🌩️ An Unusual Storm

The party awake on their last day in Calvantrus to an usual storm. Rain lashes and lightning cracks outside, a nearly impossible phenomenon for the dry climate surrounding Flammenvielen. The party attempt to spy on the source of the storm, peering in the skies back towards Flammenvielen, and notice pink sparks in the clouds, suspecting that there may be an arcane aspect to this storm. Xolo decides to taste the rain, noting it doesn't taste like normal rain, further bloating their theories.

The whole ordeal leads the party to question the climate of Flammenvielen, and they wonder where Flammenvielen even gets their water from in the first place?

👋 Departing Calvantrus

The party head out into town on what is to be their last day in Calvantrus. They arrive at the market square for the announcement of the winner of the armband game, which Lyra wins by a landslide from stealing so many children's armbands, and then head to The Lott and The Black Shore one last time to acquire bits from Sheila and Vander.

B acquires some scrap off Vander while interrogating him on where he got his prosthetic arm, learning of an establishment in the criminal city of Wallrun, The Kettlelamp, where they deal in robotic parts and pieces. The conversation shifts to B herself, and her involvement in Operation Chaos Theory - the bombings and raidings of Flammenvielen's outer districts that distracted the city's military and allowed for the Usurper Choir siege to take place. B is abrasive about the topic, and eventually leaves the place.

Before returning to the departing carts, the party swing in to The Lott to say a final goodbye to their beloved friend, Sheila Harpey. B and Sheila exchanges gifts, and the party are given a sending stone by her so that they can keep in touch.

Joining the Exodus

The party eventually get back to where the carts are departing from, and link back up with Davos and his two tortoises, Deirdre and Dundee, before heading off towards Lake Gheel Cross with the rest of the procession.

Lorna decides to travel with them for the time being while she is still recovering, and joins them in the cart with Davos as they take off along the Dry Road.

As they travel, the wildlife slowly becomes increasingly green and livelier as they distance themselves from Flammenvielen, and they casually chat with Davos amidst the procession of carts, learning of his history at the Gun Coast, and how he found Deirdre and Dundee on an uncharted island during his pirating days.

During this time, Lyra approaches B after overhearing the conversation at The Black Shore, and B reveals bits about her past involvements. Soon after, B gets to work on a contraption that can safely store the Everflame core they have stolen, while Xolo brews up potions for everyone.

🌌 The Dawning of the Purple Rift

As they are travelling, the storm above worsens, and suddenly, a sharp bolt of lighting shoots across the sky - ripping open an astronomically large purple rift above the procession, high into the sky. The valley is suddenly dimly lit in a lilac hue, and before they have a chance to process what this rift may be, a light flashes from Lorna as a mysterious sigil is suddenly branded onto the side of her torso where her arm used to be - a sigil that bears a strange resemblance to the one that Xolo and Ember observed in Kraetor's eye only a day earlier.

⚡ Beneath the Purple Rift

The party continue to travel beneath the purple rift, and spend time investigating it while they travel along the Dry Road. The rain that pours from it appears to have a purple shimmer to it too, and gives off an aura of conjuration magic. The rain is relentless at this stage, and the fissure in the sky continues to grow, seemingly moving southward.

Around them all, little pink spores appear to float around that are being spawned from the droplets. Over the course of a few days as they travel, the rain does not cease, and the spores and droplets begin to replace the surrounding flora with strange, cosmic variants that appear not from this plane.

🔎 Investigating the Brand

Xolo also spends some time trying to identify the mysterious brand that has suddenly appeared on Lorna, discovering that it is of a different magic type than any they are used to. The brand mystifies Xolo, lulling him into a trance as he attempts to magically identify it further.

🔥 Ember's Mark

One of the nights that they are travelling, Ember dreams of the Everflame core that they carry, and envisions a purple hand seizing it, the energy from it being siphoned, split and rippled.

Awaking from this dream, Ember finds a a sigil similar to both Kraetor and Lorna's branded onto the palm of her hand. The pair spend the next few days investigating their brands, and begin to learn how to harness whatever magic is within them.

Lorna is the first to figure this out, discovering that she can now dissipate her remaining arm into a bright mist, and is able to reform this mist through the mark of her missing arm into other forms. She begins to practice dissipating her right arm, to make a blade out of her left. Meanwhile, Ember practices using her mark on the Everflame core, and is able to just barely grip onto the flame magically, but is unsure what this means just yet.

👋 The Neighbouring Party

Next to the party in the procession, is another carting adventuring party. They begin to chat with them and learn their names - the tabaxi driver, Tammy, a buff human named Douglas, a white-haired halfling Angela, and a large, swollen looking orc of sorts named Blue.

They chat with this adventuring party who they learn are headed to Wallrun in search of work. As they do, they convince Douglas to snort some powder made up of the purple floating spores that they have collected. This causes his eyes to glow a little purple, and slightly alters his magical output, making his casts glow purple.

🧬 Vilios Academy and Biological Experiments

They question the party further, and learn that Douglas had broken Blue out of an experimentation facility, and then met Angela while they were on the run. The facility was working on race splicing, hence why he looks as if he is an amalgamation of an orc and a toad. The party suspect that their changeling / elf friend Sheila is a result of a similar experiment.

Douglas explains how he studied wizardry in Aelfhelum, and was working an internship of sorts with the Vilios Academy when he discovered the facility that held Blue. This facility was not run by the Vilios Academy, but by an organisation that was at least in leagues with them, and was located somewhere between Aelfhelum and Yanaviere.

🌱 Diverging through the Marsh

After hearing word that there is some sort of militia checkpoint ahead of the procession, the party urge Davos to find an alternative way around in fear of Lorna or the Everflame core being discovered. As such, Davos takes a shortcut that will take them briefly through a neighbouring marshland and out toward Lake Gheel Cross.

They set up for the night somewhat into the marsh, and take to sleep while Davos tells a spooky story of an island he once discovered that was haunted by doppelgangers.

❓ Missing Conductors

The next morning, the party wake up surrounded by spores and distorted flora and fungi that has entrapped the cart overnight. As they attempt to get the cart moving, Davos attempts to contact the rest of the procession conductors via sending stone, and cannot get into contact with anyone strangely. He eventually reaches someone, who exclaims that a large portion of the procession had gone missing at the militia checkpoint, that some of them were let through, but those who were stopped had wound up missing, with no sign of the militia left behind.