With the delicate Forsaken priestess on her shoulder, Rosettia leaned down and retrieved her axes from the gooey mess that was the Prophet Skeram. The group continued to venture through Ahn'Qiraj without further incident, ripping body parts from silithid and shredding off pieces of the hive walls. Much to Rosettia's disgust, the Qiraji and the silithid didn't get any less grotesque, only more so. Everything was going swimmingly and according to plan, until after they had finished off the Twin Emperors.
"That hateful aura... It is very near to us, I can sense it through that doorway.", Lillian mumbled, pointing to the exit from the Emperors' chambers. "What do you suppose it is? An Old God, maybe?", Rosettia quipped excitedly, bouncing from one foot to the other. "Let's hope not.", Jeremiah grumbled, cocking his crossbow and loading another bolt into it. "Must you always be such a killjoy, Jerry? Imagine how much honor we would receive if we killed one of those eldritch horrors! Maybe I'd even receive one of the Lifebinder's handmaidens for my trouble...", the Worgen warrior rambled in her thick Gilnean accent, thinking about one of the beautiful Red Dragonflight maidens.
"Don't ever call me that again, you fleabag.", Jeremiah growled, infuriated at being dubbed "Jerry".
"Suit yourself, Jer.", Rosettia snickered, shrugging and heading towards the exit Lillian had pointed to earlier. The rest of the group raced to catch up with the massive Lycanthrope, who was already drawing her axes in anticipation. "Tell you what ,guys, if it's an Old God, you all owe me 100 gold. Deal?", she squawked again, turning to Thalarion and giving him a grin.
Thalarion smirked back, drawing his greatsword and nodding. "Alright, Rosettia, you have a deal. I'll place a bet on a swarm of Battleguards, like Sartura. Anyone else want to wager?", the scarlet-haired elf laughed. "Hmmm... I'll place a bet on... Mal'Ganis?", Lillian guffawed, sticking closely to her brother, who rolled his eyes harder with every additional bit of banter. Rosettia and Thalarion burst out laughing, wheezing so hard they thought they might keel over. Sapphira offered a small snicker, before joining in the eye rolling with Jeremiah. "You're all such children...", Jeremiah scowled, leaning against the doorway into the empty room that the hallway had led to.
Rosettia stood and looked into the room confusedly. "There's nothing in there...?", she squalled, running into the room and searching the walls, as though she had missed something. "Rose, don't!", Lillian screamed, but it was too late. A massive eye rose from the center of the floor, creating a murky puddle of inky corruption around it. The rest of the group hastily ran into the room, narrowly avoiding being crushed by the gates suddenly slamming closed. "Death... is... close.", the massive, evil eye seemed to whisper, gazing directly down on to Rosettia. She only began to chortle as though a great joke had just been made, holding her sides and pointing up at it.
"The lot of you owe me 100 gold!", she yelled back at them, laughing still as she launched towards the eye and began slashing away at it. Thalarion was the second to come to his senses and jump into combat, driving his greatsword into the gargantuan eye. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see bolts flying from the corner of the room, denoting that Jeremiah had sprung into action. Sapphira had taken the other corner of the room, tossing frosty arcane bombs and firing out ice spikes. Eye stalks began to rise from the ground, occasionally zapping them with disgusting, verdant green beams. Lillian uttered a silent prayer, healing her comrades as fast as they were damaged.
Several minutes of combat went on and on, Jeremiah eventually switching to taking down the eye stalks rather than eldritch eye itself. Eventually, the strange abomination let out a small groan and sank into the ground. "Ahahaha, that's what you get! Get back here, I was only getting warmed up!", Rosettia raved, chortling and kicking the corruption she stood in, turning completely around to look at Lillian. She saw all of her friends' faces go grim, staring up as a shadow seemed to be cast on the lycanthrope. "Rose...Look behind you.", Jeremiah said darkly, pointing up at the thing casting the shadow.
Rosettia cautiously turned her head, fearing what she would see. Her jaw dropped as she saw the mass of teeth and eyes that had taken the original eye's place, twitching grotesquely. "God in Heaven...", her words came flying out, eyes widened in horror. Come on, Rosie... No fear allowed when you're part of Crowley's pack, remember?
The Worgen's expression of horror was quickly replaced by a snide smirk. "Back for round two, eh?", she taunted, burying an axe in the side of the Old God, hitting a stray eye. Black blood seeped from wherever she struck. "Thalarion! Snap the hell out of it and fight!", she bellowed to the paladin, breaking him out of his frozen state. He swung his greatsword down into one of the tentacles that seemed to keep the God grounded, gagging as the putrid blood flowed. Sapphira and Jeremiah began a barrage of enchanted bolts and sharpened ice spikes, firing them in any seemingly weak spot that they could.
Lillian's rosary beads had begun to glow with a soft, calming light from her prayers and constant casting. She had begun a steady mantra, throwing golden lights to each of her companions, healing them with every passing moment. And then she heard it, the very voice of C'thun in her mind. "Your friends will abandon you."
Sweat had begun to form on Sapphira's brow, a lasting reminder that Sjol'Vess had taken much of her magical endurance away. She pushed through, continuing to barrage the eldritch horror with numerous glistening, icy bolts. That foul voice though, how it invaded her mind, threatening to drive her insane. "You will betray your friends."
Thalarion's blood was pumping harshly through his veins, his heart threatening to burst. He muttered a single phrase, perhaps the only spell he would ever even remotely master. A golden hammer made of light smashed down on to C'thun, momentarily dazing the monster and halting its attacks. In the back of his head though, it consumed his thoughts. "You are weak."
"I would've told Lillian she was insane if she had ever told me that her and I would be fighting Old Gods with two elves and a Worgen...", Jeremiah thought to himself as loaded another set of barrage bolts into his crossbow. His bone fingers moved nimbly across the bow, showing great mastery with his weapon. That voice in his head though, he kept trying to beat it back, but no, it wouldn't disappear. "You are already dead."
Rosettia turned and saw the struggle within her companions' eyes, hearing that strange vocalization herself. "Your courage will fail." She roughly shook her head, her salted braids flying wildly. "Don't listen to it! It's playing off of your fears!", she yelled, frenzying her flurries of attacks.
They fought and they fought and they fought. Just as soon as Lillian thought she would collapse, C'thun fell dead with a loud, mumbling groan.