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Item: Proper Letter from a Mysterious Woman
Description: A Hand-Written Letter On Desert Papyrus. Written By A Certain Mysterious Someone. Whoever could it be? Sealed with a Strange Purple Flourish.
The letter’s coarse papyrus was curled up like a scroll. Its ink seal accompanied by a purple insignia of some kind. It looked like…
“Is that lipstick?” Calaf asked.
His nose wrinkled. He had a sneaking suspicion of who the sender could be.
Calaf selected the Proper Letter from a Mysterious Woman. He chose ‘Read’ in his interface.
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Dearest, Dutiful Pursuer,
I hope this letter finds you well. Still thinking of me? Thanks so much for visiting me back home. I almost didn’t expect you to dare try to follow after I nicked those lockpicks. But a brave, upstanding knight such as yourself just has to pursue a relic thief of my caliber. It’s just how the game is played.
So, you’re probably headed back towards Riverglen by now. You’ve likely also by now run into some roadblocks on the way south. Remember some of those relics I hawked before our fateful encounter in the bath back at Twelfthnight? As it turns out I handed those over to some wandering trinket merchants, who then handed them off to some wilderness aesthetic who promptly started using their level-spoofing powers to infiltrate the area around the Battletower, raid it for priceless ancient baubles, and start a cult! So, my vile, outlaw relic-thieving actions may still be causing problems for you yet.
Whoops. Good luck with all that.
I’m just writing to ensure all this doesn’t take you by surprise. And to tell you to be careful on the road down there. Maybe you’ve left an impression on me during our cat-and-mouse chase? Do be careful on the road home.
Word around the watering holes, though, says this new hinterland cult has been in communication with somebody much further up the pilgrimage line. Whatever troop movements you have down there, the scale’s so much higher thereabouts Autumn’s Redoubt. Enkidu and I are heading out to give it a look-see. There’s talk of skirmishes near Fort Duran. And where there’s dungeon-crawling, there’s loot.
Sincerely Yours,
Jelena Turandot
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Calaf folded the letter back up and weighed it in his hand, debating wether to summon up his Interface.
Whatever was she thinking, sending him a message like this? Some kind of roundabout apology for yet more trouble for him on the road?
“That from a girlfriend?” A familiar red-headed figure in flashy mage robes asked from behind.
“What?” Calaf stumbled forward. “No. Of course not!”
“It’s just, I saw it was sealed with a kiss and all.” Karol pointed at the letter.
Oh, it’s just a letter from the woman who murdered my foster-father, and who I then flirt-fought with the length and breadth of the Firefield desert! Yes, that would be the perfect angle to describe this interpersonal relationship. Calaf should lead with that.
“It’s from a stalker.” With beat-red cheeks, Calaf whisked the letter into his inventory with a swishing motion.
“A letter from a stalker. One you’re saving rather than throwing away, despite the ‘trash’ option being just two rows down in the System?” Karol asked.
“I’m a kleptomaniac.”
“Uh-huh.” Karol raised a skeptical eyebrow. “… got a girlfriend?”
“I’m betrothed,” Calaf said in a huff. “To an upstanding and holy deaconess from Riverglen. If you must know.”
Karol giggled. “Is that so?”
Was that a whiff of disappointment Calaf sensed?
“W-why are you asking?”
“Oh, just thinking of some way to make my brother mad,” she said. “Nothing major. Though, if you want to play along, feel free to hold my hand as we walk back up to Jedd.”
Calaf’s hands shot down to his side. “No, ma’am.”
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The party reconvened within the hour, as Paladin Jedd had instructed.
“Is everyone full on supplies?” Jedd asked.
“Aye,” bellowed Gael.
“Sure thing, brother,” said Karol.
Mikail nodded enigmatically.
Calaf nodded, trying to look enigmatic but mostly looking awkward.
Jedd donned his helmet. “Very well. I’ve heard word that the Plains Junction’s marshalled scouting companies have already ventured into the hills north of Twelfthnight. We should still be some days ahead of the regular army. Keep a swift pace, and we’ll see the Battletower this time tomorrow. Now, fly.”
