The Cult of Arclesia Mountain (Kuragari)

[jondude]

"Mm, that's fair. Trying to go up a river the comes that sources from a cave is probably hard too. Maybe I could find a nicer offshoot though. Lots of rivers like this in the valley along the mountains." Marco says before hauling in yet another fish. He places it in his basket and from there it's pretty much full. "Well! That's about it. How about we head back to town and get some proper lunch?", Marco says, gathering up his gear.

Seeing no reason to delay, you gear up with the rest of your equipment and follow the two of them as they descent a little further down the hills to a slightly lower portion of the valley, making polite small talk all the while. It takes about an hour to get back to their village, but during this time you learn that Ingrid and Marco live together in a modest cottage in the village of Shimmer Springs. Apparently they are essentially adoptive siblings, not actually a couple by any means, and make a living by doing odd jobs around the town. Apparently their pantry was running a little low and they had been up in the mountains patching fist, some of it to dry, others to salt and preserve.

When you get to the village it's a classic and quaint place, though quite picturesque! Nestled close to the mountains there is about 100 or so wooden buildings, and a narrow river winds through the place, descending through a series of short waterfalls into large ponds or springs where the flow over time was stripped away earth to the bare stone, revealing them to be natural basins where a surprising amount of quartz crystals of quite a wide array of colours. Each large pool seems to be dominated by a certain colour of quartz too, which when viewed from above or during twilight hours make for quite the spectacle! It wasn't like that now mind you, but you'd likely get many chances to see it.

"There we are. Home sweet home.", Ingrid says, opening the door to a modest one floor cottage near the center of the town, right along a portion of the river before it drained into one of the springs. They had a decent little plot here, with a large and healthy looking garden right next to their home. "Since you saved our butts feel free to crash here for as long as you like, but if your looking for info or some work to get some gold you can head over to the Moonskip Inn and Tavern.", Ingrid tells you before briefly explaining how to get there from here.

[Kuragari]

Heading back to town sounded good, and Kayin had no reason to say no. She finished getting her gear sorted again before following after them, keeping her eyes and ears open for signs of any further trouble. Along the way she chats with them, and shares a bit of her adventures before she arrived here in this part of the world. She also learns a bit more about the duo, though for some reason as she hears that they see each other as siblings, her brain can't help but briefly imagine the two of them getting up to more intimate, some might even say taboo, fun together.

Of course once they reach the town, her breath is taken away by how beautiful the place is. "I can see where it gets its name from." She says idly as she looks at it as they move down towards it. She'd doubtless get many chances to enjoy even further the natural beauty of the place. Her mind does wonder if there might be a bit more to the crystals, given the variety of color at each different pool. She nods to folks as she makes sure to stick close to Ingrid and Marco, though her eyes do wander about here and there. She tries not to linger on anything though, some small part of her vaguely worried about catching sight of that damned sigil somewhere and having it render her a docile lass.

"Appreciate the tip. I think I'll head over there now, see what they might have. I can swing back after, perhaps enjoy a bit of a meal." Her stomach rumbled a bit as she laughed and noted, "Haven't really eaten much today after all." With that said, she'd turn and head on off to this Moonskip Inn and Tavern to see just what options she might have.

[jondude]

"For sure! We'll be here!", Ingrid says. Marco gives you a friendly wave and then two of them go about the work of prepping and cleaning the fist they caught so they get it ready for preserving. Typically a rather smelly task, so a good time for you go check out the place a bit!

It doesn't take you long to find the Moonship, and soon identify as one the largest buildings in town, a sturdy wide based buildings that was three stories tall. Heading inside shows a similar sight you've seen many times when it comes to taverns. A couple large cozy fire places, many tables, and modicum of people taking lunch, and a burly stout man with a bushy handle bar mustache behind the counter serving drinks. Just off to your left is a huge bulletin board filled with notices that you can check out, so naturally check that out first.

