A minor rouse in the Defender’s Guild came about with the fast-spreading rumor of a questant come with news. A novice in Tartary garb claimed to know the secrets of the tombs below the lichyard. A place so few adventurers ever returned from they were claimed to be a certain deathtrap, a crucible where only the strongest imaginable warriors could ever clear and return unscathed. And though he did not claim to escape unwounded, it escaped alive. A feat left unrecorded in all the Blackwoods logs.

Ozzy went from an obscure stranger, within an hour, to the center of a rumorous maelstrom. The subject of the Guild’s captivation. People came back from the Blackwood with meager spoils, ruinous markers and tokens of their hunts, the fragments of living skeletons and other walking disasters, and their accomplishments were all overshadowed and outshone by the mere words of a stammering, well-dressed elite.

KKKKKHHHHH!

Ozzy’s excitement over being the central figure to the Guild’s attraction went unspoken. He was overburdened with questions. As he realized the predicament of his position, he gave lighter and fewer answers to them.

“What kind of treasure did you find down in the tombs?”

“Uh - gold, mostly. But deep in. And…just gold and things, really.”

“How much resistance is there?”

“A skeleton down every hall and around every corner. Armed, dangerous…abundant.”

“How did you get past the monsters in the woods?”

“Uh, I just ran for it.”

“Is there truly a guardian on par with the dreaded lich in the graveyard up top?”

“Oh - I’d say, maybe. Just about. Probably not as - but very, yes.”

The questions he left unanswered were answered by a cacophony of conjecture, as rumors crashed like waves against the sheer cliff of Ozzy’s silence. Questions about combat and performance within the catacombs, about his skill and repertoire of training. All things he couldn’t answer, because he failed to pick up even a single weapon the whole time he’d been alive.

I’m gonna get caught, he thought. And then die!

His paranoia did not come without reason. Just out of earshot - from the holes where he had no ears - he could hear people discussing their own adventures into the Blackwoods and the brief brushes they’d had of the lichyard in their own quests.

“Those skeletons,” a man said, “aren’t normal. They’re mad things. They carry the knowledge of the warriors they used to be and are manipulated by the fel magics of the ruinous sect of necromancers who have a whole necropolis below the ground. We’re fighting what used to be great humans when we cross blades with those fiends.”

“I heard salt is the cure,” another spoke. “The Zandan tribe use salt to seal in the curses of death and drive away malicious spirits to keep their fallen from rising or being taken by evil forces. They bury the bodies in salt until the flesh has been drained of all moisture and pickled.”

“I’d rather fight a skeleton than a man with jerked meat for flesh,” another commented.

“If you break the skulls open, the evil energy can’t be contained and flies away.”

“If you shatter the spine, their bodies will crumble. They say it’s because of old magic that resurrects only parts of the soul that know fighting that live in the spines of the dead.”

Ozzy came to realize something as he sat surrounded by the so-called Defenders.

These people make their living hunting and killing skeletons. Even if they aren’t human skeletons - I think - they’re all really well knowledged in…breaking the human body down into pieces.

Ozzy felt the grip of a mighty hand on his shoulder. It caused him to gasp a wide-mouthed wheeze. The old gray-faced man from before, the one who forced him to speak further about his trip into the dark below, came up to him. And he put a weighed sack on the table, along with a furled up scroll.

“Time to make good on your word,” he said.

“O-oh,” Ozzy said. “Okay…which word?”

“Of the gold hidden in the crypts,” he said. “You’re the first in a while to come in here talking about success without so much as a glint of horror lurking in your eyes over it. The first to come from beyond the walls that refuse to be scaled or past the gates which can’t be opened into the living crypt of the walking undead in service to a force so malicious it stains the sky with an unnatural, perpetual twilight.”

“Really?” Ozzy asked.

“Impressed?” the slick haired gentleman said. “Farheim’s not exactly shining beacon for the Defender’s Guild. It’s more of a proving ground. But it usually takes knights from the capital itself to so much as get into the lichyard. And then even greater effort has to be taken to get back out.”

“Oh,” Ozzy nodded. “And I did it all by myself,” he said, in some of his own disbelief.

“And now,” the old man said, “you’re going with me.”

“Oh, good!” Ozzy sighed. “I’m glad. I thought you were sending me in alone. Uh - unarmed. I lost my…tools inside there. So It’d be hard for me to get back in. As I am. By myself.”

The old man spilled the contents of the bag out onto the table. He brought over an array of simple looking hooks and spikes, climbing gear with thick braided ropes. He also had some curious looking iron pots with intricate outer designs, which had thick oily ropes that came out of the tops.

“This gear,” the old man said, “brought me to the surface one day years back. But I was forced out by a maniacal being. A skeleton with whole skeletal torsos for arms.” The people at nearby tables started to titter at the mention. He lowed and gave them all a wide, glaring eye, and they turned silent. “Twas taller than any man,” he went on. “Taller, even, than the mountainous Barbarians. Adorned all over with skulls. His chest was thickened with ribs which wove in opposing directions like a hardened wicker basket. His fingers were made of shattered forearms, and the many knotted burls of bone in the hands made up a beard upon his face which layered down like scale across his body.”

Oh God, that’s Marrowbane. He used to be only slightly huge. Now he’s literally a truck and trailer worth of bone parts! And this guy lost to him?

The man turned back to Ozzy with a pointing finger. “You’ve seen it, too, haven’t you? This mammoth affront against humanity. Seen it yourself, and lived long enough to evade it. Right?”

Ozzy looked the man dead in the eyes. “I did,” he said, firmly. “And I didn’t fight it. And…it was far, far larger than just that. What you described sounds like one skeleton amassed with just a few others. The thing in the lichyard now…is made of dozens. Maybe hundreds. It’s as big as a building and moves like a - a beast.”

