1

The plan to ensnare the daemon was quickly made and even Izumi was beginning to feel that questioning their intentions any more would only be an insult to human courage. Whatever their chances, however low, they had to try—and succeed—if they were to conclude this adventure and live to tell the tale.

Marcus’s team ended up being the one to go into the tunnels.

He had Taun and Onslow with him, which gave them the superior senses to detect the enemy before it would detect them—in theory. Like his countrymen, Marcus carried a heavy mechanical arbalest for a main weapon, and a short side axe and a dagger for backup. Taun had a wooden hunting crossbow of his own, long as his leg, light in build, but cumbersome to load. Being a hunter by trade instead of a soldier of fortune, his only other weapons were the all-purpose knife hanging from his belt and his dog.

To balance the light lineup, heavily armored Siphis was the team’s close combat specialist, bearing a two-sided waraxe, round and wide as a sawmill blade, and he neither required nor cared about other weaponry. Ethys and Elvir added to the firepower, bearing arbalests similar to what Marcus had, long daggers, hunting knives, throwing knives, back-up knives—and brass knuckles, for some reason.

Certainly, any average monster would have been terrified to run into such a grim gang in a place as eerie.

Izumi’s team—known to the others mainly as Gubal’s team—was assigned to guard the top end of the main stairway, together with Tuberkan’s team in the lower end, somewhat removed from the main area of operation.

Gronan and Faalan’s teams headed over to the industrial district to cover the tunnels’ main entrance, with Tidaal’s team for support. There was a chance that the creature lurked in the spacious refinery area instead and might attempt to surprise them from behind, which necessitated the heavier concentration of force, to have eyes in all directions. The three teams took a roundabout route to their position, downstairs and across the vault hall, checking the other locations along the way.

Meanwhile, Hrugnaw’s team was stationed at the tunnels’ southern side exit on the third level, covering the point team’s backs, and offering support if needed. They had the shortest trip to walk and waited with Marcus’s team until all the others had reached their positions.

Scattering their force so far and wide looked reckless, but the situation had its advantages, Izumi thought. While any team would struggle to deal with the enemy alone, it also meant that the others would be safe in the meanwhile, and free to react appropriately. Perhaps the Dharves’ plan was not so bad, after all? With the linkstones to connect them, they could operate as one, even while separated. And if they could actually encircle the creature, then it would be at a heavy disadvantage. Had she been cowardly, after all, to doubt their chances so?

A good part of their success would still depend on Izumi, her sword and magic. She couldn’t afford to lose faith now. Leaning on her sword, she emptied her mind of extraneous thoughts and waited with the others in silence, listening, ready for anything.

Moments passed in tense anticipation.

“This is Gronan speaking,” the leader’s magically delivered voice finally rang through the enchanted stones. “We are in position. All teams, report in, are you ready?”

“This is Faalan, my team is also in position and ready.”

“Ready as a red hot cock in here,” Tidaal’s voice reported less formally.

“This is Gubal, we are ready and in position at the stairway.”

“Tuberkan, at the stairs, awaiting orders.”

“This is Hrugnaw, the side exit is secure, we are ready to begin.”

“Marcus here, my team is ready to go.”

“Good.” Gronan spoke again. “Marcus. You go and teach that ugly wretch what happens to those who cross the Tarpit.”

“Consider it done.”

Parting from Hrugnaw’s team, Marcus led his men into the tunnels. They weren’t like crude mining shafts, barely held together with planks and beams, but clean as the halls of a noble palace, with smooth walls and ceiling, devoid of debris. Metal rails had been attached onto the floor, to assist in delivering heavier materials.

The mechanics had activated the emergency lights from the main entrance. Small, orange lamps burned in the walls like glowing topazes, about two feet above the floor and twenty feet apart, keeping the corridors lit—albeit only dimly, seeing as they were covered in dust. Visibility remained lousy, but the warriors had their ore lanterns hanging from their belts, as well as the more advanced flashlights recovered from the refinery, which granted them a sufficient view of their immediate surroundings. The monster wouldn’t easily surprise them in these straightforward tunnels, so long as they kept mindful of their backs.

