Fully rested from our downtime, I decide that I am ready to be around those other creatures from before. Sage, the clumsy one, went as far as to give the 5 of us a name. I don’t know how I feel about that yet…seems a little bit clingy, but I am able to look past it for now.
We all get together and decide that we want to try for another adventure. After all, I am really enjoying how heavy my pockets are. I’d like to keep them that way.
We very quickly go through the portal and are immediately transported to THE coldest environment I have ever touched. (And I have flown pretty high in the atmosphere) Even though I had the time to buy some cold weather clothing, there is still a nip in the air. I have to be careful that my feather’s aren’t spending too much time in the cold, and that they stay away from moisture. I still want to be able to fly after all.
As we gain our eyesight and peer ahead, we see what looks like some sort of funeral going on. Within seconds, a tall male elf walks up to us and starts talking to us as if he knows “The Fated Few”. He starts telling us about a dwarf named Urgon, who was killed by some mysterious ailment after returning home from a trip to “The Purple Rocks”. He tells us that he needs us to help figure out what is going on…something about protecting the others in their town. All of this seems like just a sad story to me until he mentioned a little bit of payment as a reward. It’s not much, but it’s enough to make my beak snap quickly, out of my control. He then proceeds to tell us to talk to some other small creature named “Tulgi”.
Honestly, being around all of these dwarves gives me a lot of unpleasant memories from when I first met Erky. Thankfully, the dwarves in this cold town are fully clothed. In fact, some have more than one layer on. In my opinion, this is why I can’t smell any of them. I put it out of my mind that maybe, just maybe, dwarves could have good hygiene.
Although it is getting later in the day, the others decide that they want to go to Urgon’s home, then move on to visiting Tulgi. Walking through Urgon’s home immediately supported my small prejudice toward these dwarves. It was a mess. Cluttered. Smelled as if someone had recently died (he had of course). Nothing is where it belongs. Even after the others realize that someone had been through his things, I am still convinced the dwarf lived this way.
After a few minutes within his home, one of the others found a receipt to some shop called “Pelc’s Curiosities”. Although I did hear the name, I wasn’t paying too close attention because I was attempting to look through the “rubble” of this dwarfs home.
Ready for some rest, again, the others decide they wanted to do one more thing before the end of the night. We walk all the way to Tulgi’s house. I think the Elf told us to talk to her. In reality, I assume that Erky just wanted to see a female of his kind, I am sure it’s been a while, with the amount of time he spent in the sunless citadel as a captor.
It was quite the work convincing Tulgi to let us in. She sounds angry, almost scared, and when Grey threatens her, and she finally lets us in, we see why. She’s covered in this same ailment they claimed killed Urgon! I step back and lift up my left wing a little bit, covering my mouth. I just want to make sure I do what I can to prevent getting…whatever that was.
After way too much questioning, she finally tells us that she robbed that shop (from the receipt) and stole all of Urgon’s findings from the “Purple Rocks”. I would like to think that the others put two and two together, and had the thought that touching some of the same items would give us the same sickness. Tulgi then showed us a Dagger that she took, and explained that the other belongings were all given to her sister, Hulil, and that she had been banished from the town.
Still slightly shivering from the cold, and also keeping my eye out for anything that looked of value, I began to lose interest in the surrounding conversation. Until Sage spoke up. He recognized the dagger that she had as having markings from a legendary “Flying City of Ascarl”. I perked up when I heard “value”, but calmed back down as I remembered that there is one dead, and one sick from these items. I decided to play it safe and be a little more cautious.
We then decided that (finally) after our rest tonight, we would go out in search of this dwarf sister, and possibly the Purple Rocks”. I hope the others choose to be as cautious around these items as I am choosing to be. I would hate for anything bad to happen to them. (At least most of them.)
While falling to sleep that night, I dreamt of hot air streams pushing me high into the sky, and soaring around for hours. Waking up every hour or so trying to make sure nothing near or on me was freezing. I needed to be extra careful if I wanted to get out of this cold region alive. In a way, I almost found myself missing the dungeon. At least the air wasn’t biting cold.
Ak's Adventures 