All the excitement was gone from the room. The rumor sharing turned into low murmurs of a hopeless sort. Then, all heads turned to the thud of heavy steps upon the floor. The man in the bear cloth suit stood with his great club and approached the table. He was seven feet tall at least. A massive man with more hair on his chest than most men in the room had hair on their heads.

“I am going with you,” he declared.

“Okay,” Ozzy said, intimidated nearly out of his seat. But the old gray man had a different plan.

“Are you a member of this guild?” he asked.

“No,” the Barbarian answered.

“Couldn’t read the forms to fill in your name?” the man said, factually without a mocking tone. The Barbarian huffed at the phrasing of his assessment. “I hold veterancy here. It’s my duty as an adjuster to evaluate the veracity of these claims and update the guild’s charter of requests to reflect the newly found information of this…candidate.” He turned to Ozzy, who looked lost in all the terminology. But he did understand enough to know that the big, huge man who might not die instantly to Marrowbane wasn’t invited.

“Well,” Ozzy spoke up, “if you’re sure about it. I’ll do what I can to keep you safe.”

The whole crowd tensed up. His patron leered at him with a stern, authoritative glare. Then he cracked a smile which lifted a whole corner of his otherwise stiff beard.

“You’ve got some spirit in you,” he said. “Spirit may have been what got you out of that crypt. Let’s see if you haven’t lost it all on the way here. Confidence, lad. Good men die because they cower, where great men live because they believe in themselves.”

“Y-yes, sir!” Ozzy said. He suddenly snapped to his feet, and was markedly shorter than the tall old man. And much, much shorter than the dismissed Barbarian.

With that, the old man started on his venture out, only waiting for Ozzy in that he did not run straight down the road without him. Ozzy started on his way, but his bearded friend stopped him with a stiff hand on his shoulder before he got too far.

“There’s something you should know,” he began, “about old Stormen.”

“Okay,” Ozzy said. “His name is a good thing to know.”

“It’s that he’s not just bragging,” he explained, “or putting up a front. He’s come back from way worse. Wars in Pollerlan, down south with abominations, even in the mountains fighting off all kinds of fiends. He’s from the old age of the Defenders where they were fighting every single day just to keep the people behind closed walls from so much as seeing a single monster. It’s been too long trapped inside a peaceful situation. He knows how to handle himself. There’s no safer hands to be in for your first job.”

“He seems pretty reliable,” Ozzy said. Heroic, even. I should see what I can learn from him while I have the chance.

“And in any case,” he continued, with a reaffirming pat on the shoulder, “it’ll make a good story whichever way it turns out.”

“Yeah, probably.”

“Assuming you make it back to tell it,” he said, with a laugh. Ozzy left on what seemed like friendly grounds and followed Stormen out into the street. He caught up to the old man just in time to ask him a question that was kept bit between his back molars for a while.

“Sir,” he began, “I don’t have a weapon. Is that going to be a big problem?”

“Not at all,” Stormen said. “Assuming you don’t have any fear for the end of your life.”

“I do, though,” Ozzy said.

“Then you’d better find one quick,” he said. Stormen wandered off to the side of the road and perched his sizeable backpack onto the fence. Inside were an array of armaments, dozens of pound worth of heavy metal and polished wood, all of which looked handmade. He had clubs and daggers, swords, hammers, knives and a buckler. A whole beginner’s armory of the most practical, mainline weaponry that fit into one hand. Then on either leg he had sheathes for a longsword and a rapier.

“The hammer,” Stormen said, “is a fine weapon. It breaks the skulls apart, fast.”

“I bet it does,” Ozzy muttered. He was staring down a whole rack of weapons meant for killing him - or really anything living. He tried the hammer. He picked it up and his entire arm nearly snapped off. He strained to keep it in the socket. But the elbow fell out and slid down his sleeve. He followed his arm to the ground quickly to cover it up and let the joint lock back into place. “KKKKKHHHHH! Heavier than it looks!”

Stormen looked down, flat expression, showing none of the disappointment that Ozzy could feel as certain as a chilling breeze. “Try the flat-end dagger.” Ozzy left the hammer on the ground and picked up the dagger instead. Heavy handle, but the blade was light. He could keep it up and ready with both hands - which defeated the point of it being a light weapon. And a one handed one.

“Got any strength at all in those arms?” Stormen asked.

Ozzy was tempted to say no, but did not want to be too revealing. He reflected on whether it was true. He had no muscle, just fluff between his ulnar and radial. He was light enough to jump a whole wall and endurant enough to never get tired. He could disassemble and reassemble, not need to breathe or eat or sleep. There had to be a downside to being a skeleton beyond just being despised as a monstrous existence. And he found it.

“Unfortunately,” Ozzy said, “n-no.”

“Then how’d you manage to survive?” Stormen asked.

“....By running,” he said, “and hiding. And jumping. And…lying my way up to here.”

Stormen nodded. “Nice to hear some honesty in your voice at last.” He drew out his rapier at his side and handed it over. Ozzy took it carefully as a delicate, precious item. To his surprise, it wasn’t that heavy. It weighed his whole hand down but not to the point where it felt awkward or awful. The blade seemingly didn’t exist.

“It’s no good against what we’re up to face,” Stormen admitted as he retrieved and repacked his other tools, “but it’s more than nothing.”

“Thank you,” Ozzy said. “I’ll make sure you get it back straight and -.”

“If we come back alive,” Stormen said, “you can keep it.” He slung the satchel over his back and set off down the road, into the twilight towards the distant gray bruise of reality over the sky. And Ozzy followed in his brave, heroic steps. He was compelled to. To follow in the path of the man he wanted to be, deep down in his bones.