The first thing Min noticed as she entered the room was the awful smell it had. Like the wet hair of a stray dog multiplied by a hundred. It was fitting, seeing as there was a whole herd of animals tightly packed in the enclosed space.
The ambiance was so dreadful that the fairies refused to follow the party inside. Or at least that´s the excuse they gave when they flew back towards the antechamber.
The room was a big circular chamber filled with an army of animals trying to push each other to reach the center. They were held at bay by a group of busy skeletons pushing them back with brooms.
Behind the undead monsters, a cauldron cooked a green, bubbling liquid. The cauldron was in the middle of a magic pentagram drawn on the center of the room, with lit candles burning purple fire at each tip.
"Ok, so good news, we found the missing animals," Min said. "But also skeletons!?"
"How can there be skeletons? I thought you said this was the result of a natural curse!" Celeria asked Liana.
"Apparently, I was wrong. Eeeexcuse me!"
"Then, someone summoned those skeletons and the livestock. But who and why?"
"Do you think it was a necromancer or a lich?" Min asked.
"Impossible. The last recorded necromancer supposedly lived in the time before the Disaster of the Burning Skies."
"Sooooo... lich?"
"That´s even more improbable."
"So, what? The skeletons spontaneously decided to get up from their coffins and have a barbeque?"
"Maybe! That´s more likely than a lich!"
"Well, I thi-"
"It doesn´t matter. What matters is interrupting whatever is going on and getting the animals back out. How did they get inside in the first place?" Celeria tried to get the party back on track.
"Hmm, Celeria?" Peonie pointed at the far wall. Or rather, at what remained of it. It had collapsed. The party could see the sunlight and the trees outside. "Look, there was another entrance. Why didn´t we come in from over there?"
"Yes, oh, peerless elven scout. I thought you scouted all the possible entrances?" Liana asked mockingly. The whole party had turned around to glare at the elf as they waited for her explanation. Celeria shrank her shoulders under the weight of her teammates' stares.
"I-err, I guess I missed that entrance. Whoops? In my defense, I didn´t think it mattered which hole in the walls we picked to get inside."
"Didn´t matter, huh? Your defense has more holes than this castle!"
"That´s all you have to say? Whoops? I would still have my armor if we had entered from over there!"
"And I, my gambeson! Now I have to run around naked, AGAIN!"
"Peonie, first of all, if you hadn´t charged at the slime or sat at the chair, you also would still have your armor. And you! Don't you give me lip, miss: I´ll run towards the fairies with my arms out as if I wanted to hug them. It´s not my fault th-"
A high-pitched sound, similar to a steaming kettle, interrupted the argument. Two skeletal hands rose from the boiling juices of the cauldron. They grabbed the edge of the metal and pulled up. A beautiful woman surfaced from the green liquid.
The woman was a willowy and pale elf with green eyes and black hair that flowed to her waist. She was naked. The party could appreciate every inch of her snow-white skin, from the tip of her head, passing by her hairless sex, and even her dainty toes. But it was her arms that caught their attention most of all, for they were bare of anything but bones.
Despite her skeletal extremities, the woman still exuded a dignified aura of nobility. Her every movement was full of elegance and poise. Not noticing the group of adventurers crouched behind a wall of cows and horses, she stepped out of the cauldron and looked at her hands with disappointment.
She then turned around and submerged them in the potion once more.
"It's a lich! A half-death abomination!" Liana whispered.
"Called it!" Min said. "But what is she doing here?" She turned to Peonie, who had lost all color. Celeria was also looking pale as a ghost. Min was the only one who didn´t seem that bothered by the spectral woman. "Err, care to venture a guess, anyone? I honestly have zero clue."
"It´s like the legend of the Burning Skies. She returned from the grave to raise an army of the dead and bring hell to this kingdom!"
"She must have gathered the livestock to cull them and use their remains to build her legion of undead abominations!"
"We must strike now before she has an army!" Peonie said.
"Are you stupid?! We can't fight her, especially in our underwear! She is way out of our league. We must run," Liana replied.
"She doesn't know we are here. One surprise attack is all it would take. Come on Liana, at least think of the reward we'll get if we bring back her head," Celeria tried to bargain with the mage.
"It´s always about the money with you, isn´t it?" Min mumbled.
"What was that?"
