My sword has begun to weigh more heavily than before. I am worried. As I walk the paths laid before me, paths that cross demons, aberrations, constructs, creatures summoned from the abyss, an army from hell, I see the darkness corrupting men’s souls before my eyes. I do not know how deeply I should be worried about what we found in the Jakes, but the unfamiliarity of what we found, and speech I had not heard before nor wished to.. Well, it unsettles me. I do not believe there is any kind of connection between the darkness we found on our recent quest, the Queen, and her Army, but I worry about what the future bodes. I suppose a part of me worries about Treff.

Throughout the months we have spent near the Flower in the Sepulcher, I have tamed the beast of brute force. My long training sessions have gone on for several days without sleep, as I
work my body’s muscles harder than any steel I have seen forged into fine armor or blade. I have learned to be cunning, yet forthcoming in battle. I have developed into a warrior without allegiance, but not without valor. Through the alleyways that are a home to various thugs, thieves, gang members, and aggressive drunks, I am known collectively as “Stand Tough Lars”. For the first time in many years, my name now holds weight, conjuring images of one that dances in the darkness, yet stands broadly in the daylight.

And in my time with the collective I have realized that goals are not made easily, and a quest should always be seen through until the end. My mistakes made long ago have haunted me in dreams and in meditation. It has taken me a long time, but I know now that nightmares follow you until the end of your days unless they can be vanquished, standing strong with full acknowledgement of one’s fears, with determination and courage. Perhaps being a streetfighter has allotted me wisdom and constitution among gains in strength.

I left a kingdom shrouded in darkness and lies. It is unfortunate that one cannot truly vanquish the hardships that a kingdom and its people face, yet it is not the case that all enemies cannot be defeated. Even against the mightiest, most terrifying and wicked dragon, a sword unraised means hope abandoned, not lost. Even against a god, or demon with power beyond imagination, one cannot abandon their strength and composure. No amount of strength is insignificant. Even to wound an enemy so powerful proves that even the highest towers can fall, and strikes fear into those who think themselves invincible. I will not make the same mistake twice.

When the time comes for our collective, I will fight to the end. Perhaps not for my companions, perhaps not even for myself, but for Treff. For the city that desperately needs to keep its hope.

The Ooze priest has been dealt with. The old blind man’s information about the acid filled trenches proved very useful. Some of my experiments about pushing the capacity of muscles played out well and I was able to enhance the speed of the collective forces in their temple. Juiblex’s forces in the city have been dealt a severe blow, but the priest, Slazak, escaped with a well timed contingency spell vowing he would return to claim vengeance against us. This is something we’ll need to be watchful of. I’ll put in the necessary research over the next few free days I can come by. It seems life in the city is quite a bit more fast-paced than my travelling days indeed. I was able to get word out throughout the poorer areas of the city that I would accept bodies with no questions asked and properly handle their internment. The Temple of Wee Jas, through Hierophant Skaven Rubyshimmer, was kind enough to provide the necessary seed money to establish a potting field near the city, I’ll need only clear the area of Knell Beetles. A rare breed of insect that burrow through the ground, likely explaining why the Rangers haven’t dealt with them, and capable of using sound waves to shake the earth. It will likely be a dangerous outing, but I’m sure I can gather some members of the collective to assist. Abad and Naheeda at least will be interested in helping the residents of the Jakes. The area should be easily protected by the unsleeping, unhungering undead significantly cutting down on costs, and the process of accepting bodies from the Jakes will likely provide plenty of cadavers to be worked upon. I shall have to speak with the Doctor and let him know that the cemetery will be functioning, I’m sure he could do much to aid Brother Brick in spreading the word.

Owain has grown distant; something about new friends he won’t say much about, though I suspect it has something to do with his ancestral lands. Rumors are speaking of some revolutionary cell I wouldn’t be surprised to find he’d taken up with.

We finally got around to helping the Circle of Equals. The first time I saw their post at the Full Quiver, I assumed there’d be undead involved. Why else would druids ask for a cleric’s assistance? Turns out that assumption was more than correct.

In the swamp, not too far from Treff, there is a graveyard that the druids hold sacred, as a great white tree of healing grew there. Symbolic of turning death into life and all that. I’d suppose there hadn’t been undead there for many years, but when they came back, they came in force.