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Far north, where scorching desert sands tapered out amidst an uplifting of brown and red-hued rocks that towered into the northern horizon.
You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.
“Ah, making papyrus by hand is such a pain,” Jelena said, nursing the continent’s worst hand cramp. “It was so much easier when I had access to a crafting interface. Chalk one up to the System brands, eh?”
Four paces ahead, Enkidu stood where the sands ended and rocky highlands began. The long-haired mountain man looked north, arms crossed and brooding.
“What’cha thinking about?”
Enkidu grumbled. “Sounds, Autumnsteel on Highlands Banded Steel Mail. Adventurers in at-level gear versus regular army. A mile and a half off the trail to the northeast.”
“Oh?” Jelena tilted her head. “I don’t hear a thing.”
“There’s the smell of blood. Distinct lack of acerbic acid in the scent. Evidence of poor diet. Freelance adventurers probably on the losing end of things.”
Ol’ Enkidu’s senses were always at the absolute limit of human capability.
“Well. Wonder who is on whose side.”
Enkidu opened his mouth to answer that with some prodigious sensory skill or another. But Jelena stopped him.
“Make it a surprise. It’ll just be a moment.”
A set of trees awash in all the reds, oranges, and yellows of an autumnal forest stood some half a mile out. The wind rustled the leaves, with a sound of combat wafting into Jelena’s more reasonably-calibrated ears.
“Ah, there we go,” she said. “Let’s roll, Oldster.”
The pair leapt over to the highland rocks and rapidly took off at a sprint, heading north and east uphill into the highlands.
“Another nickname…”
Jelena looked over at her partner in crime. “Hmmm? What about it?”
“It has the opposite meaning of the last.”
“That it does, Big Man.”
“I don’t like either of those…”
Jelena laughed as they picked up the pace.
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South of Plains Junction, where the high and arid plains gave way to slightly less arid foothills, resident Vanguard Mikail was doing his party-role based duties to trace a path through scarcely-charted territories.
They were well north of the footpath to Twelfthnight, ground Calaf had tread alongside Gorman previously. With no proper road to speak of and the terrain no longer flat as a Delta-grown wheat pancake, the going grew ever rougher.
“So much easier to run on level ground.” Calaf huffed in his full armor.
Mikail was in the lead by some fifty paces. Jedd sprinted effortlessly at the head of the main group in full Paladin armor, a testament to his endurance stat. His sister came in third, having a much easier time of it with her mage robes. And the old man Gael came in after that, hobbling between his mismatched armor and a bout of the Arthritis debuff.
Calaf came in dead last. The party crested the next hill, forcing Calaf to run ever faster to catch up.
What he found in the next dip between jagged foothills, however, was that the party had come to a stop. Mikail had found something beside a narrow watering hole. He advanced at a crouch, the rest of the party waiting behind the cover of a nearby boulder to back him up if necessary.
After much huffing and puffing, Calaf caught up. He assumed a crouching position behind Karol.
“What is it?”
Karol didn’t turn, distracted.
“Why would they leave so many here? Not even buried or burning?” she muttered to herself.
With no answer received, Calaf peeked over the boulder.
What he found, tossed haphazardly near the mouth of a natural spring, were three corpses:
Name:
Audrey of Plains Junction
Rank:
Wayfarer
Level
28
Status:
-189/87 (Deceased)
Name:
Norman of Plains Junction
Rank:
Stalwart
Level
33
Status:
-89/110 (Deceased)
Name:
Lorian of Plains Junction
Rank:
Soothsayer
Level
27
Status:
-300/45 (Deceased)
“All from the same party. One of the Junction vans,” Mikail reported. “Killed some days ago. Left to rot here.”
At Jedd’s signal, the entire group advanced to join Mikail.
“Looted clean, too,” the Vanguard said.
Furtive, golden yellow vine shooters crept out from underneath the trio of cadavers. They wound towards, and eventually into, the watering hole.
