Morgue – https://pastebin.com/79mjpHPm

Shagga dodged the giant spiked club as it whistled through the air, a decapitating blow missing his head by inches. He was very close to death, bleeding freely from numerous wounds which his chain mail had failed to stop. As the ogre lifted the club in a show of inhuman strength, grunting to raise it over its head, ten feet above the ground, Shagga unstoppered a potion of healing from his belt and quaffed it in one gulp. The ogre blinked in surprise; this minotaur had been about to fall over, swaying on his feet, his weapon arm slowed due to the spikes lodged in it which had broken off from the ogre’s club. Now he was looking rejuvenated, rolling his shoulders and beckoning with an arm. Had the ogre been able to speak intelligibly, he would’ve yelled “Not fair!” However the ogre, being an ogre, and the dungeon, being the dungeon, was not a combination which made for flourishing conversation. He grunted again and prepared to swing his club to finish the contest. But the minotaur had been given a second chance to live and was not about to let it slip. He lunged forward, puncturing the ogre’s thick hide with his horns, and brought his war-axe crashing on the ogre’s foot. He would’ve tried to cut the ogre’s head off but it was too high up and he didn’t want to risk catching another blow from the giant spiked club. The ogre, rather unobligingly, found hitherto undiscovered reserves of speed when the axe ruined his foot, and brought the club crashing down on Shagga’s back, almost breaking it in twain. Shagga struggled to straighten, knew he was back on the verge of death, and berserked.

The world turned red. He was distantly aware that his mouth was twisted in a maniacal grin, and snorting high-pitched laughter bubbled from it. He heard faint voices urging him on. The spirits of warriors long dead were gathering to see the impending violence. The ogre’s eyes widened in fear and it mixed with his own bloodlust into a heady mixture as he charged and crashed into the ogre with redoubled strength and speed, lifting the massive brute off his feet and smashing him into the rock wall behind him with bone-breaking force. The ogre sat down hard on his rump, stunned. This brought his head within easy reach of the crazed minotaur’s axe, and it was parted from the trunk with one smooth stroke. Shagga butchered the dead corpse with wild abandon and feasted on the chunks. Trog was pleased to see his servant’s handiwork and ended the berserking. The world returned to normal colours, drab brown and grey of the dungeon walls and floors, much to Shagga’s relief. He collapsed, knowing that he would not be able to put up much of a resistance to even a rat in that moment. Though he would never admit it aloud, for both embarrasement and fear, he did not like drawing upon Trog’s abilities. Berserking especially, left him famished and exhausted, moving like a minotaur twice his age. He was not one to turn away from bloodletting or sniff at killing, being a healthy and wholesome minotaur who found his life’s purpose in turning moo-ving bodies into non-moo-ving bodies and moo-wing down people in general. But even he was shaken by the grisly work that Trog inspired.

Shagga’s fast regeneration rate allowed him to mend even broken bones within a few hours. Which was fortunate, given that he had a limited supply of permanent food and the ogre’s body soon rotted. He could not camp for long in the dungeon. Although after he had cleared a floor there wouldn’t be any more enemies, he had another clock that was ticking against him. After he had recovered fully from the fight he explored the floor further. He was on Dungeon 5 and very far from the Orb of Zot according to the map the wizard had given. He vividly remembered the first of his many meetings with the kindly old man. Humans were rare near minotaur lands due to their simple and reasonable desire of not being featured in minotaur family gatherings on the dinner table. But the wizard was not an average human, and had appeared in a very distressing time for Shagga with an only solution. Shagga’s father had been taken by a severe sickness which made his flesh turn green and his horns brittle and dull. The village shaman had been at a loss. Only the wizard had known what the sickness was, and he said he could cure it, but for the cure he required the Orb of Zot. Shagga’s mother had gasped. They all knew the Orb was a fabled artefact but the details were murky. What they did know was that adventurers from all around the world were always journeying to the underground to find it but few returned, none successful in their quest. Shagga had looked at his father’s proud face, now wasting away, and asked the wizard for instructions and directions. Only because of him did Shagga know the general order of the dungeon branches and the various unique creatures that guarded it. He had entered the dungeon, apprehensive and wary, but had found only little rats, a few goblins and kobolds, and other small creatures guarding the first few levels. He realized now that it had lulled him into a false sense of security.

