The Spirit's Rise: Episode 5

### Links

***The Spirit's Rise* Episode 5** was streamed on Arcadum's Twitch channel on July 23rd, 2022, and premiered on Arcadum's Youtube channel on August 13, 2022.

### Summary

The party gets sent through the portal and ends up in a fountain in the Barony. Effie ends up realizing she has her Moonblood and proceeds to ask Maelie for help. They all realize that the wall they're next to isn't really a wall and climb on top of a near bye roof. After sorting out the "situation", the group discusses a plan. After a lot of back and forth, they come to the agreement to have Maelie act "lost" and see if she could talk to the person in charge about a diplomatic solution. If that plan didn't work, Challa and Irha were going to drop a torch down the chimney into the barracks to cause a distraction and/or injure some enemies. Effie planned to scout around while Maelie was a source of a distraction.

Maelie walked over to a nearby well to pretend there was a portal near the well as to not cause attention on the real portal. She splashed water on herself to make the rouse seem real and proceeded to walk into the light and ask for help. Effie stealthed to a nearby large tree while the rest of the party scouted from the rooftops close by. The guards notice Maelie and ask her why she's there. Maelie explains that she came in from the portal (gestured to the well) and was there as an Ambassador to discuss a resolution to the dispute between them and the Wakatanta. The guards seem ok with that plan and ask Maelie to follow them to the Commander.

As Maelie is whisked away, Effie being an established thief in her past life, is completely distracted by the glimmer of "shiny" coming from a nearby window. She proceeds to climb in through the window and see's a woman crouched infront of a very suspicious bloody symbol on the ground. Effie proceeds to ninja flip over the woman chanting to try to get a better read on what is going on. She tries to investigate the symbol as it seems very...odd but can't make out what is wrong with it. Effie does see multiple bloody drag marks going towards the symbol that makes her uneasy. Suddenly, she feels magic swirl in the room and the woman in the room starts chanting more intensely. Effie feels a pulse of magic and a blackened hand with embers floating around it crawls out from the circle. The woman unholsters her sword and smashes the hand against the ground. The hand explodes into black dust. She resheathes her weapon and starts to chant again. Effie is now very uneasy about the situation as the woman seems to be summoning demons.

Luka, Ihra and Seino are essentially left behind and discuss where Effie and the rest potentially have ran off to. Luka suggests trying to find Effie since she was the closest. Luka leads the pack and is able to see that there is a window open. Once Luka peeks inside, he can see the woman infront of the symbol. Luka finds a door to the south and tries to push the door open. What Luka doesn't realize is that it is a pull door. Luka is able to figure the door out and crack the door open. Luka then whisper shouts "Effie!" and while Effie didn't hear, the woman infront of the bloody circle did! She stands up to go see what is at the door while Effie jukes around some tables and decides to get a closer look at the bloody evil looking symbol. Ihra, Luka and Seino speed run to hide behind the corner of the building. As Effie gets closer to the symbol, she decides to try to see if she can disrupt this weird ritual and as she is not in tuned with the Arcane, she carves through the symbol.

As time shifts to Challa and Maelie's adventure, Challa is able to flank Maelie at a distance as she is escorted through the Barony to where the Commander is stationed. Maelie asks the Commander for their side of the story for kicking the Wakatanta out of their sacred space. The Commander explains that they had to kick them out due to the danger of the Barony. He expands saying that the Barony is a host of demonic activity and they are actively trying to cleanse the area. They hope that after clensing the Barony, they can turn the Barony back over to the Wakatanta. Although they don't believe the Spell Spirit itself is demonic, they do feel like it is a branch off the tree but will try to leave it in tact. Maelie reveals that she is the last step before the Wakatanta become violent and she want's to avoid bloodshed, She asks if they could live together peacefully while the Barony is cleansed. The Commander does not believe they can coexist until the Barony is completely purged. He cannot give an exact date on when they think this might be done. The Commander reveals that there was evil seeping into the stones and they were hired to purge the Barony. They did not know how bad this was. They tried to negotiate with the Wakatanta, but could not do so peacefully. They reduced the number of the Wakatanta so they could continue purging in "peace". Maelie tries to convince the Commander to let her help but he is unsure how much help she could be. Maelie asks them to preserve the Wakatanta's Spell Spirit but the Commander cannot promise anything if it is connected to anything demonic. Overall, the Commander seems to be a zealot in his own right. However, at this point one of the guards bursts in from a side door and exclaims that the "circles" have been breeched and there are multiple failures.

At this point, the timeline shifts back to Effie, Ihra, Seino and Luka. Effie has slashed through the symbol, unleashing a pulse of magic that knocks Effie back and causes the Librarian to fall to the ground. The door also pulses open. Effie see's dozens of hands start reaching up through the circle. At this point, Effie goes asses to elbows and runs out of the room. She rushes past the librarian, who lingers in the room. Effie turns the corner and see's her friends. She has a very panic wide eyed look. Ihra, against Effie's panic calls of "There's no time!" decides to go back and see what's going on in the room. He goes and looks just in time to see the Librarian ripped apart by dozens of the black ash hands. Ihra then realizes Effie's urgency and agrees they all have to leave. Effie urgently makes the decision to try and go back through the portal. They all run over, passing bye several guards who are taken aback. However, this portal is revealed to be a one way portal only. The group decides to go to the path closest to them and run. However, Ihra struggles with the decision to hang back and try to warn some of the guards. He activates Soul Sight which reveals a ton of shadowy figures as well as seeing the shadows rip apart the guards. Conflicted, Ihra makes the decision to run with the party. Effie is able to guide the group through the shadows while Ihra helps them dodge the souls. Effie ties the rope she has in the pack to the top of the gates and helps the group repel down as the front gate could not be open in time.

Perspective moves back to Challa and Maelie's events. There is a pulse that goes through the hall. The Anointed in the hall get into battle stances. During this, Challa get's weirded out that they are onto them and casts Fog Cloud around Maelie. The Anointed in the fog cloud are blinded and the light in the room begins to fade. The throne in the room begins to twist as The Eye of Contempt is released. The Commander boldly walks up to The Eye of Contempt to meet him in battle. However, the battle quickly starts to tip in the demons favor. A shadowy tentacle reaches out and grapples Maelie's legs. Challa stops concentrating on fog cloud and shoots at the tentacle that is taking Maelie. As he goes to shoot, another tentacle grabs Challa by the chest and both Maelie and Challa are dragged outside. As they are dragged out of the hall, they can hear screams of battle and anguish. It turns out, the tentacles were conjured by Daegus Class. Deagus say's it is a repayment of his debt. He teleports them out of the Barony and deposits them next to Effie, Seino, Luka and Ihra. Although that was strange, they have to keep running.

The group quickly makes their way back to the Wakatanta who are obviously very disappointed. The Wakatanta quickly gather supplies and are planning to get out of dodge. They encourage the group to do the same otherwise risk being consumed by the demons.

As the group decides what to do next, Daegus Class appears. He offer's them a chance to help him overthrow The Eye of Contempt. In exchange, there will be controlled suffering instead of chaotic suffering. There is also a chance to redirect the "light" spirits to a better path and also tools to help destroy demon kind. The group is very split but ultimately decide not to join the devil and head on the same trail as the Wakatanta.