Crap, the elf heard her. Her pointy ears weren´t just for show, apparently. Oh well, in for a penny... "I bet you would also want to run away if the lich turned to dust after dying and left no trophy behind."
"I´m not saying I´m going to sit this one out if you don´t dangle a sack of coins in front of my face, but if we don´t value our job, Min, no one else will. It´s called being a professional. Something you seem to have forgotten."
"A professional hoarder, perhaps! Sometimes, the only reward you need is the thanks from the grateful townspeople."
"Ah, so you work for praise, is that it? At least a hoarder is better than a glory hound!"
"I´m not a glory hound! Although, a bit of praise would be nice. I´m just saying that-"
"Err, girls, calm down. I think we agree that we all want to do the right thing here, well, maybe except Liana..."
"H-hey!"
"... Don´t worry, I´ll make sure we all get the due pay and recognition for finishing our quest, but can we please focus on saving the world first?" Peonie interjected.
While the party bickered, they failed to notice the figure walking across the sea of animals and pushing them aside. Celeria got hit in the head with the brush end of a broom. Wielding the cleaning utensil was the pale woman who had just climbed out of the cauldron, although now she had apparently normal hands and was wearing a long silk dress.
Or so it seemed. Celeria noticed that the garment was actually a magic illusion, but she doubted any of her teammates could make the distinction.
"Shoo." The woman hit Peonie this time. "My palace is no place for vagrants. Get out!"
"Ouch," Liana whimpered. It was her turn to receive punishment. "We *Oww* aren´t vagrants!"
"That's right!" proclaimed Min. "We are *Ouch* adventurers that came to stop your reign of evil before it can begin, lich!"
"Adventurers, vagrants. No difference. Shoo! Out! Wait…" The woman dropped her broom and approached Celeria. The adventurer gulped, what could the lich-
"Ack! Come on! You too?"
"You are an elf?" The pale woman said, pulling Celeria´s ears. "Huh. I´m a bit disappointed that some of my otherwise dignified kin would choose to go down this road. No offense."
"I am very offended!"
"In any case, I suppose you deserve a bit of courtesy. Let's start anew. I'm Tarienne, one of the eight regal enchantresses of the, apparently fallen, Lairut League."
Min, Peonie, and Celeria looked at each other and then nodded. The former stepped back into the herd of animals while the other two stepped forward towards Tarienne.
"I'm Liana the mage, nice to meet-"
"I don´t care who you say you are! You are an evil lich that´s about to sacrifice this land´s livestock to your dark ritual and then use their bones to build your undead army," interrupted Peonie.
"Plus, you are at the end of the dungeon, which automatically means you are evil," Celeria commented.
"Dungeon? This was my home! And the ritual I'm preparing doesn't need sacrifices. The animals came here as an unfortunate side effect of my magic that calls upon the primal energies of nature. They'll return as soon as I'm finished."
"So you are preparing a dark ritual!"
"It's not dark nor evil!"
"The skeletons and pentagram beg to differ."
Tarienne inhaled deeply. "If it will get you to calm down, I´ll tell you vagrants the full story. Eons ago, during the Crisis of the Red Skies, the Sisters turned me to dust. But because my former master gave me immortality, I could not die. I have spent the last few thousand years slowly regenerating from ashes, to a puddle, and finally, to a skeleton…"
"Dark master? And you say you were smitten by the Sisters themselves? This does sound like the origin story of a lich…"
"Let me finish, I´m not a lich! Or ...I don´t think I am? Since you boors can´t handle long stories, I´ll keep it short. As a skeleton, I made the potion back there to regain my flesh and to act as the catalyst for a ritual to summon my soul back from the Great Plain so I can become mortal again… or as mortals as we elves are."
"Lies. Are we supposed to believe your pure intentions when you have literal skeleton helpers?! Do you think they would have consented to have their remains profaned while they were still alive?" Peonie retorted.
"Hey! It´s not like I could find any other help down here! Those stubborn fairies refuse to even tell me the year without trying to extort a fee out of me!"
"Yeah, and you still owe us rent! This is our home now!" the purple fairy yelled from behind the safety of the antechamber.
"We are not falling for your lies, monster. You are going down. Min, now!" Min jumped from behind the cow she was hiding on. She grabbed Tarienne´s neck in a chokehold with her forearm, attempting to drag her down.
