In the shadowed underbelly of the United States, where wless syndicates thrived amid crumbling cities and forgotten frontiers, a band of criminal raiders known as the Bck Tide Cartel caught wind of Undead Isnd's macabre legends. Led by Captain Harn "Ghost" Vance, a scarred veteran of illicit arms deals and high-seas piracy, the group comprised two dozen hardened souls—ex-military deserters, bck-market hackers, and ruthless enforcers. They had plundered ancient ruins and smuggled forbidden artifacts before, but whispers from mainnd informants painted this forsaken rock in the Sea of Eternal Lament as a treasure trove of unholy power. "Infinite armies," the rumors said. "Eternal fmes that could burn empires to ash." Greed outweighed caution; they set sail on a stolen naval cutter, armed to the teeth with automatic weapons, explosives, and drone scouts, intent on investigating—and ciming—the isnd's secrets for their criminal empire.

  The journey was fraught with omens. Storms shed their vessel like vengeful spirits, and spectral currents tugged at the hull, drawing them inexorably toward the jagged silhouette on the horizon. As they anchored off the fog-shrouded shores, the air thickened with the stench of brimstone and rot. Drones sent ahead captured grainy footage of shambling hordes: yellowish undead moaning in the mist, skeleton archers perched on cliffs like silent sentinels, and thundering horsemen carving paths through barren earth. "This ain't no myth," Vance growled, reviewing the feeds. "It's a goddamn goldmine. We hit hard, grab what we can, and get out."

  Under cover of night, the raiders unched their assault. Inftable rafts carried them to the beach, where they unleashed a barrage of gunfire and grenades. Bullets shredded the first wave of yellowish undead, splintering bones and scattering ichor. But for every fallen horror, two more rose from the soil, summoned by the distant hum of the Candle of the Underworld. The group pressed innd, navigating the fifty-mile expanse of craggy terrain, dodging patrols of skeleton warriors and evading the chilling arrows of archers on high. Losses mounted—three raiders torn apart by spectral steeds, another driven mad by the isnd's echoing chorus of groans.

  Deeper in, amid the heart of the necropolis, they found it: the candle, perched atop a bckened altar in a cavernous crater, its bck wax veined with crimson, its fme swirling in infernal greens and purples. The air hummed with power, vibrating through their bones. Most of the raiders hung back, weapons trained, but one—Sergeant Elias Crowe, a former special forces operative turned cartel enforcer—felt an inexplicable pull. His eyes gzed over as he approached, dropping to his knees before the artifact. "What... what are you?" he whispered, bowing his head in a mix of awe and desperation.

  The fme surged, coiling into a towering form of shadow and bone. A lich materialized, its skeletal frame draped in tattered robes of abyssal void, eyes burning with the same unholy fire. Its voice echoed like the grinding of tectonic ptes: "I am the Abyssal Underworld King, guardian of this eternal bze. Just avoid attacking the isnd, so my forces may focus on battling demonic forces and those mortals who lust for chaos beyond these shores."

  Crowe trembled, but ambition stirred within him. The lich, sensing a kindred spirit in the raider's darkened soul, extended a bony cw. It gathered wisps of undead essence from the surrounding hordes—yellowish vapors and skeletal fragments—and merged them with abyssal essence drawn from the candle's depths, a swirling miasma of void and fme. With a gesture, the lich forged a new artifact: a colossal candle, five miles tall and wide, its wax a shimmering obsidian infused with the dual fires of the abyss and underworld. This monolith radiated a fme that promised dominion over death and shadow, a beacon of amplified power.

  But the creation was not for the isnd alone. The new candle shimmered, compressing its essence into a ethereal form that seeped into Crowe's bowed form, binding to his soul like a parasitic god. Pain wracked him as the fme ignited within, granting him visions of endless conquest. Transformed, Crowe rose—not as a mere raider, but as an emissary of the Abyssal Underworld King. He turned to his surviving comrades, his eyes now glowing with crimson veils. "No more fighting here. We serve a greater purpose."

  Under the lich's directive, Crowe began his grim pilgrimage. He dragged the bodies of fallen raiders—both his own and the isnd's endless undead—to the original candle, feeding them into its fme. Each offering strengthened the artifact, while the soul-bound candle within him absorbed faith like a vortex. Whispers spread from the isnd, carried on spectral winds to the mainnd: tales of a king who waged war against demons and the lustful corrupt. Ten million souls, drawn from the desperate and the devout across Earth-02, founded the Church of the Abyssal Underworld. They built hidden temples in urban sprawls and remote wilds, pledging allegiance to the king and his emissary. Armies of zealots mobilized, pnning holy wars against infernal incursions and mortal tyrants, their faith fueling Crowe's inner fme and undead summoning .

  As devotion poured in, the isnd expanded—five more miles each minute, a silent growth that pushed its borders outward without rippling the world's fabric. No earthquakes shook the seas; no maps redrew themselves. The nd simply... grew, a creeping dominion that swallowed ocean depths and birthed new expanses of barren rock, ready for more undead legions.

  Empowered, Crowe—now the vessel of the Abyssal Underworld King—transcended Earth-02. Portals tore open at his command, gateways to other worlds. In each realm he entered, he forged a new isnd from the void, pnting a replica of the original candle at its core. There, amid the fresh necropolis, he awaited the willing: those who would bow and worship, feeding the cycle anew. The king's influence spread like a multiversal pgue, his forces cshing with demonic hordes across dimensions, while mortal lusts fueled his eternal crusade. The Bck Tide Cartel, once mere criminals, became the vanguard of an abyssal empire, their raids now sanctified purges in the name of the fme that burned without end.