The place looked even more confusing up close than it had on paper.

There was a wider hallway proceeding from the entrance, which shortly split into numerous side tunnels, like a great tree with its branches. But whereas a random earthling would’ve been hopelessly lost, the Dharves had a better grasp of direction, and were well accustomed to pathways of stone.

“We’ll start circling towards north, along the tunnels on the west side,” Marcus instructed the others. “Try and drive it out to Gronan and their teams. If we make no contact by the time we reach their side, we’ll keep going east from there, and instead chase it back to Hrugnaw. If we still don’t see it by the time we’ve come a full circle, we’ll call the rest and take the search west, towards the stairway. Anybody have questions?”

“Yeah,” Elvir said, “anybody got any chaw? I’m all out.”

“I’ve some,” Siphis replied, searching his trouser pocket.

“Guys, a little focus, please?” Ethys requested.

“Want some?” Siphis offered Taun, feeling generous.

“Oh, no, no thank you. I’m fine,” Taun declined, not knowing what dipped tobacco even was.

“Blast it!” Marcus suddenly swore.

“What?” Ethys stirred, reflexively gripping his arbalest harder.

“Thought I’d lost mine,” the older man said, feeling his pockets. “But it’s here.”

“Oh for fuck’s sake!”

Sticking to the plan, the group followed the nearest, slightly curving tunnel westward. They took it slow and steady, holding their weapons ready, all senses sharp. But whether the daemon was in the tunnels or not, it gave no hint of its presence. All stood quiet. There was a slight draft blowing down the tunnels, but too feeble to even move the fine dust carpeting the floor and the slim rails of steel on it. Onslow went a few steps ahead of the men, smelling the floor here and there, but expressed no interest for any scent, if there even were some.

The ancient architects had done an impeccable job, making their work last untouched for so long, good as new. The path continued on unobstructed, save for the occasional cart abandoned along the way, with their supply bags and crates, which had never made it to the destination. It seemed that the place had been in operation up until the moment of its sudden desertion. What could have happened to disturb the ancient workers so?

Surely this singular beast they were chasing had not been there, so long ago, and alone responsible for the entire city’s abandonment? The very idea was absurd, no doubt.

The hunters advanced, bit by bit, controlling their breathing, the suspense and tension bringing up beads of sweat to their brows. Whatever the threat and their opinions on it, they took their jobs seriously, as ever.

In roughly a quarter hour, they came to the south-western corner of the tunnel network. Marcus examined the floor, looking for tracks in the dust. There were some faintly perceivable boot prints—made by the explorers in the morning, most likely—but nothing matching the monstrous soles of their mark. Taun had Onslow look at the prints too, but the dog held no lasting interest for them, sneezing at the dust.

At Marcus’s signal, they paused at the turn.

The team knelt in the corner, shut their lights, and quietly waited, keeping on eye on both sides, in case the creature was stalking them. For another fifteen minutes they lingered there, but nothing emerged from the misty twilight on either side, and so they eventually turned the lights back on and resumed northward.

Following the tunnel for slightly over two hundred yards, they stepped out in a wider hallway, sporting four sets of rails, side by side. On the right, a distance ahead, the rails split into a number of smaller tunnels, which headed each their own way. On the left, the main tunnel continued about sixty yards on, with a wide opening towards the industrial district. There, in the misty distance, they saw the lights of Gronan’s team and the two others with him.

“We’re at the refinery side now,” Marcus reported via his linkstone. “No sign of the bogey so far. All’s quiet.”

“We see your lights,” Gronan replied. “Keep going.”

The squad turned to head east.

The sight of their allies reinvigorated the men’s spirits and they carried on at a slightly quicker pace. Recalling the map layout, Marcus picked the tunnel second from the left. The leftmost was a dead end, taking to small storage halls, while the others led to material lifts near the middle of the zone. Whether a dumb beast or an entity of adequate intelligence, the daemon would doubtless seek to avoid being surrounded, and would therefore move away from the watchers, rather than sitting in the middle of them. Therefore, they had a chance to cut off its escape by circling ahead of it, pinning it between them and Hrugnaw’s team. Or so they reasoned.

