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Message: <blockquote data-quote="PHDungeon" data-source="post: 5015281" data-attributes="member: 86320">Dear Corvin,Outrage! I am still fuming wildly at Bella’s cold calculations. How different we are! But let me not jump ahead. This land grows more strange and more dangerous by the week. We reached a ruined temple under the foul watch of the elemental eye – a crude symbol wreathed in flames. The temple was built by some long ago people – orcs are my best guess – and appeared recently disturbed by Flagg and his men. As we approached, emaciated, skeletal creatures defended the altar. Bjorn and I struck forth, Torfinn protected Deryl – and Bella to her credit dropped a foul, flaming bone pile before it could hurl its foulness in our faces.We discovered a passage down to the tunnels below – where a sickly straggle of goblins lay scratching at each other in their misery. Bella caught some of the foul taint and Bran had enough by the time we reached their altar – a gore splattered remnant of one of Flagg’s men. We cut our way through a crypt and then made our way to a well. My friends are too cautious – but sometimes they are right. When I looked over the well, I saw something that could see through me. A black, smoking thought, a divine shade of oblivion. I confess that only the image of the sun burning bright could preserve me. Bjorn forgive me – for Thor certainly won’t. The ruins held a block of amber encasing a fist-sized tadpole above the sacrificial altar. It was easily the most bizarre object of worship I had encountered. The goblins of Grimsburg have much better taste, I can assure you. But if that were the only artefact of evil we’d be lugging halfway across the Vale, we’d be lucky.  Flagg had departed, and as we would learn later – had taken some tainted relics from three-score niches carved along the well. Brother – do send word of the flaming eye – and send it soon!We tracked Flagg back duskwards, out of the haunted hills. A village had been attacked by demonic men the night before, and it sounded enough like Flagg that we pursued. Would you believe it – we came across a Roaringhorn Manor! It was ruined but made me hope that the Androsax Manor would be as easy to identify. Their stupid crest was right above the door. Still, the Roaringhorns are all right. Remember Griselda and Greyatrix? Those girls knew how to blow a horn. But anyway, it turned out that one of Flagg’s men from Fallcrest had become corrupted by a golden skull – wearing it like a necklace! If he wasn’t stark raving mad and homicidal, he would have looked like some fashionless fop from Grimsburg. He tackled me from the shadows and was soon was joined by two villagers, similarly possessed. Now here’s where I get mad myself. Bella is the best markswoman I have ever seen. She can cut a stream of piss from a Skanzi warrior round the corner, deflecting her bolt from his discarded tankard. Seen her do it at Ragnar’s! But just when I was ready to subdue the girl, yank the necklace off her and get Bjorn to press his healing hammer upon her – thunck, Bella cracks a bolt in the poor thing’s temple. The girl was Deryl’s age, just as fair and beautiful – only more innocent. I understand Bella’s reasons. They were probably beyond saving. But not to try? Does she hate little girls? Does she hate her own lost innocence? Or is this the poison of the temple, infecting her judgment? I have been watching Bella since then. And every now and then, when she is asleep I catch a flicker: her skin turns pale. Her hair whitens. One night, I think I even saw a dwarf sleeping in her pallet. On the other hand, we have all been affected by the elemental eye. Torfinn still won’t tell me what happened to his hand. Deryl, Bella and Torfinn – they are all changing, somehow. The evil of this place is getting into their skin. The only ones unaffected seem Bjorn and I. Probably because we drink so much.We have returned to Fallcrest – and I will write again soon. Bjorn and Torfinn were able to call upon Thor’s valkyrie to point us towards Flagg – and we may be returning to Grimsburg sooner than you think. But the angel of death was also able to point due north when I asked where the Androsax Manor was!Your devoted brother,Derren***The Roaringhorn Drinking Song:“Hey, ho, whats’up! Blow that horn and down your cup!Drink, up! Drink up! Lift it high and eat your sup!Roaringhorn, Roaringhorn, don’t call me out, I’m not yet done!Roaringhorn, Roaringhorn,  there still a barrel and an hour of fun! “***Fragments from a Hagiography of Rao ... and thus did Saint Aurielus smite the troll, speaking thusly: “Foul troll – though shalt taste the sun for eternity, for I will place you on a spit and let it burn you where the sun doth not normally shine ...”</blockquote>

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