The front line was made of two cryptchanters, shades with strange instruments that played a discordant melody. I recognized it as magic, although I’m not sure of its exact qualities. It can certainly fascinate – Cyrus dropped his flail before Galen cast protection from evil on him – but their touch seemed only minimally damaging. I’ll have to ask Galen if he knows what else their music does.

The motivating force, as far as I could estimate, was a powerful ghost. He’d been a wizard in life, and retained much of his skill in death. I’m unsure of whether he summoned the rest of the undead, or if they awakened concurrently and he was simply the most powerful. As it was, he was able to use the magic jar spell, which could have become a problem very quickly if Galen hadn’t cast protection from evil on us.

The ghost had possessed a treant, that same healing tree that made the graveyard a place of honor. Fortunately Galen hadn’t cast the protection from evil he’d intended to use on himself, and was able to release the tree temporarily. I’m glad we didn’t have to fight it, considering the sacred tree was the whole point of the exercise. He also had some spectres, boneclaws, and wights. Quite the collection of nasty undead. Definitely glad to have the rest of the Rose at my back – I dealt better than I got, but the spectres and ghost slipped through my guard and something about their touch loosened my hold on my magic.

After we destroyed the ghost, Galen was able to speak with the treant. Apparently the undead awoke recently – the graveyard had been inert before. Things are changing in the swamp, he said. The disruptions in the magic run deep – I’ve felt it since I first saw the eidolon, known it since we faced the tsochar. Perhaps our new allies in the Circle will have more insight. Cade Greenturtle has offered his assistance in the future – we’ll have to take him up on that.

Oh, and the treasure was excellent. The ghost had been a man of some wealth, and his gravegoods fetched an excellent price. Maybe I’d feel bad about taking them if he wasn’t such a vindictive shit in undeath. There was also an interesting magical item – another weapon crystal. This one is called a crystal of phoenix ash threat and its strategic possibilities are intriguing – it deals some fire damage shortly after a hit with a weapon. Could make Galen’s ability to make alchemist’s fire burn stronger in contact with other flame sources usable more frequently.

I’ve also been working on some new tricks that have come in a lot of use. I finally figured out how to shape a fireball – well, not really a fireball. The energy comes off my hands like a fireball spell, traveling long distances then bursting into a sphere, but in my usual fashion, it explodes in a ball of electricity. I also… grew wings. I manifested a pair of force wings that unfurled to shield myself and anyone next to me, driving back attacks. Then I felt myself lift off the ground, slightly – I felt like I could fly, if slowly. Then, when fighting the boneclaws, a pair of dragon wings. Real wings, bronze, powerful, carrying me through the air with startling speed. I felt just so powerful, so free… well, until today. Gods above I didn’t know those muscles were there.

A gang in the Jakes and South Fen area seems to have been killed or run of by a cult of a Demon prince. They’re using a number of oozes that are spreading a disease in the area. We’ve discovered three ways into their hideout and are preparing to move in. I don’t have much time now, as we’re about to breach the building, but we were able to save the life of a small goblin child. Its good that the rest of the collective arrived when it did. I would have been forced to watch the child die without backup…

-

We’ve breached the building through a whole in the roof. Some summoned torturer was dispatched quickly and we discovered a number of prisoners. A blind man and two goblin children. Abad spoke with the man and gained some intelligence about the building. We were equally, if not more so, adept at dispatching the gelatinous cube left to guard the obvious entrance. There is a voice, speaking the Dark Speech. Even with mystical aid I could understand only snippets of the vile language. It is likely that it is the one who summoned the creature eliminated earlier. Such a caster would be very powerful. And evil approaching anything I’ve ever seen. The inhabitants of this neighborhood face challenges that exceed even the harsh conditions of my tribe. They need protectors precisely because they cannot afford the help. They are made to be prey, not by virtue of their loss of utility to the tribe, they are key to the cities operation, but because of the power of the merchants. I should explore this area of thought further, the wealth of the merchants of Treff has warped the free competition for survival. I should speak with Naheeda about questioning her friends here. We may be able to assist the area, and there are other forms of payment than currency.

I’ve never met a brass dragon, but everything I’ve ever heard about them says that they’re excessively talkative. I met one in my dream last night and I’d agree. I think she’s the same one I was talking with before, I just remember her better this morning.

