The Burning Sky

Grashok drove his blade into the snout of a Ratkin warrior, wrenching the weapon free with a wet crunch. The creature despawned with a brief flicker of red light, replaced by a loot bag that clattered to the blood-slicked stone. Around him, the wall held—but just barely. Goblins screamed. Adventurers chanted. Magic lit the skies like arc-lightning.

Below, a militia man twisted his halberd up through a Ratkin warrior’s ribs, the creature convulsing before blinking out of existence, another sack of loot joining the growing pile. For a heartbeat, it felt like they might hold.

Then came the fire.

A great plume of crimson and gold erupted from the center of Ingunde. It burst from the guildhall like a geyser of fury, towering above the rooftops in a blazing column. The explosion painted the sky in violent colour, visible for miles. Then came the shockwave—flattening banners, snapping loose shutters, and throwing up a wall of heat and dust against the sun already sinking after midday.

Grashok froze.

A cold spear of dread rammed through his gut, piercing armour and resolve alike. His breath caught. His heart knew—before the system confirmed it.

❗ SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: SYLRITH HAS FALLEN.

[Party Member Deceased]

A moment stretched into forever as his body staggered as though struck by a siege hammer. Pain radiated down his arms. Time faltered.

Snippa, far below in the plaza, dropped to her knees. Her bow slipped from her fingers, forgotten. She covered her mouth, shaking her head violently as though denial could undo the words written across her vision. Tears poured freely down her cheeks, streaking her face. Her braids shook with every sob. Her voice didn’t come. Only a broken noise, like something vital inside her had been shattered.

Nyxie turned from her spellcasters halfway down the battlement, her goblin eyes enormous, the wind catching her micro-kilt. Her hands trembled at her sides, her lips parted in disbelief. She looked up at Grashok—and in her gaze, he saw the scream she couldn’t voice. Her beloved was gone. Her chest heaved once—then again, deeper. She hadn’t spoken. Couldn’t.

Skarn let out a howl.

The wolf’s cry pierced through the chaos, wild and heartbroken, lifting above the battle. It was raw, mournful, and filled with the kind of pain no words could carry.

Elenara turned sharply, her long blonde hair whipping over her shoulder. Her voice reached Grashok’s ears distantly, as though muffled by water. “Grashok? What’s happening? Grashok—?”

But he couldn’t answer.

He was locked, paralysed, his eyes still on Nyxie. Her eyes on his. No words needed. The weight of loss sat like a boulder on both their chests. She was gone. Sylrith was gone.

Then hands were on him.

Pulling.

Tugging him from the ramparts. He resisted at first, numb, until a shriek brought him back. A scutterling had crept up the wall, its beady eyes glinting as it lunged toward him. Before it could strike, Skarn launched—his grey fur streaked with dust and gore—tearing the vermin in half mid-air. The corpse blinked into a loot bag.

Behind them, the battlemages launched another barrage—searing glyphs glowing beneath their feet, area spells bursting down into the Ratkin ranks. Blinding light exploded behind Grashok, casting everyone in jagged silhouette. For a moment, the scene was apocalyptic—bodies vanishing in a rain of fire, shields buckling, blades flashing.

Below, in the plaza, the goblin scouts had formed a ring around Snippa. Some had their bows still readied, others had their hands on her shoulders. But none could stem her grief. She rocked where she knelt, wailing as the news finally broke her composure. She looked small—so terribly small—against the scale of the burning skyline behind her.

From the valley below, an unnatural screech rose. The Ratkin. Their rage was unmistakable—fury at their failed sabotage, at the loss of whatever foul plot had been incinerated by Sylrith’s sacrifice.

Grashok’s knees buckled. He saw her in his mind—bright silver hair wild around her shoulders, laughing in the morning sun by the river camp. Her smile, rare but radiant, after a sparring match. The gentle pressure of her hand on his chest as she kissed him by firelight. The nights tangled with her, Nyxie, and Snippa—laughter, sweat, breathless teasing, and love that had somehow bloomed between warriors shaped by blood and death.