But they had barely walked on for another five minutes when something unexpected happened.

All of a sudden, the previously mellow Onslow flew into a veritable frenzy, and began to fiercely bark at something it presumably sensed ahead. The others pointed their lamps to where the dog was baying, and strained their eyes, yet failed to perceive any cause for the abrupt loss of temper. Regardless, Onslow continued to bark and roar in a fit of unquestionable rage, as if to overpower its terror and make up for its earlier cowardice. Its hunting instinct at last won over, and before Taun could seize its collar, the dog bolted down the tunnel like a hairy cannonball, making an infernal racket as it went.

“Onslow!” Taun called after it. “Onslow! Stop! Stop, stop! Get back here! ONSLOW!”

But as obedient and well-behaved as the hound typically was, requiring no leash or nudging to follow instructions, it now paid no heed to its master’s calls, disappearing into the haze, and only its mad barking could be heard.

The squad picked up the pace and jogged after the animal, but came soon to another fork on the way, with three branching paths, and couldn’t be sure which way it had gone. The noise appeared to be coming from all three corridors at the same time, the unfavorable acoustics playing with their perception.

Anxious, Taun reached for his linkstone, to caution the parties at the exits.

“Guys, if you see my dog, don’t fucking shoot him! He took off on his own!”

“What happened? Did you see the beast?” Gronan’s voice joined the channel.

“No, it’s just Taun’s dog, it went berserk on its own,” Marcus explained. “Might’ve been a rat, for all we know.”

“It wouldn’t do that for a rat!” Taun protested.

“Forget the dog and keep looking!” Gronan urged them.

Taun was obviously deeply distraught by the loss of his partner, but there was nothing they could do about it. The group picked the middle corridor at the junction, which took slightly southeast at a gentle angle, hoping it would lead them eventually back to Hrugnaw’s position. Marcus and Taun kept at the front, Siphis’s heavy footsteps behind them. Ethys and Elvir had the rear guard, behind the armored axeman.

The barking had now ceased.

Taun kept trying to call Onslow a few more times, but there was no sign of the dog or even a whimper in response.

“Quiet,” Marcus then told him. “You’ll betray our position.”

“As if they can’t hear us all the way back to Utenvik, with the tin man clinking and clanking!” Taun retorted.

“Who is the tin man?” Siphis asked, glancing around, as if he really had no clue. “Where is he hiding, I see no one!”

Further back, the suspense was starting to get to the other two.

“We shouldn’t have come here,” Ethys muttered, shaking his head, clutching his weapon so hard his hands were trembling. “This is evil, man. This whole fucking place is vile! We ought to get out of here while we still can.”

“Be quiet,” Marcus told him.

Ethys swallowed and gritted his teeth. They crept on, and peace persisted, yet the anxious mood wouldn’t let up. Ethys strongly felt something sinister and oppressing was close by. A sense of doom unlike anything he had ever felt crept up his back. Several times, he could’ve sworn someone was standing behind him, and he kept turning around to see if they weren’t followed, but the tunnels remained empty.

Nothing moved either behind or ahead. Rather, it was as if the walls themselves had turned against the intruders, trying to lead them astray and trap them.

“Quit fretting so much!” Elvir told the man. “Try to relax!”

“What’s with all these tunnels!?” Ehtys exclaimed, not listening. “The fuck are they for? They all look the same and go nowhere! This place doesn’t make any sense! You tryin’ to tell me it was human beings who built this shit?”

The unnatural orange lighting kept dulling the senses and throwing off all sense of time and distance. Holding both the heavy arbalest and the bulky flashlight at the same time was becoming tiring for the arms.

“Just a bit further ahead,” Marcus spoke in a low tone. “Then we’ll turn back south.”

Distracted by the team leader’s words, clinging to the hope they inspired, the rear guard’s alertness momentarily faltered. Because of this, Ethys nearly missed the person standing in the crossing corridor, on his right. The corner of the tunnel had covered the stranger, so that he couldn’t be seen, other than directly from the side. Ethys noticed the dark silhouette in his peripheral vision and halted, looking again. This time, it wasn’t his imagination. There was a man in the twilight, only a few paces away, staring at him, someone Ethys didn’t know. Now, upon being spotted, the man took a step forward. Before Ethys could turn, or even breathe a sound, the stranger was already in front of him, gripping his face. With casual ease, the warrior was lifted off his feet and smacked back first into the wall of the corridor.

