(9)
“I did not say that we needed to do this first.” Paprika’s voice is grumpy. “I said it might be useful as an excuse to talk to the Lord-Mayor. We walk up to him, we say we found a cultist cooperator, we offer him our services in finding more. Can’t you listen to what I’m saying?”
(actually can i take k.local instead for 5, no bonus)
(sure)
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Arius looks down at Rika. Perhaps they really are unable to communicate, due to the difference in height. “And I am saying that we can do both at the same time by splitting our group! The longer we talk, the more time we are giving to these cultists to run away!”
“What cultists? he would ask tomorrow. The ones that left yesterday? The ones that you did not chase? If you have the time to appeal to the Lord-Mayor, then you should have had the time to actually apprehend the others!”
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“…Man, I’ll never understand that fucking elf. Doesn’t he want to be involved with his kids’ lives?”
“Well, they’ll be dead years before he is, right? You know, I heard he teaches the most promising ones wizardry, and throws the rest on the scrap heap—”
“—uh, that’s a metaphor, right—”
“—yes, the metaphorical scrap heap. Happened to that Eryk kid, the one who was always going on about natural philosophy. Hope he’s doing alright…”
“…got fired from his job hauling timber for the belltower repair ‘cause he wouldn’t stop showing up drunk.”
“I dunno, I kind of feel bad for him, don’t you think?”
Sniff. “Well, I sure don’t! Someone could have gotten hurt! If you ask me, the Lord-Mayor should ban anything harder than ale…”
“…You’ve changed my life, Blessed One! I know you said not to talk about this with outsiders, but do you mind if I bring my sister next week? Zasha, she’s one of the bookkeepers at River Stetven Shipping, but she won’t tell on us, believe me…”
“…Tymur been acting weird lately?”
“You too? Yeah, he won’t shut up about the ‘cleansing flame,’ whatever that’s supposed to mean.”
“Man. I never thought he’d be the sort to be changed by money, but ever since he hit it big with that fur venture…”
“…wish they’d waste less money bringing in outsiders.”
“Well, how else will they get the spellcasting services they need?”
“They could just hire on casters to work with them permanently! It’d probably be cheaper!…”
“…brought them everything I had, and they totally ignored me! They got mad at me for ‘trespassing,’ even!”
“Well, yeah. They’ve got their own leads, don’t they? I mean, they managed to catch him…”
“…got mad at her for confronting him. Said they don’t want to encourage vigilantes.”
“And you believed that? They probably just wanted a chance to rob his house themselves…”
“…don’t get why they brought in some outsiders. We’re handling it fine ourselves.”
“Mmmm.”
Well, you don’t remember all that much about what there is in Hazel Ford, but you’ve got a few ideas. Besides the bookstore, you can also think of:
- There are various temples around town; the temples of Abadar, Gorum, and Pharasma are the most prominent, but not the only ones that exist. None of those gods are incredibly oriented around magic, but you’d expect most empowered priests to know some things about their own magic.
- If you don’t want to deal with the idiosyncratic demands of Gorumites or Pharasmins, Abadarans are frequently also willing to let you just pay money in exchange for them answering questions. This is mostly used by people who want financial advice, but there’s no reason you couldn’t use it for this.
- The lord-mayor is a sorcerer! You don’t know how you’d get an audience with him, but he might know some things about sorcery, particularly his own bloodline. (…you don’t know what his own bloodline is)
- He probably knows more about his own magic than anyone else, but other people might still know more than zero things about it. That does seem like a weaker lead, though.
- You’re pretty sure you’ve heard there’s some kind of magic item crafter around town who works on commission? Probably they know some things about magic? You’re not sure who it is, though, and they might or might not know anything about any particular kind of magic, but… it’s worth checking.
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(it’s just like the song…)
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Wanderer will share this information with the group and mention what the topic of divination was.
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“I feel as though cooperation with the watch is doable but perhaps strained.”
He pauses.
“Though let’s be honest with ourselves everyone is probably thinking about the cult leader being mentioned.”
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Sure. Rika previously identified:
- Bogdan Skliar
- Dosia Reba
- Tiberi of Southwind
and the other names remaining are:
- Eryk son of Zuzya
- Raisa Gabras
- Zasha Gabras
- Petro Bondar
- Meren of Whistle Creek
- Tymur Pelle
(It would’ve been pretty tight fitting all those people in the room at once; it’s unclear if all of them were part of the cult simultaneously.)
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(Petro and Meren aren’t directly mentioned / implied but Petro is likely the timber hauler I just feel it)
(Meren could be the Blessed One which could be huge)
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Arius struggles to find the words to explain his thoughts, as they keep changing inside his head.
After a moment of taking his time, he says: “Given [the fact that there are (at least) six people to apprehend], and [my presumption being that we need at least three people to secure one cultist], even if we are to split our group into two -which, given Rika’s agenda of contacting Amelie, seems unlikely- we should probably head over to the Watch to coordinate with them.”
“They don’t like us, but they don’t have to either. We just need to catch the cultists as soon as possible, and preferably that means that we try to catch as many cultists today.”
(Yup. Zelsh handed them 5 crownd each.)
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“I don’t know what you mean about the mention of the cult leader.” ((Zone does; Arius doesn’t.)) “We can probably talk about the details with the Watch.”
He looks at the group, when he notices one person missing. “By the way, has anyone seen Canary?”
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(This made me giggle irl. Giggles)
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“Zelsh agrees with Arius on this one.” Zelsh commented.
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Drakor shrugged. “We told the Watch, they have their list, and as incompetent as Rafau was I don’t think the others would have much difficulty rounding up people once they have their names.”
He looked around. “This is starting to feel like a dead end to me. Notably, the Baron was not one of the people Rafau mentioned.”
“It is not that I doubt the Watch’s competency -though Rafau’s existence has made me start to say otherwise-, but this is rather a matter of credit. We should strive to improve our image to the Lord-Mayor even further–”
“–far enough to gain more information on Baron Dalin, who is his uh… What was it. His nephew? Cousin? –whatever; family member.”
“The fact that the baron was not mentioned by the guard does not exclude the possibility that they are in cahoots with each other. A cult of some mighty demon surely has more than a dozen followers?”
“Perhaps Rafau was not told of cult members from other regions. Why would the cultists tell him that, after all? The cultists only need to tell him the bare minimum; the people in the vicinity whom he shouldn’t touch. He doesn’t need to be told anything beyond that.”