Deus Necros

“We’re fighting all that?” Thomas said, his voice carrying a thin tremor as he floated closer, the faint glow of his spectral form flaring like a dying lantern. His eyes roamed over the endless dark shapes flooding across the narrow bridge. From this distance they resembled silhouettes stitched from shadow and ash, their steps striking the stone in a relentless rhythm that drummed into Ludwig’s skull. The sound was like countless nails tapping at once, a tide of movement that seemed to make the ancient fortress itself shudder.

Ludwig’s jaw tightened. His fingers flexed against the rough grip of Oathcarver, the weight of the blade a cold, grounding presence across his back. “Don’t think we have another choice,” he muttered, his voice low, clipped, carrying the tone of someone already bracing for the first strike. His eyes swept the length of the bridge, calculating distance, speed, possible angles of attack. “There isn’t even a door to slow them, not even for a breath. And if we try to run deeper…” his voice trailed off, a muscle in his cheek twitching as the horde spilled closer, “…we’ll just be hunted in a tighter corner.”

The air was damp here, heavy with the mineral tang of wet stone and the faint rot of ancient corpses. Ludwig felt each breath drag through his lungs, pointless though breathing was for him; it was an old habit, one that calmed him. He narrowed his eyes, mana already humming faintly along his palm as he began, “Galvani-”

But before the spell could leave his lips, a sound interrupted him, a staccato rhythm cutting across the chaos. Footsteps. Light, rapid, controlled, too measured to belong to the Umbrites whose footfalls were clumsy and discordant. Ludwig’s head snapped toward the sound, and his muscles tensed instinctively, ready to strike.

A blur of pale hair and steel darted past him. Celine. Or at least, something wearing her face. Her cloak flared with the movement, a pale streak against the dim cavern light as she shot past Ludwig like a phantom. She landed with a sharp crack of boot against stone at the bridge’s edge. The air shook with the impact, fissures spider-webbing outward beneath her heel.

Ludwig’s grip on Oathcarver tightened, his thoughts spinning. Celine? It looks like her. Moves like her. But if it’s another Umbrite… He glanced back at the bridge, at the oncoming tide, and then back to her. A bridge broken behind them would leave him stranded here. Was this salvation or a trap?

Her boot ground against the stone as she forced her weight down. The cracks spread further, and dust rose in pale clouds.

“Bob,” Ludwig growled, his voice low and edged. He didn’t take his eyes off her. “Where’s the living soul?”

The skeleton at his side turned its blue-lit sockets toward her, the faint rattling of his jaw like distant bones in wind. “It’s that woman, my lord,” Bob rasped, his voice like a rusted hinge.

Ludwig’s shoulders eased a fraction, a breath leaving him in a slow hiss. “Good,” he said softly, almost to himself. He tasted iron in the air, or perhaps it was his imagination, old instincts stirred in a body that no longer bled.

Celine struck again. Stone splintered, but the bridge held, ancient magic woven into its masonry. Her breathing quickened, shoulders taut as her foot slammed down once more. Then Ludwig saw it, the faint shimmer around her body turning crimson, the thin veins of light crawling across her arm. He felt the shift before the system confirmed it.

[The Core of Wrath is reacting! Stop it from fully manifesting!]

The words burned across his vision. Ludwig’s lips pressed into a line as he stepped forward, boots grinding on the fractured stone. “Celine,” he said sharply, voice cutting through the hum of power around her. “Calm down.”

She looked back over her shoulder. Her eyes caught the faint fungal glow, one still the soft pale green he remembered, the other now rimmed with red, burning like a coal in shadow. “Need… to break the bridge,” she said, her voice tight with strain. “Too many. Can’t… fight them all.”

“That’s easy,” Ludwig replied, his tone steady, almost too calm. He raised his hand toward the bridge, toward the oncoming dark shapes. “I hesitated before,” he admitted, “because I didn’t know where you were.”

His voice dropped to a murmur that carried the weight of a spell: “[Detonate Dead]. [Death’s Echo].”

The world seemed to pause, the hum of mana filling the air like the intake of a vast breath. The corpses littering the bridge, a hundred or more, in armor rusted to flaking ruin, in robes still clutching splintered staves, in the twisted remains of creatures unidentifiable, jerked once as though remembering life. A heartbeat later they bloated, skin stretching, bone shuddering beneath.

Then came the explosion.

It was light and sound and heat, a violent bloom that filled the cavern with searing brightness. The shockwave slammed into Ludwig’s chest, rattling his teeth, forcing him to dig his heels against the stone. Dust roared into the air, thick and choking. Screams echoed across the bridge, voices fractured and layered, too many voices, before the bridge itself began to give way. Then, as Death’s Echo rippled outward, the corpses burst again, a second wave of destruction shredding through the advancing horde. Fire lit the darkness, outlining the Umbrites’ shapes as they stumbled, burned, and fell shrieking into the endless chasm.

Chunks of ancient stone rained into the abyss. The bridge groaned one final time and collapsed entirely, the sound like a dying god’s last breath. Shadows flailed as they plummeted, their forms unraveling into specks of light before the depths swallowed them whole.

Ludwig lowered his hand slowly, the light of the spell fading from his fingers. The air smelled of scorched bone and old dust. “That took care of it,” he said at last, his voice low.

Celine’s shoulders dropped slightly, her red-tinged eye dimming slightly, but not yet green. “Yes,” she said, catching her breath, “but not permanently. They’ll find another way. We need to move.”

“You sound like you’re in a hurry,” Ludwig observed, watching her more than the empty chasm. The tension in her posture was unmistakable.

“You’ll understand why when you see what I found,” she said, already moving toward the shadowed corridors beyond.

Ludwig followed, Oathcarver heavy across his back. “Nice blade you’ve got,” he said, nodding toward the sword in her hand. Its surface gleamed untouched by rust, the edge perfect despite centuries of decay around them.

“Oh, this?” she said, glancing at it briefly. “Palios. A famed sword. I don’t know how it even left the Imperial family.” Her tone softened, and something like awe flickered in her eyes.

“Tell me more,” Ludwig urged, his curiosity genuine even in this place.

“This belonged to the Emperor of my time,” she said quietly, almost as though speaking to herself. “It was either given… or stolen. I always wanted a famed sword but no amount of money that my family had could afford it, they’re priceless. I never thought I’d hold one of the best and for free.” Her lips curved into a small, weary smile, and Ludwig felt a strange warmth at the sight, a moment of humanity in the depths of ruin. And enough that the redness of her eyes dimmed almost completely.

“May I see it?” he asked.

“Later,” she said, turning back to the shadows ahead. “We need to move. I think the dark passage will open again soon.”

“Dark passage? Tell me more…”

“It’s better if you see for yourself.” She headed first.

Ludwig lengthened his stride to keep up, the echo of their steps following them through corridors that felt older than memory. The walls were streaked with the remnants of murals, colors faded to faint ghosts, figures of saints and warriors long forgotten, their painted eyes half‑erased by centuries of damp and dust. The air here had a taste to it, metallic and sharp, as if the stones themselves bled once.