The heavy noise alerted the others, who spun around, pointing their lights at the source of the commotion. Marcus lifted his arbalest and fired—but was slightly too late. All they caught was a flash, a shadow, which dashed off along the tunnel south, dragging Ethys along with it, like a mere ragdoll, his muffled howling growing rapidly distant.

“ETHYS!”

The others chased after the escaping monster and its prisoner, but were left in the dust. They didn’t dare to shoot again, out of the fear of hitting their comrade instead, but whether they did or didn’t made no difference. The sounds faded from hearing, the shapes blended into the sickening haze, and the hunters could only admit their failure. Any hope of retrieving Ethys alive was gone.

Running for some eighty yards on, the group came into a sharp 90-degree corner at the end of the tunnel, where they paused to wait and listen. They saw and heard nothing at all. So complete was the return of peace that it made one question if they hadn’t dreamed the whole incident. Unfortunately, one man's continued absence proved that the grievous setback had been real.

Swearing quietly, the squad leader reported the regrettable news.

“This is Marcus. The beast’s in here. It got Ehtys and fled towards east. The main stairway teams, you should be ready, it might be coming down that way. And be careful. I’ve never seen anything move that fast.”

“Gubal here. We shan’t let it through.”

The diminished hunting squad followed after the daemon, and eventually came into a larger room along the way. It was some kind of a hub, connecting several tunnels from all directions, roughly ninety feet long, one third of that wide. The floor was punctured by diamond-shaped holes, presumably for ventilation purposes. The holes were about three feet wide and two across, not quite large enough for one to tumble through by accident, but there was a narrow walkway taking safely across the room. Through the numerous openings, the mercenaries could see that they were somewhere above the vault hall.

With the abundance of possible exits, the group took a moment to plan their course. Not even Marcus could recall the map so well as to tell where each of these tunnels went. The unexpected pursuit had taken them further away from the side exit, their original goal, than they had previously assumed. They could now either take one of the south side tunnels, and hope that it would take them backwards rather than deeper east; or else give up on regrouping with Hrugnaw, and make for the central stairway instead, where Gubal and Tuberkan awaited with their teams. With luck, they could still trap the enemy there, even without reinforcements.

Cautiously watching their surroundings and the various tunnel openings, the hunters proceeded along the walkway, towards the exit directly in front of them. With more space to maneuver, they wouldn’t be surprised so easily again.

Although, there was one major direction the team neglected to pay attention to.

Due to the thick steel-plating on his boot, Siphis didn’t immediately notice something holding onto his ankle. It was only when he tried to step on and found that the other leg didn’t follow along, that he stopped and turned to see what was going on. And the instant he started to turn, the peculiar pull he felt on his left leg intensified, yanking him off his feet.

“Gah!” Siphis cried and fell down on his side.

The others turned around just in time to see a horrendous creature lean out from one of the holes by the path and pull the armored man in. He didn’t fit through the opening so easily but got stuck by the chest like a metal-coated bottle cork.

“AAAAHH, IT GOT ME!” the man wailed in terror, holding onto the edges, unable to pull himself up. “IT GOT ME! HELP! HELP ME! GET IT OFF ME!”

Elvir and Marcus rushed to him, reaching for his arms to pull Siphis back up, but were late in the effort. Another vicious pull followed, powerful enough to remove the blockade in one go, breaking his shoulders in the process. The poor mercenary was stolen from their grip and sent plummeting to his death below. His companions could only watch his helpless descent through the gap, onto the dark hall floor about forty feet below. They heard the heavy, scattered crash produced by his armor, and knew there could be no hope of the warrior’s survival.

But now was not the time to stop and grieve.

“It’s climbing under the floor!” Marcus shouted, backing away from the hole. “We need to get out of here! Move! Run!”

The three survivors went sprinting across the room, as fast as they were able, towards the exit tunnel ahead of them.

“Don’t get close to the holes! Keep to the middle!”