He was snapped out of his reverie by the sound of something cracking hard and a yelp of pain. He carefully inched forward and peered around the edge of the wall. There was a band of four humans in ragged robes torn and dirty, shuffling forward in misery and abject despair. Shepherding them from behind came a kobold, but unlike any Shagga had seen before. For one, his gait was upright and confident, and he was large for a kobold, almost as big as the humans he owned. Pikel was a slaver, and for a minotaur he was immediately despicable. He stepped out from behind the wall. Pikel started and the yelled at the humans to attack the minotaur. Shagga didn’t envy their lot. Being whipped by their kobold master to strike against a well-armoured seven foot tall bullman wielding a war axe. Such was life and Shagga drove into them, whirling his axe as the malnourished humans scrabbled at him with their bare hands. His target was watching from a safe distance away but crouched into a ready position as Shagga ran at him, war-axe raised. He swung his whip and tangled Shagga. Moreover, the whip was branded to freeze and suddenly Shagga was chilled to the bone, every movement sending hurting needles through his body. But not for nothing was Shagga known as Stone-cold in his village, and his endurance-training took over. He spun opposite to the coil of the whip and loosened it. Then he cut off the hand holding the whip and next the head of the slaver. Pikel’s head spun through the air and fell at the feet of one of the surviving slaves. He kicked at it instinctively and then cowered, terrified. Shagga said “I have slain your master. Will you seek to avenge him?” All of them shook their heads together. “Well, I must carry on with my quest, but you should head upwards and reach the surface. There is a town five miles away to the east. Tell them Shagga sent you and you will be provided with food and lodging.” They cried and whispered their gratitude, careful not to be too loud in their jubilation, for they were humans, and retained their sense of self-preservation in all circumstances.

Shagga continued to explore the floor. After some time he entered a hall he had previously gone through. It had four entrances, and he saw two of the humans at one entrance. At the other end of the hall, stood a centaur holding a longbow. Shagga’s mind raced. He went through the route he had just taken. All long corridoors with no breaks. No cover. While he retreated, he would be peppered with arrows. Centaurs were fast, both in their movement and their actions. He had found a number of potions and scrolls but had yet to identify them, leaving identification for after he had cleared Dungeon 5. It was dangerous to use consumables without identifying them. He did what minotaurs did best – lowered his head and charged. He didn’t berserk for Trog was capricious and could end it before he had finished running across the hall, and then he would be at the mercy of the centaur, exhausted and slow. He ran as fast as he could and waited for the arrows. He heard twangs but felt no pain. He could puzzle over it later but for now he was grateful to Trog and reached the centaur. Shagga had only one code of war – do what brings victory in the speediest manner. So he swung his war-axe at the centaur’s knees, where he was most vulnerable. The centaur moved quickly, rearing up on his hindlegs to dodge the it and pulling out a longsword. Their blades clashed thrice in rapid succession. But Shagga had taken away the centaur’s main advantage – his range and motility. In minutes the fight was over and Shagga wiped his war-axe on the centaur’s barding. He remembered the centaur shooting and arrows flying wide. They hadn’t; each and every arrow had flown true and found its mark. He turned and saw both the former human slaves lying dead on the ground. So they had decided to repay Shagga in a futile act of valour. Well, it had saved him from the pain of three arrows sticking in him. He sighed and finished exploring the floor.

When he entered the next level, Dungeon 6, he heard sand falling nosily. The dungeon was usually silent, waiting for the next adventurer or meal. Noises carried far and easily. He had identified all his consumables on level 5 and so knew what to do. The wizard had mentioned special branches and timed portals. The Ossuary would have good loot. He read a scroll of magic mapping and gasped softly as the level’s layout imprinted itself in his mind. He set out towards the Ossuary and found the entrance, a sand-covered pyramid of human-height. He stepped through the door and gasped again. He was in a big hallway which should have been impossible given the pyramid had been the hize of a human hut. Magic was afoot and he could feel Trog fuming. The hallway was even more silent than the dungeon and his footsteps echoed through the Ossuary. Lurching from one of the side-corridoors came zombies. They were of every kind, from small leopard-gecko ones to large centaur-warrior ones. Time and undeath had not been kind to their agility, and Shagga whirled easily through their slow and halting attacks. Soon, all that remained of them was a pile of bones and dust around him. He fought through some other groups and reached a room with an alarm trap on the doorway. He had yet to find any loot so he knew the main vault of the Ossuary would be inside with loot and more guards. He decided he had already fought through half of the guards and had come too far to turn back now. He stepped on the alarm trap. Nothing happened. He became aware then, of a soft red glow around him. Looking up, he found its source. There was a skull with crossbones under it, glowing red. In front of him, all the doors in the room opened simulaneously and zombies and mummies came shuffling out. There were too many, he would need to berserk. Quickly chewing on a loaf of bread to sustain him, he called on Trog and breathed in deeply as power flooded him. The world turned red and the zombies didn’t know what hit them. Some time later he staggered on tired feet as he rifled through the potions, scrolls, wands, and enchanted rings which were the loot.

