Day 40

Once she had the orb, Hail agreed to hear our request. She was not pleased. She seeks power from these rifts. Didn’t want to close it. But she had agreed, so she moved forward. Shifty, yet still honorable. As she planned, she fidgeted with the orb. Tossed around the BOUND REALM OF FROST like a human child’s toy.

“I can close it.” I breathed a sigh of relief. “But it will take me hours. And the other side will surely… protest my efforts during that time.” Less relieved. “If I can get my hands on an elemental censer, though…” Went on to lay out a plan. We would procure the censure from the crypt of Stonebreaker. Powerful elementalist. Died in a rockslide, and buried with the prize. Irony is delicious.

Saw an old carving in the side of the decrepit tavern as we exited. “The Crooked Bone”. Waste of a good bar name. Walking toward the city gate, something in a back alley caught Paco’s eye. He grinned like a child. “Those who came before were here!! HERE! They were HERE!” Took off running. As he sprinted away, I heard something about tools from his lab. I do not understand Quatryl.

We traveled for a day and a half. Brianca, Mary Sue, Hail, and I. Odd company. Found the mausoleum along the Serpent’s Kiss River. Overgrown in vines. Ancient. Rolled aside the massive stone door. Descended the long, dark staircase. Two cultists at the bottom. Of course. “You shouldn’t have come here, ghostface.” Addressed Hail, not us.

We laid siege to that stairway for days. Made a push, they animated more skeletons. Again. Again. Again. Five days of deadlock. Finally, Mary Sue proposed a plan. “Balboa, you and Hail push deeper into the crypt. Brianca and I will stay behind. They seem to fear Hail much more than any of us,” the Aesther tossed her orb in the air “and if they’re distracted with her, perhaps we can slip our daggers into them unseen. Well, my daggers and Brianca’s shards of ice.” The rogue’s eyes gleamed in the fire. Present. Dangerous. “Run. Don’t look back.”

“I can’t shift inside the Crypt.” It’s Hail. “Stonebreaker is gone, but this forgotten monument to him still holds power. The censure still holds power. Until I set my hand upon it, I will be locked into this realm of reality. I can’t say I relish that thought.” The fire was uncomfortably silent. No solutions. Nothing to say. We would try the plan the next day.

The ruse worked. The shambling bones defending the stairs wavered. Hail moving one way, Brianca’s rain of fire and ice coming from the other. I sprinted into the room, Hail behind me. Using me as a shield of moving stone. The room was long. Full of echoes. Lined with pillars. I made for a stone door on the far side. Slammed my shoulder against it. It crumbled into dust. Revealed a cave beyond.

I looked back. Face of one cultist was twisted in pain. Mary Sue’s dagger between his shoulders. She laughed. The face of the other cultist… he was smiling.

Evil should not smile.

Behind each column, another cultist stepped from the shadows. “Go!” Mary Sue screeched. Gritted her teeth. Twirled her dagger.

Turned around again. New cultists had animated more horrors. Between us and the deeper reaches of the crypt. Shambling bones, but now spirits as well. Wisps of malice with very real swords. We pushed on. I shattered doors and threw boulders at whatever undead that I could. Mary Sue followed, daggers flashing. Brianca defended her back. Skeletons erupted into flame, and spirits froze solid and dropped from the air. More cultists. More undead. More caves. More shit-eating smiles from evil.

We found ourselves standing back to back in yet another cave. Pits of oozing slime between us and the next stone door. “Any ideas?” Grabbed the nearest cultist, slung him at the door. Through the door. Behind it, we saw the censure. Top of a staircase, on a pedestal. Surrounded by more cultist and their already-animated undead. Fuck. “What about the pits?” I grabbed the nearest undead. Heaved him at the slime. They were getting bigger. An undead giant? Taller than the ooze was deep, apparently. Yelled at them to go. “What about that?” Mary Sue pointed at the legion of cultists behind us. With their undead friends. Yelled at them again. “Go.” They used the giant’s head as a stepping stone. Rushed forward. Sprinted forward. Mary Sue and Brianca towards the crowd. Hail towards the pedestal. The cultists engaged the fighters. Away from the censure. Good.

Moved towards the cave behind us. Took a stone. Planted it in the door. To get through, they would need to move us both. They came at me. I pummeled as many as I could. They pummeled back. One cultist among them must have been some sort of leader. Robes trimmed in crimson rather than black. Permanent sneer. Shoved through his cronies, dagger flashing. Into my chest. Where my heart would have been. Would have. It hit empty air. My head smashed though his head. I did not hit empty air.

Even without a leader, there were too many. Looked over my shoulder. Brianca had summoned shards of ice from the cave floor, and collapsed the stalactites above to close the gap. A wall of the elements between cultists and censure. One of the cultists flung her into it. She didn’t rise. Mary Sue was dancing among them. Gleaming daggers and eyes. Her dance was cut short by the lance of an undead. She landed facedown. It raised the lance to finish the job.

Turned back to the pressing horde at my front. Braced my back against the door. Braced myself against the inevitable.

They turned to ash as they reached for me. Hail was holding the censure aloft. Chanting in an unknown language. She lowered it. Laughed. “Well, that was fun.” Mary Sue rolled joined in the laughter. Her assailant’s weapon had dissolved even as it fell. Brianca was unconscious, but she woke easily. “I lost a crystal off of my shoulder. One of my favorites. Damn it all.” Her aloof façade may yet break.

With the censure in hand, we make for the portal. It is time.

–Balboa