B5 Chapter 46 – Dead Realm

“We are so fucked,” Dove groaned, collapsing to his knees and planting his bony hands in the skulls beneath him. “Why did you have to bring us here? Do you have any idea what you’ve done? I’ve seen one-copper whores on festival day less fucked than we are!”

Tyron continued his inspection of the surroundings, only half listening as his horde continued to pour through the gate.

The ground around them seemed to undulate, with rises and falls much like the dunes he had seen in the southern deserts, except larger. Beneath the dust and broken rocks, there were always, always those skull formations staring back at him. Overhead, there didn’t appear to be any sky at all, only darkness. He conjured more globes of light, scattering them further to extend his vision. This place wasn’t made for the living; without a light source, his eyes were completely useless here.

“Are you listening to me, Tyron, you meddling moron?” Dove demanded, scuttling over to the Necromancer and punching him in the leg.

“I’m listening, Dove, I’m listening,” Tyron assured him, turning his eyes back towards his former mentor, who picked himself off the ground while inspecting his hand for damage. “It’s interesting to see that your contract is not quite as restrictive now that we’re here in the Realm of the Dead. I thought that might be the case.”

“Oh, you did, did you?” Dove growled sarcastically. “Amazing for you, I’m so glad you were proven correct. That must make you feel so fucking smart. And when a Death Lord comes over here and rips your head off before shoving it right up your ever so clever anus, will you be feeling nice and smart then?”

More skeletons and covered wagons laden with materials continued to flow through the gate while it remained active. Wights and revenants took their teams of undead and scattered around the perimeter, forming a defensive line and spreading wider to scout the surrounding area.

Information from all his minions poured into Tyron’s mind, and he sifted through it all, highly alert to any sign of danger. However, so far, there didn’t seem to be any; their immediate surroundings seemed… barren.

“I know there is danger here, Dove, great danger,” Tyron said frowning, “but what is it? And where?”

“You fucking idiot,” Dove said, straightening his own armour and re-wrapping the snake skeleton around his waist, ensuring it was in the correct position. “I thought you knew about this place! This is the Realm of the Dead, not some country village!”

“So talk. Let me know just how much of a fool I am.”

That, at least, seemed to penetrate Dove’s increasing exasperation and fear. He pointed a finger at Tyron, glowing eyes dancing with glee.

“Yes! Now that you put it that way, yes! I’ve been waiting for fucking years for this!”

He pointed imperiously at the ground in front of him.

“Sit at my feet and prepare to learn the wisdom of Dove and the idiocy of Tyron Steelarm!”

Tyron stared at him, head cocked slightly to the side, eyes cold. Dove withdrew his hand.

“Nevermind the first part. Let’s start with the basics, then. Realm of the Dead, big ol’ place, lots of souls and skulls… for some reason.”

“You don’t know why everything looks like a skull?” Tyron asked, genuinely surprised. He looked down between his feet to see hollow eyes formations of crumbling stone looking back up at him.

“I have theories,” Dove said, swinging the snake skeleton up over his shoulder and planting his hands on his bony hips. “Perhaps a skull is the natural form all things take when saturated with this level of Death Magick, perhaps whoever created this realm just likes to keep things atmospheric. Perhaps there’s a team of undead worms going around reshaping the rock into skulls, like little sightless sculptors. I don’t fucking know. Is that really the most important thing right now?!”

“I suppose not,” Tyron muttered, unable to quite stop himself from theorising.

He didn’t see any little worm sculptors down there….

“Like every other realm in reality, this place is ruled by some bad, bad motherfuckers. Death Lords who command vast armies and control enormous territories. They fight amongst each other constantly, vying for resources, namely souls, forming alliances, betraying those alliances and generally stabbing everyone and everything they can find.”

“And it was one of those who put his contract on you.”

“Shut your stupid gods damned mouth…. Yes. Yes it was,” Dove conceded. “My new Class didn’t whisk my conciousness off to a lovely, wholesome and beautiful realm like the Astral Sea, but dumped my ignorant backside here. Before I could get my bearings and find a nice, native beastie to form a contract with, I was found and captured by a delightful prick named Malasin, Death Lord of Strix.”

Dove leaned back and looked up at the vast nothing overhead, sighing.

“I probably shouldn’t have been screaming and cursing quite so loudly, but I don’t think it was the sound that helped them track me, but rather the disturbance in the weave.”

He jerked his thumb back at the gate.

“By the by, the disturbance I made was like a tiny pebble being thrown into a pond compared to the fat mother-in-law divebomb you’ve punched into here.”

“So we have to move,” Tyron nodded and Dove merely laughed.

“You think you can… never mind. It’ll almost be worth it to see the smug look wiped off your stupid face. Sure, move, run if you think it will help. As far as I can see, you’ve already been incredibly, unbelievably lucky by landing in the middle of the ass-end of nowhere. That’s going to buy you a smidge of time to pretend an all powerful master of death isn’t going to swan in here and make you eat your own shit.”

“How powerful?” Tyron asked. “Are they gods of this realm? Powerful Mages? This place is rich in magick, which means the Unseen is here. Are they just extremely high level?”

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If it was a matter of levels, then as long as he could remain hidden and continue to progress, the only thing stopping Tyron from rising to match these Death Lords was time.

“All of those things,” Dove stated flatly. “Control over the Realm confers certain… advantages. The larger their territory, the more souls they amass, the stronger they get. It would take days to explain all the ways that you’re dead, but I’ll summarise it here for you: I’ve only met one of them, and he shits out minions as strong as Magnin and Beory on a daily basis. To them, you’re like a puff of wind. Even less than that, the fart of a sparrow with particularly clenched cheeks. The second they find you, you are fucked.”

“Then I should do everything I can not to be found,” Tyron nodded.

Dove slapped himself in the skull.

“You haven’t been listening to a word I’ve said, have you? How in the fuck are you going to hide when you’ve already lit a massive fucking bonfire announcing your arrival?! You literally created a break in the weave wide enough to drive a wyvern through! At least three of the fucking Lords have already sensed it and sent a hundred thousand strong army to rip out your balls and make you eat them.

“Malasin was a right prick to me and I was already dead. Only the goddess’ left tit knows how they’re going to treat someone who came here alive. My guess? It won’t be great.”

“I’m curious about that,” Tyron asked, still devoting most of his attention to sensing the surroundings via his minions. “After binding you with a contract, Malasin the Death Lord let you go, and let you form contracts with summons, didn’t they?”

“I wouldn’t be very useful if I couldn’t summon anything, now would I?” Dove grunted. “The prick wanted me to try and hijack a rift, create an opening that would allow them to send an army through.”

“To conquer our realm?”