LILITH THE EXILED [███████████?????????] 50%

  “Plague and Fire, consume this accursed city!”

  The sorceress levitated above the stone floor.

  A rift of flame and pestilence formed, splitting the room with a rapturous roar.

  Zariel ran into the fire, enduring the growing flames.

  Without needing to be told, the other three rushed into the plague-covered half.

  Their steps immediately slowed once they crossed the threshold. The virulence Lillith had unleashed from the hells instantly began to affect the group, inflicting ramping damage and slowing their movement and cast speed.

  S stood near the border, unleashing a series of backstabs on the arcane barrier around Lilith.

  “Use your potions!” Leia ordered.

  She was concentrating deeply on the budding energies pooling around the tip of her wand. Despite how much stronger she had gotten, the afflictions brought by Lilith’s plague made casting spells take twice as long. Eclipse did not fare much better, a ring of sharp icicles began to slowly form around Eclipse.

  Meanwhile, Zariel was under threat from Lilith’s arcane attacks and the now waist-high flames that raged across the floor.

  “Ready?” Zariel shouted. His tone was urgent, but not yet desperate.

  S vanished, reappearing behind Lilith and straddling the line of fire and disease too closely for Zariel’s liking.

  “Watch your feet,” Zariel snapped.

  The rogue’s foot was dangerously close to crossing the border, but he seemed unbothered.

  “Almost.” The rogue shoved his daggers into the sorceress’s back.

  A crack formed across the magical barrier surrounding her. It would not be long now.

  “On my attack,” Eclipse said, now surrounded by large, spear-like icicles.

  His orb shimmered with a white-blue glow.

  Zariel grit his teeth, raising his shield as Lilith unleashed a barrage of hellfire arrows.

  The flames were at his neck.

  He looked across the room, Leaih would not be healing him anytime soon. The paladin lowered his sword and grabbed one of the potions she had prepared for him.

  He drank it, savoring the sweet red liquid as it went down his gullet.

  “Now!”

  Zariel drew his sword.

  Each icicle hurtled towards Lilith, shattering with a thunderous crack upon meeting the arcane barrier.

  All of them did, except the last one.

  It pierced through, shattering the protective spell and impaling the betrayer.

  Lilith the Exiled [██████████??????????] 48%

  “You are nothing compared to him!” Lillith declared.

  The flames roared, rising so high that they almost reached the ceiling.

  But Zariel remembered this fight well. He had just crossed the threshold. The fires immediately died down, leading the three others to swap sides.

  Instantly, the four barraged the sorceress with their strongest attacks.

  The flames nipped at their ankles, but they were free of the debilitating effects of the plague.

  S appeared and disappeared repeatedly, slashing the boss from the shadows and dealing critical damage with each strike.

  Leaih evoked Bellatrix’s Herself, causing the goddess’s symbol to appear over the four adventurers.

  The plague sapped Zariel’s strength, but he had plenty still left.

  His foe’s gaze was fixed on him. Enraged, Lilith unleashed spells of hellfire and arcane on the paladin.

  “YOU AND YOUR CITY WILL BURN!” she roared.

  LILITH THE EXILED [█???????????????????] 5%

  She coughed up blood. The veins in her neck bulged.

  The flames of hell itself emerged through the rift, engulfing the arena entirely. A final, desperate attack meant to overwhelm the party.

  Two daggers rushed through the flames and found their mark.

  “Zantor…Punish these traitors…”

  LILITH THE EXILED [???????????????????] DEAD

  Now deprived of the perverted magic flowing through her veins, her corpse fell lifelessly onto the floor. The rift she had opened vanished as quickly as it had appeared.

  The rogue stood over her body.

  [S has looted Betrayer’s Tome of Plague and Fire]

  “No boots,” he said plainly, holding up a warped tome with a disappointed look. “Want?”

  Eclipse shook his head. “I prefer orbs. Better for casting.”

  The rogue nodded along, he had already been stuffing the tome into his bag.

  Zariel knew that as soon as they returned to Revenshein, that tome would be on the auction house listed at some exorbitant price. S’s devilish grin only served to confirm his fears.

  With Lilith gone, the seal over the staircase vanished.

  “We’ll head to the second floor and wait for the other group,” Eclipse said. “Perhaps we’ll find what we’re searching for on the upper floors.”

  “You think the other group is doing okay?” Leaih asked. “I’m worried. They don’t have a cleric with them.”

  S snickered as he headed towards the steps.

  “With that warrior? They’re probably already dead.”

  The rogue left his words behind as he vanished into the darkness, leaving Leaih behind to brood.

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  The cleric let out a nervous exhale and began to follow the two damage dealers to the second floor.

  Her foot was just about to fall upon the first step.

  “Zariel?”

  The paladin was staring at the drifting flecks of magic that were once Lilith.

  She placed her hand on him, but he seemed to not even notice.

  “Zariel, are you all right?”

