Last issue the world devouring necromancer Imperatrix Virago and her ward Syntilla had arrived on Earth and infected Tama the Geomancer with a foul necrotic magic. A slow creeping death for the young Geomancer in order to poison the planet itself through her and make it ready for consumption for Virago. Tama's guardian Gilad the Eternal Warrior...is pissed.

As we pick up with the favored oddball pair, we see Gilad bringing his young charge to the door of the famed mystic Dr.Mirage! With the help of her ghostly husband/partner Hwen, Dr.Mirage is able to give Gilad two options to save the world: 1. He dives into a perilous journey into the Deadside, one where he has to not only race the clock to save Tama from the necrotic virus but also make it in time for Hwen to hold open his portal home. Option 2? Perform a sort of spiritual circumcision that will separate Tama's fate from the fate of the planet, only caveat being there's an almost assured chance the dissection will mean certain death for one of the two with no way to know if the girl will die or the world.

Naturally, Gilad being the gutsy immortal hero he is takes the option that involves putting an over-sized handaxe in evil things faces. The trip to the Deadside (one of my favorite locales in the Valiant univese) goes about as one would expect, good guy shows up in demon world...demons wanna kill em. The thing that makes this unique though is the small tidbits of continuity mixed in with new info for example the fact the denizens of Deadside hold Gilad in both fear and renown. Tales of his ferocity and inability to perish making him a legend among the death dimension, it's just something slight yet insanely awesome to see.

When Gilad is finally face to face with his target Syntilla, he must forego his most effective methods ( beating the crap out of things, outsmarting enemies and ya know just generally being a pro at killing anything or anyone who steps to him) and try a weapon he rarely gets to dust off: Diplomacy.