“Killed to leave a warning?” Jedd exhaled sharply beneath his helmet. “Unlikely. Too secluded.”
“Left to spoil the water,” Gael said. “Poison the wells to keep advancing armies from usin’ them, aye?”
Calaf crawl-walked to the front of the pack, near the bodies.
“Whatever the reason, they’ve been left here for a while…” he mentioned. “They’ve long-since rotted.”
The visages of the hapless trio were sunken-in, eyes plucked out by some dire-bird or another. Their mouths were agape, very much looking like they were smiling at the party. Hit points indicated prodigious decay. The bodies were spoiled, well beyond the ability to consecrate them.
“We should burn the bodies,” Calaf added. “It’s church protocol.”
… and the strange feeling vines grasping for the water gave Calaf pause, went unsaid.
“And give away our position?” Mikail asked with a scowl. “The killers are probably within earshot of us. It’s dangerous to even be having this conversation!”
“No, we should incinerate them.” Jedd’s helmet shook as he nodded his head. “It’s imperative. We’ll have Gael use an internal combustion spell, should smolder them well enough as we get out of range.”
“Aye, just say the word. Alight they’ll go,” the old man grumbled with a quiet professionalism.
“Hey, Jay-Jay.” Now Karol came crouch-walking over to her brother. “Why’re we burning these guys. They’re dead. If you want to put their souls to rest, get a priest or something. Ah, if only Isen were here.”
“You see things, if you run the pilgrimage route long enough,” Jedd said softly. “They’re already so far gone. Just… get rid of them.”
Calaf looked at the corpse pile with a forlorn, pensive look on his face. Jedd’s helm shook as he moved his head to look upon the lower leveled Squire.
“Have you seen it too?” There was a pointed sharpness like an unsheathed sword to Jedd’s question.
It was a question that would go forever unanswered, as Mikail swiftly rose to a standing position and brandished his twin knives.
“Eyes up.”
Figures emerged from the hills to their north and west.
“Low levels. We’ll cut right through them,” Mikail added.
“We can break for the east to meet them on more favorable ground.” Gael prepped his massive club.
“More lambs for the slaughter!” came a booming voice, distressingly, from the south.
A man in haughty and well-kept traveling shopkeep gear approached at a lolling pace. It was:
Name:
Honest John, Humble Merchant
Rank:
Trailblazer
Level
13
Status:
24/24 (Smile Never Spreads to His Eyes)
Weapons:
Merchant’s Ordinary Stabbing Knife (x1) (Str: 2, Agl: 20)
“Ah, it’s dangerous out in the hinterlands these days,” said the not-so-honest merchant. “People are like to disappear.”
Calaf pulled up his shield to better guard their rear and flanks. He looked at the merchant.
“You…”
“Ah, you could’ve been on the side that walks out of here alive.” Honest John’s smile grew wider and less authentic. “We have so few north of level thirty in our ranks. They’re too invested in the System, yes? But after popping a few Baubles one of your mettle would have the strength of a church hunter.”
As he talked, the numerous other level ten and twelves with paltry adventurer gear advanced. They should be easy prey given the level delta. And yet…
One of those feeler vines emanating from the corpses wrapped around Calaf’s armored boot. He looked down, kicked it off.
“… Gael. Got any fire spells that shoot up a lot of smoke?” he whispered to the Battlemage.
“Aye, lad. Greater Conflagration.”
“Burn the corpses. The flame will cause a distraction, and we can strike out of the smoke.”
The old sellsword nodded, glint in his eyes. “Like the way you think, lad!”
A spark emerged from Gael’s battle gloves:
Gael Uses:
Spell:
Greater Conflagration
Effect:
Immediately Combusts a Corpse or Other Flammable Material into a Pillar of Fire. Cremates targets. Does Modest Fire Damage to Living Targets in Range. Forty-five Percent Base Chance to Inflict Burn On Living Targets.
Description:
Ancient Cleansing Flame. Used for Cremation Ceremonies in the Days of Yore.
“Oh Profaned Demon’s Flame, We Beseech Thee, Cleanse This Infestation!”
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