The skeleton became a true monster. After five minutes of crunching, squishing, and sloshing, a new creature was formed. Made entirely of exposed meat, it had the long lower body of a snake, albeit a little thin. Atop this snake body sat a humanoid torso without a head, with one of the four available eyes on each side; one on each shoulder, one their chest, and one on their back. They had four arms, each ending in a ring of multiple points made of ribs, with long tentacles coming out of the center where the hands once were.

“That should do,” she said with a satisfied, wet clap. Even the one who had the willpower to resist her intimidation aura and wit to help her out of self-protection was barely holding back the urge to puke. That he was now coated in gore himself didn’t help.

The reinforcements that had been massing below began to approach, and were somewhat comically stopped by the barrier, running into each other as they tried to run into the cave. More comical to T’Kere was the look on their faces as they saw what she had made. In itself, necromancy wasn’t considered a terrible thing if it didn’t involve the soul, though the relatives of the raised may have umbrage. But it was another thing altogether to make something new. A rare and difficult skill that required much study and focus.

The existence of this creature showed just how many corpses T’Kere had toyed with.

“Right. So, of course, this was mostly buying time to decide what to do with the rest of you. Kill you? Send you against your brethren? Cripple you and throw you into the caves? I have decided…,” A long moment of silence stretched unto eternity before she finished, “You’re more useful as parts.” The wall of force so close behind them circled around, corralling them into a single mass. An increasingly small mass.

The sounds of screaming were heard for miles as they were quickly condensed into a cylindrical pile. The abomination slithered forward, slowly absorbing the mass of bodies into itself through a hole she opened. More tentacles formed out of its back, chest, and shoulders, the creature coated in plates of bone spikes, as well as whatever armor they were actually using. Each tentacle ended in spears of bone, or in the bladed weapons they wielded when they were separate entities. The blunt weapons had masses of flesh around them, resulting in heavy-looking heads to the tentacles in question.

The only organs she had preserved were eyes, lungs, vocal chords, and mouths which were present all over the body, with an eye inside each mouth. These mouths were filled with bone shards to function as spiked teeth, and each wailed a medley of nonsense words that sounded vaguely like “kill me,” “help us,” “stop this,” or other such statements. They all blended together, however.

As this had happened, a group of fifteen had advanced from below to investigate and back up those in the cave above. Finding what they had, they froze in place, horrified into paralysis by the combination of her creation and the aura of terror.

The creature rushed forward towards the paralyzed group, who broke formation and ran screaming back to the area below. The creature wasn’t terribly swift over distances, but it followed all the same as T’Kere and the one remaining bandit who turned on the others watched from the mouth of the cave.

“This is what happens to those who threaten my family. Remember that,” she said in a quiet tone. It wasn’t a threat, it was a promise. A moment later, she vanished.

Reappearing behind the shield wall of the bandits as her creation approached, a couple of them turned to flee. This was met with their heads being smashed promptly by the metal rod she drew from her back. It was about the length of a short spear, five feet or so, and had a strange dull glean that didn’t reflect much color at all. Not even T’Kere was entirely sure what it was made of, but it was extremely conductive of magic energy, was stronger and heavier than adamantine, amplified force, and could change its own weight, shape, and size fairly easily. All of this was normally extremely complicated magic. She took it from a cult trying to raise a dead god long ago, and it had been a go-to weapon ever since. Despite her efforts, she had never been able to find its maker.

The more she killed with it, the stronger it became, and that suited her well. At least, after having removed the curse that tried to compel her to murder; she was capable of killing on her own, thanks. That said, it was rather strong by now.

They stopped trying to escape when they looked back and saw her standing there. They began to raise the alarm, but she just shook her head and gestured to them to turn back as the monster got close and crashed into the shield wall. Several of them had taken positions on nearby rooftops to fire down at the creature as it approached, using bows and spells to try to take it down while it was being held back by the shield wall. But its flesh soaked up the damage without any visible harm. All the same, it wouldn’t do to risk letting them kill it and allow the bandits move freely.

Now was a good time to rack up a few more bodies with the rod. The stronger it was, the better for the future.

Crouching briefly, she hopped the twenty or so feet up the side of the plain stone structure nearest her, and without pause brought the heavy staff down onto the head of the first archer in sight.

The others turned barely in time to see the next person get their torso caved in from the shoulder down, very loud crunching audible. Next it thrust into the heart of one of the mages she’d seen casting stone spears down below. This left only the mages casting defensive spells. A smirk crossed her lips as they froze, afflicted by her fear aura. “Go on. Keep it up,” she teased, chucking the bodies down below the get absorbed into the creature, actively sprouting more tentacles and armoring up.

This process repeated on the other rooftops with people on them, clearly leaving them all in a bizarre hostage situation; they couldn’t do meaningful harm to the monster, but nor could they resist it forever. If any element of their defense slipped, if any of the support casters changed tactics, the whole thing would collapse.

. . .

Keer’Orox, the Orox-Sheew, known to most as a snow orc, had collapsed on the ground as soon as that monster had left his side. He may have been a huge guy, 6’8”, muscular, and generally intimidating in appearance, but… fuck. Keer’Orox vomited on the dirt in front of him until his stomach heaved nothing but emptiness. He knew he was beyond lucky to get out alive… if he was going to remain that way was another question entirely.

He was shaking, and every muscle in his body wanted to run, but he sure as hell was going to stay put! He wouldn’t move from the damned spot until she said so. Fuck loyalty to these bandits. Sure, some were friends, close, even, but he believed in saving his own skin first. It’s not like they’d do any different if they had put as many points into willpower as he had. Plus, bandits followed the strongest person around - she was now that.

The man shuddered and stood again, wiping his mouth clear. He could still see the battling from here if he tried, and he definitely preferred not to. The screams echoed through the walls, though. There was little escape from it.

A small part of himself wondered how she would do against the two leaders - the immortal men, Hasdovir and Bronier. From the start, his intuition told him that anyone who stood against her wasn’t walking away. Looking at the monstrosity the woman made… he thought she’d find a way to deal with their healing.

. . .

It didn’t take long for the rest of the bandits to get wiped out. All those brave enough to fight had been dealt with a single blow each, having shifted her strange metal rod into a short spear with an acid coating to account for natural healing. A swift stab to the kidney all the way through left them more or less helpless, too in pain to cast abilities, as well as removing any healing supplies. They had brought unthinkable suffering to many; they would get no less in return. No doubt the rest were hiding.

She didn’t mind spending time searching. She had all day, after all, and she wasn’t about to let things slide. She still hadn’t found the therianthropes, the Fae servant beastfolk, that she had found tracks of which led her here. Until they were dead along with their bandit friends, she wouldn’t be satisfied.

The two immortals had yet to show their faces, which was fine by her. They’d be a hassle to deal with, but they were last on her list. The more time she had to toy with the therians, the better.

So T’Kere went door to door. She would break it off its hinges, toss it aside, and slay whatever lay inside. Some begged, of course. She wasn’t so green as to give them leeway, however. She’d picked one orc from the lot and that was more than she should have already. Begging meant nothing to these people when they robbed and pillaged, so it meant nothing to her in turn.

What brought her pause, however, was that after she busted down one of the later doors, she came upon children.