Deep within the desecrated sanctum of the Serpent's Shrine, buried beneath the blistering dunes of The Sands of Serrakhan, The Sunsations faced a cataclysmic reckoning that would come to be known as the Serpent’s Showdown. This confrontation was not merely a battle, but a reckoning long-buried in the weathered bones of the dune sea.
Led by the deranged cultist Kassim, the last faithful of the resurgent Snake Cult sought to enact a forbidden rite to resurrect The Great Serpent—an entity of immense primordial power. Before the ritual could reach fruition, the Great Serpent's withered voice, coiling through the minds of the Sunsations, began to speak. It whispered of Malekith’s betrayal, of the ribs and heart severed from its form to forge the Primarchs of the Sun. It offered the Sunsations its allegiance in exchange for their submission—warning them of what was to come if they refused.
But the Sunsations resisted.
In desperation, Kassim hurled himself into the ritual circle at the pit’s nadir, just as the light of Rozan's Eye—the divine amethyst—passed overhead. The celestial light catalyzed the spell. The Serpent’s body began to reknit, sinew and bone twisting around a fleshy pit where its heart and ribs should have been. What emerged was not rebirth—but revenance. The Great Serpent rose again, not whole, but in a state of divine necrosis. It was fury bound in flesh, driven mad by the absence of its essence.
The battle that followed was brutal. The Sunsations, already wearied, were pushed to the edge. Some were wounded. Some fell. The shrine echoed with the shrieks of serpentkin and the slithering chaos of a primordial reborn.
Then, from the dunes—Gharazh'uul.
The Grand Zirthakha, ancient matriarch of the Drakkhid, erupted from the sand, severing a massive coil of the Serpent’s body and smashing it into the desert floor. The Serpent writhed in agony, its form shuddering under the weight of death once more.
It was then that Guy the Grateful rose. Bloodied but unbroken, he climbed the shrine’s shattered stonework and swept his weapon through the Serpent’s neck—ending its second life as Guy was washed in its blackened blood...
As silence fell, Gharazh’uul loomed beside the slain serpent, bowed its vast insectoid head to the Sunsations, and disappeared beneath the dunes, leaving in scarred silence.
The Serpent’s Showdown would be remembered not only for the fury of its violence, but for what it revealed—the truth buried beneath centuries of myth, and the rising storm of ancient vengeance still coiled beneath the sands.