On level 9 after fighting a group of ogre and troll zombies a branded battleaxe appeared at his feet. Trog had gifted his servant and it was best to appear grateful, although he knew for his work so far he deserved an executioner’s axe. Atleast the brand was antimagic, one of the rarest in the world, and usually only found through worshipping Trog. As he explored that level he felt a disturbance in the air right in front of him. Diving to the ground he felt something swoosh above him, where his head had been a moment ago. This something turned out to be a sky beast. It couldn’t stay invisible for long, and flickered back into view as Shagga lured it to the upstairs. It was a strange aerial creature formed of clouds and tortured flesh that sparkled with electricity. He was about to take it upstairs and have a word with it in private, on a fully explored and cleared level. But he was still far from the stairs and too late he realized he shouldn’t have explored in a circle which took him away from them. Erica came from behind the sky beast and promptly fired a venom bolt towards them both. It hit the sky beast and made it scream satisfyingly, but Shagga’s satisfaction was shortlived as it passed through the sky beast and hit him too. He felt sick, almost disgorging the contents of his stomach in one go. He needed a potion of curing soon or he’d die of the powerful poison. He shouldn’t have been surprised at Erica’s ruthlessness. Ever a warrior, he was thinking of how he could eliminate both threats. The sky beast was blocking Erica so he couldn’t reach her directly. However it also protected him since he knew that she wouldn’t shoot through the sky beast too much because its electric attacks were effective against the chainmail-clad minotaur. Enemy of the enemy is my friend. At least in theory. He decided he would quaff a potion of curing and then go berserk which would give him greater resilience to the electric attacks (not resistance, mind you) and cut through both of them in no time. Once he had closed the gap between the witch and himself she would feel the bite of his antimagic axe and then he woud see how she cast her accursed spells. Yes, this is what he would do. Things would have gone fine had he remembered that Erica could cast Confuse and invoked Trog’s Hand to protect himself. But the poison was melting him from the inside and maybe that made it slip from his mind. Erica did just that and Shagga’s mind swam; the dungeon walls and floors started swirling around him, Erica was walking on the ceiling grinning evilly. The sky beast flickered back into invisibility while Shagga stumbled around swinging wildly at nothing. “I could hurt myself like this,” he thought. Another venom bolt hit him and this time it missed the sky beast. It reached him and began pecking at his chest, trying to reach his heart through his chainmail, shocking him ever so often. Maybe it was the melting of his innards or the shocks, but it cleared his head and he ripped open a scroll of teleportation, and prayed. After a few infinitely long moments in which Erica turned invisible and presumably began to stalk towards him, he was compressed into a single point in the space-time continuum and then ejected out of the ether to another part of the dungeon. Thankfully the stairs were nearby and after regaining his senses he took them and rested to full health.