Most of the stuff is fairly mundane. Such as some of the local farmers requesting help harvesting crops for modest pay, or someone requesting some resource from the woods. There are a few that stand out for an enterprising adventurer like yourself though and offer decent rewards. One comes from the town cleric, who requests help in appeasing some disturbed spirits at the local cemetery and pays 300 gold. One from the owner of the town general good stores inquires about assistance in locating a missing shipment of goods from further up the valley, now over due by a week and paying 250 gold. Another request from the town watch master outlines a cut and dry request to remove a nearby nest of giant rats(medium dog sized as you recall) before they start eating local crops promising 350 gold. And lastly a request to a find a missing persons from one Fiona Silvana, promising 300 gold. You might be able to find a little more though if you take some more time to examine. It was a large board after all.

Of course you can always come back to this later. The Inn keeper might have other things you could potentially do or neat information to share.

[Kuragari]

If there was one thing about Taverns, it was that they all generally had a similar vibe and look to them. The ones to watch out for were the ones that broke the mold. Fortunately this one didn't, and Kayin happily wandered over to the bulletin board to look over the jobs. She paid the mundane ones only a passing glance. She'd do those if she was about to run out of money and couldn't find anything else, but thankfully there was better stuff to be found. The jobs she found all sounded worthwhile, so she'd likely look into all of them. After a moment of thought, she decided the giant rats one would probably be the fastest to deal with first, then she could handle the cemetary one. After that, well, the missing person and the missing shipment would be on her checklist!

"Should be easy peasy~" She said with a smile. Giant rats hadn't caused her any kind of trouble in quite some time. Really unless there was something weird about them, they only tended to be a problem for folks just starting out as adventurers and thus didn't have much experience with the kinds of critters they could encounter!

[jondude]

None of the content is too exciting, but certainly a little more your speed then putting on a tavern girl outfit and serving drinks or brushing horses at the local stable in order to get a little cash. Those kinds of things were usually safe and easy, but a little bland at your experience level. Granted you'd do what you had to do, but it was fortunate there was some problems more suited for an adventurer in this seemingly sleepy mountain village.

The notice for rats says to talk to the town watch master and in your experience with places like this the town guard was usually based out of the one building in town that be made of stone. It doesn't take you long to find at all thankfully, a building of that exact description just a scant couple hundred yards away from the Moonskip Tavern. You head over and examine the relatively uncreative building; two floors, dark grey stone, a wide base to hold a small barracks, armory, office, and probably a few cells that are normally used after someone had drank a little too much. Sturdy and defensible. Heading inside shows a small reception area with two town guards in light armor, sitting at their desks and casually taking before glancing at you as you enter. "Greetings! How can I-", the first man starts, but stops as he notices your armor and swords. "Oh! Well, your certainly the capable type. I assume your here to see the watch master about the notice?"

You confer as much.

"Great! Given your gear, I'd say this one should be rather easy for you. Pay isn't much, but it's something.", he replies before standing up and gesturing you over to a side door. "Watch Master Sigurd office is here. You can talk to him real quick and he'll tell what you need to know."

He opens the door and allows you to see a rather large and quite handsome man sitting behind a desk. Tall and broad shouldered, he's fit and relatively young to boot. Like many others in the town as well he's also demi human however, sporting a pair of gray wold ears that point out his shock of longish black hair. The guard informs him that you were here about the notice, and he sighs with mild relief and gestures you inside. "Thank goodness. Not sure what brings you to these parts adventurer, but thank you for coming in. We're a pretty small village and there is only about fifteen of us here, and while we can certainly handle rats it's a pain to chase them down on top of all the other pests and duties that come with being a guard. I'm Watch Master Sigurd. Pleased to meet you.", he says, standing up and leaning over his desk with an outstretched arm to shake your hand.

[Kuragari]

Heading over to the watchhouse and going inside, she smiles and nods to the guards at the desk and heads in to meet the head of the village watch. Kayin introduces herself, but keeps from boasting about her accomplishments. While she'd have done that a bit here and there before, after her recent setback with the cultists, she felt a bit less inclined to do so. Plus, if by chance her reputation had in any way gotten up here, then the name would be all that was needed anyways.

Shaking his hand, she says, "I'll be happy to handle them. Giant Rats shouldn't be any trouble, just point me in the right direction and I'll go deal with them." She did find herself deciding to ask, "Have there been any other problems besides local pests I should keep an eye or ear out while I'm around town?"

