The cssical human literature on ology holds that there are nine distinct realms. These include The Realm of Divient, colloquially known as ‘heaven’. This is supposedly the home of those majods who have the best is of the mortal races at heart, and the in of Celestials. Then there is the Realm of Infernal Anguish, or ‘hell’, where the ‘evil’ gods reside and the spawning pce of demons. There are also the Spirit Realm, the Realm of Nature, and so forth.

  This formution is an act of pure fantasy, inappropriate even for children’s fairytales, and my colleagues would do well to discard it for the fabrication it is.

  There are more realms than grains in the endless sands of Brast, brimming with myriad varieties of magid creatures. I have personally unlocked the path to dozens of them and sampled their riches. Through those rifts, one finds wealth and power, beings of wonder htmare. And all it takes is the will to reach out and grasp them.

  - Lecture at the Seveh Annual Pan-cultural feren ology. Nevyn Eld [Guardian of the Realm], Professor of Domain Magiiversity of Dal’mohra.

  Aliandra

  Stop them? So many demons poured through the tunnels of the mostly cleared Emberfe Mihat she couldn’t see or hear the end of it. How could she even begin to imagiopping that? A ’s words had filled her with dread – what would happen to the people of Myrin’s Keep if they failed? Even just a single Hellfire Imp could set the eown abze, killing most of the townsfolk before one of the few high-level people could stop them. Nor could they easily escape without unleashing a pgue of corruption upon the unsuspeg citizens.

  No, this horde would tear through the library, killing Ryn and burning Lira’s Forest without pause. Nothing truly substantial stood in the way of the horde reag Myrin’s Keep. Those hors alone could drain everyone, and whatever was left would be sliced up by the spider demons or buro ash by the imps and wargs.

  She threw up a barrier in front of her, blog a volley of firebolts from the respawned Shards of Fme, but they ighem, tearing past as fast as they could. In moments, the pursuing Hellfire Imps teleported in using the bodies of the Shards of Fme as fire destinations for their teleportation magic. But, although vastly outnumbered, the Shards and Lava Lurkers still mao slow the demonic horde down just a little, abs the fireballs and hellfire breath until the rest of the demons could overwhelm them in a tide of sshing limbs and dreadful fangs.

  But blindly fleeing while the blood of the Pit Lord slowly corrupted her mind was no solutioher. And there was one more thing. “What are we going to do about those Sentinels?”

  “I don’t think they get through the rift,” Malika said. “Too big.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Chuckles here isn’t prang around like a tipsy ballerina anymore,” Malika panted. “Yes, the limitations of rifts are well-known – otherwise, history would be a touch different, shall we say?”

  Mato snorted.

  “Uh… sorry,” said, trying to look anywhere but them. “I’ll… aah, keep a, shall I?”

  Finally, Ali burst out into the juhe pu st of trees and damp earth and the wele sense of her own domain mana – and her mind caught up again. She had lost most of her minions to the demons, and by either instinct or luck, she had mao protect two of her Kobold acolytes. Without their stant holy magic, even with her high resistahe blood corruption would have killed her ihan fifteen seds.

  “Ali? Where’s your boss?” excimed, his head swiveli and right in arm.

  “I removed it,” she gasped. If only she still had the Hobgoblin boss she left guarding the entrance, but she regurly unsummo whehey ehe mines as a way to serve her mana.

  I need a boss. She didn’t just need a boss; she needed a ridiculously powerful boss who could take out aire horde of demons without dying. Like the Skeletal Wyvern, or the Inferno. It was clear that the Fmecaller Demon Hunter had been stantly guarding the rift against the incursion of the demons for turies, and they had just happened by and killed him, ripping it open for the hordes to pour through. Then, they had na?vely ehe Abyssal Realm and poked the proverbial hor’s . Literally. She winced, recalling just how easily she had beeranced by the siren’s call of that Sentinel demon’s mind magic. It would be at least six hours before the Emberfe Mines respawhe hunter, sealing the rift.

  And she had already used her Are Recall. She frowrying to trate as the endless hordes of glistening crimson demons spewed out of the mouth of the Emberfe Mines and into the jutrag the attention of all kinds of elementals: fme from within the dungeon, but also the flying Glimmer Shards and Corust Rays from the summoning pool. Her mind did not want to work properly, dizziness and disorientation pying havoc with her tration, and now, even the world around her ed and shimmered in ways she knew were not real.

