The ground rumbled beneath their feet.

  At first it was subtle—just a tremor, a passing shiver through the stone. Then the noise grew—a deep groan from above, like some ancient creature shifting in its sleep.

  Chronos froze mid-step.

  “Hold,” he ordered, eyes snapping upward.

  The others followed his gaze.

  High above, where the shadows of the vast ceiling met stone, a massive opening yawned wide, like a jagged maw torn in the rock. From its edge emerged two massive creatures, hunched and reptilian, their skin mottled with black scales and streaked with green ichor. They sniffed the air, long pink tongues flicking out like serpents, tasting the scent of blood, steel, and sorcery.

  “That can’t be good,” muttered Zentich.

  Chronos didn’t hesitate. “Everyone—move toward the tunnel! Back the way we came!”

  The party began to fall back, but it was too late.

  With unnatural speed, one of the lizard-creatures scaled the wall headfirst, descending as though gravity held no dominion. Its massive claws gouged stone as it leapt, landing with a thunderous crash just feet from the group.

  “Well,” Xavert said dryly, “I suppose we now know what was in the tubes.”

  “Brace yourselves!” Hrulk bellowed, sword already drawn.

  The beast lunged forward—a blur of muscle, fang, and hunger.

  The Templars dove aside, all but one. A younger knight, too slow, too frozen in fear. The creature’s jaws snapped shut around his torso with a wet, awful crunch, lifting him into the air. His screams echoed once—then silenced as the beast snapped him in half, the upper body flung to the stone while the creature gnawed on the lower half. The crunch of shattered bone reverberated across the chamber.

  The second beast, now blood-hungry, descended the wall with haste, eyes locked on the cluster of survivors.

  Steel flashed.

  Spells ignited.

  Chaos erupted.

  Xavert muttered a string of ancient syllables, and a ball of flame roared from his palm, striking the first creature in the face. It howled, scales igniting, thrashing blindly. It slammed into a wall, gouging deep scars into the stone as it tried to claw the fire away from its burning face.

  Chronos moved like smoke, closing the distance in two strides. His blade sank into the creature’s neck, biting deep. With a grunt, he ripped downward, tearing open a massive wound. Green blood sprayed in violent arcs as the creature convulsed, shrieking.

  Chronos leapt away just as it collapsed, thrashing in death.

  The second creature crashed into the fray, slamming one Templar aside like a ragdoll. The knight hit the wall hard, a smear of blood marking his final moment. Hrulk roared and struck from the side, his great sword carving upward through the creature’s gut. Intestines and slime spilled forth, bathing the floor.

  Still, the beast lashed out.

  Its jaws found another knight, clamping around his chest with a wet crunch. The man shrieked—once. Then silence.

  And then, the second creature fell, convulsing, spasming, dead.

  Only the sound of heavy breathing remained.

  Hrulk stood amidst the gore, his blade dripping green. He bent down and wiped it clean on the dead Templar’s cloak without a word.

  Across the chamber, Zentich stood by the pool of blood, staring into its bubbling depths. Chronos and Xavert joined him.

  “He is here,” Zentich said, voice almost a whisper. “I can feel him. Down below. Our lord waits.”

  Xavert arched a brow. “Are you certain?”

  Zentich nodded slowly. “There is no doubt. We have found him.”

  Chronos stepped forward. “Then let us bring him up.”

  He motioned to Hrulk.

  “Wheel. Now.”

  Hrulk grunted and called for the two remaining Templars. Together, they approached the massive chain-fed mechanism. The iron wheel was ancient, rusted, and heavier than anything they’d moved before.

  “On three,” Hrulk growled. “One—two—push!”

  The men strained. Muscles trembled. Steel groaned. With a horrible screeching wail, the wheel began to turn. Slowly at first, then with gathering momentum.

  The pool roiled. The blood bubbled.

  And then—a shape surfaced.

  A massive iron box rose from the depths, bound in blackened steel, its corners rimmed in crimson gems, its surface inscribed with arcane seals that smoked as the blood sloughed away.

  This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

  With one final heave, the chains dragged the massive-sized vessel over the lip of the pool and set it down with a titanic BOOM that echoed through the chamber like a drumbeat from the void.

  The party approached.

  The door was sealed with a great lock, shaped like two demonic goat heads devouring each other, fangs interlocked and eyes alight with residual magic.

  Hrulk stepped forward, raised his sword, and brought it down hard.

  Sparks flew.

  But the lock didn’t budge.

  “Fool,” Xavert snapped, sneering. “Did you think a simple blade could open a prison designed to hold the greatest mage the world has ever known?”

  Hrulk fumed silently, his jaw tight.

  Before tension could explode, Chronos raised a hand. “Enough. Suggestions, mage?”

  Zentich stepped forward, his eyes gleaming with anticipation.

  “I have a solution.”

  He reached within his robes and withdrew a small crystalline vial, glowing faintly gold.

  Without pause, he poured it onto the lock.

  The moment the liquid touched metal, a cascade of light erupted—blue, then violet, then red, then all colors at once—until the lock melted away in a wash of sulfurous steam.

  “What was that?” Xavert asked, blinking.

  “The blood of a god,” Zentich replied, eyes never leaving the melting metal.

  “I see,” said Xavert. And for once, said nothing else.

  The last two Templars joined Hrulk, and together, the three men grabbed the twin iron doors. With a concerted pull, they wrenched them open. The hinges groaned like tortured souls, but slowly, the way into the tomb was revealed.

  Darkness within.

  Not void, not shadow—the absence of concept. No sound. No light. A silence that pressed against the soul.

  Zentich stepped forward.

  Xavert followed.

  And together, they entered.

  The King of Kings:

  The stench struck Zentich like a blow.

