Consume the Living

Loud footsteps and bassy voices echoing from the staircase prompted Matron Etyl and I to meld into the comforting embrace of the shadows and watch the draugr scatter around the room to play dead, aided in all senses through the means of this strange device.

It was as if I were standing right there, crouched low to the ground, staring at Amun's back while he approached the entrance, pivoted just at the door, and transitioned to the wall where he sat patiently above the threshold.

Within moments, a figure could be seen snaking across the ground, dipping and swaying their hooded head with the utmost caution until they finally stood to the laughable height of a meter, then turned to wave their companions in.

The party entered bearing torches raised high enough to lick the devil above the door with their flames. But none seemed wise enough to turn their eyes up as they entered. Humans. Elves. Dwarves. They were so high and mighty they could never look up. Not until it was too late.

That was a running joke amongst our kind that Amun seemed to be aware of, noted by the silent grin that spread across his face before the perspective shifted, giving me a clear view of the invading party. Somehow without being seen.

Besides the halfling rogue, all of them seemed to be devoted to some type of deity. Directly behind the half of a human was a heavily armored figure boasting an overcompensating weapon and a holy symbol of eight dragon heads. A paladin of Bahamut, standing back-to-back against a skittish cleric of the same pantheon.

Two fighters were posted in a similar formation near the entrance. Both were shrouded in the inked markings of the God of War, both with shield, but one with sword and the other with spear.

The true prize, however, was centered between the two pairs. A clerical surface elf, devoted to Caelarin*. Born from the Queen Demon Spider herself, The Matron's bloodlust poured into the air, manifesting as a haunting cacophony of a million tugged strings that scratched and scratched at the little elf girl's mind.

I was used to the grating sound. By the sounds of her feet sliding trepidatiously across the ice, I safely assumed she was not. She knew Matron Etyl was near. Thus she, and by extension the party, remained blind to the Elven Devil lying in wait with the maleficent calmness of a Darkworld predator.

My second field of view shifted once again. This time, it retreated to the walls to watch Amun mirror their steps from the ceiling. An amused smile spread across his face as the rogue stuffed his pockets with gold and trinkets. Then it shifted to Zaraxus' throne to stare at the party as a whole before it focused on three sets of eyes that glowed with divine light.

"So many undead. Powerful undead. Draugr. All of them. Except that one." The cleric of Bahamut shuddered. "I've never seen such a thing."

"A fiend is among us." Grunted the paladin after scanning his glowing eyes about the room. "A devil."

"Wait!" The surface elf whined. "By Caelarin's word, a Unicorn Slayer is nearby. But… I also sense a… Fae?"

I found myself staring at a mirror as the words repeated soundlessly off both my and Matron Etyl's lips. 'Fae?' she signed, inflicting as much confusion as I would have through snapping motions. Then, for whatever reason, she slapped me. Then muttered a detection spell of her own.

Her eyes widened in shock as much as they glared gray with power. But then the former faded, revealing utter shock to an otherwise empty crowd. 'He is… everything. Fae. Fiend. Divine. Wicked. Undead. Yet alive. He is mana itself!' She signed ever faster. But a shrieking voice interrupted any more signals. Or slaps.

"There! It's him!"

My eyes fell on the cleric, pointing to the ceiling like a child while Amun pounced.

He was on the ground before their heads turned, crouching while the cleric yammered on about their target being the source of the conflicting signatures. A volley of divine spells and javelins crashed or bounced off the ceiling an instant later. But an eon seemed to pass before their eyes fell back down. And when they did, this enchantment forced me to stand in their place.

Time slowed to a crawl at that moment. More so, it seemed our senses melded, mine and the Clerics. I found myself looking down at a brown-skinned drow returning an amiable smile to my abject horror. Yet, I stared into the midnight-black sclera of his eyes.

They were unblinking, those eyes, birthing a curiosity that forced me to stare deeper into the draconic pupils set inside pure white irises. In return, those eyes read upon my essence like a book.

It was a comedy, apparently, as the twin rows of fiendish teeth pulled apart to laugh at the building despair of the clerical elf as she shouted. "What are you!?"

Though the crash of a second volley superseded her cry of desperation, this enchantment made it feel as if she had screamed in my ear. It even overpowered the sound of the brambles she sprouted beneath her foe. But then it enhanced the baleful scream of the fibers withering upon contact.

