Fauna shone her magelight at the tip of her staff as another section of Duskmetal was blown away by Lamphrey's magic.

The pair had been tearing through the walls of Griffon's Watch in silence for at least and hour, avoiding combat by forging their own path through Haylock's maze of death. Finally, they arrived in a long hallway far more grand than those dismal chambers they'd seen thus far in the complex.

"This place reeks of…death."

Fauna didn't know how right she was. Her Hopla nose was capable of appraising scents of decay with ease, but the Wildglance senses in her told her far more than that. There had been magic loosed in this place. Dark magic.

And pain.

The walls were a grisly tapestry of bodies – scarred, racked, and mutilated beyond recognition. In the room itself hung a series of metal cages and rectangular chambers with their doors ajar, revealing spiked interiors or freezing cold clouds of magical ice, designed to break the spirits of their occupants while keeping them alive – just barely. Other containers in the hall contained the organs of those the mad Doctor had experimented on – brain stems, livers, and other apertures floating in viscous liquid like pickled fruits.

The sight repulsed Fauna, and she resisted the urge to empty her bowels then and there.

She then felt Lamphrey's claw upon her shoulder.

"We must press on," she said. "This laboratory has a will of its own. You feel it, don't you?"

Fauna looked up again and nodded, once. She knew what Lamphrey was talking about.

In a place where magic had been used to illicit a specific emotion, sometimes 'echoes' of that emotion manifested themselves. It could be through the appearance of ghosts, it could be through voices or murmurs of the past, or it could be from something far more malevolent.

In any case, it did not behove a mage of any stripe to linger long in such a place, where the veil of reality had been torn.

But Fauna had never truly felt this kind of energy. It was like the room was watching her every movement. Like those eviscerated corpses on the walls were staring into her mind itself.

"Not since the time of Karfanng's fall have I felt such a sense of hopelessness and despair consume a place," Lamphrey gulped, shutting off her own magelight and closing her eyes to the horrors around her.

"This," Fauna muttered. "This was where he experimented on our brothers and sisters. This room, and probably others, too."

Her eyes stuck on the bloody implements that covered the tables beside each of the torture chambers – forked hooks and knives covered in crimson spatters. They looked like they'd been recently used.

"Hopla."

Fauna barely even blinked.

"How can you just ignore this?" she asked Lamphrey. "These were your people, too."

The Tialax marched up to Fauna with a sigh and gripped her hand.

"Let go of me!"

"Turn off your magelight," Lamphrey commanded. "It does nothing to acknowledge this place of death. You know I am correct."

"Of course I do!" the Hopla protested, pulling away. "But why do you act like your so above all this? Do you really not care at all?"

Before she could reply, the faint sound of moaning filled the grisly laboratory.

Both mages turned, their ephemeral lights flickering to life and bathing the once-dark hallway in brilliant luminosity.

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And then, just as soon as they had summoned it, the light died away.

"Lamphrey?"

Fauna called out and heard nothing.

"Lamphrey!?"

She reached out with a paw, gripping nothing but dank air, as the sound of pained moaning came again, much louder.

And much closer.

She could feel breath on the back of her neck. The hairs on her ears perked up, and something brushed against them.

"B-back! Back!" she shouted, twisting and sending a firebolt trailing behind her. She turned as she registered a hit, and heard a chorus of voices groan in pain.

But when she leveled her staff, ready to summon her magelight again, she heard those same voices call out to her.

"Fauna."

She froze.

She knew that turning on her light right now was a mistake. And yet, there was a small, perverse piece of her that told her she had to. She knew Lamphrey had been right. Without exception, she knew. But it didn't matter.

Because those voices weren't like those she'd heard in the City of Illusions. They were real.

"Fauna…"

And they were right in front of her.

When finally she summoned the strength to expel her light again, she was looking into the faces of her family.

"Well? Now would be about the right time to try that crazy idea of yours!"

Klax's voice cracked with fury as he smashed another Undead Shambler's skull while he and Tara tried staying on their rocky island-ride for dear life.

Three distinct types of death were waiting for them.

Around them was an endless horde of Undead. Wave after wave of skeletal Hybrid bodies.

Below them: waves of choppy waters that heralded death.

And before them, approaching faster and faster, was the wall of spikes that would offer their most painful form of demise.

Tara struck out with her daggers, slicing through bone and muscle and throwing corrupted tendon into the dark air.

"Gimmie a boost!"

Before Klax could even offer a stifled "Wha?!" she had already climbed on his shoulders, kicking out as her Undead assailants tried clipping her tail with their claws.

"I've been saving somethin'" she said as she steadied herself on his shoulders and stood upright. "Just try to hold on, 'kay?"

"To what?!"

His reply was deafened by the sounds of their island breaking apart at its side as the Duskmetal tunnel began to tear at it. They were being funneled towards their death, and had perhaps a minute before it all ended.

"Just know that I wouldn't do this for anyone!"

Klax bashed a skeletal head against his foot. "What?"

"I'm just saying – uh – nevermind!"

A series of mold-covered bone-knives flew towards Tara as she wobbled, trying to get a good position for – whatever the hell it was she was about to do. The Drowned Dead had noticed her ascent, and were intent on bringing her down.

Klax spotted the archers and sent a punch into the ground, knocking them right back into the dark waters from whence they were spawned.

"Need any help, or-"

"I – mm – need time!"

The sounds she was making on top of his shoulders was unlie anything the old Lycae had heard in all his many years on the battlefield.

"That happens to be the one commodity we don't have!"

He spun, holding her feet with one arm, and cracked a chorus of approaching skulls before they could bite through his shoulder.

"Alright," he heard his Minxit companion groan. "Here goes – I – huak!"

The next moment occurred as though it was an extremely uncomfortable dream – Klax brained one more Undead before he heard Tara give a heaving wretch on top of him, and as he looked to the skies he saw something small, spherical, and very, very hairy shoot out of her mouth towards the ceiling.

A furball.

And it was…burning?

"Tara, what-"

Once again, his question was drowned out by the sound of the explosion that mushroomed out above them as soon as the furball made contact with the roof of the cave. Stalactites and rubble rained down on their enemies, and Tara gave Klax a quick kick, pointing towards the hole she'd just made above."

"Time to go!"

Klax didn't waste time being confused. As the entire roof of the cavern crumbled around them, he activated his Lycan Leap and held Tara's ankles tight as he did so. He soared above the crashing island, seeing it finally impact the spike wall at the end of the hallway and totally break apart, taking the remaining Undead warriors with it.

"Look out!"

Tara's call was accompanied by another stout kick against his cheek. More rubble and debris were falling all around them, and it took all of Klax's dexterity to weave from one falling rock to another, putting every bit of his Monk Dexterity to the test as he took them higher into the breach.

"There! I see a chamber!"

Tara wasn't wrong. The crumbling rocks had given way to a Duskmetal room that looked like a part of the inner facility.

Safety…or at least a room safer than where they'd come from.

But the falling rocks didn't exactly let up. He could feel his paws slipping on the wet stalactites. He could feel his strength failing him.

He didn't know if he could make the jump.

"Remember what you said…about getting old?"

Tara kicked him hard against his snout, her ass practically pressing down against his cranium.

"No time for that, Dogbrain!" she howled. "It's now or never!"

He grunted, steeled himself, and gripped her thighs with more strength than he'd honestly intended to.

"Alright, hang on!"

Then…he jumped.

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