On Dungeon 10 he found a pair of the boots of running from a shop, which would enable him to run unnaturally fast. Very important for escaping the gullets of the denizens of the dungeon. He would’ve asked the secretive and reclusive shopkeeper for more details and tips on the dungeon and obtaining the Orb of Zot, but all he would say is “No refunds.” and “My, that is a beautiful battleaxe you’ve got there. Now say, in which branch of the dungeon are you going to di- rest first?” Shagga didn’t reply in turn, which served him right. He used a scroll of enchant armour to make the boots more protective. He also found a scarf of resistance which gave him resistance from both fire and cold; it would prove invaluable in the long run. By Dungeon 12 he had become what would be called in the outside the world an experienced adventurer. He had taken a stone arrow from a gargoyle to the face (not a pleasant experience), ran frantically from a two-headed ogre wielding a dire flail of draining whilst taking advantage of his low armour to blast him with a wand of scattershot, and slain a hydra with said dire flail taken from the corpse of the ogre (his battleaxe was of no use as blades cut off the hydra’s head easily and it would regrow two more when one was chopped off). He eventually found the entrance to the Lair and took it as he had found a source of poison resistance beforehand. He cut his way through the various beasts and reptiles of the Lair, and reached its bottommost level without incident. There he was surrounded by molten gargoyles and komodo dragons and wounded seriously as he didn’t have a source of fire resistance yet except the scarf. He knew by the time a scroll of teleportation acted he could die so he prayed to Trog for a brother in arms. Trog for his part responded by sending a berserk iron troll which was frothing at the mouth and scared Shagga as much as his enemies. He made short work of everything and then stood facing Shagga, breathing heavily, claws sheathing and unsheathing spasmodically. Shagga explored the rest of Lair 6 with him, too nervous to even rest. He found a ring of protection from fire and opened the final vault, containing a single fire dragon. Since he had just asked Trog for a big favour and he didn’t want to presume too much on his munificence, he decided to handle the fire dragon by himself. He was glad to have drank the potion of experience on dungeon 10. His newfound knowledge of the art of swinging axes and lopping heads off stood him in good stead in the contest. So did his two degrees of fire resistance. Dodging the tail slaps and weathering the fiery breath of the fire dragon, he hacked at it methodically till the giant beast fell dead at his feet. This feat had made him the unparalleled hero of his village, but Shagga was nothing if not focused, and he moved on, hungry for the Orb of Zot.

He next went to the Orcish Mines and made merry with his battleaxe amongst the orcs and orc priests. He was annoyed when the orc priests would smite him to deal large amounts of damage from far away, and he returned the favour by shooting them with sling bullets from his hunting sling. Through a combination of luring and stairdancing (taking monsters with him to a fully explored level above) he cleared Orc 1. Orc 2 saw more powerful orcs appear, including orc knights, orc sorcerors, orc high priests and even an orc warlord. Surrounded away from the stairs and halfway to death, he desperately summoned a deep troll from Trog who went berserk and started slaughtering everyone around him indiscriminately. At the end of that fight Nessos arrived at the very edge of Shagga’s line-of-sight. Nessos was a legend, a centaur warrior who who had slain a mighty hydra. His intention, as it became apparent from his unsheathed bow and fixed hunter-gaze, was not to get-together with his fellow hydra-slayer and swap quest stories over a campfire in the Orcish Mines, but instead to stop a fellow adventurer from reaching the Orb of Zot before him. He started shooting arrows, coated in the poisonous blood of the hydra he had slain so long ago. Fortunately the deep troll was still present with Shagga, and still berserk with thirst for blood. He shouted at the deep troll to attack Nessos and it rushed towards him, and slashed its long claws at empty air. Nessos had blinked away and was calmly shooting Shagga with arrows, knowing that if the summoner was killed, the deep troll would vanish in a puff of smoke. This happened a couple of times after which Shagga was badly hurt and poisoned. He threw poisoned javelins at Nessos but to no avail, he dodged them all easily. What it did achieve was, as Shagga had hoped, was him forgetting to blink. The deep troll was very angry at this elusive opponent and put on a burst of speed which caught Nessos once, piercing him deeply with his claws. Nessos blinked again and shot Shagga full of arrows which both burnt (due to the flaming brand on Nessos’ longbow) and poisoned him. But he was slowing down and dripping blood from the deep troll’s attacks and maybe it was that, or his magic ran out, but he wagered his life on killing Shagga before the deep troll reached him. Shagga on the other hand had other ideas, ideas which came almost too late, and quaffed a potion of healing. His health returned and Nessos was ripped apart by the deep troll, after which it vanished in a puff of smoke before Shagga could thank it, clearly a troll of few words and much deadliness. Shagga realized he could’ve used a potion of haste to speed up and rush Nessos but he knew Nessos had haste as an ability too and the wily centaur-warrior may have outmatched him. He was genuinely thankful to Trog for providing him with these brothers in arms.

