finish the last adventurer as the spell wore off. The Wizard’s surprised glare met the monsters desperate to flay the skin from her bones, quickly conjuring up another flame, a fireball to detonate the beasts, flinging it angrily at them.

  It stopped mid-air, and Amithaera materialized where it would’ve landed, her powerful magic holding the spinning little fireball up for the Wizard to see.

  That small flicker of hopelessness, the fear on the Wizard’s face, Amithaera lived for it. For her opponents to know in their final moments that they’d never stood a chance, she would sell her soul again to be perpetually static within the sensation.

  “... Oh, fuck,” the Wizard got out, just as Amithaera flung her own fireball right back at her.