He saw her again—arms around him from behind, chin on his shoulder, whispering that she finally felt safe.

His throat caught. His vision blurred.

SLAP.

The pain was immediate.

He reeled.

Elenara stood before him, eyes wide, her hand still half-raised in horror. “I—” she stammered, then stopped herself, forcing the words. “I had to. We need you.”

Her voice was trembling.

Grashok blinked.

The wall was still burning. The Ratkin were still climbing. Mages behind him still shouted cooldowns. Goblins shouted for new quivers. Blood still flowed. And Sylrith was gone.

But she had given everything.

Everything for this wall. For this town. For him.

He straightened. Gritting his teeth. Locking it down. The ache in his chest didn’t fade. But it settled into place—sharp, familiar. A sword wound that would never close.

There would be time to mourn.

After.

Now, there was only one thing to do.

Win and make her sacrifice count.

Grashok’s gaze dropped to the plaza below, where Snippa still knelt among the chaos. Her tears glistened in the torchlight, her bow abandoned at her side. For a heartbeat, she looked broken beyond repair. But as if pulled by his will, she lifted her head. Their eyes locked across the smoke and din, and he saw her pain sharpen into something harder. She reached for her bow, fingers steadying, and rose to her feet. Her grief was not gone—it never would be—but she forced it down, bracing herself to fight again.

Then his eyes swept back along the battlement, finding Nyxie through the haze. Her small frame was taut with sorrow, trembling against the wind. Yet when she saw Snippa rise, and felt Grashok’s gaze upon her, the tremor in her hands stilled. She drew in a breath, lifted her staff, and gave the smallest nod—a vow without words. Strength flowed into her, not from denial of grief, but from the resolve she shared with them both. She would not falter.

They were apart, separated by walls and war, yet bound by duty and by Sylrith’s memory. In that silent communion, they chose to stand.

Grashok turned, jaw clenched as the unmistakable sound of splintering timber cracked through the din. The southern wall—deliberately weakened, now ablaze in patches from the tar-flame concoctions of Ratkin fire-slingers—was buckling. Through the heat haze, he caught a glimpse.

There.

A shape—hulking, robed in bone-laced regalia. Just for a moment. There, in the reek and chaos. The Vermin King. Surrounded by the Pallid Claws, his personal guard. Their albino forms glimmered with unnatural light, bone-armour clacking as they moved in eerie silence, blades glinting. Grashok saw him spurring his troops forward—clawed hands gesturing, guttural clicks issuing orders. Their formation shifted, redirected like a tide aiming for the break.

He bared his tusks and spat over the edge.

“Time,” he growled to Elenara. “Fall back. Secondary line.”

She nodded, immediately relaying the command to a goblin runner who dashed away down the line. Moments later he arrived in the area and Grashok watched as the defenders peeled away in staggered formation, leaving behind burning pitch, caltrops, and a wall one breath from collapse.

Moments later, the wall broke.

Not with a single crash—but a groan, a cascade, wood tumbling down like dominoes under the tide of chittering bodies. The Ratkin howled in victory, surging through the gap. Warriors, skirmishers, scutterlings and brutes, even shamans with glowing bone-charms. They poured into the city—eager, blood-hungry, certain the day was theirs.

They found a plaza.

Enclosed.

Ringed with buildings.

The roads? Barricaded. Choke points layered with sharpened stakes and trap-laced rubble. The alleys? Collapsed or barred with killgates. Even the buildings? Reinforced with slit windows, converted into blockhouses. The plaza they thought was a victory ground was a bowl—no exits. Only one thing to do.

Die.

Grashok raised his clawed fist. “Now.”

Hell descended.

From behind every window, from behind every barricade, the defenders struck.

