Scene 1: Tombside Manners
The crypt stank of scorched bone, rotting cloth, and the kind of mildew that meant you were somewhere you definitely weren’t invited.
Vegon Shadowseer, tall and regal even while flinging fire, stepped over the remains of a shattered bone knight. “How many of these things did this lich have?” he muttered, his long green robes trailing smoke.
“Too many,” Xil replied from across the chamber, his voice quiet, his blade slick with something black and still moving. His silver-white hair was pulled back, and his violet drow eyes stayed locked on the next shadow. “They’re drawn to his power.”
“Power smells like feet,” Zook muttered. The gnome ranger was halfway up a crumbling statue, short sword glowing faintly in one hand, shield slung tight on his back. “I’ve had compost bins cleaner than this.”
Deacon Bruce, as usual, didn’t say much. He was kneeling behind cover, his old leather armor dusted with ash, a rune-carved bolt being loaded into one of his vicious hand crossbows. He checked the line of sight, narrowed one eye, and loosed.
The skeletal mage across the hall jerked back—and collapsed in a puff of robes and regret.
“That’s eleven,” Deacon grunted.
“Is that eleven undead or eleven complaints about the smell?” Vegon asked, casually casting Mage Hand to slap a spider off his shoulder.
Deacon reloaded. “Yes.”
In the far corner of the room, beneath a pile of shattered urns and a sticky aura of failed bravado, Jandar groaned.
“Oh no,” Zook said. “He’s awake.”
“Give him a moment,” Vegon said, already casting Prestidigitation to clean the blood off his boots. “He’ll say something dramatic.”
Jandar sat up, slowly, his black carapace armor scratched and his pirate hat crumpled against the wall. His cape—still somehow fluttering—billowed behind him as if offended.
“I wasn’t knocked out,” he declared.
“No?” said Xil.
Jandar stood, brushed ash from his coat, and drew his rapier with a flourish that absolutely no one asked for. “I was conducting a tactical nap.”
“You were paralyzed,” Deacon said flatly.
“Exactly. Strategically.”
The team regrouped at the edge of a massive archway, beyond which a pale green light pulsed steadily. The real threat lay ahead: a lich once known as Ulvanax the Wise. Now just Ulvanax the Bitter and Undead.
“We ready?” Vegon asked.
Deacon loaded another bolt. “As we’ll ever be.”
Xil nodded.
Zook checked his pockets. “I have three healing potions, two flasks of holy water, and... an old turnip. Let’s do this.”
Jandar spun his rapier and grinned. “Let’s go ruin someone’s afterlife.”
Scene 2: Adequate at Best
The hallway beyond the archway was long, silent, and suspiciously dust-free.
Vegon raised an eyebrow. “I dislike how clean this is.”
“Means magic,” Deacon muttered. He held up a hand crossbow and scanned the hall. “Or something worse.”
“Let’s assume both,” Xil said, stepping into the corridor with the eerie calm of someone who grew up navigating corridors built by people who thought murder was interior design.
Jandar clapped his hands. “Well! This seems like a fine place for me to show off.”
“Oh no,” Zook whispered.
Jandar strutted forward, rapier drawn, a dagger twirling in his off-hand. “My friends, I have danced across rooftops under a storm. I have escaped from two prisons and one angry duchess. I have snuck into, and out of, the Emperor’s wine cellar dressed as a lute player. If anyone can spot and disarm a trap—”
CLICK.
He froze. Everyone else did too.
“—it’s definitely me,” he finished, less confidently.
A second passed. Then the floor dropped out from under him.
“TRAP!” Zook shouted, far too late.
Jandar vanished into the pit with a crash, a clang, and an insult muffled by dust and echo. A moment later, a faint voice drifted up.
“…I meant to do that.”
Deacon leaned over the edge. “He’s fine. Mostly.”
Vegon nodded, casting Feather Fall retroactively to slow the landing. “That was actually one of the better trap performances I’ve seen from him.”
A panel in the wall opened nearby. Zook yanked his shield up just in time to deflect a bolt of necrotic energy. “Guys?! Maybe hurry it up down there!”
Xil tossed a rope into the pit, eyes scanning the runes now glowing faintly across the walls. “There are more traps. This place is designed to delay, not kill. The lich is preparing something.”
Deacon muttered, “Then we keep moving.”
They pulled Jandar out of the pit. He was unconscious, again, hat still somehow perfectly perched on his head. His rapier was missing. No—wait, it was stuck in his boot.
