Kael knelt near the slumped corpses of the last plague beasts, blood and bile still steaming on the corrupted floor. His hand sank into the fetid soil, fingers splayed wide.

  “Rise.”

  A surge of mana pulsed from his core. The Hollow Grimoire snapped open, its pages fluttering violently, and the corpses twitched. One—a horned crawler with shattered ribs—rose on uneven legs, its movements suddenly more fluid. Another, a skeletal humanoid with a warped spine, clenched its rusted cleaver with purpose.

  They weren’t mindless.

  They remembered.

  The upgraded spell—Raise Lesser Dead: Rank II—was already paying off. The minions snapped into formation, some dragging their weapons, others hissing in anticipation.

  Kael stood, cloak torn and spattered with ash, the Grimoire floating beside him, its runes glowing with silent hunger.

  Before him loomed the Boss Room.

  A massive, broken archway framed the entrance—covered in bone sigils and quivering flesh-sacs stitched into the stone. Beyond it: total darkness… and something waiting.

  He stepped through.

  The room opened into a cathedral-sized chamber of rot. Shattered pillars leaned like corpses mid-collapse. Bones—hundreds, maybe thousands—were scattered across the floor like ash and snow. The walls pulsed with a dull red glow, veins throbbing within them.

  And from the far end… it moved.

  A humanoid figure stepped forward from the shadows. Eight feet tall. Drenched in old blood and wrapped in chains of bone. Its skin was corpse-gray, but patches of dark metal had been grafted into it—forming jagged armor that pulsed with sick mana.

  If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

  In its gnarled hands, it dragged a massive two-handed sword, the blade etched with screaming faces and fused vertebrae.

  Its head was crowned by a cage of black iron, and within that cage: a shrunken, withered face—its own—locked in endless silent agony.

  [Dungeon Boss Identified: The Mourning Knight]

  Cursed Guardian of the Howling Cysts

  The air vibrated with hatred.

  Kael raised his hand. “Go.”

  The fight was brutal.

  His undead charged, weapons drawn, flanking from multiple sides. The Mourning Knight moved like lightning—its greatsword cleaving through bone and shadow in wide, devastating arcs. One of Kael’s summons was split in half before it even landed a strike. Another tried to leap onto its back—only to be flung against the wall so hard it exploded on impact.

  Kael strafed around the outer ring of the room, casting Necrotic Missile again and again. Twin bolts of rotting energy spiraled from his hands, slamming into the boss’s plated chest.

  The DOT took hold.

  Dark veins spread across its skin—slowly, steadily eating it from the inside. The boss roared, lurching forward, each step shaking the floor.

  Kael’s last minion, a hybrid beast of stitched crawler limbs and skeletal arms, lunged one final time—

  —and was impaled through the mouth.

  Only Kael remained.

  But so did the DOT.

  He kept his distance. Weaving through broken pillars, hurling bolts of necrotic energy, bleeding his mana reserves dry while the Grimoire whispered in his ear:

  “It suffers… It decays. Feed it pain. Let it end in ruin.”

  The Mourning Knight slowed. Its movements grew jerky. Smoke poured from its joints. With a final roar—choked, gurgling—it dropped to its knees… and collapsed.

  The silence was deafening.

  Kael approached slowly, breath ragged, veins glowing with mana fatigue.

  He placed his hand over the boss's shattered chest and whispered, “Vault.”

  [Boss Soul Captured – Mourning Knight stored in Soul Vault]

  Potential for Elite Undead Conversion: HIGH

  Sentiment: Grief, Duty, Endless Rage

  The corpse shimmered, then vanished into spectral mist, absorbed by Kael’s will and sealed inside the Hollow Grimoire.

  He stepped back… and noticed it.

  A chest.

  Tucked against the far wall, half-buried in rotting filth and shattered bone, it glowed with a golden light—radiant and ethereal, almost angelic in contrast to the filth around it.

  Kael’s eyes narrowed.

  Legendary.

  The Grimoire whispered beside him, excited. “All dungeons are born hungry… but some bleed treasure when their hearts are slain. This one bleeds golden secrets.”

  The chest pulsed once.

  Then again.

  Kael stepped toward it.