  Her eyes sed across the pitiful remnants of her minion army. She didly have much left to work with. She had a single dual-axe-wielding Hobgoblin, a Hellfire Imp, two holy Acolytes, and a Sparkling Ooze that had mao survive by hitg a ride on the Hobgoblin’s back. Dozens of Demonic Horwitched feebly from within the Ooze’s transparent body, slowly dissolving. Everything else had been wiped out somewhere along the way.

  I have to do something. She had visions of the demons burning dowire library on the way to razing the town. She slowed, f her mind to work via sheer willpower, and pced a hand on her Hobgoblin’s shoulder.

  “Guard this area,” Ali told her and dredged up her magic.

  “Yes, Mistress,” her Hobgoblin replied, turning the grim mask of her bloody face to the oning horde, raising her axes without hesitation. Even her Hobgoblin was suffering uhe devastating corruption, but the raid domain enha should give her a lot more health.

  Domain Respalied to Hobgoblin Warrior.Raid Domain Enha applied to Hobgoblin Warrior.

  She needed her Hobgoblin to be powerful, but she did not have much time, so she chose the first things that came to mind, thinking only of what the essence of a warrior was.

  Attribute Enha (Strength) applied.Attribute Enha (Dexterity) applied.e applied.

  Domain Enha plete.

  Your reserved mana has increased by +1081.

  The Hobgoblin’s body swelled as the potent domain mana infused her with power. Her muscles bulged massively, and her body twitched as she let out a ferocious battle cry that caused the entire horde of demons to pause.

  Domain mana surged within her, drawn like a great inhation from the surrounding trees and moss, and she summoned a copy of herself. Then it surged again as a third copy appeared. All three identical Hobgoblins turard each other for a moment. A brief nod was exged and then all three of them charged, tearing into the demons with a savage brutality that sent chills running down Ali’s spine.

  The copies are not corrupted. She had the presenind to notice at least that. Yet.

  “Keep running,” Malika urged.

  The three warriors coordinated perfectly, guarding each other as they shed out with an incredible flurry of dark Eimuuran steel bdes and flying blood in a dispy of martial arts that would have made even Malika proud. The speed of their strikes was unreal, and so was the power. The strength enha on top of the two-and-a-half-times damage multiplier from the raid domain enha sent the smaller demons flying, limbs separated so violently that their obsidian bones ripped right through their tough hides. The dexterity boost granted speed, reas, critical damage, and accuracy, all of whibio produce a nightmare of steel and gore.

  Ali’s notification chime sounded tinuously as she fled the se catg up to her friends. But she kept her Martial Insight trained on the senses of her raid boss, desperately hoping that she would be enough.

  “Is it w?” gasped.

  But it quickly became clear that they would fall. Clouds of demonic hors swarmed around the Hobgoblins with an angry droning, biting and stinging, spraying clouds of Goblin blood into the air that formed an ominous red mist that somehow empowered the swarm. Gleaming, scythe-like legs sshed and pierced as the stalker demons emerged like a dark and shimmering tide from the unseen shadows with vicious rending strikes.

  Even with the power and enormous life and energy of the raid boss, all the es were losih steadily and many of the demons began bypassing them, leaving them to the never-ending horde that followed.

  “No…” she said. The Hobgoblins would buy them some time, but she would need a sed boss, and for that, she o get further away. “I need… something stronger.”

  But what? She racked her brain to think of something that might be effective against suimaginable numbers. The wargs and the imps were immuo fire, and the imps would heal the wargs. How I even kill that? What seemed abundantly clear was that she needed some way to block the tide or an area damage attack to hit all of them simultaneously – anything that was not fire. Frantically, she threw out enormous domain-enhanced barrier walls, desperate to buy them just a little more time. She staggered, her barrier tipping siderecariously before she caught herself, holding onto the blood-slick surface with a death grip.

  “The Demon Hunter,” panted. “How did he do it?”

  As she was desperately searg for any ideas, ’s suggestion suddenly turned her thoughts to the Fmecaller Demon Huhey had just sin, and with a kernel of hope kindling within, she opehe description for the ability she had learned. Mark of Prey would not be useful here, but the sed one had been an ability called Syer – specifically for demons.

  Glittering golde imprihe ability on the aged part of her mind’s tome. She sed it instantly, pushing her Reading skill to the limits in a frantic grasp for time.