We were walking on a sandy beach, and she was asking me questions about my life. I told her about traveling with the halfling caravans, learning my tinker’s trade, and she asked questions – why did I repair the wheel that way, how did I fix the wagon-covers when we were out of thread, why I darned socks by hand instead of with magic.

Even at a stately amble, her steps were so much larger than mine that I had to run to keep up with her. I was breathing heavily, and she stopped.

“Why are you so tired?”

“It’s hard to keep up with you, my legs are so much shorter.”

“Why don’t you just fly?”

Then I had wings.

Well, let’s call this another edition of highly unadvisable things that I totally intend to do. Apparently there’s someone out there who can tell me more about my family – Makan pointed me towards an arcane knight. The details, so I don’t forget them: his name is Kartouche, he’s 70-80 years old, his shield has a distinctive device – white dragon wings set with sapphires over a crashing wave. Apparently also a fairly hidebound noble – chooses to speak in Draconic alone, will likely expect proper etiquette. It was specifically mentioned that he’s not ‘liberal like Mr. Drylands’. Oh come on, I wouldn’t give Cyrus half as much trouble if he didn’t like it.

The highly unadvisable part is not letting me make first introduction to a noble, although admittedly that’s pretty unadvisable too. The catch is that Kartouche was last known to be hunting a green dragon in the far south of the swamp, and he’s been conspicuously absent for as long as I’ve been in Treff. I’d assume that searching for the knight is going to involve tangling with a dragon. Cyrus was less than thrilled about the idea of dragon-hunting, but I don’t want to fight one without him. Having someone who knows the “rules” of nobles at my side is quite the asset too. If only he spoke Draconic.

I’ve started doing some research, trying to figure out where this green dragon could be. I couldn’t find anything in particular in the Cabinet, which frustrated me to no end. One of the finest libraries in the Known World and I couldn’t find anything that a first-year xenobiology text wouldn’t have. I have ideas about where to look next, though.

A green wouldn’t be able to hold territory in the deep swamp long – blacks prize marsh territory and would be better suited to fighting for it. Even if a green was more powerful than an individual black, over time holding a marsh territory would prove deadly. A smart green – and they’re all smart – would claim a comparatively dry range, probably up in the Moss Mountains where there’s no standing water for blacks to hide.

I think it likely that the Sawgrass Rangers would have an idea of the local dragon territories, and they’d probably pay well for a trophy on top of it. Investigating this possibility will have to wait for a while, though. We’re heading out to help the druidic circle tomorrow, and after that I’m hoping to take whatever information we can find about plant mutations back to the Butcher’s Guild and help them with their musk creeper problem.

Finn had a run-in with our fan club while I was at lunch with the Four Corners – in our kitchen. Apparently the male of the pair was just looking at our belongings, marveling over the fact that we “actually use plates! and cups!” Some evidence we found around the hall concerns me – first, he got in by polymorphing into a small animal of some sort and climbing down the chimney. Second, he disappeared when Finn looked away for a second. Both of those things would imply that he’s a caster. But he was enthralled by the idea of quills and writing. He couldn’t possibly be a wizard – maybe a sorcerer, but I’m thinking something more than that. I’m also suddenly concerned with someone teleporting into our stronghold, and since he’s seen the inside, what’s the point in keeping him out? We should still install a grate, would hate to see what happens if someone vindictive pulled the same trick.

Oh, Finn also let slip that we now own a turbotiére. Apparently the gauntlet has been thrown. Bring it on, Drylands. The extraneous kitchenware is admittedly a uniquely effective method of getting under my skin, but I went to the Arcane Academy at Stone Table. If I didn’t have a few tricks up my sleeve, I might as well spoil my Ballot of Arts.

In a letter addressed simply to:

The text of the letter is written in a crude cipher:

Dearest cousin,

I hope this letter finds you well, and that Minara is likewise in good health. I have found myself in some rather mixed company here in Treff. You may remember the instance I recounted in my last letter to you – something about being locked in a closet in a smuggler’s den? Through circumstances I won’t detail here (so as to spare what remains of my dignity), I found myself once again captive. Upon securing my release, I happened upon that selfsame pack of ne’er-do-wells (you know I mean this in the most complimentary sense) who accompanied me on that first quest. It is an interesting band, to be sure. Together, we number six – a fine specimen of half-orc womanhood, foaming at the mouth but surprisingly piquant; a spellcaster of malevolent and devious aspect; an ambitious and well-spoken sellsword; a taciturn and warlike swordsman; and a holier-than-thou half-elf ranger.