Snippa was the first. Her goblin scouts had the high ground, layered along the roofs and window slits of the buildings flanking the plaza. Arrows screamed through the air in disciplined volleys. Snippa stood at the apex, her short green leather skirt fluttering in the breeze, long brown twin braids swinging as she aimed and loosed with terrifying speed. Her green top clung tight to her form, smeared with soot and tears, but her eyes—those were fire. Focused. Rage-fed. She wasn’t fighting for a town anymore. She was fighting for Sylrith.

“Scouts!” she shouted. “Front rank, crush casters!”

“Copy that, boss!” one of her scouts called back. “Sniping shaman mobs!”

Ratkin shamans blinked out of existence, loot bags spilling in their wake.

Beneath the buildings, spears thrust through narrow murder-holes. Goblin infantry jabbed upward and out, catching Ratkin between ribs, through thighs, under jaws. Human militia joined them, halberds swinging in brutal arcs when the Ratkin got too close. Crossbows fired in mechanical rhythm from raised barricades, quarrels thudding into meat with clinical efficiency.

To the left, the Rock Troll—Grashok’s stony-skinned brute of a minion—lurched forward with a gravelly grunt. He leaned heavily over one of the barricades, stone fingers gripping the wooden edge for balance. With a low, rumbling snarl, he brought his crude iron-shod club crashing down onto a knot of Ratkin below. Three of them were crushed in a single swing, their bodies erupting into a haze of red mist and crushed bones before dropping into loot bags that bounced gently against the barricade. The troll blinked once, then pulled back to ready another blow.

“AOE that chokepoint!” a voice cried—one of the adventurers. “Big pull, like thirty-plus mobs!”

A fireball detonated in the eastern alley. Searing light and a massive whoomp threw half a squad of Ratkin into the air. They despawned mid-arc, loot bags raining onto the cobbles.

More adventurers arrived, drawn by the unmistakable sound of mass XP.

“Yo, someone tag a commander, I need quest credit!”

“Bro, this is nuts! It’s like a loot piñata in here!”

“Hold aggro, I’m on cooldown!”

Grashok stood atop the barricade, arms folded, the tip of Soulrend resting on the blood-soaked planks. Skarn sat at his side, muzzle red, ears pricked forward. The battle raged below them—but it wasn’t a battle any more. It was a slaughter. Controlled. Calculated. Beautiful.

He had known they would strike the southern wall.

He had made it inviting.

Every flame, every crumbling mortar joint, every missing archer—deliberately allowed. And they had taken the bait. Now they were packed into a death trap, funnelling themselves into a grinder from which there was no escape.

The Ratkin had come to feast.

And they had walked into the maw.

The hobgoblin looked up.

The sun had passed its peak and was descending into afternoon.

It glinted off his armour. Off the spires of flame and steel that surrounded the plaza. The light was harsh—but clean.

They would hold.

Until sunset, if needed.

They would hold.

For Sylrith.

He watched as the battle raged on, his knuckles tight on Soulrend’s hilt. Below, the plaza was a storm of precision slaughter. Ratkin packed in dense, frantic clusters, clawing at barricades and blockhouses, only to collapse in convulsing heaps. With every arrow, every strike of spear or spell, their bodies blinked into loot bags, until the cobbles were carpeted in glimmering spoils and blood. The sweet stench of despawning flesh hung thick in the air; screams had dulled to gurgles, and hope had died early.

Snippa stood proud above them as she directed her goblin scouts with clear, sharp shouts—each arrow from their bows singing death into the charge. They moved like wraiths between rooftops, loosing arrows with terrifying precision. Goblins and humans at the barricades stabbed with brutal rhythm. Grashok’s gaze caught one goblin he recognised—the same volunteer from the tunnels. Now, with the War Axe of the Fallen gripped tight, the goblin swung it into a charging Ratkin, cleaving through fur and bone before the creature blinked into a loot bag. The sight drew murmurs of respect from his kin, their morale surging. Adventurers cheered over damage meters and kill‑steals, adding their spells and blades to the carnage.

They were holding.

For now.

