7th of Lenzin

The morning was rather uneventful thankfully. Just a modest meal that, while not the best I've ever had, was certainly enough to fill me for the day ahead. We got started sometime in the morning and headed to the Prismatic Eye first, an alchemy shop. The proprietor's name is Davenport, and apparently Velvet knows him. I was looking around when Velvet pulled me over to the counter. Evidently the two of them were discussing the weird ichor and crystal we found the other day at the cultist encampment. I showed it to him and he identified the likely source of the ichor as being from demons. Definitely unsettling, for sure.
 
After we were done at the Prismatic Eye the group wanted to head to the Temple of Kord for various reasons. Mara and Ashton wanted to pray so we all tagged along. The place was really interesting, with all sorts of symbolism and work everywhere. I've never been to one of these sorts of places as religion has never been anything I've been concerned about. Still, I can absolutely appreciate the arts and feelings in this area, and I can understand how others may feel inspired or in awe of such a group. Still, being in such an area filled with people made me a little anxious. I definitely felt out of place, because my magic is certainly not of the divine persuasion and... well, it just felt a little awkward.
 
Evidently I got distracted, because when I had finally made my way around the full temple I saw the full group talking with some people, so I quickly joined up. Apparently they were talking to a man by the name of War Cleric Raybold, seemingly inquiring about work or things that they could use assistance with. Velvet and Ashton seemed to be leading those talks. Ultimately, we were led to speak with Berthold, Raybold's second in command. He took us back into another room with several acolytes and town guards pouring over documents. They said they were investigating cultist activity in town, and we agreed to join the investigation. The town guard were going to be investigating part of the town while we would inquire at an abandoned hovel in another part of the town. He did mention there would be some form of payment, but I figured we'd cross that bridge when we got to it.
 
When we got there it looked to be a fairly dingy single story wooden shack, clearly in disarray. It's not clear if it's in such disrepair due to age or due to not having had occupants in quite some time. The front door was locked until Velvet picked the lock, letting us in. Quite frankly it was very musty, almost difficult to breathe inside. But we did go about and did some digging around inside. We didn't find much until we entered the kitchen where we found signs of someone having been there recently. Additionally, we found fresh ashes in the fireplace and footprints in the dust that led to a hidden compartment in the corner. There was a ladder leading down, so naturally we descended. Clearly there was more to this place than it seemed.
 
Well, when we went downstairs we were jumped be a few cultists. We handled them with minor difficulty and managed to capture the captain. He seemed almost fanatical in his desire to escape, even trying to off himself in order to do so. Ultimately we captured and knocked him out and stashed him in a barrel to keep him from hurting himself or even worse, bringing down the house on us later. There was another path leading down, a stairwell behind the storage barrels below. Velvet did some quick reconnaissance to see the path was clear before we all headed down.
 
It was extremely surprising that there was such a structure here unknown to the town for however long it took to make it. Or perhaps this was already here before they got here, who knows.
 
Either way, Chael sensed danger in the area, though it wasn't clear where exactly. There was a door ahead that we tried looking through which Velvet indicated something was on the other side. The group tried to sneak through the open door but we wound up making a noise and alerted the room. There were more cultists and more of those weird demon dog things from the encampment before, but more concernedly there were these strange creatures crawling on the ceiling.
 
After a bit of a skirmish we made it through, although Velvet in particular was a bit worse for wear as she was caught by one of those ceiling crawling monsters. We found the room had a bit of a circular path around the outside, so we went and examined around the length. Eventually we came across a room that had a cultist mage inside. We fought him fairly easily and won, but as he was almost defeated he looked to be charging a powerful spell. Thankfully, Mara stopped him with a well thrown handaxe, impaling him to the wall.
 
Here we found a couple additional potions on burners, one of which seemingly was a potion of healing, as well as something that seemed to be a murky reddish brown. Ashton found some items with these strange wobbly eyes on them. I'm not sure what the significance is but he seems to be enamored with them and they seem harmless. We also found a scroll which didn't make quite sense to me, but I took it thinking I'll take a look at it and see if it's something I may be able to use.
 
We eventually came to another set of double doors with a bunch of monsters inside. They were carrying one of the human cultists and threw him into a pool of this rusty, thick goo. Once we had dealt with the monsters Chael tried to save him but it was too late. At least he recovered a bit of the goo in a vial to identify later.
 
We returned to the last room, examining the final room that we had not yet looked into. Between Harper and Velvet they disarmed some kind of trap and Harper took this strange magical cloth. It allowed Harper to move it almost like it was a hand. After we had finalized our search we left, taking the captured cultist with us. Though as we were leaving Velvet came out with an oddly shiny shirt.
 
We got back to the Temple of Kord and brought our captive who was hauled away by guards while we reported that we cleared out the area. They made good on their promise to reward us, and even brought out some healers to heal us. Some of us were quite beaten up after the last series of battles.
 
After we got back we went to the guard outpost to deliver the missive from Duke Stagdew to the guard captain. Unfortunately he wasn't available right away so we decided to wait. In the meantime Velvet and I took a look at the job boards. Well, I say I went to look too, but realistically speaking I got only a quick glance before Velvet snatched up the posted jobs so we could sift through them later. Kind of interesting how that works with a posted job board. I remember back at the academy it was all just assignments, but getting to pick for yourself is kind of nice too.
 
We waited for a while, and eventually some guards brought in a man covered with a black hood. He was hauled in by a number of guards followed by the guard captain. Since he was back, Velvet passed him the missive, and he didn't seem all that surprised at its contents, likely what he already knew. Probably about the cultists, much like the person he'd just dragged in, probably. Velvet asked to see the captive as she seemed to recognize him. She went back briefly to look at him with the guard captain and when she came back she looked horrified. Whatever she saw clearly shocked her to her core. I wanted to say something but the look on her face said there wasn't anything that could have been said to help. I feel bad. I don't like seeing people in pain.
 
After that we returned to the Dusky Fawn for dinner. Vegetable stew with rabbit meat which was quite good. The tone was a bit somber at first, so I decided that I would try to play for a bit in hopes to lift everyone's spirits. Turns out Harper had the same idea, so the two of us played for the tavern for a while. I think we did pretty good, as everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves. It seemed to go by fairly quickly, but it was fun. Harper's quite good. It might be fun to play with him again sometime.
 
After we finished though, a small blue rasp with messy black hair came up to me with a box. An admirer? I'm not sure, because after they gave it to me they quickly left. Turns out it was a small music box that plays a nice, calm tune when you turn the key. It was a wonderful and unexpected present and I'm grateful. It wasn't long after that that everyone began to disperse and we all went our separate ways to our rooms.
 
Another utterly exhausting day. I'll definitely sleep well after tonight. Maybe tomorrow-
-The writing seems to end abruptly. The lower corner of the page looks to have a hastily cleaned up wet stain. Arlan must have fallen asleep on his journal as he was writing.-