🩸 Guardian Profile: Varlak, the Hungering Maw
Name: Varlak
Age: Unknown (Ancient Demon)
Height: 9 feet
Weight: 600 lbs
Power Type: Soul Consumption, Flesh Reconstruction, Hunger Phantoms
Weapon: Maw Chains — sentient metal chains that feed on the fear of enemies.
Backstory: Varlak was once a mortal prince cursed by the King of Hell to forever crave the souls of the brave. He guards the Bastion's entrance and devours any who fail the trials.
The sky blackened as the trio approached the base of the First Spire. Even Hell seemed to grow silent.
The Bastion of Hunger loomed like a bleeding fang, built from cracked obsidian and jagged bone. Chains wrapped around its exterior, writhing as though alive. Screams echoed faintly through its many mouths—carved openings that oozed crimson mist.
"This place..." Ethan muttered, "feels like it's starving."
Lilith stepped forward, her sword pulsing with golden flame. "Because it is."
🧩 The Trials of Hunger
The entrance to the Bastion didn't have a door. It swallowed them.
A pulsing, organic tunnel sealed shut behind them, and the world turned into darkness. A voice echoed all around them—low, wet, and hungry.
"Only those who starve for power may enter. Only those who sacrifice will pass."
Suddenly, the trio found themselves in separate chambers.
Lilith was surrounded by shadows whispering her fears—visions of herself as a puppet, her brother laughing on a golden throne. A spectral figure offered her a blade with her brother's name etched on it.
"Take it," it hissed. "Kill him in your mind."
But Lilith burned it instead. "My vengeance isn't blind," she growled. "It's earned."
Sarah stood in a hall of mirrors, each one showing versions of herself: one where she betrayed Lilith, one where she ruled alone, another where she was forgotten. To pass, she had to shatter every false version of herself.
Ethan faced a boiling sea. Voices from the fire called him "a freak," a "failed hybrid." He had to walk across a bridge of flames without suppressing either power—only by fully embracing both fire and water did the bridge stabilize.
When they emerged… Varlak waited.
The demon towered over them, its face split into three rows of serrated teeth, each one chattering with voices of the consumed.
"You passed the hunger within. But I... am the hunger without."
He unleashed his Maw Chains, which moved like serpents. One snatched Sarah mid-air, draining her strength. Ethan fought to free her, steam hissing from his fists as fire clashed against iron.
Lilith leapt forward, eyes blazing with Heartfire.
"You're not the only one who feeds off pain!"
Her Bloomfire Vortex collided with Varlak's chains, burning the whispers into silence. But Varlak regenerated faster than before. When his claw pierced Ethan's side, the demon grinned.
"I taste his loyalty... it's delicious."
Enraged, Sarah whispered a forbidden incantation and vanished—completely. She reappeared behind Varlak, embedding a cursed dagger into his neck.
He howled—and that's when Lilith struck.
Channeling the Heartfire Bloom, she called upon the forbidden energy within, conjuring a spear of burning light. With a roar, she drove it through his gaping chest.
Varlak screamed as his body turned to ash.
🗝️ The Gate Opens
With the guardian defeated, the Bastion began to crumble. At the top of the spiral tower, a stone gate carved with sigils of the Seven Spires opened.
Sarah dropped to her knees, exhausted. Ethan clutched his wound, wincing.
Lilith looked out over the edge.
"One down," she whispered.
A strange breeze lifted her hair—cooler than any wind in Hell. She looked up.
Far above them, the next Spire flickered like a mirage—The Maw of Silence.
As they descended the broken steps, none of them spoke.
But the wind carried a promise.
The King was watching.
And he was no longer amused.