He scanned the area and spotted his Yzobu mount still waiting near the foot of the nearest stairs, with the unflappable Tilda standing beside it. She had also secured a few local horses, now gathered nearby. Her stance was calm, hands resting lightly on the reins.

A crash to the left snapped Grashok’s focus.

More Ratkin.

A fresh cluster poured over a cracked section of wall, snarling and yipping, brutes behind them hefting jagged glaives and boneswords. The kill zone had drawn the bulk, but the tide had not turned. Not yet. One breach, one faltering line, and the defence could unravel.

Grashok moved along the battlement, Skarn padding at his side. His boot crushed a half‑faded loot bag, coins scattering between the timbers. A Ratkin lunged over the parapet—claws extended, eyes wild—but Soulrend swept in a clean arc, severing tendon and spine. The creature shrieked, then blinked out with a hiss and chime.

Another scrabbled up—thin, fast, shrieking. Grashok’s blade cut low, steel biting through its knee. It toppled backward with a final screech, vanishing in a burst of crimson mist and sparkles.

Skarn surged past, grey fur rippling, and clamped his fangs around the next Ratkin’s throat. It spasmed once, then collapsed into a loot bag. A crystalline ding echoed across the wall.

<Skarn has levelled up!>

Grashok gave his companion a quick nod. “Good boy.” The wolf, fur slick with ash, bared his teeth in what might have been a grin—clearly relishing the fight.

Further along the line, Nyxie stood upon a raised section of stone, one hand extended, her face alight with fury and power. Smoke curled from her scorched leather, her stance braced and unyielding. Her other hand traced glyphs in the air, sigils burning purple and green.

With a sharp word, she unleashed a cone of arcane force into the mass of Ratkin in the plaza below. It smashed into them like a tidal wave, folding metal, tearing fur and flesh. Dozens vanished in a heartbeat.

“Eat crits, you sewer-born freaks!” she shouted, hair wild and lips curled in savage glee.

And then it came.

A sound. Clean. High. Cutting across the battlefield like a blade of music.

A note.

It rang from the west—rising, trilling, unmistakable.

Grashok froze.

Then the horns answered it—deep and wild, blaring from the depths of the forest to the west. A call he had heard before. So many months ago. When he had marched to aid the western tribes against the Ratkin. This was the music of the western clans and it could mean only one thing.

The Veiled Bloom had come.

He could hear them now—shouts, war cries, the thud of drums beneath the trees. Steel clashed with claw. The Ratkin flank, hidden in the forest, was under attack.

And the wall answered.

All along the line—goblins, xvarts, even wounded militia—took up the chant.

“Bloom! Bloom! Bloom!”

Weapons raised. Shields rattled. The morale surged like wildfire.

Grashok lifted his sword skyward.

Hope—new, bright, and edged with vengeance—rose with it.

They would hold.

They would win.

The clash of steel and screams of the dying still filled the air, but for a brief, brutal moment, Grashok allowed himself to enjoy the moment. The wall still held. His warriors still stood. The adventurers, gods help them, were even starting to take the fight seriously.

The cheers along the wall were still fading when Zarukk, scarred and snarling, raised both clawed hands and chanted in a guttural tongue that stung the air itself. His bones writhed under his robe, talismans pulsing. A vortex of dark energy swirled overhead—then tore forward in a jagged blast towards the southeast gate.

Grashok turned sharply, tracing the arc of the spell—just in time to see what Zarukk had seen..

Three of them.

Swarm Swellers.

Monstrosities.

They moved in that grotesque, shuddering shuffle that made the stomach knot just to witness. Their swollen, distended bodies rippled with barely-contained pressure—veins the thickness of ropes pulsed across their pallid, hairless flesh. Their jaws were split too wide, locked open in a silent scream, lips torn back to expose endless rows of yellowing teeth. One dragged a cluster of fused ribcages from its chest like an apron. Another had bone rods impaling it through the shoulders to support its bulk, like grotesque scaffolding. Flies buzzed in clouds around them, and behind them followed a tremor of fear that even battle-hardened goblins could feel in their guts.

