Total chaos, total fucking chaos. Esk with her bloodied face with grey skin was screaming weakly about closing the tunnel, Corry was missing, Thorn was dead and lost down the hole, our halfling was in hiding, Ricardo was bloodied and looking for something to punch and waving his new quarterstaff about, and I was cursing about the tunnel.

We had no plan. Nothing.

To find out how bad it was, and to give everyone as much time as possible I ran into the tunnel where the skeletons were held up. The improvised barricade was bursting and cracking under the weight of literally hundreds and hundreds of skeletons. The sight of their snarling faces and clawing hands as they tried to climb over each other to get to us gives me shivers and will probably keep me awake for many nights to come. This was fucking hopeless..

Behind me Romero had pulled out that magic paint and was mumbling something like ‘a little crimson blue heeeeere, a little deep grey theeeeeere’, like we were not under attack by hordes and hordes of undead wanting to chew our faces off. Then I heard him scream ‘TIMBEEERRRRRR’ and I turned tail and started to run as fast as I could.

We all hauled ass into the tunnel that brought us here as one of the four pillars holding up the roof started cracking. And then.. Nothing. The noise just stopped. That magic paint had taken a huge bite clear out of the pillar but the damned thing was still standing!

Romero and I rushed back into the chamber, and I heard the snaps and the rush as the barricade broke, and that pent up horde of hundreds of skeletons started to unravel themselves to rush into the chamber. To rush at us! Trithereon help us, this could not end well.

As I was trying to intercept the skeletons I saw Romero just WALKING up another pillar holding a little light, just like he was standing on the floor. He slapped his forehead like he had some new insight and he started drawing. He paused for a moment and screamed at me ‘GET OUT OF HERE, I’VE GOT IT COVERED’. I was not about to leave a buddy on a suicide mission, but he screamed again ‘I HAVE AN ESCAPE, DON’T WORRY, RUN!’. And I did, I turned my tail and rushed into the tunnel. Behind me I heard a pop and a lot of cracking and just as I reached our friends a big boom and a whole lot of dust came blowing into the tunnel as we ran and ran.

Corry was here, we had caught up with him, and suddenly we came across Romero! What the hell? This is one slippery dude. With a tear in my eye I jumped forward, since I thought he was dead for sure, and gave him a big hug. Only to be completely engulfed in flame! Everywhere around me felt insanely hot and if it wasn’t for my infernal heritage it would have seriously hurt me. It did get my temper hot, so I whacked him upside the head, only to be burned again! Bastard! Everything that I had on me that could burn went up in flames. That included my shield, my precious wooden shield that had sustained me through all that crap on this continent, and that had my holy symbol inscribed on it. FUCK!

Romero mumbled an apology, said something about too much magic too quick and put the paint on the floor and stepped away. I huffed and scooped up the box of paint. We decided to walk back and see what was happening at the chamber. Did the whole thing come down? Did we stop the machine? Did we do it before that undead lych bastard of a general could summon his portal and return his armies here? When we were about 100ft away from the entrance Eskerina started casting that safety hut thing that she does, and our halfling volunteered to go scouting. Only problem was, the sucker can’t see in the dark!

So ok, I’ll go and see what is happening. Corry helped me out by making me invisible, and off I was. Around my feet everywhere the dust from the pillar crash puffed like crazy so I had to take it very very slow, putting my feet down in the gentlest way. As I got to the chamber I froze because there they were, hundreds of skeletons roaming around, just like ants covering the ground. Seemingly combing through the chamber, and certainly not long from also moving into our tunnel. The pillar had fallen, into the tunnel entrance where the skeletons emerged from, so that should stop more emerging for now, but not before a zillion managed to burst out. And that sound was still going, bbzzzzzzzzzzZZAAPP, so the horrible machine of creating undead was working just fine. All this for nothing. I grinned my teeth and made up my mind. We need to bring down the house. That roof has to come down, permanently, and that means getting rid of those pillars.

And that’s when I heard the music starting to play somewhere in the back of my mind. My priest had told me a story about Trithereons music once. A battle hymn heard by the most devout believer that guides their movements in battle and action. I thought back to the moment that Romero steadied me when we fought the beholder, and the time was right now. Right now -I- had to make sure that this was not all for nothing, because there was nobody else, and the odds are overwhelming. Better that I die trying and that my friends have a chance to get away. Lord knows I don’t have many that I count a friend.

I closed my eyes and surrendered to the music. So I started my dance of death. Stepping invisibly into the chamber between these hundreds of skeletons to the pace of Trithereons hymn I began to evade ribcages and sweeping claws with the first two steps I took. I pulled in my tail and stretched it to the side to balance myself as I ducked under another skeleton, leaned back to let a claw pass over my chest and pirouetted to the side as I made another few steps. I could feel the air move on my blue invisible skin as they almost grazed me with their rotten bones. My divine sense showed me the position of every undead around me and the music showed me how to move. It was not up to me, I was in my gods hands truly. There was now 15 feet between me and the entrance, along with about 30 skeletons. It seemed that the further I got the less space there was to move, the denser and denser the hord became with multiple skeletons moving through a single 5ft space, as they bumped into each other in a macabre dance of their own. I started to sweat and moved franticly as the pace of the music increased and pushed me ever onwards. As suddenly the skeletons seems to swarm around me I panicked, let my faith waver for just a moment, and my foot slipped, disrupting my balance. Making them aware of my presence here between so many of them was certain death, and I could not hurt any of them without becoming visible! As I spun and twisted through an opening my imperfect balance made me knock my shoulder into one of the skeletons. It stopped immediately to turn towards me, along with 6 others. That was it.

I gasped in a deep breath and immediately cast my last spell. My very last single spell of my entire repertoire, emptying everything I had with a leap of faith. With a Misty Step incantation I teleported myself to the pillar that I was headed for. I landed at the base, twisted and moved to a frantic crescendo beat in the divine music, evading the moving skeletons there and was out of the thick of it! Behind me 40 skeletons converged madly on the spot where I bumped into one and started beating the floor, the air and each other. It was a meat grinder! No way I would have survived any of that.

To gain some free space and to start drawing with the paint I started to climb up the pillar. It was worn with the ages, as it was obviously an ancient support holding up this millennia old ziggurat, and did not look that hard to climb. But my hands were shaking, my heart was pounding and I was surrounded by hordes of undead. My foot slipped after a few feet and I slid down, right onto a few skeletons. They immediately turned to me, along with all other skeletons in the area and hit me, slamming me full in the ribs and in the shoulder with their claws.

I was already damaged from our earlier fights and they almost got me. I did not want to lose the invisibility that kept me alive so I tried to just evade and started my frantic climb up the pillar again. Oh what I would have given to have my shield with me to fend off these malicious bones. Once more I slipped and once more I got mauled, before I finally managed to pull myself up about 20 or 30 feet above these fuckers, bleeding profusely. I slowly manoeuvred myself around to pillar to the perfect spot to start drawing, because taking down just one pillar was not going to do the job. I was going to drop this pillar across the hole, and hit the base of one of the other pillars that was still standing. Hopefully. With a lot of luck and a lot of divine guidance.

Below me the skeletons started piling onto each other and started to come up the pillar by forming their own ant hill. I had to draw fast. Picturing the way I wanted to damage the pillar in my mind the paint started to flow from the box as I applied it to the pillar. I moved to the side again a bit as I applied the last paint so the thing would hopefully not crash on my head immediately. I applied the last of the paint, heard a POP as part of the pillar disappeared and as I pushed the paint into my pocket I let go of the pillar…