The Agate Seekers continue off from last time, preparing to open the door to where then monster in the facility was kept in stasis. Philomena Snapdragon puts in the southern password, Dareth goes on to put in the other password, and Mikhail puts in the password for the stasis field... And realizes that all of these passwords are named after Illiadian saints. Entering the chamber with the Planar Window, the party immediately find it ruined and full of skeletonized corpses. Dareth, together with Volk Lesnoy and Zora lead the charge... And Dareth gets hit by the monster, which kept itself invisible, and has wrapped itself around the machine.
Initiative is rolled, a fight is had. The monster, a many-eyed, many tentacled thing with sharp teeth, gets in a few good hits with its tentacles and poisonous bite. However, the party is ultimately victorious. However, opening the last gate seems to have compromised the energy supply, and the party just about makes it out of the ruin before it loses power completely. That night, Mikhail thinks about the Pads and their messages; and the northern pad's message was authored by one Rani Ventarida. While this name seems familiar, he didn't know where he heard it. But since Arilki Rayshine was also mentioned in that pad's message, perhaps he could ask him about the situation later on.
The next day, the party arrives in the rather pastoral Patasa, where fruits, vegetables and flowers are grown, and worship of Demeter thrives. There, they seek out the Golden Shield Tavern and Inn, a rather high-class tavern. There, they see a Human and a Tirrdaka with a Half-Orc appearance. The former of which introduces himself as Ylos Asol, and his colleague as Ul'grak Niedermeier... who turns out to be Mr. Cracklebones, quite embarrassed about their situation. Turns out Ylos, rather uncarefully, revealed both their identities as an Feda-Lide and a Light-Walker respectively, and the rather backwater merchants from Grehel that they worked with in order to establish safer trade routes in the country, decided to just leave them behind, so they wouldn't have to deal with them.
After resupplying, the party and their clients left the town, with Ylos revealing his true form... which suspiciously looks a lot like the Midnight Sun. A conversation was had, with Ylos revealing that he had many siblings, some of which also joined the Liwilai Adventurer's Guild, like his sibling Evalwyn. Sooty and Mikhail then proceeded to ask if they had seen their specific people of interest, Selene McCoy and Annalise Krios. While Ylos wasn't able to give info on the former, he was able to remember Annalise; in part due to her similarity to Mikhail. 3 Months ago, he says she worked in a Bishop-Ranked adventuring group called the Evergreen Hunt in the Kingdom of Bursztyn. They helped escort him once, but besides one other member beign a dragonborn, he wasn't able to remember anything else.
During the night, Mikhail and Ul'grak; or Cracklebones, as you may, have a heart-to-heart. Mikhail apologizes for their first interaction, where he hid behind his friends, and tells him of his misconception of Feda-Lide. Ul'grak doesn't take it badly at all, and agrees that most Feda-Lide ARE dangerous, with ones like him being rather rare. They just weren't dangerous for the reasons he thought, as they couldn't further corrupt Tirrdaka and Half-Tirrdaka.
The next day, the party goes the mountain route and sees... a tower in the distance, with Banners that have a stylized little Owl on them, with a shield and a spear. As they get closer, they realize it's a Wizard's Tower. Upon finding the doorbell and ringing it, one Wagner Shatterhorn, an archwizard and high-ranking member of the guild, though now mostly retired and working in the Support-Tier. Having already heard about the party from his good friend Aldic Dobarum, he invites everyone in for some tea and cookies. Wagner says that he'd introduce his husband, Urzug Hammerrun, but he currently is out on a mission in the Elemental Plane of Fire.
Dareth pipes up, asking if Wagner offers services for Guild Members due to being in the Support Tier, and asks if he perhaps has spells to locate people. Volk meanwhile asks if he's able to delve into minds to see things. He confirms both things. After some debating amongst the group, Volk, Sooty and Dareth ask him for some services. First, Volk. Volk reveals that he suspects that he's actually over 2100 years old, due to having grown up in a more advanced time, and waking up in a time where everything was more backwards, and everyone talked about The Great Wasting. Wagner confirms that this may very well be the case, as it is the year 2142 post-wasting on the Post-Wasting Calendar.
Using Detect Thoughts, Wagner delves into Volk's mind, and Volk thinks about the things he remembers. How he used to be a bandit, a brunette woman with emerald-green eyes, and how he lost consciousness next to a tree that was much taller than what it was when he fell unconscious. Wagner delves deeper, only to be left with a nosebleed as the spell is forcibly stopped. He could only see the woman pressing down on Volk's chest, a red glow, the pain and cracking of re-arraging bones and the woman's terrified face, much to Volk's worry.
Next up, Sooty. Sooty asks if he can locate his owner, Selene, via scrying. Wagner agrees, but the spell fails. He gives multiple reasons for why this could be. She could be on another plane, she could be wearing something that blocks scrying, or she could... have passed away. He reassures Sooty, offering the idea that perhaps she just doesn't want to be found. Sooty, although saddened, clings onto hope.
Last, we have Dareth, who asks Wagner to scry on his half-brother Clayton Griffmane, giving a signet ring and a verbal description visualized by Wagner's minor illusion. He reveals to the party that he's actually a member of the Griffmane Family, which a few members of the party seem to recognize. Most notably Sooty.
Wagner proceeds to scry on Clayton, with the spell succeeding. Clayton looks rather unkempt, haggard, with dirty armor, and doesn't seem to be taking the best care of himself, and he seems to be drinking the day away at a tavern of some sort; Wagner isn't able to assign a certain style to the tavern, so he can't narrow down the area where it is. However, he notices a Greatsword by Clayton's side. From the description, Dareth realizes that it's Skytalon, his family's heirloom blade.
After the scrying is done, Dareth excuses himself and leaves. Mikhail, respecting his emotional state, decides to give him some space, but Volk goes after him. The two have a bit of a heart-to-heart, where Dareth admits he can't understand what's going on with his brother; to him, he's always been the perfect brother and heir to the Griffmane name, and hearing how he drinks so heavily, and acting like this, when his uncle basically wasn't a good drunk... it doesn't make sense for him.
In an attempt to lift the mood, Volk does talk to him, but then lets off a stupid line about Mikhail. Turns out Volk knew of their little Broom Closet escapade, and is assigning more meaning to it than it should. Angry and flushed, Dareth storms back inside, closely followed by Volk.
As it's getting late, Wagner proposes to the party and their clients Ul'grak and Ylos, that they can stay in his Magnificent Mansion. It'd also work in Volk's favor, as the moon would have less of a grasp on him while they're in that extradimensional space. The party and clients, and especially Ul'grak, agrees, and thus, Wagner opens up a doorway in the middle of the room, leading to a magnificent foyer.
SESSION END.