Vegon sighed. “We’ll drag him like luggage.”
Zook patted Jandar’s shoulder as they hoisted him up. “At least he disabled the trap.”
“By becoming one with it,” Xil noted.
And so, with their unconscious pirate in tow, the Hand of the Storm pushed deeper into the crypt—toward the ritual chamber, where death waited, and where Jandar would almost certainly wake up just in time to make things weird.
Scene 3: Meat Shield of the Storm
Jandar came to with a start—and a groan.
“Why does my everything hurt?” he asked, blinking up at the cracked ceiling of the crypt as if expecting applause for waking up.
“Because you fell down a hole full of bad decisions,” Xil replied dryly, kneeling beside him. The drow placed a cool hand on Jandar’s forehead and whispered a prayer in Elvish. A faint silver glow spread from his fingers, easing the bruises and pulling Jandar out of the ache.
“Thanks, doc,” Jandar muttered. “I feel...adequate again.”
Zook leaned over and handed him his rapier. “You dropped this when you were unconscious. Again.”
“Doesn’t count if you do it with style,” Jandar said, standing up with a wince and a heroic wobble.
The corridor beyond narrowed and opened into a great vault-like chamber. Moss clung to pillars, and arcane symbols glowed faintly in the floor tiles. But in the center stood something massive—an undead ogre, wrapped in chains and plated bone. Its eyes burned blue. Its fists were roughly the size of Jandar's optimism.
“Don’t suppose we can talk to it,” Vegon murmured.
Deacon raised his crossbow. “Doubt it.”
Xil narrowed his eyes. “It’s bound here. A soul guardian. Anchored to the ritual beyond.”
“Perfect,” Jandar said, flipping his cape over his shoulder. “I’ll go say hello.”
Everyone stared.
“You’re going to what?” Zook asked.
“Tank it,” Jandar said. “You spell-slingers set up. Deacon, do your sharpshooter thing. Zook—be the distraction you were born to be. I’ll keep this big boy busy.”
Xil blinked. “That’s surprisingly… selfless.”
“I’m due,” Jandar replied, already walking toward the ogre.
He drew his rapier, his dagger, and his courage. The ogre’s eyes locked on him with undead hunger.
“HEY BONEHEAD!” Jandar shouted. “Wanna dance?”
The creature charged.
The room exploded into motion. Spells flew, bolts whistled, blades clashed. Jandar ducked a swing, jabbed with his rapier, dodged left, barely avoided a bone-breaking strike—and then caught a backhand that launched him across the room like a very stylish ragdoll.
He hit the wall with a thud and a groan that sounded like, “I regret everything.”
“Jandar’s down!” Zook shouted. “Again!”
“I’m starting to think it’s a strategy,” Vegon muttered as he unleashed a lightning bolt.
Deacon’s bolts found gaps in the armor. Xil channeled divine fire. Zook leapt onto the creature’s back and stabbed deep—and with a final crack, the chained ogre crumbled, its bones falling still at last.
Silence fell.
The group stood panting, weapons lowered.
Then, from across the room, a weak voice: “Tell my cape… I died… fabulously…”
Scene 4: The Headbutt Heard ‘Round the Crypt
The chamber was shaped like a dome, lined with pulsing green runes and haunted whispers that echoed from nowhere in particular. A jagged throne sat at its heart, draped in withered banners and bones. Upon it stood the lich Ulvanax—crowned, robed, and deeply unimpressed.
“Your bones will serve me well,” it rasped, raising a gnarled hand as arcane symbols flared in the air.
“Yeah?” Jandar shouted, stepping forward, rapier gleaming and hat slightly askew. “You’ll be lucky to get my leftover dandruff, you oversized candleholder!”
Behind him, the Hand of the Storm fanned out, preparing for battle.
Deacon took cover near a pillar, quietly loading rune-etched bolts. Xil muttered a blessing. Vegon began weaving counter-magic. Zook crouched low, shield raised.
Jandar, of course, acted first.
He dashed forward, blade flashing, cloak snapping like a banner of sheer ego. He leapt over a rising skeleton, kicked off a broken sarcophagus, and slashed the lich across the chest with a line of elemental energy—fire and cold snapping together in one hit.
Ulvanax reeled.
Then Deacon opened fire from the back line.
Thunk! Thunk-thunk!
Three bolts, two weak spots, one furious lich. Massive amounts of radiant-drenched vengeance in less than six seconds.
Ulvanax shrieked. The runes around the room surged—and everyone flinched.
“Uh-oh,” Zook said.
