HELL. YES. The Saintly Bastards are geared, drunk, and morally compromised enough to kick in the tomb door of the Fuckin’ Lich King himself. Presented here in all-natural, RAW fashion. Enjoy.
The Tomb of the Fuckin' Lich King
Part One
They called themselves the Saintly Bastards—four vagabonds bonded by coin, sarcasm, and a mutual dislike of authority. Their journey began not with a trumpet blast or a royal summons, but with a half-remembered tavern tale and a map stained with ale and regret. Beneath the jagged hills of the Dunmarch lay the whispered resting place of the Fuckin’ Lich King, a name spoken with equal parts dread and drunken laughter.
Grobnar the Hateful led the way—an ogre-blooded brute whose solution to most things involved smashing them. Behind him stalked Sister Malady, a Tiefling cleric draped in faith and menace, her whispered prayers often sounding like threats. Sleevax the Bastard, ever-smirking, ever-armed, followed with blade and innuendo ready. Pimm Whistlesprocket brought up the rear, his gnomish frame light, but his ego far heavier.
“You sure this place is loaded with treasure?” Sleevax muttered, eying the shadows. “The last ruin you dragged us through cost more in bribes and bandages than it paid out.”
“And it smelled like wet goblin balls,” Pimm added with a scowl. “Grob’s hair still smells like ass.”
“Shut it,” Grobnar growled. “This one’s different. Feels right. Smells wrong.”
“That’s probably you,” Sleevax said, smirking.
Sister Malady ignored them all. “Keep bickering. I’ll save your souls—if there’s anything left worth saving.”
The tomb’s entrance was a mouth of shadow. They stepped inside, torches sputtering, the air thick with ancient dust and distant echoes. The first chamber—the Screaming Foyer—lived up to its name. Grotesque stone faces lined the walls, erupting into ear-shattering howls every few seconds. The Bastards spread out cautiously, inspecting the grim decor.
Malady’s sharp eyes found a hidden prize—a skull-shaped amulet that whispered secrets only she seemed to hear. “Ooh,” she murmured. “I can feel the power inside this! It whispers to me.”
Sleevax stepped back. “Yeah, no thanks. That thing’s giving me bad vibes. You keep it, Sister Creepy.”
With torchlight flickering and bones vibrating from the infernal shrieking, Pimm deciphered the arcane riddle etched above a sealed iron gate. He grinned. “I remember now—‘Pay in pain or piss in blood.’ Said it was just a joke, but look at that…”
Grobnar squinted at the gate as it melted. “Bitchin’. Guess I didn’t need to bash it down... this time.”
Beyond it lay the Hall of the Bone Choir.
Dozens of skeletons stood frozen in macabre performance, mouths agape and arms poised with decayed instruments. It was a trap—they knew it instinctively. But Grobnar, ever the impatient, scuffed a bone with his boot.
The choir erupted into a death hymn, a hellish cacophony of scraping bone and phantom shrieks that split the air like a blade to the brain. The sound clawed into their skulls, unraveling thought with each discordant note. Pimm clutched his ears, swaying as blood trickled from his nose. Sister Malady dropped to one knee, her lips moving in a half-formed prayer. Grobnar roared, more from rage than pain, and swung blindly at the air. Only Sleevax stood still, face pale but eyes sharp, lips curling into a grimace. Blood trickled from ears. Only Sleevax kept his footing.
“That is mildly annoying. Slightly out of tone, if you ask me,” Sleevax said, unfazed.
The Bastards reacted the only way they knew how: with violence. Grobnar charged first, bellowing with rage, his greatsword cleaving through ribcages like firewood. Bone splinters rained across the chamber. Sister Malady followed in righteous fury, her mace cracking skulls while scripture poured from her lips like a litany of vengeance. Pimm, nimble and feral, darted between the chaos, using his sling and short blade with surprising precision, occasionally pausing to kick a tibia out of his path with a gleeful snarl. Sleevax danced through the fray like a shadow, his rapier flicking between joints, separating limbs from torsos with surgical grace. The skeletons retaliated with unnatural coordination, their fingers clawing and instruments wailing as if mourning their own destruction. Dust rose thick as the last of the choir fell silent, shattered beneath the Bastards’ fury. Bones shattered beneath Grobnar’s swings, Sister Malady’s mace, and Pimm’s boots.