They ran and ran, not even daring to look back. They stumbled down a brief flight of stairs, into another tunnel that ran counter to their path. They turned right there and ran on, up another set of stairs, not thinking about where they were going, only determined to put as much distance between themselves and the horror as they could.

Instead of coming out in the main stairway, close to Gubal’s position, as they’d hoped, the hunters eventually found that they’d reached a dead end instead. They entered a long, narrow room with a high ceiling, with only two other tunnels, which all pointed back westward to danger.

Along the eastern wall were rectangular pillars, hollow stone chutes with openings on the sides, some of them closed with thin metal hatches, while others were still open. Everywhere around lay chunks of coal, hardened into solid mounds over time, rusted wheelbarrows and shovels. The shafts might have been used to supply fuel to the upper layers in the past, but all their presence told to the mercenaries now was that they were far removed from where they wanted to be.

Here they paused, forced to recognize that they were hopelessly lost.

“Where the Hel are we?” Marcus pondered, catching his breath.

“Wish I bloody knew!” Taun panted, leaning on his knees. “It’s not coming after us, is it?”

They glanced around, half expecting the daemon to dash out of any opening. But it didn’t seem to have pursued them. Silence had returned once again.

“Well, lads,” the hunter continued. “I don’t know about you, but that doesn’t seem like an average bear to me, whatever the Hel it is! And I’d say we’ve failed our job quite miserably! We lost Ethys, we lost Sip, and I lost my godsdamned dog! It doesn’t get a whole lot worse than this! So let’s call this whole thing off, and just regroup with the others, shall we?”

Marcus breathed a helpless sigh. Taun was right. He had to call in and abort the operation. But in trying to decide what to say, and imagining their leader’s reaction, he hesitated. Gronan would never admit defeat but charge into the tunnels himself, to be trapped and murdered.

“Huh...?”

Suddenly, they all looked up, alerted by a strange observation. Pitiful whimpering carried down along one of the tunnels. Everyone turned that way now, surprised, as the sound was unmistakably made by a dog.

“Onslow?” Taun called, stepping to the tunnel entrance.

True enough, in a moment, the blond-furred hunting dog’s nimble figure skittered into view from the twilight, looking fatigued and highly guilty, its tongue hanging far out, as if it had run a long, long way.

“Oh, Onslow! Good boy! You came back!” Taun greeted his dear partner, overjoyed, crouching and beckoning the dog. “Where have you been! Gosh, you can’t run off on your own like that! It’s bad manners! Ow, look at you? Did you hurt yourself, boy?”

As it came closer, they could see that Onslow was walking a bit weird, as if wary of one of its hind legs, skipping a step.

“Come ‘ere, let me see! Pa’s got your back, don’t you worry about a thing!” Taun called the dog, which came to him obediently, as best it could.

Marcus turned his flashlight at the animal, frowning. Something was indeed seriously wrong with the dog, but he couldn’t see clearly what. It was only too late that he realized the issue, as baffling as it was. The dog hadn’t merely hurt its leg—the fourth leg was missing entirely from the hips down. Yet, the animal showed no outward pain, nor bled, as if it had only ever had three legs to begin with.

“TAUN!” Marcus howled, retreating. “GET AWAY FROM IT!”

“What?” Taun glanced at him, confused, oblivious.

Onslow picked up the pace and leapt. Suddenly, there was no dog, but only a dark, misshapen shadow, which slipped lightly across the air, grabbed Taun, and pulled the man along down into the open coal chute behind him.

“TAAAUN!”

Elvir chased after the unlucky hunter, with the apparent hope that he might still get a hold of him, and perhaps pull the man back up. His reflexive act of compassion became his undoing. The enemy was not content with claiming only one victim, and hadn’t fled the scene, against what it seemed. As soon as Elvir peered into the hole in the pillar, a dark arm reached up from the chasm, seized his face, and tore him along, and then they were both gone, outside the reach of mortal aid.