“Which one of us is it?” asked Vegon grimly.
“I have a guess,” Xil muttered.
“PIRATE” the lich roared.
“Oh come on!” Jandar shouted. “He’s way more dangerous than I am!”
He pointed at Deacon, who gave a little wave and reloaded. “Hi.”
The lich’s hand flared with necrotic power. A ancient spell—a word of unmaking meant to tear the soul straight out of a mortal.
It hit Jandar like a freight cart full of guilt and bad decisions.
He collapsed mid-quip, smoke curling from his armor.
“Par for the course,” Vegon sighed, launching a fireball.
The fight raged on. Xil held the line with divine fire, Zook cut down skeletons with speed and fury, and Deacon kept hammering bolts into Ulvanax’s rotting frame. Inch by inch, the lich was breaking.
But it wasn’t enough.
Ulvanax stepped toward his throne, raising a final spell—a ritual to bind his soul to a new phylactery.
“Let this world burn,” he hissed. “Let your bones be dust!”
And then—
A shadow moved.
A blur of black armor and bronze trim.
Jandar.
Barely upright, covered in soot, hat missing, and very done with this nonsense.
He didn’t draw his sword.
He didn’t monologue.
He just screamed—
“FORGET THE BONES—EAT FOREHEAD!”
—and headbutted the lich square in the face.
There was a CRACK like a tombstone shattering.
Ulvanax stumbled back, green fire sputtering from his eyes. The ritual failed. The throne shattered.
Deacon’s bolt took him through the chest a second later.
The lich collapsed into ash and silence.
Jandar crumpled next to him, muttering something about “the world’s most magical headache.”
The rest of the party stood in stunned silence.
Then Zook said, “So… is that how we win now?”
Xil shrugged. “I’ve seen worse strategies.”
Vegon chuckled. “Remind me to ward his skull next time.”
Deacon walked over, nudged Jandar’s boot. “You alright?”
Jandar groaned. “Put that on my tombstone. ‘Got the last word... and it was a headbutt.’”
Epilogue: The Toast and the Bruise
The fire in the hearth crackled like it had a story to tell.
Inside the Welcoming Hand, the usual suspects nursed bruises and mugs in equal measure. The place was cozy chaos—half tavern, half monument to poor decisions and legendary victories. Shields lined the walls. Old wanted posters were framed like art. One, near the door, bore a very smug sketch of Jandar labeled: Wanted—For Being Too Much.
Jandar sat at the main table, slouched sideways in a chair, a cold compress pressed to his forehead. He wore his favorite coat, slightly scorched. His hat sat on the table beside him, dented where it had tried—and failed—to protect him.
Zook climbed onto the chair opposite, balancing a mug nearly as tall as himself. “You know, I’ve seen dragons fall with less drama.”
Jandar squinted. “I am the drama.”
Xil leaned against a pillar, sipping something dark and unnerving. “One day, your skull’s going to give out, and I won’t be healing your ego after that.”
“Joke’s on you,” Jandar said, tapping his temple. “This is the hardest part of me. Just ask Ulvanax.”
Vegon chuckled as he entered, still in green robes dusted with ash. “You gave the lich brain damage. That has to be some kind of poetic justice.”
“Pretty sure it was just poetry,” Jandar said, dramatically tilting his head toward the ceiling. “Skull versus skull... A battle for the ages...”
Deacon arrived last, setting a tray of roasted meat and fresh bread on the table. He didn’t say anything at first, just looked at Jandar’s forehead, then at the rest of the party.
“Who let him do that?”
Everyone pointed at someone else.
Deacon sighed and sat down. “Next time, maybe try stabbing.”
“I was out of clever quips,” Jandar said. “And that was my backup plan.”
They all raised their mugs.
“To survival,” Xil offered.
“To bad plans that work,” said Vegon.
“To really stubborn pirates,” Zook added.
Deacon raised his mug with a dry smirk. “To the skull that saved the world.”
They drank.
Outside, the wind howled. But inside, the fire blazed, the laughter rose, and the tales grew taller.
Somewhere in the corner, a bard scribbled notes furiously. He’d heard the story of the Headbutt—now he just needed a name for it.
Jandar leaned back, arms behind his head. “You think the lich’s phylactery was in his skull? I might’ve cracked a magical relic with my face.”
Deacon rolled his eyes. “Just drink your ale, Jandar the Adequate.”
“The Heroic,” Jandar corrected.
They laughed louder.
And for one night, the hand rested easy.