  He staggered back a half-step, retching into his sleeve. His vision blurred and eyes watered as the pungent stench of death and centuries-old decay thickened the air inside the prison. Beside him, Xavert pulled his robes up over his nose, muttering a curse beneath his breath.

  Chronos was already inside, eyes scanning the shadows.

  Behind them, Hrulk and the last two Templars followed in, weapons drawn, faces grim.

  The chamber was vast, yet unnaturally still. The walls were lined with ancient runes, many long since faded, others pulsing faintly, struggling to hold their glow. The magic that had once held this place in place—divine, potent, final—was now bleeding out like a dying breath.

  In the back of the cell, slumped in the gloom, was a massive black shape.

  They drew closer. And what they saw did not inspire reverence.

  It was a ruined body, twisted and wasted. Flesh as thin as parchment clung to bones like cracked lacquer. Long robes of dark silk and moldering velvet clung in tatters to the withered frame. Beneath the cowl, no light shone—just a void where dignity had once sat.

  Xavert, Zentich, and Chronos now stood shoulder to shoulder, staring down at the creature bound in chain and dust.

  Chronos broke the silence. “This… cannot be our lord.”

  “This creature is dead,” he added flatly.

  Zentich’s voice quivered—not with fear, but awe. “Rest assured, Lord Commander… this is the King of Kings.”

  He stepped forward, kneeling. “And he is not dead. He yet slumbers—awaiting his salvation.”

  Chronos said nothing. But his lips thinned.

  “Then let us wait no longer,” Xavert said.

  He turned slightly.

  “Hrulk. If you would, please.”

  Hrulk didn’t hesitate.

  In a single motion, he stepped behind the two unsuspecting Templars. His dagger slid across the first man’s throat, spilling blood in a clean arc. The knight gasped, choking on his own cry as he dropped to his knees, clutching his ruined neck.

  The second barely had time to react before Hrulk drove his blade into the side of his neck, jerking it free in a violent spray of blood that splattered the wall and floor. The screams faded fast.

  The blood pooled.

  Thick, warm, red life spilling across the blackened stone—and toward the chained corpse.

  As the first rivulet touched one of the creature’s exposed limbs, something began to happen.

  At first, only the faintest twitch.

  Then—movement.

  Sinew knit itself.

  Skin pulled tight.

  Bone thickened.

  The regeneration began slowly—like sap rising in winter—then surged as blood soaked deeper into the veins of the creature. Torn muscle twisted and reformed. Rotted cloth slithered off as new flesh rose beneath it, hideous and pale. Limbs once skeletal became heavy with meat.

  Still hunched, the figure slid across the floor, its movements unnatural, until its hooded head dipped low to the pooling blood.

  It drank.

  Loudly.

  Messily.

  Greedily.

  Chronos recoiled. Even he, who had ordered cities burned and priests executed, felt revulsion claw at his gut. This was not worship. It was consumption.

  More blood vanished into the thing. Its form grew—broader, taller, monstrous. The tattered robes began to refit themselves to a frame that now loomed over them, nearly three heads taller than any man in the room.

  Then it crawled—toward one of the dead knights.

  And continued feeding.

  They stood still. Silent. None dared interrupt what was unfolding.

  When it had finished, both corpses were withered husks, their armor sloshing loosely around brittle bone.

  Then the creature rose.

  It stood fully now, a giant among them, pale and monstrous. Its hood fell back, revealing a skeletal visage, skin stretched too tightly over bone. No lips. Only blackened teeth. And eyes like dying stars—deep, burning purple, rimmed with cracks of silver fire.

  And when it spoke, its voice was the sound of grinding stone and thunder.

  “I have waited centuries… for release.

  I have dreamed of fire and ruin.

  And now… the world shall remember me.”

  Zentich dropped to his knees.

  “My king,” he whispered.

  One by one, the others followed. Even Chronos, slow and deliberate, bowed his head.

  Malekith surveyed them all—these ants who had come to serve.

  “My wrath will be eternal.

  I shall drain the realms of the weak, the idle, the unworthy.

  And from ash I shall build a kingdom where only the strong survive.

  When my domain is made whole, I shall take vengeance upon the heavens.

  I shall storm the gates of the gods, and cast down their false thrones.”

  He paused, eyes burning as he gazed at those kneeling.

  “And you, my faithful… shall have your place in my new world.

  Granted you remain… worthy.”

  He turned.

  “There is still hunger in me. And much to do.”

  ?

  They exited the prison in silence.

  The two Templars standing guard at the cliff edge stared in awe, their mouths slack as they beheld the towering thing that now walked behind their superiors. So transfixed were they that they didn’t even notice Xavert slipping up behind one, or Hrulk stalking the other.

  Xavert slid an arm around the first man’s throat and drove a dagger into his skull, piercing behind the ear with surgical precision. He dropped wordlessly.

  Hrulk didn’t bother with subtlety—he slashed the hamstrings of his target, bringing him down howling.

  Malekith loomed above the screaming knight, and with one hand, he lifted him from the ground, bringing him face to face.

  The man fell silent, save for a single tear.

  Malekith placed a skeletal hand over the man’s chest.

  And drained him.

  Life fled the body in seconds—skin shriveling, muscle withering, eyes sinking into bone. When he was done, Malekith discarded what was left like trash.

  Chronos turned away. Even he could not stomach the sight.

  When the second man was drained, Malekith turned toward the ledge.

  He whispered a word.

  And gravity surrendered.

  The party rose into the air, lifted by dark sorcery, floating like dust upon a breeze until they crested the rim and returned to the cliff above.

  ?

  Hours later, the party rode through the desert once more.

  The storm had stilled. The wind was quiet.

  And at the center of the column, wagon cloaked in shadow, rode the Lich King, reborn.