[jondude]

"Nothing that farmers themselves can't handle on their own generally.", Watch Master Sigurd says as he sits back down. As he does though he gives you a slightly more serious look. "Just to be sure though. These are a little bigger then your average actually giant rats. Most giant rats breeds are like cat sized, but these ones are proper giant. Like... 60 to 70 pounds. A little smaller then your average wolf, but not by much. Granted, you still look more then capable for such a thing. Just want to make sure your not caught off guard is all by past expectations.

"In any case the rats are mostly appearing near the towns edge along barley fields centered around one of our two granaries. They've haven't gotten into it, but they've eaten some dents into the fields itself and I have about half of my manpower busy just chasing them off, and naturally the things are quick to disappear once they are back in the woods. Some of out local hunters however have done us a favor and managed to track them a mile and half or so to a really dense copse of trees centered around a small lake fed by other mountain rivers, and covered in a huge thicket of also giant thorn vines. I've never seen it's like anywhere else in the valley, so we think it might be an old druid enclave that has been long abandoned and overgrown. We think the thorn vines may have gotten large feeding on the slightly higher concentration of latent magic there. Luckily though, while it is big it also pretty easy to cut through. Here's a rough path you can use."

The next five minutes or so we shows you his map and traces out a rough way for you to use. It would involve a fair bit of bushwhacking, but he gives you enough terrain markers that you should be able to use to get to the area.

[Kuragari]

"Mhm, bigger yeah. Not by too much though." Kayin says after a moment. She'd dealt with some that were the more typical size, but had also encountered instances of ones that were larger. Usually magic or something about the environment was what allowed them to get that big. She listens as he notes the trouble specifically and the details for their location. When he mentions the lake is fed by mountain rivers, a part of her can't help but suddenly think back to that cult base in the mountain, and wonder if the cult might be involved, or perhaps was just indirectly causing the issue.

"I think that's all the information I need. Unless there's anything else of note I should be aware of, I'll happily go deal with those rats and take that burden off you guys." She said with a smile, patting her swords and preparing to head off to do it after a visit back at Marco and Ingrid's place for a quick bite to eat.

[jondude]

"No that's it. I wish you luck miss Kayin!", Sigurd says. With not much else to do you see yourself out, stomach rumbling at the thought of a good meal.

You get back to Marco's and Ingrid's home after a short walk, politely knocking on the door. After about thirty seconds or so the door swings open, and there is Ingrid. She gives a big smile and invites you in, saying that they were just finishing cooking up lunch.

Perception: 17

As you head inside though you do note a couple things, mostly that Ingrid seems to have changed from the clothes she was wearing earlier to what appears to be an oversized shirt and not much else. It's possible she could be wearing some shorts or something, but it strikes you as something put on in a hurry. Likewise, Marco as well seems to be clad in only shorts in a shirt. A little more involved, but a far cry from his earlier clothing, which included a lot of leather strapping for all his fishing gear. Granted though they had presumably been gutting and cleaning fish while you were doing so, and that was a messy job...

Your soon distracted from such thoughts when your presented a large white fish filet, covered with a simple sauce of garlic, butter, and thyme. On the side is a nice portion of steamed potatoes and salt and peppered broccoli, along with a few slices of cheese. Given that the last few meals you had mostly consisted of cum other then the few nuts and berries, it looked and smelled incredible. "Please, enjoy!", Marco says as pours you a glass of water.

"So any luck finding some cool adventurer stuff to do?", Ingrid asks as she plops down in her own seat and starts to dig into her own food.

[Kuragari]

Kayin can't help but wonder why they might be wearing barely anything. But at least Ingrid doesn't have that one mark visible, that was the last thing she needed right now. As soon as she was presented with the food though her stomach yelled its hunger and need and she happily dug into the food as soon as it was presented to her. It might have been simple, but it was thoroughly delicious!

"Quite a few. The first I am doing is going to be dealing with some giant rats causing trouble. Then a few others I am going to tackle afterwards!"

[jondude]

"Oh thats great! Should be really easy for you.", Ingrid says as she starts to dig into her own food.

"You know normally we'd have our local mage go and take care of stuff like that, but they've been travel for a few months now. I hope they're alright. They said they were going to go and do something about those horny cultists that have been popping up here and there in the valley. It has been a while though...", Marco says, continuing to make conversation.