  SyerRequirements: Enemy must be one you uand or create. Source: Demon HunterChoose an enemy (monster, race, or category) to hunt. Your minion gains a substantial bonus to all damage when fighting the chosen enemy. Your minion gains a pertage of each sin enemy’s health over thirty seds. The more specific your chosen enemy, the greater the bonus to damage done ah gained.Skill – Domain Magic

  That’s it! As she finally passed the domain range for her Hobgoblin raid boss, she had her idea. Choosing her Sparkling Ooze this time, surprisingly her only perfectly healthy monster, she activated her domain magic a sed time.

  Domain Respalied to Sparkling Ooze.Raid Domain Enha applied to Sparkling Ooze.

  She wished she had checked Syer first before making the Hobgoblin boss, but now that she uood it, she could use it, and hopefully what she had in mind for the ooze would be suffit. What she had failed to sider in the heat of the moment was healing and area damage – against such a multitude, they would be essential. Syer would take care of healing, and she had a Sparkling Ooze.

  Syer (Demon) applied.

  For her Syer, she chose the eegory of demons, wanting to set the bonus against every single monster in that inexorable horde. It seemed she could choose anything her Grimoire was capable of making, all the way from a specifister like the Hellfire Imp, through the broadest category like beast or humanoid. She just hoped ‘Demon’ wasn’t too general and that she got a substantial damage boost.

  e applied.Nova Strike (Sparkling Bomb) applied.

  For the rest of her pn, she decided she needed volume and area damage, so she ed her Sparkling Ooze to ehere would be three of them and enhaheir ranged Sparkling Bomb attack with Nova Strike to double down on the area damage.

  Domain Enha plete.

  Your reserved mana has increased by +654.

  Her ooze filled with a rush of domain mana, and it began to glow intensely. As it reacted to the vast power of her raid domain enha, she quickly set about finishing her pns, filling the area with massive domain-supported barriers with only small gaps between them.

  The ooze summos es, and they spread out, expl the area Ali had given them. With the three ed oozes all using Nova Strike to multiply their ranged light bombs empowered with syer magic that was tuo kill demons, she certainly hoped this boss would have more success tha one. She fled the se, desperately hoping for her pn to work.

  Her mana twisted, and her senses wrenched out of the st dying Hobgoblin boss as it fell to the ravening horde that swept over it. She switched quickly to her Sparkling Oozes, feeling the rumble through the ground and the buzzing drone of untable demonigs as the bck writhing sea of bodies charged forward. She couldn’t even begin to t them.

  “Is it w?” asked as they tinued rushing toward the library. He looked horrible, staggering drunkenly with trails of blood soaking the front of his armor.

  “The Hobgoblin just fell, but I made a triple ooze with Demon Syer and Nova Strike. I blocked them in with barriers.” She checked its sheet quickly and found that her Syer magic was adding more than a hundred pert to her Sparkling Ooze’s damage.

  “That’s clever,” he said, coughing, but Ali was still very worried. He hadn’t seen the sheer vastness of the demonic horde that bore down on them. As much as it terrified her, she sed the tide of demons stantly, searg for any sign of those Sentinels which would spell instant doom, or worse, that monstrous Pit Lord. Or perhaps he see more than me. His eyes are excellent. But to her dismay, she could sehe Hellfire Imps regurly summoning more imps with their accelerated casting paired with their terrifying ritual. With so many, it was rapidly reag critical mass, and she had no idea how to avoid getting overrun. And within the horde, seen again only with her tremor sense, were hundreds of spider demons p forth in plete stealth.

  The tide broke against her barriers and the oozes unleashed a veritable torrent of glowing balls of light, lofting them high over the barriers to e down in a tinuous explosion of light that tore through the mass of monsters, raising a huge pall of dust and bits of demon. It erhaps a good thing oozes did not have vision; she was certain she would have been blinded the fgration. A chorus of screeches and screams reached her ears even this far from the battle as her oozes annihited everything in sight.

  Ali’s notification chime buzzed tinuously as the monsters were burned, ignited, and ripped apart not by fire, but by pure light magic. A tinuous cloud of balls of light rained down from on high, falling onto the wailing demons, and ripping through them with powerful explosive detonations. But the wargs at the back breathed hellfire on the horde, and demonic wolves stood back up in droves, throwing themselves against the barriers. Mana, recovered from the detonations, gushed through her barrier magic, returning to the domain itself as it absorbed explosions, auras, hellfire, and more. The i demons rose from the horde like a droning cloud, flying over the barriers and dive-bombing the slimes from above, even as their formations were blown to bits. The wargs and imps surged against the barriers, cmbering over their brethren and the mangled corpses to reach their enemy.

