Richard Knaak - Scales of the Serpent

Returning to the previous intersection, Uldyssian headed in the direction that he had rejected. There was no further contact by the priest’s specter and so Uldyssian assumed that he should keep walking until it said something.

Indeed, the voice arose at the next junction. To the left you must go …

“How long is this going to take?”

The distance shortens, Uldyssian ul-Diomed, even if the danger also heightens …

“Which means?”

This was the plaything of my lord Lucion…a wrong step, a wrong turn…and you will have your hands full… The voice went silent after that and Uldyssian decided not to bother seeking more. Other than the directions, all Malic offered were riddles. Again, Uldyssian vowed to remain wary of the ghost.

Malic did not speak again until they had reached another corridor. Uldyssian followed the new path and after a few minutes noticed that the way was growing darker. In addition, a sense of claustrophobia took hold of him.

Recalling the tricks of the Worldstone’s cavern, Uldyssian rejected the feeling. As the torches grew farther and farther apart, he summoned a light of his own.

The changes in his surroundings did not bode well. He resorted to the bone fragment for answers. “What goes on here, priest?”

Remain steady on the path , the ghost replied very succinctly. It was almost as if Malic stood next to him. Touch not the walls, whatever the need …

While he was certainly willing to obey, Uldyssian wanted a reason. “Why? What’ll happen if I—”

The stone floor tilted, sending him sliding to the left.

Beware! The wall!

Still clutching the fragment, Uldyssian grasped with his free hand a depression between two stones in the floor. His momentum ceased. He held on tight. Oddly, the path behind him looked absolutely normal. With the utmost caution Uldyssian pulled himself toward it.

The floor shifted, sending him rolling on into the darkened areas. This was not some clever use of mechanisms; the only manner by which the floor could move in so many directions was magic.

He concentrated, willing the floor to become even again. The angle at which he tumbled lessened, then disappeared altogether.

Uldyssian paused to catch his breath.

The floor shifted to his right.

The wall, fool! Beware the —

It was too late. Uldyssian, already near one side of the corridor, had no chance to react before his shoulder slammed into the wall. The stone there gave way. He dropped into emptiness…

And a moment later, landed on a harsh, slick surface.

Rise up! Rise up, you dolt! Malic all but shouted in his head. They come! They come!

Savage grunting filled Uldyssian’s ears. On instinct, he rolled away from their source.

A heavy battle-ax chopped into the ground near his head.

Ending on his back, Uldyssian stared up into the black pits that were the eyes of a morlu.

Uldyssian thrust his hand toward the monstrous figure. With a roar of anger, the morlu went flying back, finally crashing into a jagged wall far away. The body fell several dozen yards before hitting the bottom.

But as Uldyssian rose from dealing with this threat, he saw that Malic had been correct when the ghost had used the word “they.”

He was in a vast underground chamber filled with morlu.

Uldyssian had been certain that Lilith had thrown all her resources into attacking the edyrem. He would have never believed that she had kept so many of these hideous creatures at hand should Uldyssian escape her trap. Then again, perhaps she had merely held on to this band for other ventures, such as against Inarius, conspicuously absent in all this struggle.

Whatever the reason, the morlu howled at the sight of Uldyssian and charged him. Like ants, they flowed toward the intruder from every direction. Some waved weapons, others merely sought to tear him apart with their hands.

He thrust the fragment into his shirt and then met the first of his attackers. Uldyssian grappled with the morlu just long enough to gain a hold, then twisted the warrior around in time for the ax of another to bury itself deep in the first’s chest regardless of the armor.

Tossing aside the body, Uldyssian sent a ball of fire at the second attacker. Perhaps because of the morlu’s undead nature, the creature immediately became an inferno. Uldyssian kicked him into another, then turned to his left, where his most imminent foe now stood.

That morlu received what the initial one had. Driven by the human’s powers, the armored beast flew up, then dropped over a lava flow Uldyssian had spotted. The morlu sank out of sight, the lava sizzling loud.

But even with such success, the horde was pressing him harder. With a cry of defiance, Uldyssian swept his arm across the chamber. The ground around him exploded and morlu by the scores were ripped apart or tossed far away. Uldyssian did the same with his other arm, with just as dramatic results. He continued this twice more, clearing for a great distance the ground around him.

Morlu bodies and parts lay scattered everywhere. Driven by his frustration and fury and not having to fear harming friends, Uldyssian had been able to take down nearly as many of the creatures as had been part of the entire attack on his followers. He did not fear the survivors; all Uldyssian wanted was a moment to catch his breath and then he would rid this place of the last of the vermin.

But then he saw an arm lying over one body slide off that and roll to its former wielder. Once there, it reattached itself. Uldyssian looked to the other side and beheld the ruined throat of another heal itself.

As that happened, something emerged from the lava. Armor blazing red and flesh seared, the morlu he had tossed into the flow also stalked toward him.

Everywhere, the demonic warriors healed and rose. It was an even more horrible tableau than that from the battle, yet Uldyssian knew that it had to be related.

It is the Kiss of Mephisto that raises them, but the demoness has amplified its powers , came Malic’s voice. Seek the black gemstone in the center! Seek it!

Morlu blocked his view in that direction. Inhaling, Uldyssian clapped his hands together. The crashing sound bowled over his foes…

There, at last revealed, was what Malic claimed the source of the warriors’ regeneration. A gleaming black gemstone nearly as tall as him and embedded in a triangular column of red-streaked marble.

That is it! It must be destroyed! Quickly!

But the morlu perhaps understood what he intended, for they came at him in a frenzy, screaming and leaping and swinging whatever weapons they carried. They converged on Uldyssian from all sides.

Despite that, he concentrated only on the huge gem. Compared to the Worldstone, the task proved easier. Uldyssian located within it a fault and threw all his will into that one place—

With a shattering sound worthy of the colliding Shards of the Worldstone, the Kiss of Mephisto was no more.

The morlu did not slow even then. Their hatred for him was absolute. Foam splattered the mouths of many and their shrieks would have frightened the dead. The morlu lived only for his utter annihilation.

Just as he had done before, a grim Uldyssian waved his arm across his view. He threw morlu left and right, into walls and into the lava flows. Those that got closer he burned with flame or speared with solid light. When even that did not halt the tide, Uldyssian seized one morlu after another and crushed their throats or broke their necks or backs. Blades cut wounds in him that he forced to heal. Gauntleted hands grasping for his limbs or neck slid off as if seeking to hold oil.

Uldyssian pictured Lilith in his mind as he tore through the ranks of the morlu. Each one slain was her.