The first screams came at dawn.
Xerces awoke to pounding at the barn's lower door—fists, then voices, then cries for help. His mask had nearly failed overnight, mana spent thin like worn parchment, and he had to recast it in haste before stepping into the early fog.
Mira stood outside, pale and winded.
"Something's wrong at the fields," she said. "I think… I think something's killing the crops. And now livestock."
She didn't wait—just turned and ran.
Xerces followed in silence, fingers twitching beneath his sleeves. The magic in the air felt thick—not wild, but directional. Something guided it. Something ancient and malevolent.
When they reached the fields, the scent hit him first.
Rot. Sweet and thick like spoiled meat and wet ash.
Dozens of villagers stood in a circle, gaping in horror. The wheat had turned black at its base—dead, not from drought or disease, but from corruption. Several sheep lay near the edge, their eyes sunken and their skin sloughing off as if something had leeched the life from within.
One of the farmers—Kallan—stood near the front, clutching a pitchfork.
"We heard howling last night," he said. "Not wolves. Not anything we've ever heard. Then this."
Xerces stepped past them all, carefully.
His illusion still held, but barely. Sweat would have rolled from his brow if he were still capable of such things. Instead, he drew quietly upon his inner reservoir of necrotic power, letting tendrils of unseen energy spiral from his fingers into the soil.
There it was.
Burrowing. Waiting. Watching.
A Darkling Wretch—a larval spawn of some deeper beast. A creature born from fear itself, often sent ahead of its parent to test the air and soften the prey.
It slithered beneath the crops like a shadow with fangs. It would strike soon.
And Xerces could not allow that.
He waited until the villagers began to move back toward the temple to speak with the cleric. Mira remained behind, hesitant.
"You're going to do something, aren't you?" she asked.
He looked at her.
"Yes."
She touched his arm—lightly, barely.
"Be careful. I don't know what you're running from, but… I don't want to lose you."
He didn't answer.
Couldn't.
He waited until she was gone.
Then he dropped the mask.
Bones creaked. Light shimmered and peeled away from his form like smoke. Beneath, the Lich stood tall and ageless—runes etched across ivory bone, eyes like cold blue fire.
Xerces raised a hand and summoned his oldest command:
"Rise."
From the fetid soil, a corpse clawed upward—a skeletal warhound, buried long ago beneath forgotten furrows. It limped, one leg missing, yet its hollow eyes burned with loyalty.
"Find it," Xerces whispered.
The hound took off with impossible speed.
Moments later, the earth split with a hiss, and the Darkling Wretch erupted, screaming like a newborn god.
It was a thing of tendrils and slime-covered flesh—long, narrow, with rows of inverted teeth and twitching feelers. It shrieked toward him.
Xerces stepped forward, unfazed.
"Your master is watching," he said aloud. "Let him watch."
Then, with a crack of his hand, he cast Soulburn, a spell that clawed the life-force from cursed things and returned it in fragments.
The wretch screeched, buckled, and burst into shadow as blue fire consumed its core.
And Xerces absorbed its death.
His phylactery—buried deep within his chest—pulsed once. The spell didn't restore life, but it strengthened the tether between his soul and the world.
+1 Max Soul Core Node unlocked.
A faint rune glowed to life along his spine—his power subtly growing, like a candle beginning to remember it was once a flame.
He re-cast the mask with ease now.
And as villagers returned to find the field strangely purged of rot, Mira ran toward him.
He met her with a calm, practiced look.
"What happened?" she asked breathlessly.
"Whatever it was," Xerces said, "it's gone now."
But he could feel it.
That had only been a whisper. A test.
The true threat still crawled somewhere deeper… watching him.