Having need of my services, they have adopted me as one of their band, quaintly styled the Travelers’ Collective. My first days have been invigorating as well as profitable. I had grown so accustomed to acquiring wealth through extralegal means that I doubted my skills could be put to a more lawful use – not that our little band could exist outside of Treff, which like many uncivilized regions has its own strange customs and odd beliefs. The locals here are taken with a radical sense of equality that is not entirely without its appeals. If it were prudent to write to her, I should like to tell my dear sister that I had joined a collective, and ask that you write back with a precise depiction of her reaction. But alas, we shall have to rekindle our sibling bond once I return to Father’s good graces, if that ever is the case.

I hope you do not think that my rough-and-tumble circumstances are beyond me. In fact, I find myself quite well-suited for this kind of life, and quite enamored with the town. Undoubtedly, it pales in comparison to the splendors of the Ermine Republic, but Treff is a city filled with wealth of a more fluid sort, which suits me well.

And now to the unpleasant business. As to my creditors, I hope may once again rely upon your discretion and your aid. I am disappointed to learn that they intend on prosecuting their case, and I can only hope that you can smooth it over – for Minara’s sake, if not for Father’s. I am in high hopes that I might maintain myself here in the city of smugglers until I can return, dripping with enough coin to drown the money-grubbing sons of whores.

Yours etc.,

L

That ranging is done now, we’ve returned to Treff, but it was nice to be travelling again. The letter of marque from the Order means we made quite a substantial profit off of this ranging. Abad and I finally had a chance to go over the Skeleton Mage’s Spellbook. An explosive rune and a snake sigil, but they were easy enough to disarm. Even so, perhaps I should invest in some mystical defenses of my own books. Between my spellbook, prayerbook and this new book that I intend to hold on to I have three to keep track of. Sure they’re mostly safe in my haversack, but it may be worthwhile to invest in some defenses. We certainly brought back more than enough from the ranging. I was able to find some contacts who were willing to offload their library for cheap to get it done in platinum quickly before they left the city. And with the books we liberated from the temple in the swamp I’ve got quite a collection going now. I hired some laborers to bring the books in, but the work of fixing their arrangement has just begun. The former owner certainly seems to have kept them in a haphazard fashion, though complete, so I can’t complain too much.

As far as my personal research has been going I think I’ve worked out a better way to send the Mosquito Kingdom’s summoned minions back to their plane of origin. It has some further testing to do, but this form of dismissal should prove very helpful. At the urging of some of the collective I also looked into flight and it was not a difficult trick to master, I had time even to expand on a divine speed abjuration; I believe the extra speed and opportunities provided by Haste may be useful to us in the future. Yet I’m still struggling to understand the nuances of several incantations in the Undead Mage’s spellbook: Damning Darkness, Enervation, Orb of Fire. I watched several of the casters use Enervation and heard Damning Darkness invoked once, yet I can’t quite get the trick of them yet. I’ve also undertaken a study of the architecture of the Mosquito Kingdom following several traps in the fire temple. My prying deeper into the lore and history of this region and these mystical effects however has given me some insight into how to avoid some danger preternaturally. This trick is sure to come in quite handy.

I’ve left the Giant’s skeleton in the Swamp to be recovered at a later date if necessary. Owain was less than pleased with that path, but I believe I assuaged his concerns that it won’t cause any trouble. He also had concerns over the fashion in which Naheeda and myself were gathering information from the captured Gnoll cleric. He’s an excellent warrior, but his concern for high-minded ideals will come back to bite him. At least in this case I put the gnoll down before we left, so that’s one problem we won’t have to worry about coming back on us. But from what I hear from my new companions, they’ve a history of allowing their enemies to escape. A dangerous habit to get into; its best to leave no loose ends.