The wizard had told him he needed three runes to enter the realm of Zot, where the Orb of Zot was kept. They were stored in the lowest levels of the dungeon side-branches. He decided to go to Spider Nest before Shoals as he had weak armour and no resistance to cold, and he wasn’t keen on encountering merfolk with their ranged attacks and polearms. Spider 1 was no laughing matter. The welcoming committee consisted of packs of redback spiders and Azrael hurling damnation at him from far away, hitting friend and foe alike. He stairdanced them all, glad that they were all near the stairs because he didn’t know how he would’ve survived had they cornered him away from the stairs. Thus began the slow process of luring spiders to stairs with javelins and sling-bullets and killing them in small manageable groups. He cleared Spider Nest in this vein without incident, save for once when his summoned troll was poisoned to death by wolf-spiders and three tarantellas confused him at once. He came out of his confused and bewildered state just in time to read a scroll of teleportation and land close to the stairs. An entropy weaver was blocking his path and corroded his weapons. It was a gaunt humanoid with flaking, pale chitin and spindly limbs ending in razor-sharp talons. He had to kill it with another summoned troll after his summoned ogre died in one hit from it. From the Spider Nest he obtained the gossamer rune. He dipped his toes into Shoals but soon got out. The slippery terrain full of water and the ranged attacks of the merfolk scared him away and forced him to go to Vaults. The Vaults were full of loot and strong guardians who didn’t like snooping adventurers. On Vaults 2 a necromancer cast Agony and cut his health in half in one turn. He had to make a speedy departure from that level and rest. This served as a reminder that he should cast Trog’s Hand in front of any dangerous magic users. As for Trog, He was most pleased with his servant, who was steadily demolishing the many magic users of the dungeon and kept gifting him weapons with various brands, not all of them useful. Of course, Shagga didn’t complain. One accepted Trog’s will with a grateful and humble attitude. The Wrathful God was known for His… wrath.

On Vaults 3 he blasted two boggarts with a wand of disintegration. He was glad that they were in range and didn’t blink away like Nessos because then he would have been in trouble. Their shadow creatures could cascade and fill the dungeon around him, as boggarts could summon more boggarts. They could even turn invisible so if a bunch of monsters suddenly surrounded Shagga, he knew who was to blame. Up to this point his strategy against ironbrand convokers had been simple – kill them before they could cast word of recall. One one occasion his way to the convoker was blocked by many two-headed ogres and even for a minotaur of his means it took a while before he could make his way to the convoker. By then it had cast the word of recall and suddenly the space around him was filled with monsters from other parts of the level. He rushed back upstairs, healed and came down, at which point a vault warden sealed the doors and upstairs, effectively trapping Shagga in the room. He stood and fought, bringing down monster after monster, but the enemies down in the vaults were better trained and smarter. Four yaktaurs encircled him and shot at him with arrows while the melee brutes like deep trolls and ogres kept him engaged. He read a scroll of fog to reduce visibility of the yaktaurs on him and dealt with the monsters in range of his axe. All they saw was a terrifying vision of a large armoured figure coming out of the dense cloud and then no more. By the time the fog subsided he had killed all the monsters nearby which left the yaktaurs still shooting. He evoked a sack of spiders which summoned dangerous redbacks and fast moving wolf spiders to keep the yaktaurs busy while he reached close enough to let them taste the bite of his antimagic executioner’s axe (which he had received from Trog and enchanted to the maximum point). In Vaults 4 he met a rakshasa which blocked the doorway which he had planned to use to fight out of sight of the rest of the floor. The rakshasa produced many illusions of itself and Shagga had no way of knowing which was the real one. Meanwhile a stone giant was pelting him with large rocks from half way across the hall he was forced to stand in (since he couldn’t go in the room the rakshasa was blocking). He summoned an iron troll who soaked up the ranged damage of the stone giant, making it close the distance between them. This gave him time to destroy the rakshasa illusions. His antimagic executioner’s axe came in use here. As the rakshasa’s magic leaked into the air, it couldn’t produce illusions anymore. Which was just as well, as fighting a shape-changing foe which could change from a tiger to a huge blue skinned demon with shiny fangs was difficult enough for Shagga. The stone giant reached the iron troll and felled it in one giant blow. Then Shagga felled the stone giant in three giant blows.