Marcus Orellus had seen many things. He’d been at the war against the Empire. He’d witnessed Dharva’s bitter defeat, and Tratovia’s horrifying military might. He had made it back home, his heart irreversibly fractured, but his body still mostly intact. Not many had been as lucky. But what he had witnessed in this ancient city tonight went above and beyond even his tested tolerance. His mind utterly broken, he forgot what he was meant to do. He turned his back on the scene of slaughter and left walking, dazed, in shock, only determined to get away from the place where his comrades had died. He’d seen enough of that.

Going northward, following the wall of the tall room, Marcus eventually came across a tunnel towards east and entered it, with the vague idea of joining the stairway teams. He couldn’t even remember who were in those teams or what they looked like anymore. He had no idea what to do afterwards either. He merely wanted to see at least one friendly face before his end, that’s all.

He didn’t want to die alone—anything but that.

Walking on a bit further, Marcus came to a narrow, cubic stairwell taking down, and was certain he was on the right path. He started to descend, thinking about other things. He’d have to apologize to the families of the deceased once they’d make it back to Utenvik. Did Taun even have family? He never mentioned such, but a nice guy like him was bound to have a wife out there, and children—at least three or four of them. His wife would be waiting somewhere out there by the hearth of a cozy little cottage, for her husband to come back from his incredible hunting trip. What a story that had shaped out to be. Marcus made a faint smile, stepping down the ancient stairs. His own wife wouldn’t believe it either, were she still alive. Then, the daemon ran up the stairs and killed him. Marcus felt nothing as his neck was sliced open from ear to ear in passing, and a blink of an eye later, he was alone again.

“Sure is...fast.” He made an incredulous, breathless chuckle, and began to fall.

2

A considerable while had passed since there had been any word from the tunnel team, and the others were beginning to grow restless. Gubal and Tuberkan’s teams were anticipating the monster to emerge in the central stairway, as per Marcus’s final transmission, and held their weapons ready to receive it. But all remained quiet on their side.

“Marcus?” Gronan finally interrupted the radio silence and tried for contact. “Can you hear me? Marcus? Siphis, Elvir? Taun! Can any of you hear what I say? Answer me, damn it! Is there something wrong with these things?”

Only a defiant silence came back. It didn’t seem normal anymore, by any measure. The linkstones had a one-mile operating range, the search team couldn’t have gone as far under any circumstances. Stone alone wouldn’t trouble the work of magic, but it was possible there were large metal objects or ore rich in iron on the way to hinder the signal. But surely someone from the other teams could have reached them regardless?

The leader’s communicator was different from those of the others. The stone was black, the enchantment two-layered. Reluctant to display its functionality in the open, Gronan now tapped his linkstone thrice and listened. He was not a magician. Few of his people were. Even with the master receiver, controlling which communicator to eavesdrop by thought alone was difficult. The Dharves had generally poured whatever arcane potential emerged to serve daily labor, and their specalties were in enhancement and reinforcement, not in black magic or mind tricks. The war with the Empire had forced them to re-evaluate the possibilities of wizardry, but it would still take several long centuries before there would be a mages’ college in Dharva, if ever. The unease growing in him, Gronan tried to perceive any hint of what was happening on Marcus’s side, but all that carried back to his ears were the impatient mumbling and shifting of the other teams.

Finally, he gave up on the effort altogether and switched the mode.

“All teams, has there been any word of Marcus and his men since they lost Ethys?” he asked.

“Negative, we have heard nothing,” Hrugnaw responded. “Something must’ve happened to them.”

“Nothing here either,” Gubal reported.

“They must be unable to respond and need our help,” Tuberkan’s voice added.

The idea that all five had perished without a word—was still too incredible for anyone to suggest. But Marcus’s group might have been locked in a battle that demanded their full attention and allowed no time to talk.

In that case, time was of the essence.

Gronan turned to face his team and signaled to the two others with his hands

“We’re going in. Follow me!”

3

Meanwhile, at the southern side entrance, Hrugnaw pricked her ears with a frown. The cruleans’ hearing was not quite on par with dogs or cats, but still superior to an average human, and so she was able to observe the sound before the others.

Footsteps in the dark. A solitary set, getting steadily louder. A human walker approached them. Or humanoid, at any rate. But why would anyone from Marcus’s team be moving alone, when they had been cautioned against doing so? She saw it best to alert the others.

