The cultist Leader starred at me in shock. He pulled out a scroll and nodded scribble off the ceremony we had just done from the list then he turned to me. “You know the achievement for something like this is huge. Why did you not force the demon to hand over a scroll and do the ceremony yourself. That Achievement could have been yours?” I blinked “Its fairly simply i can do the ceremony again later. I would think I would still get a lesser achievement. This way I get what i need now and I will still claim the achievement later.”

Max And thorn followed me out the door Max looked worried. He tried to give me a hard stare but stopped when he realized I was telling him nothing. I looked at Thorn “So lets capture a Thieves hideout and use it. We need to let the red light from Max run down before leaving the city. I swear I am cursed well i have enough books to study by myself for a while. Where do you guys want to go after?”

Thorn grinned “I want to unite the Orcs and form a horde.” Max grinned “Lets take a castle and become bandits” I looked at Max “There coming to kill us you know that right? We need to hide somewhere outside the human and elf lands. There was a dead elf so the elf's are going to be pissed. So where about can we become bandit Chiefs ?”

Max winked at me “There are trade routes going to the Orc Lands we just need to open up a new one.” It was not a terrible thought. I certainly needed someplace to hide. Max had killed at least one Elf maybe some of the piles of ash he had left behind were also elves. The nobles tended to have the paladin and knight classes. Poorer people tended to have black knight or squire classes elves were not poor. As those killed by Max had high class it was likely all those incinerated by Max were nobles and had family with high clases and levels.

I pulled out a map of the underground tunnels and tossed it to Thorn. “Assume that there is about to be a huge bounty on our head. I want to pass by somewhere where we can be seen. A choke point where i can set down some poison. Then we head to ground. Where the best place to hide out?”

Thorn stared at the map “We are going to have to hide near the lesser dungeons. They have regular breeches so everyone avoids that area. There is a old thieves base down there. ”

We headed out with me casting stench and spitting out clouds of poison and disease mist at regular intervals. We reached a massive cave and Thorn pointed at a river flowing into the cave. “Thats it just above the stream. This place has hundreds of mole tunnels connecting it to most of the tunnel systems. The bridge connects several entrances and exits. Put your poison in or around the bridge.”

We walked over the bridge and I pulled out a corpse and cast create zombie onto it. I ordered to one side of the bridge and pulled out my greater blight spells. I got ready and altered the greater blight spell a bit i added a disease to the corruption part of the spell.

I cast the spell at the Zombie who started to decay. Spells stack this would hopefully turn the zombie into a giant disease incubator . To make sure anyone coming down would catch a disease i pulled out a couple of packets of seeds and tossed them at the Zombie. I nodded and looked at Thorn “This next spell is going to suck your going to have to carry me afterwards.”

I pulled out my last Greater blight spell and began to add effects. Disease was added as was greater plant corruption. I targeted the Zombie who visible changed. Mushrooms popped up on his head and popped.

I slumped into unconsciousness and found myself awake in a cave. Max was casting a flame light ball spell. Thorn looked at me in concern “I really hope that spell was a nasty one I found a poster theres a five thousand gold coin reward on our heads.”

I would have chuckled but i was to tired “It was a explosive diarrhoea disease and poison curse. Its the mushrooms on the zombie. They feed off the cursed flesh and emit a type of toxic spore. The spore should mix with the other poison in the air and you get a chain reaction. For about Six hours you can not walk much. The mushrooms grow in damp conditions and if your not careful can grow on you digging into your flesh.”

Thorn ginned wickedly “They will not have much to wipe there asses down here.” Max swore “Thats horrible” I looked at Max “Well if you had not killed all those folks i would not be down here risking my life. So suck it up. Your just lucky they would have killed me even if i had handed you over.”

Report on the search for Max by inquisitor Lotario dei Conti di Segni

The errors made by our paladins are many. There biggest mistake was underestimating what a spawn of darkness could do. An Arch necromancer is not to be underestimated.

I myself must fault myself on my lack of understanding just how evil and cunning the little fiend Wrath could be. Luckily Jessica Lightstar was there to lend support. Otherwise i fear for the result of our search.

The facts are clear Max a Orc called Thorn and the arch fiend Wrath entered the underground tunnels and crossed over a bridge known as Gnolls last stand.

Our trackers and a number of bounty hunters followed them as far as the bridge. Which is where things began to go wrong. The Arch fiend Wrath had cast numerous poison and disease clouds in the tunnels out trackers had just walked threw.

While the churches of goodness Paladins were cloaked and protected in there righteousness. The Mercenaries were not and neither were there dogs. Projectile vomiting began as did explosive diarrhoea

By the time I arrived the smell and mixture of bodily fluids was enough to make even hardened soldiers turn green. My own bodyguard a man of stiff resolve actually puked upon seeing the wretched scene.

Unfortunately far worse was to come. Jessica Lightstar a priestess i must admit i had doubts about at first spotted the problem. A undead zombie that had been left near the bridge.

It was at this stage the true horror of the situation became known. The zombie was infected with spores from mushrooms. Toxic Mushrooms which grow in warm damp places. The paladins and mercenaries had long since run out of toilet paper.

Jessica acted with ruthless pragmatism and burned all the areas she could safely do so. She also slaughtered all the tracking hounds but one who she sent forward with a Paladin.

