The world outside the shattered mausoleum window bled from the usual grey of Nocen into a blinding, fleshy yellow. It was the color of a bruise, of something sickly and swollen, and it pulsed with a nauseating light that Morvan found profoundly irritating. He squinted, rubbing at his eyes with a desultory thumb and forefinger. “Did someone leave the sunlamp on for too long?” he muttered, the question aimed more at the universe than anyone present. From the sky, which now seemed to stretch like distended skin, something peeled away. Not clouds, but vast, segmented shapes that unfurled like grotesque blossoms. They were the size of small villas, each one bristling with a dozen or more eyes that wept trails of burning ichor down their leathery, multi-jointed forms. Wings, too numerous to count, beat the thick air, stirring the mist into violent eddies. These were the ‘Judgement-Harriers,’ as Davorin’s cosmic passenger called them, descending to purge the city, their glide punctuated only by the wet thrum of their colossal wings. “They’re here,” the fragment within Davorin rasped, gaze fixed on the firmament, stripped of its usual chilling composure. “The Sun’s immediate response. It is sweeping the city clean, starting with us.” He turned to Morvan, his voice regaining a fraction of its former intensity. “We must reach the tethering crystal at the Ossuary’s zenith. Now.” Lysoria, her shadow-wreathed form already bristling with coiled power, didn’t wait for Morvan’s assent. Her dual blades, Rippleshadow and Soul-Reap, materialized in her hands, absorbing the sickly yellow light. “Through the crypts, Lord Morvan. The grand stairwell offers the fastest path,” she declared, her voice a low growl of anticipation. For her, this was not a desperate flight but a glorious hunt. The thought of protecting Morvan, of fighting off an entire host for his serene slumber, was a heady elixir. Yurik, meanwhile, had already snatched up the parchment map, now crumpled and tea-stained. He clutched it to his chest, his eyes wide with a mixture of fear and avarice. “The path to the zenith! The Sun’s heart! Imagine the relics we can find on the way, my Lord! The sacred dust, the blessed gargoyle tears!” He began frantically stuffing vials and small velvet pouches into his satchel, already planning his next pop-up market. Morvan sighed. “Fine, fine. Just try not to make too much noise. This whole ‘apocalypse’ thing is really cutting into my chill-out time.” He trudged forward, Davorin leading the way with an urgent, frantic speed. Lysoria took the rear, her shadows sniffing out threats, while Yurik scuttled somewhere in the middle, muttering to himself about ‘celestial dandruff’ and ‘sanctified toe-clippings.’ The Grand Ossuary was a labyrinth of death and devotion, its spiraling staircases carved from black basalt and perpetually slick with condensation. Grotesque gargoyles leered from every shadowy alcove, their stone faces twisted into silent screams. The air grew colder, the yellow light outside barely penetrating the thicker stone walls, replaced by the faint, eerie luminescence of phosphorescent moss. They had ascended only a few dozen flights when the first Judgement-Harrier, smaller than the ones descending on the city proper, but still the size of an armored carriage, peeled itself from the ceiling of the stairwell. It was a ‘Blind-Vermin,’ a scout unit, its four multi-faceted eyes darting wildly, its chitinous legs scuttling across the stone. It let out a high-pitched shriek, a sound like grinding teeth, and lunged directly for Yurik, who had paused to scrape some vaguely shimmering lichen from the wall with a silver spoon. Yurik screamed, dropping his spoon and the lichen. “Holy void-spores! A monster!” Morvan, who had been lazily trying to re-tie a loose lace on his worn leather boot for the past five minutes, barely looked up. His eyes, however, caught the motion of the lunging creature in his peripheral vision. With a grunt of mild annoyance, he instinctively thrust his foot forward, not as an attack, but to gain purchase for his knot-tying. His boot, still half-untied, connected with the Blind-Vermin’s lowest jointed leg. The creature, caught mid-leap, lost its balance. It tumbled with a surprisingly undignified squawk, bouncing off the narrow railing, and then plunged down the hundreds of steps they had just ascended. The sound