“Someone comes!” Hrugnaw grunted, and her drowsy-looking team waiting further in the back got quickly up on their feet. Tomas, Ames, and Phos were in this group. They were armed only with arbalests, and not seasoned warriors, none of them even in their thirties yet. This squad depended mostly on the crulean’s might, which matched twenty average men, and would have under other circumstances sufficed to deal with any imaginable foe.

Yet, on the inside, Hrugnaw was less confident than she looked. She’d never visited the colony of New Metonzyne on the east coast of Amarno, but she’d heard various stories from her friends and relatives. Those stories all boiled down to the same lesson: facing a daemon in battle meant death.

Cruleans were once known as the fiercest among the warring races, not only due to the innate strength of their forms, but also thanks to their advanced level of technology, not far behind the emiri. But, ironically, the cruleans’ campaign in Amarno had been successful chiefly for the fact that they had avoided fighting altogether. They had swallowed their pride, learned from the mistakes of others, and so secured themselves a lasting hold in the desolate realm abandoned by others.

However, here and now, a fight was likely unavoidable. How would her might compare with the myth? Would it be enough to protect the others?

And what sort of a foe was a daemon, really?

Gripping her hammer firm with a wide, two-handed hold, Hrugnaw listened on, some ten yards into the tunnel, surveying the haze, the others behind her at the entrance. The stranger made no effort to hide or mask his approach, but walked steadily towards them, though he could not yet be seen. And though Hrugnaw had believed herself sufficiently prepared for whatever should emerge, the vision to eventually step out of the orange twilight made her jaw fall out of surprise.

The nearing blurry shadow condensed in the shape of Marcus Orellus.

It was him, no mistake about it, lacking nothing.

The same thick, brown beard, the same tired face, his short, flaxen bangs parted in the middle of the forehead. The same fur-laced coat, leather gloves, and knee-high boots. The same walking style, shoe tips slightly outward pointed. He was exactly the way they had last seen him an hour ago.

Merely looking like another person was an elementary trick any wizard’s apprentice could master. But donning the very identity of another, the weight of age that only a man nearing his fifties could know, and reflecting the shadows of a painful past on his visage without actually living through any of it, was a feat beyond sorcery.

Coming closer, Marcus raised his arms wide apart, to show that he had no foul intentions, and held up his arbalest in the right hand grip, by the frame.

“It’s just me,” the man said in a weary, resigned tone. “I’m alive. Don’t shoot me.”

Hrugnaw heard the Dharves behind make relieved sounds. Of course, none who knew the man could possibly suggest he was something other than his own self.

The crulean wasn’t as quick to lower her hammer, though.

“Where were you?” she asked. “Why didn’t you answer our calls? Where are the others?”

“It got us,” Marcus answered as he came closer. “I lost my stone in the scuffle. None of the others could make it. They’re gone.”

“Hm?”

“Call Gronan for me. We need to regroup and leave here.”

Marcus lowered his arms and headed for the entrance, past the crulean. The three others turned to leave also, expecting Hrugnaw to contact the other teams. But this she didn’t do. Instead, the crulean took a quick sidestep to block the man’s path and held up her hammer, forcing him to stop.

“You’re not Marcus!” she growled, baring her fangs.

“What...?” Marcus paused, staring blankly at the crulean.

The others turned back, no less confused.

“You don’t smell like him,” Hrugnaw declared. Removing one hand from the hammer’s handle, reaching for her ear, she quickly called the other groups. “The daemon is here! We need backup, make it quick!”

For a moment, Marcus remained still, looking genuinely dumbfounded. So life-like was his shock, that Hrugnaw had to wonder, for a fleeting instance, if she hadn’t actually made a mistake. Even though she knew better. For a human to rid himself so entirely of his body odor was no easier a task than shedding his own skin.

Even as Marcus’s face was the very image of innocence, his arms were less virtuous. They casually picked up the arbalest, aiming slightly off from the crulean, and pulled the trigger. With a sharp swish, the bolt cut through Tomas’s head twenty feet back with a smashing sound and he fell.

“Damn you!” Hrugnaw roared and swung down her hammer in rage.

