Vile

The shrine trembles with anticipation as you return. Hooded cultists crowd around, their chants rising in a guttural cadence that makes the air itself vibrate. Torchlight gutters, casting long, writhing shadows across the cracked stone walls.

One cultist takes the ruby skull from your hands, blood still dripping from its hollow eyes. Another uncorks the Resurrection Potion, its liquid gleaming with a sickly light. With trembling reverence, they pour it into the skull’s gaping maw.

The ground shakes. The shadows gather. A piercing shriek echoes from everywhere and nowhere at once as the ruby skull lifts into the air, spinning madly. Flesh does not return—no, instead the bones of long-dead cult leaders claw their way up from the shrine floor, stitching themselves together into a throne of skeletal remains. The skull fuses into place, eyes igniting with cold, green fire.

The cultists fall prostrate, their voices quaking in unison:

“Vile, Lord of Secrets, Whisperer in the Dark, Eternal Hunger—arise!”

The Demilich stirs. Its voice slithers into your mind, not spoken but branded directly onto your thoughts:

“Who dares wield me as a tool? Who dares unearth what was buried in silence? You will feed me with your screams.”

The chamber erupts with necrotic energy as the Demilich floats free of its bone-throne, its laughter grinding like a thousand locked doors opening at once. Power surges from its form—illusions tearing at your senses, shadows clawing at your skin.

This is no relic. This is no secret. This is Vile, the god of secrets incarnate, and he will not rest until your body is added to his dominion of whispers.

The cultists scatter as the Demilich’s wrath turns upon you. The air grows heavy, your very soul feels dragged toward his gaping maw of silence. The battle has begun.

[Defeat the Demilich and return to the Temple, or die and respawn in the Temple to continue…]