the rat infestation for a price far lower than what the Duke was planning to pay the barbarians. Parodying the Pied Piper, Diek charms the rats with his flute and leads them to a nearby jetty and drowns them all. As he goes to collect his reward from the Duke, he finds that the Dullitch Treasury lacks the funds to pay him. Enraged, he leaves the Treasury and is convinced by a voice in his head- the magic possessing him– that he should have his revenge on all of Dullitch. He then charms the city's children in the same way. The citizens of Dullitch, bewildered at the sudden disappearance of the children of the city, decide that Duke Modeset is a good scapegoat. They surround the palace, trapping him inside, but not before he gives Jimmy Quickstint a couple of hundred crowns down-payment to give to the barbarian mercenaries, as well as Tambor, who has joined the pair and returned to his sorcerer roots, to bring the children of Dullitch back and kill Diek. Unfortunately, the horse Jimmy is riding runs off with the money and he is stuck in the middle of the Carafat Jungles, but soon finds a secret entrance to the catacombs of the mountains known as the Twelve, where he meets a stranger named Stump, who claims to have seen Diek come into the catacombs with the children. Jimmy and Stump travel further into the Twelve, where they meet Tambor, Groan and Gordo, who have also found their way into the Twelve as they were held prisoner by an angry giant. The group, motivated by the prospect of saving the children of Dullitch from Diek, as well as by the prospect of money, decide to attack Diek, whose mind has been totally consumed by dark magic, when they find him deep in the Twelve. In the battle that follows, Tambor opens a portal known as the Doorway of Death, a way into the limbo, as Groan distracts Diek. Unfortunately, Diek manages to push Tambor into his own Doorway, and as a furious Groan hurls Diek bodily into the portal, the Doorway of Death closes, sealing their fates. Meanwhile, as Jimmy and Gordo manage to free the children from their prison, Stump falls into a hole and disappears. The remaining three lead the children safely back to Dullitch, where they are rewarded in separate ways. Groan and