By the sounds of it what he was talking about wasn't affiliated with that other notice you had read about a missing person. Still a town missing it's token mage was hardly ideal. It might be worth your time to try and investigate that if you got a chance, but given that you basically had no information to go off at the moment it probably wasn't worth putting a lot of thought into yet. Maybe after you dealt with these rats you might be able to ask Watch Master Sigurd about it?

[Kuragari]

"A mage you say? Hmm... I might look into that as able. Though, given what I went through, I wouldn't be surprised if they got nabbed and messed with too." Kayin murmurs, briefly glaring at her plate as she thinks about the vengeance she'll seek to inflict upon those cultists.

Still, once she finished her plate, she thanked them again before setting off to where the job needed to be dealt with. She kept herself alert and at the ready. Just because they were giant rats, even if bigger than the usual ones, didn't mean she should be cocky. Especially if there was even the slightest chance the Cult had something to do with them, directly or indirectly.

[jondude]

Deciding to not stick around and get straight to the action you quickly head out once you're done eating, Ingrid and Marco giving you friendly wave as you go. With the entire afternoon to work with you should be able to hopefully make quick work of these pesky giant rats!

You get to the more commonly pilfered field as Sigurd mentioned, where you spot a half a dozen guards patrolling around the edge of it and another half dozen randomly roaming the field itself in case any of the rats had slipped through. Finding the forest edge you find a couple hunting trails, and then proceed to find your way through a decent network of them, turning at markers that the Watch Master had told you about. After about an hour you eventually come across the suspected nest, as a rising wall of thick thorns weaving between forest trees makes itself known. At the base of the thorny plants they are nearly as thick around as your leg, and while not tough like typical tree wood are more then dense enough that hacking away with your swords might take a day or two, and by the sounds of it simply grow back just as quickly due to latent druid magic in the area. Walking along the edge you decide to try and spot an entrance the rats might be using, and learn that the thorny grove isn't actually all that large. Maybe a few acres at best, but nothing you could walk around in an hour or so even with all the forest in your way.

Walking quietly though you eventually start to crest a small hill and quickly spot a dark grey form. Crouching and peering over at it, you quickly see it's indeed a giant rat. Thankfully these giant variety are all mangy and savage looking, lacking any of the cuteness that small rodents could possess. It seemed to be gnawing at a bone of some kind. You had an excellent opportunity to ambush it... but it could lead you to an entrance if you were willing to be a little patient.

[Kuragari]

Kayin nods to the militia guards as she arrives at her destination, quickly making for the forest edge and the hunting trails. She's all business now as she casts her eyes about and follows the markers. She's not pleased to see how thick the wall of thorns are that seem to be guarding the nest. Axes would make quicker work of such but even then it'd take time and it'd be a battle in its own right as it tried to grow back. Maybe there was a spot that they used to come and go from, since it did seem tight enough that even giant rats might have trouble coming and going without some kind of exitway.

When Kayin spots one of the beasties though, she shifts into tracking mode. Killing it would be pointless right now. She needed to find a way past the thorns so she could deal with the nest. Killing a single lone rat would be a waste of time. Instead, she moves to watch and follow it. Though as she does so, she also tries to study it carefully for any signs of something that might suggest the rat had been tampered with magically.

[jondude]

Roll: 18

Knowing that killing it now wouldn't be all that productive you keep low and wait for it to move on, hoping it might lead you back to an entrance. Resolving to be patient you make use of all the skills you've learned regarding stealth, and keep an eye on the thing. It gnaws on the bones for about 15 minutes before suddenly prancing off into the woods, and moving swift but silently you manage to use it's tracks to keep from falling to far behind as it darts this way and that. After an hour though you watch as the thing manages to catch a hare, the larger rodent easily overpowering the smaller one and claiming it as prey. With it's kill in it's mouth it then heads back toward the groove, and you keep pace, helped along now by a convenient trail of blood droplets.