so owain is going to get all high and mightee about killing some folk. this isnt to much diferent from batel. me and gan layed down a litel presure so to speek. thats i how i got answers in the desert and thats how im going to answers in the swamp. havent we al had to cut of a finger or to. we got some of the answers we needed but by the time we got em. the nol camp was long gone. aparentlee they had a scout. fuk if i no. i was more concerned about not geting my ass eaten by a fuking demon.

this hole kaleena busines has left me with more questions than answers. so kaleena reveeled to me that she is a monk. well why didnt she come with us. shes strong. said something about being apart of some demon bloodline. her eyes glowed red and her claws grew long. i saw that once bak in the desert. a goblin. the guy was evil throo and throo. im not saying i dont trust kaleena but you cant really keep a lid on demon blood. its a part of you. just like i cannot play human when im part orc.

kaleena said that because we fetched her kid brother that she offers us her services. problem is she seems a bit like a stiff gal if you catch my drift. not wiling to bend rules or do wat needs to be done. im honored but realy i know this is a gift that is going to go unused. wat do we need another melee fighter for. me and lars are more than enof.

id like to stay a bit in treff for a wile. we were out in the swamp for to long. brother dick has a mision to help out the jakes people. even tho i think he is a bit much. ill deal. i wanna get my foot in the door to help out the people of the jakes. make myself non they have been put down for so long. by the elves. by the rich humans. even some by there own kin. they need a leader. and i think that its me.

Busy, busy day in town – very glad that Finn and I bought coffee, otherwise I have no idea how I would have gotten through the day. We arrived back in Treff about sunrise and immediately handed over our prisoner to Thessalus Watersmeet. He did something absolutely incredible with spellcraft, weaving together a spell of atonement and a spell of quest, making the effect of the first conditional of the completion of the second. Letours was offered a chance at redemption, which I suppose is as good as he could have hoped for. The pay was as good as promised too.

We got back to the Rose shortly after. Cyrus was already back from his wild goose chase with the Order, so I floated the strategy I’ve been thinking about since I talked to Alain, undermining the Runners’ soft power by doing work for their likely allies. He agrees that it’s a good plan, and also that Isabella really needs to work on more problem-solving strategies than “hit it with a halberd”. Aside from the whole long-term strategy for dealing with the Runners, the Guilds also pay well, and my hoard is looking a little small.

Galen and I went to speak with Herman Knacker. Clearly someone it wouldn’t hurt to have on our good side – incredibly wealthy but still invested in his craft, which I can respect. We identified his problem pretty much immediately – cattle getting infected by a yellow musk creeper – but further research reveals it to be more worrying than expected. Typically, musk creeper spores lure prey to them, then they eat the brains and control the body. These cattle were infected while going down the river, yards from shore. I was joking when I said we should write a paper about it but Galen seemed to take it seriously. I think the druids might be able to help – we should probably give them a hand and then talk with with Cade Greenturtle about his sense of what could be different about this plant.

I also did some errands around Figaro. Bianca from the Sole Exception was incredibly helpful, discussing the elemental foci with me. Apparently the water focus we retrieved was incomplete, not corrupted – this makes her think that the Mosquito Kingdom might have had another water focus to copy from. We also discussed the possibility of the foci not being “elemental” at all – the known foci are tied to the elemental planes, but there’s no reason they couldn’t be planar foci instead. In theory, there could be planar foci connected to any plane, perhaps even at the next set of sites – a Negative Plane focus at Death, a Far Realms focus at Madness? And perhaps there are foci for the other planes that are scattered around the swamp but aren’t connected to the prophecy gems – a true Water or Earth focus, a Shadow focus, an Astral focus? I don’t know what those would look like, but the possibility is intriguing. Of course, I was so caught up thinking about that, I forgot that she might have some good references on how the musk creeper might have changed. I’ll stop back again later, I suppose.

I might discuss also discuss those topics further with Elise Somerall when we escort her on her expedition. She’s ready to travel, research wise, but considering she didn’t think about bringing waterproof boots, she might need a little time to physically prepare. I’m thinking that initiating our plan to undermine the Runners and get paid at the same time might be more pressing, though.

