Charybdis stands motionless in the tunnel ahead, hands crossed before him, blocking the truck’s path with quiet confidence. His appearance is unremarkable—disturbingly so.
“He just looks like a guy,” Arman observes, already reaching for the door handle.
“No!” Reklaw’s warning cuts through the cabin air. “He’s a powerful and dangerous entity! Maybe even a demigod!”
Arman waves dismissively over his shoulder as he drops from the truck. “He looks fine!”
Inside the vehicle, urgent debate erupts. Voices overlap—should they engage? Should they flee? What unknown abilities might this stranger possess? The questions multiply faster than answers can form.
But Arman is already striding toward the mysterious figure, his footsteps echoing in the tunnel. He offers the man a ride with casual friendliness. The stranger’s smile spreads slowly across his face as he accepts, following Arman back toward the truck.
Kiki yanks open the doors on one side, allowing Arman to climb aboard. But when the stranger reaches for entry, she blocks his path with her body. The man’s expression doesn’t change as he moves to the other side, rattling the door handle with increasing insistence.
The metallic sound sets everyone’s teeth on edge.
Skepticism wins out over hospitality. Kiki makes the decision, spinning the truck’s tires in a spray of ice and stone. The stranger diminishes in the rearview mirror as they accelerate away, and the group begins to breathe easier.
“You’re all so judgemental,” Arman grumbles, crossing his arms.
⚔
With Kiki behind the wheel, they navigate a narrow passage swallowed by darkness. Progress is agonizingly slow—careful bumps forward, cautious turns, the headlights barely penetrating the oppressive black. They’re searching for Clunk, Thunk’s dear friend, but at this pace…
“We might as well be on foot,” Thunk mutters.
The truck grinds to a halt before a towering steel door that blocks the entire passage. Borark studies it from his seat, but from this distance he can discern nothing useful. The door appears formidably strong, almost certainly locked.
“We could use the chains,” someone suggests.
“The saws?” another voice offers.
Kiki settles the debate by engaging the truck’s mounted saw. The shriek of metal on metal fills the cabin, vibrating through bone and teeth. Everything rattles.
Thunk, crouched near the rear of the truck, glances backward. His blood runs cold.
Charybdis is approaching through the corridor they just left. He’s caught up to them.
The figure strides purposefully to the rear door and knocks—a calm, measured sound that somehow feels more threatening than pounding. No one moves to answer. The knocking stops.
Then Charybdis begins trying to break in.
Shouts erupt inside the cabin—suggestions, strategies, panic. Borark seizes the ion cannon’s controller, remotely aiming through rooftop cannon to strike just in front of the rear window. The weapon discharges with a roar of superheated air, striking the man on the top of his head and across both shoulders.
As the flames diminish and smoke clears, the human figure has burned away entirely.
In its place stands a massive winged devil—heavily muscled, skin like dark wrinkled raisins, impossibly large. The creature’s eyes lock onto the window, and an icy aura of supernatural terror washes over everyone inside.
Most of the party crumbles. They press desperately against the farthest bulkhead, scrambling over each other to get away from those terrible eyes. Only Thunk and the rooster remain steady, watching their comrades collapse into mindless fear.
Thunk tears through his pack, searching frantically for his spellbook. “I can banish it!” he shouts, even as he pauses to deliver a rallying speech to his terrified companions.
Only Reklaw manages to shake off the fear. The monk moves with careful urgency, gently displacing Kiki from the pilot’s seat. She doesn’t resist, scooting away to huddle in fear with the others.
Behind them, the devil begins pounding on the tailgate. Each impact reverberates through the truck’s frame.
Reklaw stamps on the accelerator.
The engine screams. The truck doesn’t move.
The cabin fills with the acrid stench of burning rubber and the hiss of melting ice beneath churning rear wheels. The devil has seized the bumper, its impossible strength anchoring them in place.
Reklaw shifts into reverse. The truck lurches backward, catching the devil by surprise. They slam it against the tunnel wall with the very bumper it’s been holding. The creature bellows in shock and pain, releasing its grip.
The aura of fear shatters like glass.
They continue rolling backward, past an opening to a side cavern. Through the rear window, Arman spots a two-wheeled motorized vehicle within—similar to Mr. C’s motorcycle from earlier in their journey.
The devil steps into their path, raising an enormous clawed hand. A pyroclastic attack streaks toward the truck, molten rock striking a side panel with devastating force. The metal melts, dripping slowly earthward, leaving a long deep gouge in the door.
The creature winds up for another spell—something far more deadly. It’s attempting to bind their very souls.
But instead of the expected arcane chains, there’s a flash of light and a wave of putrid stench. The spell backfires catastrophically. The devil roars its frustration at the companions, helpless before it, then wheels and flees into the side passage.
Impulsively, Borark leaps from the truck in pursuit. The devil ambushes him just inside the cavern entrance—another pyroclastic blast followed by terrible jaws closing on his shoulder. The barbarian responds with a massive Hellish Rebuke that lights up the entire tunnel. The devil reels backward, retreating deeper, and throws itself onto the motorized trike.
Reklaw joins the pursuit, striking the devil twice with precise, devastating blows. The final strike sends both creature and bike tumbling backward. The monk steps aside, allowing Borark to finish it.
The fiend disappears with a foul-smelling fizzle. Nothing remains save a rank spatter on the saddle of the trike.
“Gotcha!” Thunk crows triumphantly, finally extracting his spellbook from his pack.
In front of the truck, the steel door grinds open. A human-sized figure stands in the revealed space, squinting into the darkness. The face is disturbingly familiar—Charybdis before he dropped his polymorphed disguise.
“Charybdis?” the man calls out. “Is that you?”
Reklaw, pale, mutters, “I don’t recall if I told you this, but Charybdis has a couple of brothers…”.
The group shifts positions, allowing Thunk clear line of sight through the windshield. He raises one hand, speaking the words to Banishment with careful precision.
The figure shimmers, distorts, reality bending around its edges. A loud pop echoes through the cavern.
Where the creature once stood, only empty air remains.
