Year 75

The longer you spend in this place, the more you're starting to like it and that is somewhat of a worrying thought to you, because it certainly isn't a thought shared by anyone under your command. The last five years have probably been a nightmare to most.

You've had to rotate your "normal" military personnel fairly regularly. Most of them can only handle the psychological impact of the powerful undead horrors the necromancers have unleashed a limited amount of times before they become more of a liability rather than an asset. You can only imagine how full the asylums are getting back home. For the most part you've regulated most of your military to defend Evigrus since the svelk in last two years have tried to open up a new front by transporting groups of elite via portals. They've been relatively unsuccessful and even less so when they attempted to do the same thing on Nyttrus where your kobolds easily overwhelmed them and used the land to their advantage. The svelk for the most part have seemingly pulled out of Mortos though altogether.

You've had to pull back your Eyes as well. Well trained they may be, most of them are still human and with that they suffer the same failings of the mind. It's just as well, since things are starting to get a little unstable back home. It's probably a combination of several things (Some of which might be all the new asylum patients) so Cassandra and the Eyes are back to their primary job of maintaining order.

Even the Eternals are starting to get weary of this war and most of them have aged several years than normal. Still, they are Eternals, and whether they are third or fourth generation, they stand by your side…even in death.

Since your time here, you've learned how to use the necromancer's magic against them. You've managed to unlock the secrets of necromancy. You're no master at it, and it takes great concentration on your part, but its come in handy at times. The odd thing is you seem to only be able to maintain control over fallen Eternals. Attempting to raise others has only resulted in them eventually turning against you. You wonder if its because of the way Eternals are "made" or their conditioned loyaty from birth, or maybe a combination of both that seems to result in their dedication to you and resist the overpowering will of the necromancers.

As far as your own concerns about your state of mind you've been trying to hold it together. You sometimes think you're living on borrowed time and that if you don't achieve your goal soon, this place will eventually consume you. Maybe that's why you're starting to like it here, because you feel so close to death and this place is basically a home to the dead.

But you're not dying here if you can help it; in fact the whole point to this is so you don't die at all. You've already begun to unlock the talents of the necromantic arts by yourself. As soon as you get that book, you KNOW you'll be able to master them completely and become immortal.

And that goal is now closer than ever because you've finally tracked it down.

You stand on a slightly elevated bit of land with what remains of your army of Eternals (both living and dead) and a few juggernauts filled with crews of half mad engineers. In the distance a ruined fortress lies before you. It is a non-descript thing and has no real defenses since its walls are mostly broken or gone completely, but THAT is where your goal lies. Inside it somewhere.

And that is also where Nicodemus must be.

You need to attack now, because you know it'll be only a matter of time before reinforcements to help him show up. There are ALWAYS undead, no matter how many you put down in this place.

"General Damon, today the Empire assures its mastery over death itself." You say.
"We are all prepared my Emperor, we just await your word."

You nod and for a moment there is complete silence.

"ATTACK!" you shout and then in unison, you and your Eternals advance towards the target. You lead from the front, just like the old days…

Your juggernauts rumble past the sides of your army and then that's when you finally hear him in your head…

"This will not end well for you, Eternal. Turn back from this path now, or suffer the same fate as your father Casimir."

Naturally you ignore this pitiful attempt at stopping you, so Nicodemus finally unleashes his defenses.

Several undead rise up out of the ground. Not just the normal type either, these are the remains of some sort of long dead gigantic beasts that must've once roamed this island. They are accompanied by the appearance of several ghostly forms. Wraiths and spectres with their ability to drain life with a mere touch.

To your far left and far right, hordes of skeletons and zombies come popping up out of the ground. Nicodemus probably believes that you've foolishly walked into an obvious trap, but honestly you knew something like this would happen. Your goal here is to get the book at all costs.

"Death will not stop us today! But then some of you personally already know that! Destroy these abominations and take the fortress!" you shout.

One of your juggernauts is already moving far ahead of your army and firing off its canon, blowing away bits of the gigantic bone horrors. Under the right circumstances you believe it would easily finish up the task, but it isn't those undead giants that are the problem, the problem lies with the wraiths and spectres who easily glide through the machine and turning it into a steel coffin by killing the crew within.