Galen and I went to the Pelican Market – or really, the Pelican Market came to us. I met a rather pleasant halfling tailor who was able to bind more protection spells into my mother’s vest. Tomorrow can’t come soon enough, I feel naked without it. Galen also picked up some more items to improve his healing abilities. We also ran into Xante, Kaleena, and her younger brother Khad. He obviously did something terribly wrong – he was quite literally walking around with his tail between his legs. Apparently Kaleena is intending to do more ranging. I wonder what her particular set of skills is, aside from keeping the Quiver in line. Maybe I’ll ask her in more detail later.

Also, there’s something rather unnerving happening today – a man and a woman, apparently siblings, have been following us around all day. According to Leslie they’d been hanging around the Rose while we were out, too. They’re not doing an excellent job at keeping hidden, so I think they’re intending to be noticed, but they scoot away pretty quickly if they notice us noticing them… we’ve overheard them commenting on us, mentioning a grandfather, saying that the time isn’t right yet. Disturbing.

On one hand, I’m really glad to know that there’s a Republic bar in Figaro, just a stone’s throw from the Rose. On the other hand, my headache is really, really unhappy about that. The Founding Day celebration was a ton of fun, even if I think I was a little bit embarrassingly drunk.

While Finn and I were recovering, Galen went to talk to Thessalus Watersmeet. Apparently he had a referral to make as far as traveling companions for our job with the Trinitarian Church, because Galen came back with Naheeda Sand of the Traveler’s Collective. I’d heard of her by reputation, of course. Mostly from Krog mooning over her, but one positive comment about her hunting prowess from Owain. She seems entirely too coarse to put up with Krog’s airs, not to mention too practical.

Her first impression of us was probably that Cyrus is polite and respectful and that I’m utterly insane. She did walk in right when we were working on teaching our new friend how not to use a broom… that little automaton we found is a surprisingly adaptable worker, if occasionally unaware of his own strength. We’ve dubbed him Cogsworth.

After some strategy discussion, Finn came up with the brilliant idea to bait the bandits into ambushing us. Since we needed to disguise ourselves as pilgrims, we went to look for Bex el’Enen. She’s brilliant at what she does. (Much to my embarrassment.)

Hunting the bandits went well, all things considered. Note, my definition of “well” includes “took four flaming arrows to the stomach” and “currently ignoring the depressed cleric in the back of the boat”. At least I’ve gotten good enough at guiding Ned to drive while I’m writing.

Finn and Bex’s ambush plan went off without a hitch. Finn picked out two scrags, an ogre commander, and a line of bugbears about 100 feet away. Galen teleported with Naheeda to take on the ogre before he could damage our boat, Bex destroyed one of the scrags in an underwater melee, I took out the other with lightning, and Finn picked off enough bugbears to break their morale. Then, our quarry appeared, dealing a great deal of damage to Galen before retreating. I dispelled his air walk spell, which didn’t stop him completely, but was deeply satisfying.

We ended up springing an ambush of our own, which, aside from the flaming arrows to the stomach, was incredibly successful. Bex negated three powerful allies – a hill giant and two trolls – by suggesting that the hill giant attack the trolls. It would have been more humorous if we didn’t have to deal with an angry cleric and an erinyes devil. The cleric got a confusion spell off against Naheeda, despite my best attempt to counter, but he quickly became a non-issue when Bex wrestled him to the ground and swiped his holy symbol. The erinyes was more of an issue – she used her flight capabilities to keep out of range of anything except for Finn’s arrows, which didn’t seem to graze her, my lightning, which did some damage despite her general resistance to the arcane, and the single flask of holy water that Galen lobbed at her. I had to draw her fire to keep her from killing Galen or Finn, and well, that hurt. A lot. Yet another edition of “I miss Cyrus” theater.

I’m glad our mission specifically called to leave the cleric alive. He’s clearly done evil things, terrible things, but I can’t honestly say that his reasons aren’t sympathetic. Losing everything, having it offered back, then losing it all again, even more than before? It doesn’t excuse his actions, but it certainly explains them. Hopefully Thessalus will be able to help him.

To Do List:

1. Talk to the Sole Exception about elemental foci.
2. Discuss options with Isabella.
3. Float the idea of doing some work for the Merchants’ Guilds. (Make them think twice about sending their militias after us)
4. Check on the beer.
5. See if one of the more cerebral members of the TC will talk with me about the foci. Naheeda didn’t much seem to care.
6. Find someone who can improve enchantments, my vest could use an upgrade.