The throne room seemed to breathe with a sinister life of its own, the flickering candlelight casting grotesque, twisting shadows on the stone walls. The long-forgotten castle had awoken, its ancient halls stirring with a cold, unnatural energy. The red-carpeted stairs leading to the throne bore the weight of a thousand battles, stained in the blood of those who had once dared to defy its dark master.
And now, the girl stood at the precipice of history. Her form was illuminated by the dim glow of the chandeliers, her silhouette sharp against the crimson hue of the steps. Her wings unfurled slowly, black and immense, like a living shadow, the tips curling slightly as they brushed the floor. Her horns glowed faintly, humming with dark power as the twisted energy of the place surged around her.
She stood before the empty throne, but not as a challenger. No, she was no mere invader seeking to claim it for herself. There was something deliberate, something patient in her every step, as though the throne had been waiting for her all along.
Behind her, Morwrath, the undead king, remained motionless but intrigued. His bony fingers tightened around the ruined rod he held, the faint light of the runes carved into his skull flickering in sync with the arcane power of the room. His empty eye sockets, though hollow, seemed to observe her with an intensity reserved for those few things in this world that could still surprise him.
"So" he said again, his voice an ethereal rasp, each word drifting like a dying breeze "You achieved your end of the deal" The mockery in his tone was unmistakable, but beneath it was something else. A curiosity he hadn't felt in eons.
The girl paused, halfway up the stairs, her head tilted slightly as she regarded the empty throne. It loomed large, a relic of ancient, forgotten power. Yet she did not step toward it as he expected.
Instead, she turned, her dark eyes piercing through the dim light, her expression unreadable. Her gaze fell on Morwrath, the ancient lich, whose golden crown of runes glimmered faintly beneath his hood. His skeletal grin remained fixed, waiting for her next move, for the inevitable conclusion of what he thought he understood "Are you going to claim the throne?"
But instead, she answered his question not with action, but with her words.
"There is none so pretentious here, lich" she said softly, her voice both calm, sensual, and cold. A voice that echoed with the confidence of one who had transcended mortal desires. Her wings spread further, casting a dark shadow across the room as her horns gleamed brighter "To sit on that throne"
Morwrath's skeletal jaw clicked, his ancient magic flaring slightly, though his expression remained unchanged. He hadn't expected this, but nonetheless it was a fun twist "Is that so?" His voice dripped with amusement, but the curiosity still lingered "You've come so far, gathered so much power, and now you walk away from the very thing that could be yours with but a word"
The girl stopped at the edge of the dais, wings folded slightly, her gaze unfocused as though her mind was far from the castle "This place…" She glanced back at the lich, her voice taking on a softer, more contemplative tone "It is a remnant of what once was. A prison, locked in time, shackled by its own glory. What is a throne, but a chain for the one who sits upon it?"
The lich tilted his head slightly, a sound like the grinding of old bones as he shifted. He had seen many seek power, seek dominion, yet her words struck something within him, in the end, transcendent beings truly thought alike, and he had come to the same realization when he was trapped as well.
"So you seek freedom" Morwrath mused, his voice softening slightly, the mocking edge fading "But tell me this, Iren. If not this throne, if not this castle, then what is it you desire?"
Iren, the demoness and end boss of this dungeon that had spawned smiled and looked at the dark skies through this illusion that had spawned, and the red moon.
"Blue skies" She finally said.
Soon two more figures emerged from the corridor as heavy ancient doors opened, a knight clad in dark gothic armor, and a man, or what once was a man, because it looked more like a rotten bloated person with dark glasses on his eyes stood in front of the throne. Another figure who wore colorful clothes and a theatrical mask awaited leaning on a pillar.
"Soon we will have guests" The demon said looking at the portal that had rippled in her domain, the trap that was set by a twisted creature.
The minions of the castle would receive the unwanted fools who dared to enter, they were dragged like insects to the sweet honey to meet their doom. This was a dark miracle produced by the uninvited lich that had arrived while this place was sealed and drifted in the void of memories, after all, none in this disgusting world had reached a peak of magic like him, Morwrath was a little over the level 50 by her understanding, but even so, when it arrived in front of her, only she was able to save its miserable life after being beaten so badly.
"Let's see how much they can strugle" She thought, she still needed time to rip open the drift to be free from this place.
All of her subordinates were over level 30, and she had reached depths of magic that transcended her old mortal status, but at the price of being chained in this rift for all eternity, now, she felt like she had the chance after changing perspective.
The knight in black gothic armor, his presence as cold and oppressive as the castle itself, took a step forward. His armor clanked with a deliberate weight, every movement deliberate, precise. He gave a curt nod to Iren, his face hidden beneath a jagged visor. His grip tightened on the hilt of his enormous sword, the edge gleaming darkly in the flickering candlelight.
Beside him, the bloated, rotting man with sunken cheeks and dark glasses shuffled forward. A sickening stench wafted around him, a walking abomination held together by dark necromancy. His bloated body squelched with each movement, yet his eyes... hidden behind those glasses... were fixed on the portal, anticipation bubbling up from within his decaying form.
The figure in the colorful clothes and theatrical mask leaned lazily against the pillar, twirling a silver dagger between gloved fingers. She vanished in thin air after sensing that the game was about to start.
"Move the guards" Said Iren finally to the dark knight "Release the abominations" She looked at the bloated man "And mobilize all the maids and butlers" She finally said the figure that had vanished, she then looked at Morwrath "You may do as you please"
"Then I will wait in the library" He said "There are so many fun ideas in your books" The external boss said with a chuckle, after arriving here, he had felt alive if that was the correct sense of the word, the magical knowledge of the girl in front of him surpassed his own, even after spending all his life and afterlife experimenting and progressing, she had tricks that made him feel like he was still just scratching the surface of the true power of magic, a sensation he had only felt when he was no more than a mere apprentice.
As the minions left and the guest decided on his post, she stood there in the throne room all alone and couldn't help but feel a little excited.
"Just don't die too fast" She thought as she began to prepare.
She was no mere demon, she had long ago transcended those limits, but even so, there was so much room for improvement. The preparations would not be completed now, it would take time, maybe even some years, but she was patient, she had been here stuck and frozen in time for an eternity after all.
[Iren, The Plague lvl 69]
...
...
...
"Readings are almost complete sir!" Said one of the guild staff members who had come from the capital to her superior "But... what is this?" She was so confused.
To detect the power inside a dungeon they use scrying crystals, these crystals can predict how much mana is inside the gate, which helps them understand or at least have an idea about how dangerous was a gate. The crystals after absorbing the magical emanations would change color.
Grey crystals would mean the dungeon had very low magical energy, so probably the monsters would be easy to defeat, like goblins, slimes or horned rabbits.
Green crystals would mean the dungeon is competent in the difficulty, so probably orcs, kobolds or similar creatures would lay inside, they would pose a threat to normal adventurers but could be defeated.
Blue crystals meant that the dungeon had some degree of mana inside, that would spawn monsters capable of using magic, that would threaten the lives of the adventurers inside...
And so on, the color would turn yellow, then pink, then orange... in theory then it would turn red, and predicting so on it would go brown, then black... in the history of this world only one brown gate had spawned and was conquered some years ago.
"White... why is white?" The clerk asked with notable confusion in her voice.
Beside her, an old man in tunics who was resting on a rock looked at her with a resigned smile on his face.
"If you read about the magical theory, then you would understand, that it's because the mana inside is so pure that the crystal turned pure white, which means inside rests a monster unparalleled" He then laughed and negated with his head "You may tell your superiors that whoever steps inside and face the real threat inside is doomed"