  His eyes broke free of the trance they were in. A deep breath.

  “Yes,” he replied. “It’s just that…”

  He looked once more at where Lilith had stood, but then his eyes went to the stairwell.

  “Let’s go.”

  The second and third floors were cleared with ease. No portals. No signs of that ethereal foe they had fought that day.

  Even worse, Evo did not get her new boots.

  A spiral staircase had revealed itself, descending from the top of the third floor to the depths of the citadel. There, in the darkest recesses of the raid, awaited Zantor. A dark, towering figure in the dim light. His horns curled upwards from his head, blocking the feeble flames of the candlestick chandelier overhead.

  Leaih bestowed upon the group while they completed their last-minute preparations.

  Zariel faced the giant silhouette, sword and shield at the ready. A faint aura of light wrapped around him. It came naturally, needing no conscious invocation

  He detested evil, and there was no greater evil than demons. Zariel knew that evil well.

  The attacks. Their strength and frequency.

  The paladin vowed to triumph over the citadel once more.

  “Ready when you two are,” Leaih said, bestowing her blessing on ForNot and Zariel.

  ForNot glanced at Zariel. She had tanked the last two floors, and he expected her to remind him of the fact through some blunt, authoritative remark.

  “Take the lead on this one,” the warrior said.

  She spoke effortlessly, as if it was a simple request—as if it was expected. Zariel simply nodded, ignoring the odd smirk on the warrior’s face.

  “ForNot, that expression of yours…” Leaih said softly, sliding her way between them. “You’re not hoping he dies, are you? I assure you, I let that happen.”

  The warrior turned away from both of them.

  “Of course not,” she said. “Just thought I’d let him tank for once. Make him feel useful.”

  S chuckled.

  “Lies like a warrior,” he told Arctic, but the bard was preoccupied.

  Her legs were trembling. Her eyes sat on the two horns that pierced the darkness.

  “What’s wrong?” Evo asked. “You did this before, didn’t you?”

  “Y-yes,” she said. “But I was…”.

  “A second chance comes once,” Marcatan said, his restorative auras falling over the party as he approached.

  “Seize it before it slips through your fing—your strings,” he corrected, motioning towards the bard’s harplin.

  His remark roused a chuckle from the bard, and her restless legs seemed to calm.

  But Zariel found nothing humorous in the pits of Zantori Citadel. He stepped forward, ignoring the warrior’s concerning smirk. He would not die. He knew Zantor. He knew the fight. Every word the demon would say. Every taunt.

  Sixty-eight attempts had instilled them all in his mind.

  The paladin’s light radiated over his weapons—the same ones he had gotten from Zantor.

  It was then that the demon stepped forward, the heavy step shook the ground.

  “You’ve returned, little light.”

  The demon’s face emerged from the shadows revealing snarled teeth covered in blood.

  “Somehow, you survived oblivion, but at what cost? Taller, but a shadow of your former self.”

  As he approached, he dragged the chains that had once bound him. Now free of their fixtures, those fists would soon burn once again.

  That was expected. His knowing, fiendish grin and taunt was not.

  “You will die first,” he said. “Their deaths will be as painful as possible.”

  Zariel’s advance was cut short by his words.

  He remembered what Lilith had said—what he thought she had said.

  Was this also his imagination?

  He looked back.

  The entire party battled a range of emotions as they gazed up at the demon.

  Disgust, fear, shock were abundant.

  ForNot was the exception.

  Anger. Rage

  She snarled at Zantor.

  “I’ll—I’ll kill you…” she said weakly, much quieter than Zariel had ever heard her speak.

  “I’LL KILL YOU!”

  The warrior leapt forwards, placing herself beneath Zantor’s rising fists.

  Across his journey so far, Zariel had always charged in at the start of every battle.

  But for once, the paladin hesitated.

  Zantor had never said those words before.

  He spoke of oblivion. As if he knew. Something had changed, and now the battle he had felt so prepared for was inherently different.

  It was unknown.

  And it terrified him.

  ZANTOR [████████████████████] 100%

  “AGH!”

  ForNot was sent flying across the room with a swipe of Zantor’s arm.

  “YOU DARE CHALLENGE ME?” the demon roared.

  Familiar.

  Zariel rushed forwards, channeling his powers into his shield and causing the chains that wrapped around it to glow with a holy light.

  “ForNot!” Leaih ran across the arena to get in range of the warrior. She healed the warrior’s body, but she could do nothing for the bloodlust that had consumed her.

  “I’LL MAKE YOU REGRET THOSE WORDS! TEAR OUT THAT DEVIL TONGUE ONCE MORE!”

  She rushed back into the fray, her eyes firmly set on the citadel’s lord. Her outburst was enough to rouse everyone to action. Fireballs flew. Explosions burst around the demon’s chest. Daggers and staff struck Zantor’s legs. It was only the bard’s harplin that was silent.

