### 195

The face of the worm is changing. It no longer resembles your brother Jen; it has taken on the haughty visage of the Demoness Shamath.

‘Ha!’ she snorts. ‘How puny and insignificant you mortals are. There can be no sport for me in the easy slaying of your kind, for it is too easy. There is no challenge. Therefore I, Shamath, Mistress of the Gates of Darkness, shall devise one. I challenge you to a duel … a duel of intellect!’

The great worm-thing retreats towards the dais and the darkened walls of the cavern are suddenly illuminated by a thousand jets of flame, which roar from jets set into the smooth, glassy floor.

‘Very well,’ she says, fixing you with her supernatural eyes. ‘Let the combat begin.’

Turn to 189.