Magic? Magic.

After our encounter with Emeros the Amerock, we still had about a day and a half to go. Still had plenty of excitement though. we came by a black-blue blood smelling trail in the snow with 8ft footprints. Rose being the driver decided to check it out as Quinn said it was still fresh. I borrowed a stick from Mako and poked the sticky mess. Almost lost the pole, but I did confirm it was blood, likely from the creatures that like to attack the wall. I gave it back and he seemed to burn off the residue I couldn't wipe away. Over a hill into the plains we saw it, a class 3 kraken, a 30ft mainly quadrupedal living siege weapon. These brutes typically hit the wall directly and need lots of barbed ballistae to deal with usually. Good thing this one wasn't moving itself.
It was being dragged by a 50ft tall cloud giant. He had a big hammer and a grip on the tentacles of the thing. He also had been ran through with one of the beast's weapons. Being of North wall Heraldry, we came on over to see. That strange birdman went and tended to the giant as Alroy and I used our Greater Flaming Sphere equipment to end the brute. It wasn't totally dead yet, and we'd rather not let one of these live. Later they said that this was the 4th one he drug all the way from the east mine to the giant spire hole halfway out to the river! Good thing we happened along or he would have died or succumbed to the disease. I swear that Bird makes miracles. But ya, he was hired out by N.W. to help guard the East Mine. That place has got great logistics if meh security. The strangest thing though is they have horse sized semi-domesticated lizards that feed on mithril ore. A very strange choice of a beast of burden, but I guess you make use of what you got up here. He also "handed" us a literal ton and a half sack of ore and gems and stuff asking to deliver it to Azilnar.
We all looked at each other as Faena walked up. She used some fancy big city magic to shrink the entire thing into a small cloth! I'd never seen anything like it. To think of how useful that would be for logistical movement! You could just hand an entire caravan over to a Brightwolf and say good instead of hiring out an entire detail! I got to get that as a recommendation for the higherups. Well Quinn was handed some sort of buckler sized medallion from the Giant as he stepped back raised his hammer and lightninginged? away. We continued on.
 
When we stopped for the night, I went to go looking for some food as usual, but the area was too thin for much of anything. Just enough so that we could have a little fresh stuff with our rations. It's one of the downsides of following a path I suppose. The next day was rough though. Another Blizzard blew through, but this one was strange. It dropped down to -12 before the sky went black with clouds and a lightning storm started. No snow or rain, just flashing and thunder. I was looking into the clouds at one point when I see a flash and hear ringing as I was out cold. I woke up to Alroy having done something for me. My ears were still ringing when he talked about an illusion. Either way I kept a bit lower and just about arms reach from Rose, the metal plated for the rest of the day. We stopped for camp that night more shenanigans happened.
They told me that the winds had surged that day, I only vaguely understand that it affects the magics but I could never keep track of high/low and the meanings. That is why I usually have some sort of caster on my team. Well, when he cast the Hut for the night the thing was larger than normal and the trees in a giant area reacted strangely; they all bent toward the hut. I only had ever seen a powerful dryad do what happened next. All the trees in about 80ft went through an entire season cycle in like 30 minutes. During which I yelled at Blu to grab a sack as apples started to show. These weren't the kinda bitter winter ones either, these were the proper honey sweet ones! I ran around like mad with her and we got about 20 pounds of the tasty treats. Wen we took them back Mako asked for some and he buried some after lighting a fire. He then grabbed the coals with his hands to put them over the buried apples. After rinsing them off and adding some spices, they made an excellent desert of sorts. I'm going to have to remember that one!
 
The next day, Alroy decided to have Blu drive. I know she's pretty smart for a bear, but really? Well she did great, only almost crashed once going after a bird. I could only imagine what the rest of Logistics will think when I tell them that Blu drove a phantom Chariot. When we got into town Alroy did some kind of concealing magic to himself and Faena seemed to hide her crests. We asked around to find a tavern to sleep in for the night. We were pointed to Demon's.
Rose stood outside with Blu while the rest of us went in. The crowd up here was what you'd expect. Many mutations and strange alterations. After waiting for a bit we figured out one individual was Demon the owner. He had 3 arms with one horn on his head and a gimped bat wing on one side. He came over to Quinn and babbled strangely, like I could understand a few words, but I think he kept jumping languages. Well, Quinn healed him I guess, he went away for a bit and the barfolk seemed agitated at his departure. He came back after a second nearly crying and seemed happy with Quinn. He was still speaking several languages at a time, but it seemed to flow better. We were offered some food and drink as our room was prepared and Quinn listened in on the gossip. I guess the most common story that happened here was a 6 armed arachnid like 11 foot person busted through the mayor's house wall, stole a thing of value to him and disappeared. We'd investigate in the morning. For now we got the King's suite in the tavern, the entire top floor. Though the place was a little run down, it looked fit for higher-ups. We'd sleep nicely tonight!