Unfortunately by this stage the Paladins that had arrived first had been inside a cursed region for about half a hour. Even there potions of disease resistance had begun to weaken.

Jessica ordered everyone else back and we were forced to retreat burning the animals carcasses as we left.

For anyone who would say I was premature in my retreat let me just say this. First hear the scream of a paladin who has a mushroom growing out of his neither region and then tell me i was wrong to retreat in the face of such evil.

Wrath

Water dripped off the ceiling and into a bowl. Max looked upset and i starred at him. He shuddered and i got back to work on my bones. Thorn looked over “What are you doing with that bone?”

I focused and cast yet another spell onto the bone. “I am shaping it into a totem and then i am going to use create dead on it. It will form a magic ring” Thorn looked at the ring “Yeah but you have been doing the same thing over and over for days I thought enchanting only took a few hours at most.”

I kept chanting and looked at thorn “I am a necromancer not a enchanter. Luckily the raw materials that demon traded us were good Ok finished” i looked at my rings

Cursed bone ring Effects Curse of flame

All flame attacks are 50 percent more powerful and cost less mana however wielder suffers from flame backlash Cursed black bone ring

Effects Curse of rage

infuses the wielder with rage greatly increases strength

Warning over time the rage will build up and cause berserker fury

I tossed the bone ring of flame to Max and the cursed bone ring of rage to Thorn. Then i checked my status as usual I could feel my necromancer skills increase. My create greater undead spell had hit level 7 and my other levels had also increased. I knew that once my create undead spell hit level 8 i could start to create lesser death knights from scratch.

I looked at Thorn “Alright so when can we get out of here?” Thorn nodded “It has been almost a week if they have given up or are about to block off all the exits and stave us out I am not certain about. I am betting on the starve out but Max is still showing a red light which for some reason has not vanished. We need to leave during the day when it will not be as noticeable.”

I pulled out my ice storm scroll spell. “This will help i can use it to freeze the underground river we can avoid the bridge.” Thorn shook her head “No we sneaking past the bridge will not get us much we kill our way threw. We use the scroll to produce a ice raft which we use on the city river at night. The current is good we can be miles away before they notice.”

We left the hole that had been our home for a few days and followed the smell to the bridge. I starred two Paladins were playing dice near a open fire. There was what looked like a chicken on the fire.

A paladin cursed “Your a cheating mongrel. Whose ass is finer that Jessica chick or the cute baker.” The other paladin gave it some thought. “Well that Jessica has a nice rack but the bakers is better. Still I love thinking about the baker she's not such a ice queen”

The other paladin laughed “Yeah that Jessica has a icicle up her ass thats for sure.” Thorn pulled out two axes and they both flashed out striking both Paladins in the head. Thorn began to glow red. We approached the dead paladins and tossed there corpses on the side of the bridge we had come from. I cast raise dead on the bodies They would attack anyone who came around to see what killed them. and Max set the bridge on fire.

The bridge fell into the river and the two ghouls on the other side of the bridge starred hungrily at us. Thorn grabbed the chicken and we all ate before moving on. Dead rats littered the ground. They must have been infected by the spores of the mushrooms. Lucky for us the Knights had a ample supply of disease resistance and cure disease potions. My poison had blown away but it looked like my monster plant breeder and dungeon herbalist sub class had a unexpected result. The mushrooms around us had altered.

Disease mushroom Inhaling the spores of this mushroom has a chance to give you a weak disease. Constant exposure will weaken the immune system making it easier to catch diseases Poison mushroom

Effect 1 A highly toxic mushroom

Effect 2 ??????

I put on a glove and picked some of the poison mushrooms. They would be useful later. Eyes stared at us from the darkness and i released my aura of death to scare off the rats.

Finding a exit to the surface proved easy. There were boards up on most of the exits but thieves or maybe the homeless had ripped them out. It was just turning dark out as we made our way to the docks and had to start a truly horrible swim.

We had one ring of water breathing which Thorn had to wear. She was weighed down by our bags of holding. Bags of holding only reduced weight which was a problem. So i had to dump all the bodies out of the bags. Thorn had to toss away her armour as did Max.

We swam out as silently as we could. Then I had to reach into my bag of holding and cast a altered Ice storm scroll to create a small block of ice which we clambered onto and set off. Max and Thorn had to wear wet blankets because they were both glowing red. We sat there shivering for the night all except Max whose new nature kept him warm. Finally I felt well enough and drunk a bottle of Mana potion. I basked in the heat of my spell and extended it to Thorn who gave me a thankful smile.

We had to get off the ice when we reached the ocean. All of us slipped into the water to emerge into a thistle bed. Thorn pushed the thistles aside and set up a basic camp. I fell asleep under the only dry blanket we had left. Cursing Max and his need for flashy vengeance. Would it have killed him to wait a while and gut the Paladin when no one was looking.

Warning Steadfast title is evolving. It is effecting your mental state do you wish to stop the evolution. Or do you wish to accept the evolution

How bad could it effect me. I reached out and selected accept

Steadfast

effects Endurance +4 Strength +2 + steel will power unyielding pride + immune to mind control lesser + immune to charm

changed to

Steadfast

effects Endurance +4 Strength +2 + steel wall will power + unyielding pride + immune to mind control + immune to charm + immune to magic effecting the mind