This is a continuation of the Mortis Custos Part 33 by 
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Viewer discretion is advised due to gory violence! Undead! Swords! Death! Beware!
He could feel it in the distance.
It was more than his sense for magic. Adiran always needed to be able to tell when something magical in nature was afoot. It came as part and parcel of his function in the Kingdom, keeping everyone safe from the undead threat and struggling to fix the things that he had broken.
"Do you feel that Mage?" Helga asked him.
"What?" He asked. His reminiscing on the past was interrupted. He had forgotten about Helga for a moment. Forgotten about where he was. Forgotten about when he was. His mind had clouded over with future possibilities and past hurts. He blinked and rubbed his eyes. He had a pounding headache. "Feel what?"
"There!" She pointed with her one good wing. "In that direction where the landscape gets darker. There is a feeling... there is power..."
"I do." He agreed. "What does it feel like to you?"
The harpy turned to him. Her eyes were larger than a human's, like all other Harpy's. Helga's iris was a metallic teal green. In certain cultures, Harpy eyes fetched a massive price just for their ornamentation. In others, they were believed to have magical powers. Superstition though. But this has nothing to do with her sight. Her eyes were wide with fear now as she spoke a single word.
"Death."
Mortis was moving faster than Derric had ever seen a human move. Even though the knight was clad in heavy armour, heavier than the set that Magna had discarded, the knight moved as a blur.
The knight dodged and parried a horde of small tentacles, the size of the knight's forearms, lashing out and reaching for the spot where Derric stood over Magna. The knight parried and deflected each one, often severing an appendage that turned to dust as he cut them off.
The bleeding in Magna's neck had stopped, seared shut by some evil fire conjured up by the knight.
Derric had felt his blood boil at the thought of the knight feasting on his friend.
But when he wanted to attack the knight, the man... Derric was not sure what Mortis was... stared at him with eyes burning with fire, his skin was dark and crusted.
Derric shuddered.
Death.
If he had attacked the knight, he would have met only Death.
The smaller tentacles withdrew and Mortis spun in a circle, ensuring no ambush was coming their way.
The massive spire of a tentacle with all the eyes on it leaned closer to inspect Mortis.
There was a deep rumble and it spoke... or just rumbled and gurgled.
Mortis threw his head back and roared with laughter.
"Nay! You shall not pass here! You cannot have her!" The knight yelled at the monster.
The tentacle quivered and raised another appendage. This one was covered in bulbous white knots.
These sprayed out toward Mortis and Derric. Derric knew what they meant. Creatures would come forth and swarm them.
Mortis whipped his sword through the air and a glowing sigil appeared before the knight.
Mortis stabbed his sword into the ground before him, then threw his arms back and roared.
It was not a human roar. It bellowed over the landscape like thunder. Derric fell flat and covered his ears with his paws.
He kept one eye open and tried to keep up with the battle.
Bright blazing flames roared forth from the sigil before Mortis. It followed and sprayed when the knight turned his head.
The spores were incinerated in mid flight. The flames reached beyond and poured over the appendage that spawned them and finally grazed the appendage bearing the eyes.
The massive creature shrieked, the thunder of its roar shaking the very ground. It convulsed and moved away from the fire. There was a crack as the hillside to the right side of the party cracked open. It was somehow moved into the air and placed between Mortis and the creature, shielding it from the fire.
Mortis kept his barrage of flames cast at the creature. The creature was somewhat on the defensive or at least that is what Derric thought. A massive spray of spores littered the air on the flank, not sprayed at the party.
Instead these were sprayed over the hillside to the left.
The creature's spawn will come over the hill in great numbers to surround us!
I cannot halt my attack. Mortis' thoughts slammed into Derric's mind, it felt... abrasive and sickly. Not even the Ghoul King's thoughts felt so corrupted. The knight's roar halted. The hillside was dropped slightly but the Knight used another spell and a lance of fire shot at the eye-bearing tentacle, ripping through another part of it.
Meanwhile it released more spores into the air and ducked behind its shield.
Derric then noticed that the hole left by the hillside ripped out of the ground. He reluctantly left Magna's side and ran closer to get a better view. He saw the writhing mass of unnatural flesh inside the crater.
Mortis! He yelled at the Knight. In the crater! The beast's flesh!
The Knight merely chuckled in reply.
After another blast in the direction of the creature using the hillside as a shield the Knight ran towards Derric. The Knight's fists were abalaze with magical energies.
"Get out of the way!"
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