<hr>


    There must always be a Lich overlooking the dungeon. A dead but yet undying heart at the core of our home.


    Let this testament serve as your guide and inspiration, my daughter. To teach you how to – and, more importantly, why – we must stay here. Why we must dissuade, and slay if need be, trespassers to our subterranean abode. When my story is over, my darling daughter, perhaps you will understand why your nursery attendants were skeletons. Why surface-dwellers had pet dire-dogs while you made do with barrow-spiders. And even why your mother’s eyes glow red in the lightless corridors of our darkest dungeon.


    We will start from the beginning…


    It all starts with I – your dearest father’s – death.


    <hr>


    … Worry not, for the beginning starts with a fight. I was not going to bore you with the circumstances of my birth out in the Rift Valley, of long years spent learning to endurance hunt on the plains.


    Five we were. A party of heroes. Armed with the finest reed-woven armor, grooved wooden war clubs, and daggers with iron tips taken from a fallen star.


    A great rock had fallen from the heavens directly into our village hunting grounds. Using the metal from this rock we had forged rudimentary weapons with which we’d vanquished all other opposing villages for three valleys over. Our ancient rivals were still using stone mallets, and we slew them with impunity.


    It was after driving the last rival village from our land that we discovered the Barrow. A mound old even in those ancient times, partially built into a mountain.


    A single, jagged opening offered access. The stone-carver villages had displays outside, all pointed towards the entrance. They’d at once worshipped the spot and feared it. But now they were dead, and our iron tools could surely best whatever paltry gods the stone carvers worshiped.


    Five volunteers went into the barrow, me included. They were:


    Gavrin, he who excelled at dire-deer hunts. He wielded a handheld club and was one of our village’s best healers.


    Yona, particularly skilled at chasing dire-dingoes away from the village storerooms.


    Yurt, Yona’s half-brother. A practical joker and a bit of a klutz. Not bad with a bow.


    … I cannot quite remember the penultimate fellow’s name. Good with a spear though.


    And myself. Your dad. It has been centuries; I looked much different back then. Had more skin clinging to my bones. But I digress.


    Onward we marched. Only, I did not have a torch with me, carrying both a shield and a meteoric iron-enhanced blade. The war band wielded the best weaponry in the entire valley and more than prepared for anything we could face.


    There were traps – a false floor leading down to a pit I nearly fell in, saved only by timely intervention from Yona. Gavrin stepped on another tile that sunk in, sending him off balance. Then, a trio of stone-etched arrowheads tied to wooden bolts flew through the wall directly ahead of us. I ran to the front and blocked it with my wooden plank shield, saving the party.You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.


    Though the mound lay embedded in a mountain the corridors looped around in a circular pattern. There were few dead ends, more a gauntlet of traps, funneling us into a central burial chamber. There, we encountered a slew of open sarcophagi and, dead in the center, a fetid she-lich!


    This mistress of the dungeon was dressed in furs from animals we’d never seen. She was squat but muscular, and with a hefty brow quite unlike the people of our village. It was as if this rotting creature sitting on a simple stone throne was a relic of an older era.


    Dead emerged from the sarcophagi, from holes in the ground, and even fell from the ceiling.


    Now, this sounds perfectly natural to you, born in the dark such as you are. But we had never seen a walking corpse. Nor a lich.


    Yurt’s arrows did nothing to stop these barrow wrights.


    Gavrin’s club did some blunt damage, though only crushing the skulls proved remotely effective.


    Yona and I hacked at the oncoming horde with our blades. We sliced brittle limbs off the desiccated corpses, but even a severed arm or leg would not stop them.


    Our nameless forgotten friend impaled one with his spear, only to have his weapon stuck in the chest cavity of a creature that was still crawling at us. Others swarmed him and tore him apart.


    Fire. Fire was our only defense. Yona set one of the walking dead alight with her torch. Though the barrow was cold and damp, the corpses were long-dead and bone-dry. Still, for every wright we felled two more crawled out from the depths.


    “That thing is controlling them!” I said.


    We made for the she-lich. My shield physically pushed the horde back – as corpses, they were light on mass.


    The lich had an ‘honor guard’ of sorts. They wore hefty metal garb stronger than even our iron blades. And their weapons – great stone axe heads with ornate carvings – were unlike anything our paltry village could hope to develop.


    Still, iron proved superior, while flames would still burn them with time. Yona and Gavrin took to this task, while I pushed through with my simple shield and made for the lich.


    A great blasting scream and a fell glowing green light emanated from the she-lich’s hand. Intimidation tactics, but we were past her guards and with knives drawn at that point.


    I ignored the psychic nightmare visions she imposed on all who came within ten paces of her. Acting on instinct, I thrust my iron blade into her heart.


    There was nothing to pierce. The lich was farther gone than even its minions. It could have just as easily reached over and raked my face off with its knife-sized nails. And yet, instead, something happened…


    <hr>


    A gurgling sound came from the Lich. A forgotten, ancient tongue. I pulled my blade out of the lich’s chest. The entire cavity was barren.


    Again, the creature spoke. This time, its barbaric blather warped into something I could almost understand.


    “Your weapons… strong. Bond. My time is done. You must… bond with the dungeon. In my place.”


    I moved away from the rotting creature, but it grabbed me with its clawlike nails and dug into my skin.


    A purple miasma burst forth from the gaping chest wound on this she-lich. It surrounded me, and I breathed in a deep wafting breath before I was able to break free.


    Muscles seized, paralyzed. I tore my reed armor off just to breathe, to no avail. I fell to the floor, letting out a death rattle.


    All around, the barrow appeared in a state of collapse. Archways fell, tombs toppled over. Yurt took off running for the exit without further prompting. Yona lunged for me, which I could still just barely register with my failing senses. But Gavrin held her at bay, for the purple miasma was only spreading. He dragged her out through the exit as dust and tomb-mold were kicked up by the collapsing chamber.


    What happened next? Well, I died, my dear. Years before you were born, my mortal form breathed its last.


    But the beating heart of that she-lich was not done with me yet. It had designs for this new intruder with superior weaponry.


    The barrow’s halls and central chamber collapsed. Yet, in some small hidden divot beneath the throne, the lich’s will still reigned…


    <hr>