  “Arctic, do something!” Leaih begged. “Please!”

  The bard’s head shook softly. She could not break free of the terror that gripped her.

  “I-I can’t win…” she muttered. “I-I can’t…”

  “You can,” Leaih said. “You’re one of the eight on the Spire’s wall. You triumphed over—”

  “I died!”

  Arctic’s harplin fell onto the floor.

  “We fought that monster so many times… I was so tired… I died before his fists even started to…”

  She began to tremble.

  “Your second chance,” Marcatan reminded her from across the arena.

  The chanter twirled his staff around his body with finesse, spinning the sturdy rod with impressive speed and slamming it into Zantor.

  “Seize it—umph!”

  A chain wrapped around Marcatan, constricting him.

  In just a few moments, the chanter was brought to his knees—dangerously low on health.

  Leaih pointed her wand at him, muttering an incantation as quickly as she could without jumbling the words.

  A magical arrow of light and magic flew into the air and surged into Marcatan. It healed him before leaping out from his body and flying towards Zantor.

  She could not heal them all alone.

  “I need your song.” Leaih turned to Arctic. “Marcatan’s auras aren’t enough—”

  “M-my song?”

  The bard’s eyes lit up.

  She picked up the harplin and drew her bow.

  Her fingers traced the strings, causing them to vibrate.

  The soft music was lost in the mayhem unfolding across the battlefield.

  Zariel took a direct hit. Marcatan was slow to recover, and his auras were consequently weakened.

  ZANTOR [███████████████?????] 60%

  All around the party, chains snapped like whips, sending piercing wails through the chamber that pained the raid team.

  “Arctic, I can’t keep them all up—”

  It was then, as the health of the raid team was getting lower and lower with each crack of the infernal chains, that the bard began to play.

  Enchanted notes surrounded the eight. A temporary but powerful bulwark brought by the bard’s song.

  Marcatan’s eyes met Arctic’s.

  He gave her a subtle, proud nod before resuming his attacks on the demon. Her song bought them time, enough for Leaih to heal the party back to full strength.

  “Keep the pace!”

  Eclipse’s command was also a warning, for the demon’s horns were beginning to glow. Everyone knew what that meant. The time Arctic had earned them was fleeting.

  “Help them,” Leaih told her. “We need everything.”

  Arctic, now beaming with confidence, began to pluck the strings with intensity. Each staccato conjured a magical note that collided with Zantor in a burst of light.

  At the same time, a hail of comets descended from a portal opened by the warlock. Burning meteors pummeled the demon’s head, but he continued to relentlessly pound Zariel all the same.

  ZANTOR [███████?????????????] 30%

  A glow.

  The black horns were fully engulfed by scarlet.

  Zariel’s mind raced. It hadn’t been this quickly before. He was certain. It was all wrong. They were higher level. Better fighters. More experienced.

  The demon’s fists began to crackle.

  Zariel turned to his raid team. He knew they were next. There was nothing he could do now except attack and hope to slay the beast before he killed his allies.

  “THE FIRES OF HELL CONSUME—”

  Zantor stopped.

  ZANTOR [████????????????????] 20%

  An eerie silence fell over the pit. No one moved.

  Even the fire on the torches lining the wall seemed to stop moving.

  “This is it,” Eclipse said. “He froze like this before.”

  Evo lowered her rifle.

  “This is different. Zantor was on his last legs when things suddenly got dark—”

  “Stop talking and kill him!” ForNot ordered, free of the stupor that had fallen over her. Her axes furiously carved through the demon’s leg.

  To Zariel’s horror, he knew this different.

  Before, Zantor had frozen mid-swing.

  But now, the demon slowly rose his hands up to his face. They were more like claws, covered in dark, scaly skin that had burned Zariel with each blow.

  Thunder.

  It echoed across Zantori Citadel.

  Beyond the walls.

  Fire erupted over Zantor’s fists.

  “Spread out and use everything!” Zariel ordered. “I won’t be able to keep his attention any—"

  The unfeeling, ancient eyes of the citadel’s prisoner fell upon the paladin. Zariel felt cold.

  “No,” Zantor said. “ will be the first to die, paladin.”

  Zariel’s heart pounded wildly within his armor.

  The demon raised his hand and showed the eight of them the crimson flames. Crimson, not the green flames of hell.

  Thunder once more.

  Lightning crackled around his fists, dancing through the flames as if Zantor held a storm in his palms.

  His horns shattered. Flames ran down the length of the chains.

  STORMFIRE ZANTOR [███?????????????????] 15%

  “Oblivion is inescapable,” Zantor said, his eyes glowing with shimmering lightning. “Allow me to free you from this life.”

  Those were the last words Zariel heard before the lightning-flame fists crushed him.

  Zariel saw his end approaching. As his final act, he dropped his shield and plunged his sword into the demon’s flesh with both hands.

  Zariel, the best paladin in Atrea.

  He died instantly.