Zarukk’s spell struck the one in the centre.

The impact wasn’t clean—it didn’t vaporise it, didn’t end it swiftly. Instead, the creature seemed to bloat. Every inch of it swelled further, flesh straining, splitting, blood weeping from every pore until the thing ruptured.

Not exploded—ruptured.

It screamed. It shouldn’t have been able to, but it screamed—a wet, agonised gurgle that echoed along the wall. Chunks of bone-studded meat flung in all directions, dozens of rats spraying out like gore-drenched shrapnel. They twitched and writhed even as they hit the stone, some still alive, others pulped. A chunk the size of a goblin torso slammed into the dwarf adventurer nearby, reducing him to red mist.

“More fire!” Grashok roared, voice like gravel dragged through flame. “Burn them down, now!”

He scanned the lines and saw it—the Vermin King himself, hunched and twitching just beyond the treeline, urging his forces forward behind the Swellers. His bone-laced robes fluttered in the wind, and though Grashok couldn’t be certain from the distance... there was something desperate in his movements. Frenzied. He wasn’t leading. He was pushing.

Nyxie, already raising her staff, nodded grimly and bellowed an incantation. Lightning crackled toward the second Sweller—but it was an adventurer who dealt the killing blow. The second Sweller staggered, speared through by a javelin of pure light.

“CRIT!” an adventurer shouted from atop a nearby tower. “Boss-tier filth down! Someone roll that loot bag, I saw it first!”

The creature fell, shrieking like a boiling kettle, before vanishing in a cloud of violet mist and an echoing poof!—a loot bag clattering to the ground in its place.

“Boom, baby! That’s what you get when you spec into Precision Throwing!”

Grashok didn’t waste time celebrating.

Because the last one reached the gate.

It pressed up against it like a grotesque parody of a siege ram. Its swollen belly churned, skin stretched to the edge of tearing. Then it spasmed violently.

And it detonated.

The blast was concussive, a hammering wave of force that tore outward in a wall of flesh and bone. The reinforced gate didn’t stand a chance; the entire centre of the structure was ripped asunder in a storm of meat and blood. The wooden beams were flung apart like kindling, iron bindings twisting like ribbon.

Worse was what happened above.

The parapet.

Militia, goblin archers, and adventurers stationed above the gate were obliterated—some torn to pieces by bone shrapnel, others flung backwards, limp and broken, off the wall entirely. A few simply vanished in the eruption, their bodies converting instantly into loot bags, fluttering down amid the carnage.

Grashok staggered backward, shielding Elenara with one arm as Skarn crouched low beside him, growling through the shockwave.

A moment later, a massive section of the south-eastern wall slumped and collapsed, leaving behind a yawning, bloody breach.

Grashok stared.

The wind tugged at his cloak. He blinked once, slowly.

A hole in his line.

A breach.

And through it surged the Pallid Claws.

Silent. Albino. Death incarnate.

Gliding across the wreckage, their bone-laced armour caught the light like ivory knives, twin sickles gleaming with dark enchantments as they advanced with unnerving precision—each strike placed with surgical lethality. Behind them poured the last of the Ratkin reserve, claws flashing, shrieks rising in a wave of savage triumph.

But it was not just them.

At their centre moved the Vermin King himself.

Hunched, robed in layered bone and shadow, the monarch of filth strode through the breach on clawed feet, flanked on all sides by his elite guard. His eyes, twin embers sunk deep in a mask of pallid skin and twisted iron, locked on the heart of the town. His crooked staff thudded into the blood-slick stone with each step, the fetishes and bones hanging from it clacking in rhythm.

There was no speech. No cry of conquest.

Only purpose.

The gate was gone.

And so too, soon, would be the town.

Grashok’s grip tightened on his sword.

“Hold…” he muttered to himself.

“Got to hold the bloody line.”