  Suddenly, an imp jumped over the lip of the barrier, nding within the arena beside the Sparkling Oozes. It snapped off an accelerated and empowered hellfire fireball, and the detonation rocked the area, but although the damage didn’t unduly bother the slimes, it filled the pen with gobs of falling hellfire, and in moments the entire area was inundated with cag Hellfire Imps, telep in through the fmes of their brother.

  The bance had tipped, and as soon as she felt the barriers crack, Ali khey wouldn’t st for more than a few moments longer.

  “They’re going to die,” she said, as she realized it.

  “Fuck,” said suctly, resignation flickering across his pain-wracked, bloody face.

  Ali had just reached the library and now she faced a tough decision. “We probably o retreat through the library a Lira and Ryn out of there.” It would hurt to lose the library, and she would o begin again from scratch, but if she could draw the demons past her Forest Guardian, perhaps they could stop them there. She didn’t hold much fidehough; both of her frantically created bosses were strohan the shrine guardian.

  “We won’t make it in time,” Malika said, and to Ali’s horror, she noticed that fifteen minutes of the corruption had already passed. “We need a pake a stand, so that Mato cure this blood corruption.”

  As she stood, body wracked with pain, throwing up more blood than she could imagine, her eyes fell upon the giant Elder Tree, visible through the library doors, standing silently in the ter of the atrium, wreathed in wisps. A tree filled with meaning, Lira’s new home, and Ali was loath to lose it. It emitted such a dense, pure mana that she could feel it prig her ski alo – not as dense as the Lair of the Demon God, but it was vastly dehan anywhere else in her dungeon.

  And suddenly, a thought occurred to her: I think I attach two bosses here. She had sidered it before, but back then it had been merely an academisideration, for the most part – if she had bosses over level one hu probably wouldn’t work, but she could probably mawo mid-fifties raid bosses without straining the dense domain mana too much.

  At least, I hope I . But what overe so much hellfire healing? The sight of the horde of wargs breathing on the corpses and seeing them rise en masse terrified her. It was all due to their hellfire absorption. Syer had helped, but it was woefully ie in the face of the onsught.

  But I have a monster with absorption, too. And that gave her an idea; a crazy idea, but she hoped it might be just crazy enough to save them and the town, and not be a fever dream inspired by the blood corruption.

  “ you hold the demons off for a bit? I o summon some monsters,” Ali said, getting some strange looks, strangled gasps, and raised eyebrows from her friends.

  “That’s a lot of demons, Ali,” Malika said, eyeing the beginning trickle of imps that had bypassed the dying oozes dubiously.

  “I just need a few minutes. Enough for two monsters. I have an idea,” Ali said, pulling out her Grimoire. There wasn’t a moment to lose, especially as she was uo accelerate her summoning with her Are Recall, having used it to save ’s life earlier. Already she was jealous of the imps and their Accelerated Castiamagic.

  “I got you, Ali,” Mato growled, his voice ing as he re-assumed his Bear Form and took a firm stance up front, interposing himself between Ali and the oning horde. Even his normally coarse fur was slicked with his own blood. Malika and readied themselves, falling automatically into formation beside the bear, both of them looking unsteady on their feet. But as ragged as they looked, mao hold his bow steady, and Ali decided she would just have to trust them to do what they o.

  She focused on her Grimoire, p her mana into the imprint. This had better work. There would be no sed ces, no afterward to even think of if she failed. She tuned out the ragged roar and csh of bat and the increasingly frequent pulses of holy magi her remaining Acolytes.

  Forest Guardian – Wood Elemental – level 53 (Nature)

  Her Forest Guardians had long beeaple reliable monster, only retly discarded because of their fire vulnerability. But they were spectacur elemental monsters – twenty attribute points per level, high strength, endurance, wisdom, and vitality. Self-healing, and a regeion aura. They were incredible tanks, but the feature she would be relying on most of all was their nature and poison absorption. They would heal instead of taking damage from their own aed affinities, just like the fire elementals did in the Emberfe Mines.

  “Here they e!” Malika’s shout had an edge ency, and her voice cracked. And no wonder, in the distahe dark mass of hellfire tore through the juoward them as the bulk of the horde broke over the remnants of the oozes and barriers.

