"You have to provoke it!" a small mouse cries out, barely able to hold his spear upright in his shaking, furless fingers.

"I'm trying! It's not working!" a heavily armored one replies, his terrified eyes staring through the metal grill of his visor, peering around the thick wooden shield planted at his feet.

A light rain falls, light even by the standards of such small creatures, the small alleyway lit by the dull glow of a nearby street-lamp, leaving little visible outside of their immediate vicinity. The paved ground is littered with trash, mostly of the useless and non-edible variety, the remainder long since broken down into tiny jagged particles by countless passing feet. None of this really matters, however, as the warrior sees none of it. All he can focus on is the terrible creature before him. The night, the rain and the littered landscape cloaks everything in long, hideous shadows which streak away from every wall, object and creature painted by the unnatural light. Well, every creature except for one. While his foe is the embodiment of darkness itself, a lord of it in fact, no shadow connects to its feet, the earth beneath it lit up as though nothing stood there at all. It somehow blocks the light, however. The distant lamp is invisible to the armored mouse, blocked by the massive head, and yet no shade falls upon him. He wonders how can this be possible, how can he simultaneously be blocked of light yet not in a shadow. While he has far, far more important things to worry about at the moment, that vexing, looping thought simply won't go away.

"Blind!" a robed and hooded woman calls out, a orb of crimson energy briefly flashing into existence at the tip of her fingers with the word. An impressive feat, by any standards, but clearly the intention is to provide much more than simply a show of light. "Poison! Confuse! Slow!" each word spoken with ever more urgency, each spawning a similar unnatural glow, each of a different color, and yet all of which vanish as quickly as they appear. "Nothing's working! I..."

Her words are cut off without warning. In the gloom she doesn't appear to fall over, merely collapsing under her own weight, immediately followed by the sound of multiple dull thuds and sickening liquid spatters.

"H-Hannah!" the spearsman shouts, gritting his teeth, turning to his foe. "How dare you!" He charges, glass blade of his weapon shimmering as it catches the artificial light above. "How dare-"

Similar to his comrade, the mouse has no chance to even cry out in pain. His upper body continues forward, even as his no longer attached feet lose their momentum. The warrior topples forward into bloodied pieces.

"Orick?" the armoured mouse says, but despite his best efforts hardly a whisper comes out. "Hannah? Are... are you okay?"

He knows full well that no answer is coming. It is fortunate he can't will himself to look to the ruins of his former comrades, his eyes instead locked on the unnatural beast before him. "Please." he asks his opponent in a surprisingly calm voice, his eyes wide, mouth a warped smile which he has no control over. "Please don't kill me." he adds, the voice neither fearful nor pleading. If anything the tone is questioning, as though it weren't a request for mercy, simply one asking for verification, clarification on an event which might as well have already occurred, one which even as he's witnessing it, he cannot possibly comprehend.

The creature turns its head away and the tank of the party smiles wider still. His armor still shines in the rain, thick, strong and heavy, seemingly indestructible, and this battle has done nothing to shown it to be otherwise. It remains standing upright, even as his lifes blood drains away, his body little more than pieces of meat stacked within it, his face bearing an expression of contentment. He's finally gotten his answer, after all, and nobody can ever take that, or anything else away from him ever again.

The dark lord looks to the aged red brick wall with a curious expression, staring both into and through the last surviving member of the rodent adventuring party standing before it.

"Will you not run?" it asks. "Will you not hide? Will you not beg? Will you not fight?" it's expression one of genuine wonder, the questions both rhetorical and yet lacking any sort of answer within its mind.

As for the mouse, she simply stares. A small club in hand, which she doesn't even bother to raise, can't even bring herself to raise, eyes locked upon the creature before her. The beast doesn't step forward, it is simply there, directly in front of her, looking down at the pitiful creature. As for the mouse, the healer of the group, her only movement is to look up to meet the gaze, even as she wishes that she was capable of looking literally anywhere else.

"No, of course not. I smell no fear on you. That's good. Such a disgusting scent." it says, lowering its face further towards her. "I smell no courage or determination on you either. All the better. They are even more offensive."