The same was true for the other spells, I noted. Most bounced harmlessly off of him. Others did little, if any damage. But the blades ran him through all the same. A fact that seemed to shock the fighters, given the way they backpedaled away from him with more haste than the others.

Uncertainty. Fear. Disbelief. Disgust. All of the above and more was plastered on their faces while they watched Amun sink to his feet, coughing up a pool of blood while the life drained from his eyes. Some covered their mouths and coughed as if the stench was unbearable. One of the fighters even began swiping at their arm frantically.

When the necrotic fires blossomed into that familiar scape of black bones, I was prepared and held firm. Thus I watched the foul energy wash over the humans in comfort.

The Bahamut paladin reacted first, turning about as if they had been blinded while Caelarin's cleric shouted repeatedly for someone to answer her, despite the fighters shouting to kill the advancing drow as they fumbled with their weapons.

Amun advanced with a basic punch that caved in the proud symbol of Bahamut's paladin near the rear. They fell to their knees with a feminine cry while Amun spun around gracefully, smashing her helmeted temple against his heel before he followed through with a spine-shattering axe kick for good measure.

The resulting crack was deafening enough to demand stillness in every corner of the room. Save one place.

The newly felled corpse began convulsing the moment Amun lifted his foot from the mangled armor. But Amun hardly waited. Skipping with the Wind, he leaped up and kicked off a pillar in a blur of motion, propelling himself down to land in the center of the other four.

While the lone rogue fumbled with his wits, Amun's fists blazed with fires of Furious Blows as he stood to his full height to grace Caelarin's cleric with six armor-denting impacts against her left side in rapid succession.

She was writhing and on her way down by the third nearly gut-wrenching blow, clearing enough space for short swords and shields to slash and bash Amun. But he paid them little mind.

Amun kicked out behind him, shattering the kneecap of Bahamut's cleric coming up behind him before he stepped forward and pivoted to slam his elbow into the falling cleric's helm. The cleric's mace went tumbling overhead, once and then twice before a brown hand plucked it out of the air and flung it into the downed cleric's abdomen, crashing with a dull thunk.

By then, the rogue had regained his wits and turned towards the sounds of muffled screams. In completing his motion, he first saw those dreadful eyes staring into his soul before his eyes flicked to the fiendish drow's hands, clutched tightly around the fighter's faces.

The comparatively massive humans kicked their feet helplessly and poked and prodded Amun with short swords and daggers. All to no avail.

A pitiful gasp escaped the rogue's lips before he forced his little eyes to turn madly. They scanned the room for the exit with the utmost desperation. Only for the wilting bodies of his comrades to reveal the door beyond their foe.

It was louder than the destruction of a city of glass, the sound of the rogue's hope shattering to dust.

The dull thud of knees against ice accented the sharp clamor of weapons and armor clattering against the floor. An acrid smell followed, spreading across the room from a source that coincided with the sudden wet spot on the rogue's pants.

If there were any sounds of dripping fluids, they were muted by the cracks and pops of shifting bones and joints. Sounds that inevitably brought the weeping rogue's eyes back to the shifting mass of flesh and bone that was Amun.

Much to his, and our, surprise; Amun began convulsing along with the corpses. Albeit to a much lesser degree. His face remained placid while every fiber of his musculature writhed and spasmed violently. His back arched in pain, yet he remained on his feet until the fighters were naught but dry husks of flesh and bone.

The corpses fell to spasm and seized like all the rest. Amun fell with them. Down to his knee, where he silently endured the pain of his physiology being pushed past his limits.

I could not begin to imagine what it was like to have my body destroy and repair itself a dozen times per second in order to make up for the absurd strength I forced it to wield. But like seemingly everything, Amun took it with little issue.

When he rose a few seconds later, he was only a few centimeters taller and wider. But when he looked down and smiled at the lone rogue, he seemed all the more menacing. Enough to steal my and the Matron's breath. However, the intense stillness that should have been was ruined only by a cacophony of convulsing corpses who, one by one, burst into ethereal flames and jumped to their feet.

With guttural huffs, they started tearing at their chests with wild abandon. Breastplates and helmets were carelessly tossed around the room to be forgotten. Even some of their clothes were. Not that the undead cared.

With exposed genitalia and all, they poured their combined malice onto the lone rogue while the wickedly grinning Elven Devil stood at their center, permeating a deathly whisper through the cavern that held one soul-grating word.

"Run."