  “Hurrying,” Ali said. In the background she was dimly aware of fring with light as he unleashed a tinuous barrage of explosive volleys into the oning horde as Malika flickered and fshed, tearing through the vanguard. From the ground, Mato’s pnts burst forth, twisting and binding, deying the iable crush of demons. She blinked away the visual haziness and haloes she was seeing ohing and focused on her work.

  Domain Respalied to Forest Guardian.Raid Domain Enha applied to Forest Guardian.

  What she wanted from this boss was a reliable, iructible tank to hold back the entire horde without budging. And she he tank first if her friends were going to survive. As she summohem, first one, and then the sed Kobold fred with their holy Devotion skill, desperately trying to keep pace with the demon horde’s damage and the corruption.

  They’re about to run dry.

  e applied.Summon (Poison Wyvern) applied.Attribute Enha (Wisdom) applied.

  Domain Enha plete.

  Your reserved mana has increased by +1712.

  The cost was enormous, but she wasn’t ting right now. The massive wooden guardiaal creaked and groaned as its body greidly, substantially rger than the one she had set to guard the shrine. But it wasn’t done – as the noise of her friends engaging the demons crashed through the area, eg off the walls of the library, and the hellfire fireballs begaonating, her massive guardian summos es.

  “Go. Help them. Defend the library,” she told them, and the three enormous elementals charged forward simultaneously, crashing heavily into the horde of demons.

  “Uh, Ali, aren’t those vulnerable to fire?” asked, sounding rather uain.

  “I’m not do,” she said, rapidly flipping the pages of her Grimoire and summoning her mohe guardians’ regeion auras scaled with wisdom, enhang both their power and range dramatically, and all three of them overpped, giving her beleaguered and wrung-out Kobolds a mueeded break. The etlefield erupted with roots, brambles, and explosions of pnt life as the guardians ehe horde of demons. In the air above them, they began summoning Poison Wyverns which swooped and darted bad forth, spraying the entire field with their poisoh. The buzzing demonic hors rose in a cloud to ehe wyverns in the air, swooping bad forth in swirling formations trying to avoid the sprays of poison. The first wyvern fell spiraling downward, quickly overe by the ravenous swarm.

  But even with their stupendous health and regeion, the guardians’ fire vulnerability was too much against such a horde of wargs, imps, and the horrifying spider-like stealth demons that struck from the shadows. Their health began to spiral downward as the imps freed themselves from the roots and lobbed fireballs everywhere.

  Please be in time, she thought, urging her Grimoire to go faster.

  Toxic Spitter – Ooze – level 55 (Poison).

  Finally! In a rush she finished up her domain magic, trying frantically to hurry and also to go slow enough that she didn’t make any mistakes. This was the mohat they had struggled with so much at the pool of liquid nature mana – she had not fotten the ridiculous bination it made with the guardians.

  Domain Respalied to Toxic Spitter.Raid Domain Enha applied to Toxic Spitter.

  Syer (Demon) applied.Affinity Aura (Poison) applied.Elemental Storm (Poison) applied.

  Domain Enha plete.

  Your reserved mana has increased by +1889.

  There was a moment of severe anxiousness when she applied Elemental Storm to her boss. She had made something of an educated guess that the poison-affinity would work, based on her success at using poison as a patible subset of nature affinity for her Tunnel Weaver’s Affinity Aura, but she had never exactly tried it with Elemental Storm before, and her relief alpable when it seemed to apply correctly.

  This monster was to be both her battlefield stability, and her fihe guardians were not meant to kill anything – their job was to tank and heal – and to fuel the slime spawhe Toxic Spitter was how she inteo overwhelm the Hellfire Wargs’ ability to heal, and simultaneously take out all the imps.

  As her gigantic ooze swelled in size, growing in power from the great infusion of domain mana, a toxic aura of poisonous gas billowed out through the battlefield, pulsing with poison magic. The Forest Guardians’ health immediately stopped dropping as they began abs the poison aura as healing.

  You have been afflicted with poison.

  “Run!” Ali shouted, ign the notification. “Into the library!” Her friends reacted immediately, even while shooting her very surprised and fused looks, but she k wouldn’t take long for the poison to overwhelm all of them.

  Your poison has increased to 2.

  On its own, the Toxic Spitter would speh, spitting out smaller slimes whe was full, relying on its regeion to recover. But they had discovered that uhe influence of the Forest Guardian’s magical regeion aura, it could spit out more, faster, and even occasionally split itself into two. Now, subject to the vast power of three domain-empowered regeion auras, the Toxic Spitter did not hold back, ung a tinuous torrent of toxic slimes into the air to rain down across the battlefield with wet spts and plops.

