It is the sound of a thousand dying breaths. Your ears bleed. Your vision blurs. But you do not lower the torch. You step closer. The screaming becomes words: “What do you seek?”
“The Staff of Ages,” you say.
The first corridor is a lie. It is grand, vaulted, lined with banners depicting beasts that never existed. You take three steps and the flagstone dips . A click. You throw yourself sideways as a blade the size of a dinner table swings from a hidden slit, shaving a hair from your ear. First lesson , you think, heart hammering. Trust nothing. castle shadowgate c64
Beyond is the Sanctum. And there, on a pedestal of black obsidian, lies the Staff. It is beautiful. Carved from a single shard of starlight, humming with a power that makes your teeth ache. The Warlock’s body lies in a crystal casket behind it—not sleeping, but waiting . His lips are blue. His fingers are long. And he is smiling.
“Then help me understand.”
The torch goes out.
“Why?”
The first thing you notice is the dark. Not the gentle dark of a countryside night, but the hungry dark of a tomb. The second thing is the smell: wet stone, old rust, and something sweetly rotten beneath it all.
“To end it.”