After about ten minutes you manage to just sees its tail disappear through a series of vines at the base of a short rocky crag. Waiting a moment for it to move deeper you move in, shifting the vines away to reveal a small cave. It was quite short meaning you'd need to crawl through on your hands and knees, but it wasn't overly long at least, as you could see whispers of light on the other side. It seemed the cave turned once or twice, but probably wasn't any further then a 60 or 70 feet if you had to hazard a guess. Still, encountering a rat while going through wouldn't be the most ideal as you wouldn't have any room to maneuver. You could simply camp the entrance and kill then as they came through, but who knows how long that would take really.

[Kuragari]

Kayin couldn't help but scowl as she saw what their way into the grove was. A tight and confining space where she wouldn't be able to do much of anything. Great. And if she picked the wrong direction, it'd be a pain in the ass to get turned back around and get going. For a moment she was considering taking the longer route... but no, that could take days. Better to just go ahead and crawl in and hope for the best. Besides, she was certain she'd be fine. They were just giant rats after all. At worst, they'd likely just be an annoyance for an adventurer like herself.

So with that thought in mind, she went ahead and got down on all fours and started forward.

[jondude]

Luck Roll: 10

Thinking about it for a few minutes you eventually decide to go for it, not willing to wait days to deal with really amounted to a nuisance problem. You had a purpose in this valley after all! You give it a few more minutes before you go in though, hoping to give that one rat plenty of time to go through so you hopefully didn't encounter him.

Heading in you do your best to make it through, trying to move quickly, but while you can see tinges of light at the other side the tunnel itself is still dark, and much to your annoyance the tip of one your swords bangs against a rock, sending a short but very audible clack to echo through the short cave. To your continued annoyance then you hear a sudden hissing of a rodent... behind you! You could theoretically just roll onto your back and draw a blade to fight it off, but that could risk eventually another rat coming from ahead of you. You were already about halfway through though, so maybe you could just pick up the pace and get out of the cave before this poorly timed rat behind you caught up!

[Kuragari]

Scowling as she heard the clack of metal against stone, followed by the hiss of a rodent, Kayin went ahead and rolled onto her back as quickly as she could as she drew one of her swords. She had no interest in letting one of these things come up from behind her, even if she could manage to scrabble fast enough! She'd rather kill the thing and then roll back onto hands and knees and scurry forward so she could get out of this cramped and confined space!

[jondude]

Roll: 19

Deciding to stand your ground, or lay on it technically, you roll onto your back and draw one of your blades before the thing can get any closer. Luckily you manage to pick one of the few turns in the cave to fight, meaning you could basically set up a little ambush of your own right back! You don't have to wait long for a giant rat to suddenly appear around the corner, it's frame mostly dark but the silhouette unmistakable. You stab your sword downward in a quick motion a fraction of a second after appears, skewering the creature! It makes a sudden hiss and snaps it's jaws, but your aim is true as you stab it right through it's heart, making the creature go still and silent within moments. You give it a few moments to ensure it passes, then pull out your blade, the creature slumping silently over.

Problem dealt with you decide to keep moving, scrambling the rest of the way through the cave and escaping it about 20 seconds later, happy to be out into the light again!

On the other side you get to your feet, and discover what appears to be an overgrown druid groove. The mostly intact remains of wooden huts and buildings, many covered with colourful flowers spot the area connected by barely visible paths now mostly overgrown by long grasses. Pools spot the area, along with large oak and birch trees who's growth had probably been encourage by the druids that used to be here before they presumably changed locations. Luckily, the surrounding thorns do not litter the central area. What you do see an abundance of though are those giant rats, many of which hiss at you, emerging from their little dens they've built in the small hillside or within the old buildings.

[Kuragari]

The giant rat that had been coming up from behind had no chance, and was dead in an instant. Glad that despite the environment she was still able to easily handle something so mundane, she hurries out of these blasted caves and emerges on the other side, now in the grove itself. The place looks rather beautiful, despite or perhaps even because of the overgrown nature of the place. This would be a rather relaxing place, were it not for two things. The wall of thorns encircling the place... and the large number of giant rats occupying it.

Drawing both swords and grinning, Kayin smirks as she says, "Sorry guys, but you've worn out your welcome." With that she surged forth, hoping to make use of her speed and two swords to easily dent into the numbers and have a good start for this job!