On Vaults 4 he ran into a kobold demonologist surrounded by deep elf warriors and a deep elf annihilator. The kobold summoned tormentors who tormented him halfway to death and executioners (a horribly powerful and swift demon, its shape obscured by a cloud of swirling scythe-like blades). He was forced to take drastic action. He read a scroll of holy word which instantly left the demons almost dead and dazed them. Next he read a scroll of summoning to summon allied vault guards. That marked the only time he was relieved to see pesky humans near him. He killed the deep elf archers and the annihilator, catching an iron shot in the process but managing to stay on his feet (his armour was seriously outclassed at this point, an enchanted chain mail wouldn’t keep him alive for much longer) and finally gutted the small kobold demonologist. Without his magic he was just a dog-like coward who couldn’t fight to save his own life, and didn’t. Then he went back and completed Shoals, which for an adventurer of his experience, was a cakewalk (apart from the simple merman wielding a trident of distrortion(!), taken care of by his summoned troll). Having obtained two runes he looked forward to tackling Vault 5 next. Before that he bought an enchanted crystal plate armour which gave him both fire and poison resistance from a shop in the Orcish Mines. His worries about armour were over and he discarded his chainmail with pleasure. He knew the Vault 5 layout would be stairs only in the middle of the floor with vault guards waiting around it in a circle so instead he took an escape hatch down one of the quadrants. Before that he buffed himself up with a potion of might and a potion of agility, took a deep breath, and shimmied down the hatch. He landed in a quarter which didn’t have many monsters. At this point, with his fully enchanted weapon and the resistances he had accrued from the various pieces of jewellery found in the dungeon, he could comfortably take on multiple dragons and titans, only needing to call on Trog summons if things got out of hand or berserk as a last resort. He read a scroll of magic mapping and set about clearing the quadrants. But he met his match in the middle of the third quadrant, when he was in the middle of clearing the centre of the floor. Mara, Lord of Illusions, mighty among dreamers walked slowly from behind a wall.

“You have been making a lot of noise, little one. Time to go to sleep.” This speech would have been laughable from anyone else, Shagga being a full seven feet tall, not including his horns. But Mara was taller than the best bred ogre. The air darkened around Shagga and he felt a weariness that had nothing to do with the fighting. Shaking his head to dispel the fatigue, he charged at Mara, only to stop in wonder as three Maras smiled at him, their eyes glittering and stars swimming in them. The demon-lord had a few tricks up his sleeve. A deadly dance began as all the illusions, Mara presumably among them, began to slice at Shagga with their claws. He summoned an iron troll and together they obliterated them quickly. Then Mara created an illusion of Shagga. It was very real and wielding the same enchanted antimagic executioner’s axe that Shagga was. Shagga was just thankful that he hadn’t berserked when the illusion had been created, as that would have given all his augmented might and speed to the illusion as well, and a berserk Shagga, while favourable on most days, was not a person to have opposing you. He looked at his copy, feeling very strange and unsettled. He kept thinking if he changed his expression his copy would too. He frowned hard to test this theory. His illusion instead gave a lopsided smile. His teeth were just a little more fanglike than Shagga’s. His illusion whirled his axe into Shagga’s side and Shagga’s little insignificant magic leaked out into the air. Good thing Shagga didn’t have the magical aptitude to light a candle. He started chasing Mara who was blinking away while the iron troll battled his illusion. He knew this arrangement was shortlived, any moment now his troll would be vanquished. After all, Shagga knew his own calibre. During all of this a vault sentinel arrived and placed a sentinel’s mark on him which started attracting all the floor’s monsters towards his location. Shagga was at very low health, having been hit by a Lehudib’s crystal spear from a deep elf annihilator and gave up the hopeless chase of Mara as a lost cause. He already had the rune, he could enter the realm of Zot now, he needed to stay focused and remember his priorities. He read a scroll of blinking and was transferred to a location of his choosing, very close to the stairs (the limit of the scroll’s capacity). He ran upstairs and rested. Fortunately no one followed him and the sentinel’s mark faded away. Then he paused. Demon-lord or not, he was not going to run away from his own copy. It was a personal insult to him. He walked back down and berserked. Admittedly it was a bad plan. Had Mara blinked out of range a lot of times his increased speed would have ran out and left him exhausted and slow. Furthermore the Mara he hit might not have been the real one. His main worry was his own illusion, which should have dissipated by now. If Mara brought him back he would be left helpless. But his new speed, combined with his boots of running, let him catch up to Mara before he could cast any illusions and he obliterated the demon-lord before he could so much as blink (ha!). Mara ducked and weaved, feinted and parried, but he could not match Shagga’s berserked quickness. Mara’s death marked a turning point in Shagga’s adventure. From hereonwards things were much easier and Shagga could hold his own against the dungeon’s inhabitants. Or so he thought.

