There almost seemed to some ripple effect as the heavy corpses slammed into the group. Those at the northern part of the chamber lunging out first, striking against Kireth and Beltak.

None of the slams against their sides from the corpses seemed to do a huge amount of harm, but the combined buffeting would not take long to take its toll.

The corpses all around Tradden pressed close in, crushing him and leaving him no room for maneouvre.

Tradden’s aggression certainly appeared to attract the attention of the corpses, their ropes twitching them towards the young fighter at speed. Those that could not reach the warrior simply struck out at the nearest warm body.

With the amount of bodies swinging, however, the ropes found it difficult to bring their charges closer to the group, harmlessly bumping against one another.

Even as Kireth prepared himself to cast some form of spell the limp corpses crushed in around him, buffeting the mage, and making movement very difficult.

The energy ripped through the swinging corpses, ripping them apart at their core, bones and dried skin crumbling to dust, the ropes blackened and charred falling lifeless to the floor.

Even with their force shattered by the twin assaults of warrior and mage the animated ropes kept on coming.

But as some of them moved into Kireth’s light they seemed to burst into flames, the corpses crumbling and the ropes disintegrating.

The bodies kept coming out of the dim light, though, steering clear of the light another barrelled in at Tradden.

The time Tradden could not avoid the body, as half a skeleton crashed into his ribs.

As corpses and half-skeletons crashed to the floor or exploded into dust around him, the warlord whirled his craghammer. Three of the hanging bodies, one almost a full corspe, bloated and swollen, another a skeleton, its toes dragging across the stone floor, and the last just a torso, closed in, pressing together and restricting the dwarf’s movements.

At the far side of the room, near the statues in the torchlight, the bodies kept swinging, winding their way in an ungainly flight towards the group.

The one nearest to Zero struck out with a bony leg at the rogue.

A sharp white toe bone nearly took out Zero’s eye, but as the body of the corpse swung into the light it succumbed to Kireth’s power, bones cracking and crumbling before the rogue’s face.

The other creatures closed in around Tradden.

Before swinging into him, trying to knock the young fighter off balance.

All three crashed into Tradden knocking him from one side to the next.

In his haste to escape the proximity of the gross undead the rogue turned his back and the nearest corpse bashed against his flank.

It almost sent him spiralling, but Zero managed to regain control of his footing across the now-stationary eyeballs and headed for the corner of the room.

The corpse shattered in two as the bolt struck it, collapsing to the floor and a clatter of bones.

Despite the tide of combat seeming to turn easily in the favour of the group the scribe and the mage were still surrounded by the hanging bodies. They pushed in around Beltak, restricting his movements.

The scribe knew tht he had to clear some space for himself and Kireth to work, so grabbed his holy symbol and held it out in front of him, pushing the corpses away as best he could whilst he started to chant a well-versed prayer.

There was a bright light for a moment and the sounds of splintering bone and the puff of desiccated flesh exploding and then Beltak and Kireth appeared alone, but for a cloud of dust that was all that was left of the creatures around them.

‘Eight,’ spluttered and coughed the scribe.

Regardless of the whirling blades and the amount of shattered corpses at his feet, the young fighter was still beset by a number of swinging bodies. They pushed past his blades, pressing in on him, not allowing him to breathe or move.

The furthest west of the creatures seemed consumed by Tradden’s blades, starting to float over to where the young fighter continued his dervish melee.

It was the half-hanging corpse that was consumed, however, the light upon Kireth’s staff stripping it of its necromantic energy, forever destroying its bonds, and reducing it to ash.

The corpse swung wildly from the noose around its neck after the buffeting from the hammer, back and forth, constantantly glaring at the dwarf, its eyeless sockets dark and the enforced grin of a bare jaw mocking the warlord.

The mocking stopped as the light from Kireth’s staff played over the body, the creature crumbling to dust — the dust spray caused from its swinging movement cascading over the dwarf’s helm and armour.

‘It seems I win,’ suggested the mage from behind Khalin’s shoulder.