of its descent was a wet, pulpy series of thumps and cracks, ending with a final, sickening splat somewhere far below. Silence. Yurik stared, then slowly turned to Morvan, his mouth agape. Lysoria, who had been mid-draw of her shadow blades, froze, one hand still hovering over her hip. Even the dormant shadow-entity within Davorin paused, a flicker of bewildered awe crossing his luminous face. Morvan, completely oblivious, finally managed a double knot. He wiggled his toes. “There. Much better. Almost tripped over that thing. Clumsy little bugger, wasn’t it?” Yurik, ever the opportunist, immediately dropped to his knees, scooping up Morvan’s recently tied boot. “The sacred boot of the Dread Sovereign! An instrument of sovereign wrath! It felled a celestial beast with but a mere brush! This — this is worth a king’s ransom!” He clutched it to his chest, his eyes shining with manic glee. “Who wants to buy the weapon that slew the first harbinger of the false dawn? Starting bid: ten chests of electrum!” “Put that down, you idiot,” Lysoria hissed, her patience wearing thin. “We are still exposed.” They pressed on, the ascent growing steeper, the air thinner and colder. The sound of distant crashes and the faint, high-pitched shrieks of the Judgement-Harriers echoed from the city below, a horrifying symphony of destruction. They wound through narrow passages, past crumbling sarcophagi, and across precarious bridges spanning chasms that plunged into unseen darkness. Suddenly, with a groaning roar that shook the very foundations of the Ossuary, a massive stone pillar, ancient and cracked, detached itself from the ceiling directly above Lysoria. It was easily twice her height and several times her width, a relic of a bygone era. “Lysoria!” the shadow-vessel bellowed, but it was too late. The pillar crashed down, pinning her to the cold stone floor. Her shadows flared, attempting to resist, but the sheer inertia was too great. She gritted her teeth, a frustrated snarl escaping her lips, her body straining. Morvan stopped, rubbing his eyes. “Oh, come on. More dust? Is there no end to this construction work?” He ambled over, peering at the trapped Inquisitor with the detached interest of someone observing a particularly stubborn stain. Lysoria, pinned and struggling, gasped, “Lord… Morvan! It is… too heavy!” With another sigh, Morvan reached down, not even bothering to crouch. He grabbed the rough, cold stone of the pillar with one hand. His fingers, seemingly without effort, burrowed slightly into the ancient rock, creating miniature craters. He lifted. The massive stone column, which had resisted Lysoria’s furious struggles, rose with a scraping groan, levitating a foot off the ground as if it were made of styrofoam. Morvan gave it a desultory push to the side, sending it toppling into a nearby chasm with a thunderous crash that reverberated through the very bedrock. He watched the dust motes settle, then turned back to Lysoria, who lay sprawled on the ground, chest heaving, gazing at him with an intensity that bordered on religious fervor. Her face was flushed, her lips slightly parted, a damp sheen on her brow. “You’re welcome,” he said flatly, before continuing his languid pace up the stairs. “Honestly, the mess people make.” Lysoria watched him go, every fiber of her being humming. A profound, bone-deep tremor shook her. This was not strength; it was something else, ancient and terrifyingly casual. Her ribs ached from the impact. The sheer, effortless power, the complete indifference to it… she felt a dizzying pull, a desperate yearning to be closer to this magnificent, exasperating being. She scrambled to her feet, a new, fiercer glint in her eyes, and hurried after him. They reached what should have been the final ascent. The spiraling steps terminated abruptly, not into an open platform as the map suggested, but into a colossal, arched doorway of polished obsidian. Blocking it stood the remaining pantheon of the Weeping Idols. Their faces, usually serene and pompous, were now contorted into masks of furious hatred. Each of them, from the portly Zophiel to the reedy goddess of whispers, Clamorosa, gripped a weapon of pure, solidified light. At the forefront, held by the Patriarch, Xylos, glowed a spear of blinding, incandescent energy, its tip crackling with destructive power. The Dawn Lance.

Ascent Through the Ossuary