He cleared the Depths easily, only having to run away from a flayed ghost once. Finally he unlocked the door leading to the realm of Zot. The gate opened with a hiss and he climbed downwards. He had saved his scrolls of mapping for Vaults 5 and the realm of Zot and he used them now. Zot 1-4 was smooth sailing since he had electric resistance against electric golems and his enchanted crystal plate armour protected him from the many draconians and golden dragons. Killer klowns were more of a worry, because he could not predict the kind of damage they would do, but his antimagic executioner’s axe let him hold his own against them too. The only real threats were cursed skulls, which could torment him to half his health, and orbs of fire, which could malmutate him. He gained and lost a series of mutations from fighting orbs of fire (he made sure to wear jewellery to give him third degree resistance to fire first) and from quaffing potions of mutations to get rid of them. He had been saving up these potions from the beginning, heeding the warning of the wizard that mutations could end his run abruptly. There were some truly terrible mutations out there. He caught one of them, the mutation which teleported him right next to monsters occasionally, but fortunately was able to remove it with a potion of mutation. Another threat were ancient liches (powerful wizards who have learned to cheat death itself, now existing as skeletal, desiccated corpses kept intact by a extreme exercise of dark magic). One of them met Shagga in the orb chamber lung, losing no time in summoning greater demons and sending force lances at him, sending him crashing into the glowing purple Zot walls. He was lucky that he hadn’t landed on a Zot trap, which could do anything from summoning several terrifying monsters to banishing him to the Abyss (a truly horrible everchanging place where he had no desire to go if he had his way). But Shagga had had enough of being toyed around by magical forces, and after using Trog’s Hand to keep him safe from banishment, he summoned a few iron trolls and cut the ancient lich down to size. He finally prepared himself for the orbrun, the final part of his journey, and gazed upon the Orb kept in the centre of the orb chamber. The Orb of Zot, the goal of his quest, the object of his dreams, for which he had trained all these past months and which could save his father (or so the wizard assured him). It didn’t seem like a fabled artefact of legends, looking like a dragon-egg sized purple stone. He picked it up.

It let out a piercing shriek and started glowing with a deep violet aura. He tried putting it back but it was stuck fast to his hand. He knew what would come now, the entire dungeon was being alerted to the attempted theft of the Orb (there were several branches, such as Hell and Pandemonium, that he hadn’t dared step in). He started cautiously making his way back to the upstairs around the many traps his exploration has revealed in the chamber. Then he looked up and started running. For the orb lungs were full of demons and amidst them stood a Pandemonium lord. He was, like Mara, very tall, and stood with the solid self-assurance that came naturally to those who were used to being in command. He gestured and hellwings flew towards him. An ice fiend cast bolt of cold and it hit him squarely in the abdomen. But Shagga had the maximum degree of both cold and fire resistance due to some fortunate mutations that he had gained as a result of gulping down so many potions of mutations perilously. He simply shrugged off the bolts and started running towards the stairs, trusting in his boots of running to outdistance the pursuing enemies. But his way was blocked by an orb of fire. While at this point he could kill the orb without breaking a sweat, it would waste valuable time which would allow his pursuers to catch up to him; what he didn’t want was to fight a pandemonium lord in single combat. Here he would have to deal with his summons too. So he quaffed a potion of haste and read as scroll of teleportation. The first time he ended up in the innermost sanctum of the orb chamber and the second time he ended in sight of the Pandemonium lord. But the third time was a charm, and took him right next to the staircase. He started running madly, going back up the way he had come, passing the Depths and reaching the main dungeon proper. He would frequently be interrupted with Orb guardians (four-armed purple humanoid creatures shaped by the Orb of Zot itself for its defense). But at this stage, he could deal with anything the dungeon could throw at him, short of sources of torment damage and Pandemonium Lords. His boots of running proved invaluable and let him reach the upper floors of the dungeon without being overly harassed. His way to the final upstairs leading out of the dungeon was blocked by a green death and an ice fiend. The green death blew out a venomous cloud which engulfed the ice fiend. It seemed excitement was contagious and the green death had been infected by Shagga. Shagga barrelled past them, not even bothering to fight, and climbed upstairs to taste the fresh air and victory. The denizens of the dungeon would die if made to breath surface air, so he knew he was safe. Now to make sure the wizard didn’t double cross him…

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