Between the chaos, Sleevax had retrieved a scroll. “Didn’t you once play Khawkaskie’s Melodies for a princess, Pimm? Or were you just boasting and full of shit?”
“Yes and yes,” Pimm grinned. “But I did play it. She cried. Could’ve been the hangover, though.”
With Sleevax’s cunning and Pimm’s theatrical performance, the cursed organ at the far end yielded to song rather than brute force. A stairwell opened.
Below, the Ossuary of Hands awaited.
Walls, ceiling, and floor writhed with skeletal arms nailed in eternal reaching, their yellowed bones twitching in fits and starts as though some buried instinct still lingered. The fingers flexed with impossible coordination, some grasping, others clawing at unseen enemies, the nails scratched raw and rust-colored. Each motion was jagged, like puppets animated by broken strings. The air stank of mildew, dust, and something older—like long-sealed crypts exhaling after centuries. The corridor pulsed with a kind of dread rhythm, as if the room itself waited to snatch the unwary into its brittle embrace. A narrow path beckoned. Sleevax led, Grobnar behind with the torch, then Malady and Pimm.
“Fuckin’ creepy guys,” Grobnar muttered.
“Think of all the people who gave up an arm to decorate this place,” Pimm whispered with a chuckle.
Grobnar, half-listening, reached out and brushed a wall.
The arms responded.
With a sudden lurch, the wall came alive—hundreds of skeletal arms erupting from their frozen poses. Grobnar had barely touched the surface when the nearest hand snapped around his wrist like a vice. Others followed, climbing over one another, clawing up his body, latching onto armor, flesh, and hair. They surged in waves, rattling like dry branches in a storm, dragging him backward into the wall itself.
He shouted—once—a guttural bellow of fury that turned quickly to a strangled grunt. The arms piled higher, smothering him, burying him in bone until the wall seemed to collapse inward, swallowing the brute whole beneath a tide of ancient limbs.
"Grobnar!" Malady hissed, already moving. The others were on him in an instant, pulling, hacking, kicking limbs away. The wall resisted, arms flailing and seizing anything they could reach.
With a final heave, they yanked him free, battered, bloodied, and limp. His chest barely moved.
Malady dropped to her knees beside him, fingers glowing with celestial fire. She pressed her palm to his sternum. With a whispered curse and prayer woven into one, the divine energy surged into his chest.
Grobnar groaned, his eyes fluttering open. "Ugh... fuckin’ arms..."
"You’re welcome," Malady muttered, already standing, her hand still faintly aglow.
Vax kicked him lightly. “Up and at it, big guy. That wench at the Saucy Tart’s waiting for me.”
“Hope she likes blood and bone dust,” Grobnar grumbled.
Sleevax drew his rapier and made a vaguely lewd gesture. “That’ll be the least of her worries. You coming, or do I have to do all the hard work?”
The arms calmed. Malady’s gaze swept the carnage, drawn to a strange glint beneath the shifting bones. She knelt and gently pried loose a gilded skeletal hand, its golden surface dulled by dust but worn smooth at the fingertips—as if reverently touched by generations. Not far from it, a second artifact caught her eye: a hand forged of black iron, unnaturally cold even in the close, torch-lit air. She hesitated before grasping it, a flicker of unease tugging at her gut. These weren’t mere decorations. They had been placed here with intent, and whatever lay beyond would demand their use.
They lingered at the edge of the room, ash and bone still settling in the torchlight. Sleevax was the first to speak. “We heading back, or are we letting Sister Creepy sniff another relic?”
“I say we press on,” Malady said, eyes locked on the darkened path beyond. “The auras here are ancient. Hungry. We’re close to something sacred—or damned.”
Grobnar grunted from his seat against the wall. “I nearly got turned into bonemeal. I’m gettin’ an ale and a nap. In that order.”
Sleevax scoffed. “You soft bastard. But fine. We’ll go tuck you in.” He turned and added with a wink, “Besides, that pretty little barmaid at the Saucy Tart promised to cry if I didn’t make it back.”
“Cry from relief, maybe,” Pimm muttered, rolling his eyes.
The Bastards gathered their gear, battered and bruised but not broken, and turned toward the exit. They would rest. Regroup. Return to town to drink, sharpen steel, and forget the song that still echoed faintly in the back of their minds.
The tomb had only begun to open.
And the Fuckin’ Lich King was still waiting.
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