  Your poison has increased to 4 (+2).

  They all charged into the cool, dark library and Ali smmed the stro barrier she could manage across the door, bound to whatever left-over domain capacity she had in the area, and then stopped to watch the battle unfold through the transparent golden wall, her breath snagging ihroat as she dared hope it would be enough.

  “Keep a Restoration on that spitter,” she said, direg her Acolytes to heal the boss.

  Overhead, Poison Wyverns spawned tinuously, ign the poison aura emitted by the Toxic Spitter, spreading more and more sprays of lurid green liquid throughout the demonic sea. The demonic hors began dropping from the swarm, nding on the chaos of the battlefield with thumps barely audible above the chaos of fire and crashing limbs.

  “Ali… what exactly did you do?” asked breathlessly.

  “I gave it Demon Syer, poison aura, and… Elemental Storm.”

  “Oh… shit,” he said, bag away from the barrier nervously.

  “Isn’t that the ability you got from the Inferno?” Malika asked.

  “Yup.” As she said it, she felt a tidal surge of mana being drawn into the Toxic Spitter.

  Staring out at the horde, she quietly said, “This is where you hide.” Outside, beyond the barrier, the world turned a violent muddy green as a veritable hurrie of poisonous gas ripped through the demon horde with enough force to throw the smaller monsters flying. It raged on and on, and the only thing she could see was the virulent wave of mana grounding through her barrier’s absorption into the domain itself as the Toxic Spitter unleashed a poiseddon.

  Enough poison mana was absorbed through her barrier and into her domain that it began leaking out through the domain mana nearby and her remaining Kobolds began handing out extra restoration spells to everyog, even though they were all still standing iriple regeion aura of the now maximum health Forest Guardians.

  “The guardians have poison absorb,” said, uanding dawning in his eyes. “So that’s how you hahe fire vulnerability?”

  “Yes, and they’re stantly healing the Toxic Spitter, meaning it will split faster, geing more slimes,” Ali noted.

  “And the wyverns?” he asked.

  “They’re for more poison damage betweeal storms, and for the flying hors. We have at least six hours of this to go before the Emberfe Mines respawns that Demon Hunter and locks down the rift.”

  He nodded in apparent disbelief. “You thought that far ahead?”

  “It took two failures,” Ali said, shaking her head. She o be better. Smarter and quicker – not every enter would leave room for retries.

  As the poisorom died down beyond the barrier, the battlefield cleared to the sight of hordes of dead and dying demons, and a sea of toxic slimes and rivers of poison. She could barely evehe Forest Guardians among the ooze.

  And then, the monsters all turo face the wave of ining demons.

  “Enough talking. Ali, make me a hole,” Mato said, his voice rough and followed by a hag cough. He was ba his Beastkin form, dripping blood from his eyes and mouth, holding himself up using the wall.

  Hole? Oh… It was a simple matter to wield her Domain Mastery and turn a rge circle of the fgstones into dirt beside the Elder Tree, and Mato immediately pnted himself, transf into his Tree Form. His aura burst outward the moment he pleted his shapeshifting, c the entire area, aending even out into the battlefield beyond. For the first time sintering Maalgaroth the Pit Lord, Ali felt the hold of the corruption – the nausea and dizziness – begin to loosen.

  “Ali, maybe we should put some defenders on the door to the level above? Or at least block it off with a barrier – some of those demons could have flown up there,” suggested, pointing out a fw in her blockade. Indeed, she would be having nightmares of the bloodsug demonic hor swarms that had chased them through the mines, draining the life from her minions.

  “Eep! What… is that?”

  Ali’s head snapped up at the sound of the surprisingly high-pitched and terrified Gnomish voice that interrupted their versation. She found Ryn, Brena, and Sabri all huddled together, staring with wide eyes at the devastation unfolding right before them on the opposite side of a very transparent barrier.

  Behind them, silhouetted against the dim light of the library, ce swooped and dove aggressively, brandishing the terrifying glowing goldeh and barrier magic she had glimpsed once before.

  “Uh… I expin…” Ali began and then trailed off. I? Her mind balked at the magnitude of what they had just endured, a somehow survived.

  ----------

  https:///DungeonOfKnowledge

  https:///series/1135403/dungeon-of-knowledge

  https:///fi/80744/dungeon-of-knowledge-raid-bat-litrpg

  timewalk