Your other juggernaut decides not to engage such ghostly creatures and instead turns off to fend off the approaching undead horde to your left. Hopefully it can destroy a good chunk of them.

The undead giants still intact begin to lumber forward to meet your army while throwing large pieces of stone lying nearby. You cast a barrier in front of your army to protect against the projectiles and then throw your own projectiles in the form of fire at the giants while your army opens fire at their legs until the bone and rotting flesh that are allowing them to still stand is finally severed to a degree that the rest of their bulk goes crashing to the ground. Most of them splinter into pieces from the fall, but other continue to come at you, dragging themselves toward you with their arms. These are dispatched with a few well places magic bolts and more gunfire.

With the giants mostly taken care of, you notice the spectres and wraiths steadily approaching. You immediately drop the barrier and redirect your energy to cast an enchantment over your soldiers' hand weapons. Guns are useless against things like spectres and wraiths, but with some skill they can still be overcome by an enchanted melee weapon.

"Prepare for melee and don't let them touch you!" you shout.

The unearthly howls and shrieks by the ghostly assaliants fill your ears as you blast them with your magic bolts. Your dead Eternals come in very handy here as they directly engage the spectres and wraiths and try to shield their living brethren (and you) from being touched. It isn't without some casualties though and the problems increase when the horde on your right finally reaches you. Fortunately the left side seems to be preoccupied with overwhelming the juggernaut, which has now resorted to its inside mounted repeater rifles, and just trying to run them over though its wheels are starting to get jammed with body parts.

"FIGHT THROUGH THESE ROTTING BAGS, WE'RE NEARLY THERE!" you shout just in time to see several necromancers appear on the battlements and begin doing some sort of chant.

Suddenly there's an aura of death around you, and it isn't just becase you're surrounded by zombies. You feel like you just walked into one of those negative zones, except this one is being forced on you.

You're old enough as it is, you can't afford to age anymore. You have to do something now because you won't even make it to the broken fortress gates at this point.

You call your Eternals to surround you and you begin to cast a spell of your own. Your living Eternals are suffering the affects of the necromancers' spell, but trying to cancel their spell through your willpower isn't going to help because they're too strong collectively.

So you rely on your traditional blast everything in the nearby area and hope it kills everything.

You bring down an inferno on not just your enemies, but you and your people as well. Though you attempt to protect some with a surrounding barrier, but you just don't have the strength to protect everyone.

Most of the horde to your right are incinerated as are most of your people. There isn't even much left to "raise."

To your left, there is a similar sight with a pile of burned undead no longer in any condition to pose a threat, though the juggernaut sits still and completely blackened by the rain of fire. The crew inside has no doubt cooked to death.

Most importantly are the effects you see in front of you. You no longer see the row of necromancers and no longer feel the effects of their spell. The ruined fortess is also partially on fire, but it being made of stone it isn't doing much more than cracking the already damaged structure.

You're incredibly drained however. This battle has really taken it out of you and you've still got Nicodemus and who knows what else to deal with. General Damon still by your side helps you from falling down. The Eternals that are still alive are finishing up putting down the undead that managed to survive by being within your protective barrier when you cast it.

"Come on, my Emperor. As you said, we're almost there." He says.

There are other necromantic arts that you've learned besides raising your Eternals, though you haven't really pondered using them since there wasn't any need or you still didn't really have mastery over them.

One of these was emulating the life drain of some of the undead here.

And suddenly you're actually pondering draining your own Eternals of their lifeforce to sustain your own. The thought does not give you any pleasure to do so, but you just aren't sure if you're going to make it otherwise.

You continue onward

You can't do it. While you've sacrificed many in several different ways, you're not going to start draining the life force of your own Eternals like some undead horror. You've crossed many lines and all its done is brought you to this ruined state.

You struggle towards the fortress, but even with Damon helping you, you don't think you're going to make it, let alone have the strength to face Nicodemus.

"Take…take me back home…" you order Damon. You don't even need to tell him twice, he sees how pale and weak you are and all of you are making a hasty retreat.

Unfortunately between your age, your wounds, your exhaustion and the general negative energy in Mortos, you don't make back home alive and you unceremoniously pass away just before you get to the home portal.