The massive creature lowers its nose to her feet, giving a long sniff as it moves up her body, stopping at her furred cheek. The mouse still doesn't react, cannot react. She doesn't feel the touch of the nose, or the motion of the air as it breathes, only a strange sensation of unnatural coldness.

"An intoxicating aroma." the creature purrs, its eyes shut, taking in the new sensation. "Hardly a trace of a mouse scent. So little of you remains that it is amazing you do not simply pass through the earth like a spirit. You smell... empty. Just like me. But for very different reasons, I would imagine."

The mouse woman again does not answer, simply staring. All she can do is take in the words, even if she can barely comprehend them in her current state.

"There's something else, however. Even after so much has been torn from you, something significant remains." It smiles. "Yes. I think I like you. I think I like you very much. You should feel honored, as I'm not the sort who likes very many people." the creature pauses for only the briefest of moments, knowing full well not to anticipate any sort of reply. "...and I take very, very good care of those that I like."

It raises a foot just slightly, the paw-pad tilted towards the naked, pale furred rodent. "Don't be afraid..." followed by a chuckle. "Now, why did I say that? We both know you won't. It's just a common courtesy, I suppose."

As for the mouse herself, her eyes look to the paw, more accurately towards the subtle gleam of the claw retracted between two of the toes. Her eyes reflexively cross, staring at the base of it as it extends directly between her eyes. She has no intention or moving, not that standing perfectly still is any sort of deliberate plan either. She simply cannot help it. Her body convulses, her club is dropped, small clay vials of healing potion falling from her belt, the closest thing to clothing she wears, shattering at her feet. Her eyes roll back into her head, and while there is pain, it's nowhere near the level one would expect, instead just a lingering sting deep behind her eyes. There's no sense of the claw piercing her skin much less her skull, just the strange sense of intrusion and the steady ache. This passes as quickly as it appears, the claw is once again retracted. Well, partially passes. It never would completely fade.

She shows the first signs of life in what feel like forever. She has no idea when last she breathed, last she moved, if her heart is even still beating, if she still has control over her body. Now, however, she finds herself sitting in the puddle of rose colored water which the rain slowly dilutes, her furless paws groping for her forehead without even thinking about it, eyes shut tight. Perhaps unsurprisingly, there was no cut, no scar, no sign of injury or damage whatsoever. At least nothing that her hands can feel. As for her head, there is just a cold numbness between her eyes,, an awareness of her own fingers touching herself, but nothing that could properly be considered feeling.

"Open your eyes, little one. I have given you precious gifts, although some will take time to fully... mature." it says with a smile. Not that the smile actually reaches the mouth of the large creature, but somehow she's sure it is there.

The cream furred mouse opens her eyes and immediately regrets it. It's like awakening from a deep sleep to a bright light. Everything hurts, and all she wants to do is close then once more, to retreat back into that comforting darkness, but she can't. In the distance stand three pillars of light, green, blue and pink. Massive yet far away, visible even though she knows full well that there are many, many walls and barriers between them and herself. They burn her eyes, her mind, and yet she cannot look away. It takes her a moment to realize that the creature, the one that slaughtered all of her... well, not so much friends, but comrades still stands before her, blocking her view of everything else in the world. Everything except for those terrible towers of energy which streak upwards as far as the eyes can see.

"I have very high expectations of you, my child, but I know you'll meet, if not exceed them. Once you do, we shall meet again." it says, giving another sniff. "I'm curious what you will smell like by then."

Without another word or motion, the creature vanishes. It doesn't turn or walk away, it doesn't jump, it doesn't even teleport away in a puff of smoke or a flash of arcane energy. It is simply gone, leaving no footprints, no shedded hairs, no sign it were ever there at all. All that remains is the healer mouse, and the violent carnage surrounding her which she takes little notice of. Her eyes still hurt, but at this point even closing them helps little, dulling the blinding lights, but the unnatural glow of them still passes through her eyelids. Her head hurts, her body feels weak, and she feels... well, physicality aside, she feels nothing. No fear, no dread, no grief for the fallen. That isn't a new sensation, however, the only novelty of it being that for once she didn't have to force it. Tonight the numbness comes naturally.