The great wall and its battle was days in the past. As soon as the dust had settled, another quest had appeared. The final quest.

Quest – Defeat Boglug Gutrender (Main)

Description – You have held back the greenskin hordes and now pursue them back to Whitespear Mountain. Seek him out and destroy the goblin king, bringing the war to an end.

Reward – Boss Loot Box (Legendary)

Celestial Affinity

I was beyond excited to see what the affinity was all about, but not so thrilled about the path to reach it. We had a lot of miles to cover first, and this was the only first leg of the journey.

Following a night of heavy drinking, a bleary but buoyed army began the slow march towards Pitchollow. Three days of slog saw us nearing our destination. Or what remained of it. The scouts had returned a couple of hours ago, informing us of their discovery. I was at the head of the column alongside Trystan, Thomas, and Sun. Fen and his growing warg pack had scoured the forest all the way to the edge of the Timeless Tower’s mountain, killing anything green they came across. They were like a dragnet, pulling every bit of filth from the ocean of forest.

“It is true then,” muttered Trystan as we left the trail.

The dead had been left where they fell. Bloated orc and troll carcasses littered the land surrounding the ruin that had once been Pitchhollow garrison. There was little left, except a fire blackened keep and swirling ashes. Everything had been put to the torch, and I mean everything. The walls, the homes, the stakes in the pit, the interior of the keep itself. I guessed they wanted to keep us from using it as a staging point.

“The birds aren’t going near the bodies,” I said, more to myself.

“Orc flesh is so tainted that even the flies steer clear,” replied Trystan “Notice how the rot isn’t infested with maggots. Even carrion creatures have their standards.”

“So we burn them? It can’t be good to leave them out like this, surely?”

The wind changed direction, and I was smacked in the face by a wave of the most vile stench I’d ever encountered. My senses had taken a battering over the past few weeks, so I was able to minimise my reaction to a few unsteady gulps instead of projectile vomiting.

“I think that’s…” Trystan started to say before swallowing audibly, “probably for the best. I’ll see to the building of pyres.”

“I’m going in to the town if you don’t mind,” I told my companions. “I need to see something quickly.”

“There’s nothing to see,” said Thomas.

“It’s in the bowels of the keep. I won’t be long.”

“Do you want me to come with you?” asked Sun.

“No, I’ll be fine. I’m just going to find our little eight legged friend.”

“Ok. Be careful. The structure could be weak and collapse on you.”

“I will,” I replied, trotting towards the ash strewn drawbridge. The moat was topped with more flecks of grey from the fires, and countless bodies. The trolls who had fallen before the walls were half submerged, their fluids of decomposition leaking into the water, tinging it a yellowy black. The gatehouse itself was little more than a pile of charred beams and quite impassable for Lady, so I hopped down and put her away. Climbing over the debris, I was black by the time I set foot inside the garrison. I wouldn’t have looked out of place in Mary Poppins as one of the soot-streaked Victorian chimney sweeps. The one thing I immediately noticed once I was inside was the absence of any of our bodies. There were no human bones littering the burned town, only the abnormally thick orcish skeletons. My only comfort in their fate as fuel for the horde was that they were already dead, and we had now avenged their sacrifice many times over.

“Jesus,” I muttered as I passed the destruction. The protective mud applied to the roofs counted for little when the fires had been set from inside. The tavern was gone. The stables were gone. Hilde’s blacksmiths was gone, except for the stone forge, which had been smashed apart instead. I knew this was but one of hundreds of garrisons, castles, villages, that would need to be rebuilt, but it still hurt a little more because I had called it home, for however brief a time.

I trudged on through the swirling grey ghosts of what had once been. I could almost hear the voices and laughter of the people who were now gone. Beneath the ruin was still the base of their town, the hill of their keep. In a few months or years it would probably be alive with people again, but at that moment, I felt very alone. The steps to the fortress were still piled high with bodies, so I had to scrabble up the muddy bank, using the craters form by the troll bombardment as footholds.