"Still not mortal, remember? Can´t choke me if I don't breathe, or have blood flow for that matter…" Min´s attack barely miffed Tarienne, only prompting her to wrinkle her nose. "Although... You have a familiar stench on you. One I haven´t smelled in millennia-"
"Now´s our chance. Attack!"
Without regard for her own modesty, Peonie charged towards Tarienne, a wooden branch high in hand, her chest jiggling freely as she launched her naked body forward.
The lich´s eyes glowed white with an unnatural light. Peonie swung her weapon with all her might, but it came to a stop just shy of her target's head. Something grabbed her arms and held them in place, along with her legs and torso.
Peonie struggled to move her neck and look at herself. Strings of web bound her body to the floor and ceiling. But it wasn't just her, all of her companions shared the same fate, all strung along like flies on a web.
"What?" She looked up and screamed. A cluster of dog-sized spiders inhabited the ceilings. A few of them had shot their web at the party of adventurers.
"Did you know that horses and cows aren´t the only animals my ritual attracted? But unlike the livestock, my eigh-legged friends are more pliable to suggestion."
"Ahh! She´s going to feed us to her pet spiders!"
"No! Nothing as ghoulish, and they aren´t my pets! They are barely associates! I don't have time to convince you of my intentions. The moons won't stay aligned for long, and the ritual must be complete by then. I´ll see you then, little human." Tarienne caressed Min´s cheeks. "I have to get to the bottom of your stench."
"H-hey, I´ll have you know that I bathe daily! …whenever possible."
Tarienne turned back to tend to her cauldron. The party writhed and twisted against their bonds, Peonie most desperately of all, as she was also fighting to be able to cover herself again.
After much struggle, Liana wriggled herself free by sacrificing her chemise to the web and sliding out of the garment without touching the sticky substance.
The mage shivered. Even though, she was already almost naked, losing her last garment made her feel especially vulnerable. At least there were only other naked girls there, so it wasn´t that bad. Not like they were going to mock her about it. It was kind of like she was in the baths... underground... with spiders, skeletons, and monsters.
Celeria took inspiration from Min and also wiggled herself free, albeit by ripping and sacrificing her underwear to the web. Now fully naked, she also shivered as the mage did, for pretty much the same reason. Nothing was hiding her breasts or the golden mane between her legs.
In silence, each adventurer went to work freeing the rest of the party, Peonie was cut from her web with one of Celeria´s last remaining arrows, the few ones that didn´t have metal arrowheads and were instead pure wood. Liana, meanwhile, grabbed a sharp rock and helped Min.
"I guess we are even," Min whispered as she pouted.
"Huh?"
"Cause you are saving me from the web, so we are even about the whole teleporting my clothes away thing."
"Are you still on about that?!"
"Not anymore."
Tarienne was busy with her ritual. She didn't notice the party escape. The naked adventurers hid behind a bull and huddled together to discuss what to do next.
"Hold on to me, and I'll teleport us to safety," Liana proposed.
"No, we aren't leaving the lich alone to her devices. This kingdom and all its neighbors are in danger!" Peonie retored.
"Also, I don't trust your ability to teleport anything accurately," replied Celeria.
"Me neither," Min added.
"But we can't beat her! Our only option is to run away!"
"Not necessarily, I have a plan..."
"Right, and where did your last plan leave us? Stuck on a web!"
"Maybe if you deigned yourself to help us, it would have worked!"
"That web was instantaneous. You didn´t even have enough time to pull your bowstring, how could I have cast a spell?"
"You could have bonked her in the head with your staff," Min proposed. "You don´t have to use magic for everything, you know?"
"Come on Liana. If you don´t care about the people or the reward, think about how much honor and glory this could give you. No one will remember your days as a bandit or even your time on the stocks after we beat the lich!" Peonie said.
"Yeah, eyes on the prize. A lich´s head is worth easily a castle or two," Celeria commented.
"Stop staring at me with those puppy eyes…" Liana growled. She hid her eyes under the palm on her hand and uttered a silent cursed under her lips. "Can´t believe I´m doing this… Fiiinne. But I´m teleporting away the second this goes tits up."
"Excellent. Are we all on the same page then?" Celeria looked around the party, each member nodding as she did. "Ok, here is the plan…"