After their fateful misadventure in the mountainous Norther Reaches of RUNDAO, a dark new threat to all of RUNDAO has been revealed to the mercenary band of THE CREEPING BAM and their newest member, half-orc bandit SHAYLINE SWIFT-KILL. Returning their hard-won cargo to THE SILVER ORDER in their city stronghold in BAVAT, they find their well-deserved rest will have to rest – half-elf wizard GAEL FOXTAIL’s father has disappeared while performing an investigation in the coastal city of UNTERMER, and it’s up to our motley crew to find him.

As a son of Untermer, wily bakaneko thief ART OF SHADOWS is the perfect choice to lead the way, but he has ghosts of his own to face as their investigation brings them into the orbit of the THIEVES GUILD. But there are daker forces at work here, and as they uncover a dark conspiracy and form an uneasy alliance with a trio of tough sellswords with their own stake in the game, led by dwarven warrior THELGAEWYNN FROSTFORGE, the Creeping Bam begin to suspect this may be connected to that unfinished business they started back up north …

This is a love letter and homage to the high-fantasy worlds of the tabletop RPGs like Dungeons & Dragons, Pathfinder and Warhammer and the sword & sorcery cinema and literature I fell in love with as a kid growing up in the 80s, from Robert E. Howard’s Conan the Barbarian (and the awesome Schwarzenegger movie, STILL my favourite fantasy film EVER), The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit and Ron Howard and George Lucas’ Willow, to the more grown-up and edgy worlds of grimdark masters George RR Martin and (my all-time favourite) Joe Abercrombie, as well as a BIG DOLLOP of Terry Pratchett’s immortal Discworld series.

IMPORTANT: This story contains material which some readers may consider to be mature, such as battle violence, some strong language and occasional mild sexual scenes. If this is not your kind of thing, this story is not for you.

I am also serializing this story on Tumblr, Wattpad, Quotev and Sweek.