The keep was in an even worse state now that I was stood in its shadow. I could see daylight through the upper windows where the roof had collapsed inwards. Climbing the steps to the reception hall, I was made to clear large chunks of half-burned debris to have any chance of making it to the dungeon. After a few minutes, I’d created a decent enough pyre outside the keep to take care of the corpses that littered the ground. I glanced up one last time, spying the fireplace that we had escaped through, only it no longer had a room to serve as it hung in the air. Hell, it had no floor or anything. It looked bizarre having the hearth sat forty feet above me so I put it out of my mind, especially when I started to think of Randulf’s last stand. I prayed that their bodies had burned before the orcs could use their meat as sustenance.

“There you are,” I said, finally revealing the way down to the dungeon. Aside from a smattering of ash, the lower level had escaped any damage. Mostly because everything below ground level was solid stone and thick columns that supported the keep above. My night eyes came into play and I found the blocks where I had left them, completely undisturbed. I added them both to my pack and found a thick spider’s nest within. Silky, white webbing covered every inch of the cells and narrow passage. A thick leg slowly appeared from within the cocoon in the furthest corner. Spidey moved into view, approaching slowly.

“Hey, buddy,” I said. “Sorry I left you.”

The massive arachnid watched me through its multifaceted eyes. Nothing about its posture told me if it was going to lunge and poison me, or was happy at my appearance. With every nerve in my body screaming, I held my ground. Sun’s words about treating him poorly gonged in my head. It came within arm’s reach, slowly lifting its head. Not knowing what else to do, I stroked the coarse fur. I knew beyond a doubt that the aliens were trolling us as Spidey leaned in to my hand like a fucking dog. If it had been blessed with a tail instead of its spinnerets, I’m sure it would’ve started wagging.

“I need to put you away, mate. You’ve done your job.”

Spidey seemed to understand and waited patiently for my pack to reclaim him. I stepped into the lair, conscious of the glowing red dot that showed on the corner of my minimap. In an ironic twist, the cell that Finneus had thrown me was now his home. There was little of the man remaining in the tight shroud that was wrapped around his body. I tried to ignore the jaundiced, bloodshot eyes that looked out at me, the insanity plain.

“You brought this on yourself,” I said, filling the small cell with a stack of extra wood I’d taken from upstairs. Retreating to Scab’s abandoned table, I tossed in a dozen torches, igniting everything within, including my enemy who perished almost immediately. The smoke was thick, starting to fill the dungeon, so I tucked my face into the crook of my elbow and headed back up. My need for vengeance had been great, but I felt nothing but a dull ache and sickness at my actions. Was the pendulum on my “fallen paladin” status swinging heavily against me? If the half-rotten thing I’d caused in the cell below was anything to go by, then the answer was probably yes. I was halfway up the steps when a voice from below sent waves of ice through my veins.

“Hello, little fly. It looks like I’m not the only spider in this world,” said Alwyn, mockingly.

I whirled round and found the warder’s room empty. “Alwyn?”

“In the flesh,” she replied, appearing at first as a shimmering haze, before fully forming as the invisibility spell faded.

“I’ll kill you for what you’ve done!” I snapped, summoning my matriarch swarm. My heart sank when nothing happened, so I tried again.

She giggled madly and tutted. “Oh no, little fly. I’ve put a temporary stop to your little tricks.”

I tried my fated skill, then smite, then I tried to equip my sword to attack her physically. Nothing was happening. “Ok, fists it is.” I snarled, making to move. Except I was stuck fast.

“Stop with all the silliness, little fly. We’re going on a journey, you and I. There are secrets in that head of yours I want to dig out.”

“There’re thousands of soldiers outside the keep. You’ll never get past them.”

She laughed again and it was a dreadful, malicious cackle. “You don’t think I rode here, do you? Our mutual friend showed me something deep below the mountain. Something powerful. I’m going to take you there now, so that we can pry open that pretty little mind of yours and take a peek inside.”

She wrapped her arms around my shoulders in an almost loving embrace. I heard whispered words in a language I didn’t recognise, then the grey stones of the dungeon vanished.

The disturbed dust settled to the now empty steps of the dead keep.