Belissar tensed as his bees sward towards Starami. The Tower Lord was the last elite standing, but he was still the most powerful. Even Nenavann, oldest of the Circle’s dungeon masters, had not been able to bring him down, had not even given him a solid hit. Apparently, this sort of duel was new for the elven dungeon master, most of his past experience was against fleets, armies, and giant sea monsters while most of his purifications had been handled by his own defenders.
The fair folk thus held back and carefully started surrounding Starami, wary of him lashing out once cornered. The bees, on the other hand, had no such restraint, with Niobee sending attack orders throughout the hive of hives. Belissar feared for their safety…but Starami needed to be dealt with, preferably quickly and decisively. Belissar decided to trust in his bees and in the Fire protection Urubran, Chief Rohsuak, and the Third of the Sixth had given them. It had already protected them from Urubran’s fire, so hopefully it would against Starami’s as well. Belissar instead sent his spell bees ahead to absorb the damage and let the bee army finish this fight.
But to his surprise, Starami paused midair. He did not send out another fire breath or even attack with his dragon coat’s tail and claws but just hovered midair and let the bees swarm over him. Belissar was puzzled by this…but he wasn’t about to hold the bees back during the most dangerous fight of their lives thus far, not until Starami died or surrendered.
Starami did not surrender…and soon he was dead.
Belissar blinked as Starami fell from the sky, dragon coat gone. He kept staring at the body, expecting it to move or to form another dragon coat or to sohow conjure up an army of dragons and Tower Guards. But the body splashed into the sea without doing anything more.
Belissar took a deep breath and fell silent. It was real, it had really happened. Lord Starami was dead.
Belissar had no idea how to feel about it. It just…felt entirely unreal. For all of his life, Lord Starami had lood over him as soone vast and unknowable, closer to the gods than to mortal humans like himself. It took him a while to even rember to be mad at Lord Starami for all the pain he had caused because to him Lord Starami was more like a force of nature than a man, a fact of life Belissar had long just accepted.
And now he was dead, killed by Belissar’s own bees and allies.
What did it even an to kill Lord Starami? What did that an for his Tower, for all the people living under him? Belissar now knew the answers but it was still tough to wrap his head around it all.
“King? King ok?”
Belissar slowly exhaled his breath, then reached up and brushed Niobee’s back.
“I’m fine, thank you Niobee. And thank you for protecting our ho.”
Niobee buzzed her wings.
“Stung hive burner! Won’t burn hives, won’t steal King’s honey!”
Belissar made a small smile at that. Yes…Starami would not burning down any more hive or villages ever again. The battle was now over, no one else needed to die.
That brought Belissar out of his thoughts and back into the present. He turned his attention back towards Starami’s Tower Guards and monsters. There were still a few left in his Tower and several thousand still waiting outside. Belissar hoped the fighting would be finished now…but he had to be prepared if not.
But one way or another, the end of this battle was in sight. For that, Belissar could not be more grateful.
Back outside, Starami’s captains stood around a tent. They had initially been ordered to arrange further waves for Starami and his Claw to pick up and carry through the deadly water room…but their lord never returned for the second wave. As ti went on, they eventually pulled back out of the rogue Tower, realizing that he had decided to press on without them.
They took stock of the situation to prepare things for their lord’s next order to them…and that was when word of the attack on the supply base spread. Lord Starami had not inford them, but enough of them had heard about it from survivors to tell the rest. A scouting party then confird a big group of spiderkin and monsters down below them.
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The captains were thus at a loss, realizing they now had no supplies to feed the army and a big hostile force at their rear. They had no idea how they would hold their ground while they waited for their lord’s next command.
But it was not Lord Starami who would contact them next. All of them suddenly felt a disturbance in their mana…followed by a ssage that appeared before each and every one of them, down to newest Tower Guard:
Your dungeon master has fallen and will no longer be revived.
Your oath to your dungeon remains until a new master is chosen.
Mission received: Defend your dungeon until a new master is chosen.
All the captains stiffened. Silence hung heavily upon them until one of them dared to speak.
“Lord Starami…is dead?”
So of the captains murmured but none of them could refute it. The ssage from the gods made it undeniably clear…and all of them felt their bond to their sworn lord disappear.
Eventually, one of them asked the dreaded question.
“Then…what do we do?”
