The Black Warren was whispered of in Skaven burrows as a labyrinth of shadow and bone, its tunnels said to scrape the border of the underworld itself. Only the most wretched and expendable slaves were sent there, forced to dig deeper and deeper in search of warpstone veins rumored to glow with the essence of death itself. The warlock-engineers who oversaw the mine cared little for the *crawled warnings of past diggers, the weeping echoes in the stone.

When the tunnels began to collapse, they simply sealed the exits and left. Acceptable losses.

But the Black Warren was no ordinary mine - it was a path to oblivion.

The Skaven miners starved in the choking dark, their flesh withering away, their teeth clamping down on anything they could find. They chewed their robes, their tools, their own limbs. Their hunger twisted into rage so deep that their souls refused to pass into the void. Instead, they shredded their mortal ties and returned as gnawing wraiths, cloaked in spectral tatters they had woven as funerary shrouds in their final moments.

Now known as the Blighthaunt, they haunt the shattered ruins of the Black Warren, bound not by vengeance, nor sorrow—but by hunger. They gnaw at their own ethereal forms, clawing at nothing, believing that if they devour the remnants of their despair, they will finally find release.

Tikkit Dustwhisker, Last-to-Die – The Lingering Maw 

When the others had wasted away, Tikkit remained. He chewed at anything - old bones, his own tail, the dust clinging to the walls. Hunger hollowed him out, stretching him thin, leaving him as little more than a mouth that would never be filled.

Zarkhrit the Tunnel-Carver – The One Who Digs, But Never Breaks Through 

When the tunnels failed, Zarkhrit didn’t beg or wait. He picked up his tools and dug. He dug as his claws split, as his muscles failed, as his ribs pressed against his skin. He told himself there was light ahead. Now he carves through the earth, through flesh, through everything in his path, but the tunnel never ends.

Skezzik Run-Twice – The One Who Ran, and Runs Forever

 Skezzik was always the fastest. He thought that mattered. When the tunnels collapsed, he ran - clawing past the dying, scampering toward the light. He almost made it. The stone crushed his legs, left him gasping, left him waiting for starvation to finish what the rock had started. Now he moves as a blur, never stumbling, never stopping, but never truly free.

The Haul-Shattered

The cart was too heavy. Their masters told them to push, and they obeyed. They dug their claws into the wood, shoved with all they had left, dragged the load forward inch by inch, even as their bodies failed. Their legs went first. Their breath went next. But the weight never left them.

The Winch-Flayed

The gears locked. The counterweight failed. They pulled anyway. They hauled until their fingers tore, until their ribs cracked against the strain, until their bodies gave out and the winch took the last of them. The mechanism is dust now, but they still pull, still strain, still believe they can lift themselves out of the dark.

Tretchak the Bone-Spitter & Vrekkik the Splinter-Tongued

Tretchak’s teeth cracked first. He gnawed at iron tools, at the haft of his pick, at anything to trick his gut into believing he had food. He swallowed the splinters, the broken enamel, the blood. He told himself the pain meant it was working. It wasn’t. His mouth is ruined now, but his blade does the biting for him.

Vrekkik bit into the stone walls, grinding his fangs against rock. He broke them one by one, swallowed the dust, let the shards stick in his gums like jagged little offerings to a god of starvation. Even now, his mouth moves as if he’s still trying to chew through the mountain that entombed him.

The Hollowed

They pleaded in the dark, whispered prayers to the warlocks, to their kin, to anything that would listen. They promised favors, secrets, anything. The only thing that answered them was silence. They never stopped speaking, even as their throats dried and their voices cracked. Now, their mouths move, but no sound ever comes.