Instead of their co-leader’s body, her dreadful strike met only the sandstone floor. Marcus had disappeared in an eruption of scentless black smoke and the discarded arbalest clattered on the floor without an owner.

Hrugnaw spun around, but the enemy wasn’t after her. Several paces away, Marcus had reappeared and grabbed Ames by the neck, lifting the man casually off the floor with only one arm. Marcus’s hand didn’t look like a human hand anymore either, but had turned into what resembled a metal trident, wide, flat blades for fingers. The blades slid past each other, decapitating the helpless mineralogist in their grip. His corpse fell down limp as a sack, while his head went rolling down the stairs from the entrance with dull thudding, a look of boundless terror frozen on his face.

“AAAAAAMES!” Phos screamed and fired at his former boss.

The bolt struck Marcus directly in the chest, but he wouldn’t fall, or even blink. The durability of his monstrous body was above mere ring mail, and the shaft reached barely two inches into his flesh. Whether he felt any pain or not, no trace of it showed on his now expressionless face. Marcus brushed off the arrow, and his familiar features melted away like mountain snow before spring. In his place appeared the faceless abomination of the antechamber, and the onset of horror made fight and flight alike vanish from Phos’s rattled mind. With a quick, lion-like roar, the daemon lashed out with its arm, one of the gruesome fingers extending out into a whip-like blade, which sliced open Phos’s unguarded throat from over five feet away.

“Stop it!” Hrugnaw cried and charged, anger overpowering her fear.

This time, her aim was true. The crulean’s overhead blow smote the turning enemy's torso, sounding out a loud, metallic boom. But the adversary’s incredible toughness and poise surprised Hrugnaw once more. She had learned to subconsciously hold back, knowing how even a casual brush could pulverize humans. But holding back at all was a critical mistake with such an opponent. It withstood the warhammer’s impact like a hunk of steel itself, showing no outward sign of injury. Only briefly wavering at the heavy hit, the daemon bounced quickly up again, and stepped towards the crulean. Filled with rage and revulsion, Hrugnaw pulled her hammer back up and struck again, harder, faster.

But this time, her swing wouldn’t connect at all.

The warhammer’s path was interrupted by an enormous fist wrapping around the weapon’s handle, stilling it barely halfway down its path. To her dismay, Hrugnaw found the enemy gone. In the daemon’s place, another crulean faced her, the red flame of berserk rage burning vividly in its eyes. Ruthlessly exploiting her surprise, the second Hrugnaw grappled her and pushed her back with irresistible might, slamming her against the wall of the tunnel. Without delay, it began to pummel her with a heavy fist.

Enduring the strikes that made even her rocky bones creak and crack, Hrugnaw dropped her hammer and seized the doppelganger’s arms, kicking her bulky knee into its side, once, twice. The enemy absorbed the hits without a sound, and retaliated by pulling back its bulky right arm. An arm it was no more, blending into a curving, thick blade from the elbow down, akin to a pickaxe. Hrugnaw couldn’t stop it with only one hand, and the monster forced the improvised weapon through her guard, driving the sting into her left shoulder, and pinning her into the wall.

“Graaaaahhh!” Hrugnaw roared, fighting the pain, trying to push the enemy back.

Stealing her right arm loose, her strength appended by fury, Hrugnaw punched the copy’s face as hard as she could, and pulled her leg between them, kicking the enemy back. The barb was simultaneously drawn from her flesh and Hrugnaw fell to her knees, crippled by the searing agony, which sapped power and vitality. Gritting her teeth, tasting blood thick on her tongue, she tried to summon her rapidly fading strength and fight on.

Allowing her no time to recover, the daemon stepped back to finish off the crulean—but then suddenly stopped, and looked away, listening.

Down the tunnel from the west carried the noise of numerous footsteps and shouting, and the long cones of flashlights painted the walls. There came the teams from the main entrance, led by Gronan, Faalan, and Tidaal. More sounds came from behind, outside. There, Gubal and Tuberkan’s teams were running up the stairs, the summoned champion among them.

Exuding a cloud of darkness that obscured its form, the daemon vanished, melting back into the shadows.