The largest among them narrowed his eyes and rested his hand on his sword.
“There’s only one thing to do. We break through the subhumans and get back to the Tower. We defend it as the gods commanded.”
Another captain shook his head.
“Without Lord Starami, his dragon, or his claw? And with no supplies for the journey?”
The largest captain shrugged.
“There’s no other choice. We die if we stay here. We still have most of the army, we can break through. Then we can et up with so of the supply convoys on the way back, get enough to survive.”
The objecting captain rubbed his chin.
“There is another choice, though? Captain Auschias already surrendered, didn’t he? Said the gods commanded it and it’s pretty clear Lord Starami had defied them. Maybe we should follow after him.”
The largest captain scowled.
“That senile traitor? You want to bet your life on his delusions and cowardice?”
The objecting captain glared right back at him.
“You really think it was just delusions? Then who was it that burned half your face off, if not the God of Light? Who could strike at Lord Starami like that but the gods?”
A third captain stepped between the two as they tensed. He looked the largest captain in the eyes first.
“Ok, I think we all knew Lord Starami did not tell us everything about why we were here. The monsters alone are proof of that and now the gods have decided not to revive him…plus we all know what he did to Starami’s Spear. Maybe Auschias had a point in leaving.”
He then turned to the objecting captain.
“But we don’t have to follow Auschias. Auschias made his choice while Lord Starami was still around, his only options were to obey our lord and defy the gods, or to surrender to the fey. But we have another choice. We can honor the gods and stop this Hunger-bitten campaign without offering ourselves up to the fey.”
He glanced between them.
“I agree we should breakthrough and head back. We need to find out what’s going on in the Conclave. If that dragon rider we fought at the start was the real deal and not a fey imposter…there could be a lot more going on than we were told. And Lord Starami left our Tower barely defended…”
The captains made grim expressions at that. One by one, they began to nod.
Shortly thereafter, the Tower Guards, the spawner dragonkin, and whichever of the bred dragonkin they managed to wrangle began marching down into the Underway, prepared to fight the spiderkin between them and their way ho…
An army of humans and dragonkin stord into the forr supply base. Dragonfire burned through webs, traps, and chitins, quickly turning the cavern into an inferno. Drake fangs and enchanted blades cut down spiderkin and the monsters of the Underway, shields and dragon coats deflected arrows with ease. Even without their Tower Lord or their elites, several thousand blessed champions of the gods were a force to be reckoned with. The spiderkin quickly gave way, scuttling back into their tunnels. The humans quickly grabbed whatever supplies the spiderkin hadn’t already looted and then rushed down the tunnel ho.
Once they had passed, the spiderkin queen erged from the shadows of a side tunnel, along with her army.
“Follow them.”
She had confird the presence of god-blessed when a squad of them intervened against her initial attack, so she knew the Sorcerer Kings had a God’s Nest of their own. Further scouting revealed she had only hit a lightly-defended rear base and that the bulk of the Sorcerer Kings’ army was up on the surface besieging a God’s Nest, likely the sa one her daughter had encountered.
Since this Sorcerer King army was invading rather than defending, the spiderkin queen decided against attacking them imdiately. She left a token blocking force to avoid suspicion, reported the situation back to the queens with God’s Nests, and waited to see what the Sorcerer Kings would do. If, gods forbid, their assault on the God’s Nest succeeded, she would await reinforcents from the nearest queens with God’s Nests of their own.
But now the Sorcerer Kings had broken off their siege once they realized they had lost their supplies. They subsequently tore through her holding force and retreated in haste. Now, as she had hoped…they were leading her right back to their ho.
Scouts swiftly and silently pursued the Sorcerer King army while the rest of her nest moved to secure a supply line, preferably one not right next to a hostile God’s Nest. Speaking of which, one of her subordinates walked up behind her with a frown on her face.
“My queen, what about the God’s Nest?”
The spiderkin queen kept her eyes down on the tunnel.
“The survivor from my daughter's nest said they fought bearkin, skunk-kin, and monsters, right? Ignore the God’s Nest for now, it’s controlled by another Underway tribe that’s clearly no friend of the Sorcerer Kings. Once the Queen of Liberation hears what happened here, she will call on everyone to march to war and we must be ready to lead the way. The other Underway tribes and their God’s Nests can wait until the Sorcerer Kings are dealt with, once and for all.”
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