2023/01/25

Last time in the Iron Kingdoms: Painful truths were uncovered.

The party had been attacked by the desert hydra that was residing within Klokhor fortress. Abe knew a little bit about the horrid creatures native to the Bloodstone Marches, namely that they were always hungry and that they had a nasty propensity for regenerating. As the party wasn't particularly keen on being eaten, they fought back against the beast. Evading its thrashing heads, and their maws filled with pointy teeth. The hydra was capable of more than just bites however, as the party was subjected to one of the heads vomiting out its digestive tract, complete with the still potent acid. Despite the size and tenacity of the hydra, the party was victorious and once the beast was put down initially, Abe spent a little time making sure it was dead, pulverizing the main body of the beast, where its brain and vital organs resided. The party then figured that the fortress was now safe, as the hydra would have kept anything else away, or have eaten anything foolish enough to come closer. So the party began setting up camp, with Abe and Hector trying to determine if the hydra's corpse was edible. From what they knew, there was no reason that it shouldn't be edible, though they were unsure as to how to prepare the meat. Once the camp was set up, Abe went for a walk through the abandoned fortress, looking for anything that would give a clue as to Abigail's location or that of the cultists that she was tracking in the area.

During his walk around the fortress, while he was on the ramparts, Abe noticed what looked to be a person and a steamjack off in the distance. With his heart jumping in anticipation, he alerted the others about what he had seen. Charlotte was more apprehensive however, and warned Abe that something wasn't quite right about the situation. As the thought of a lone warcaster this far from any support was suspicious. Despite that, the party set out from the fortress to go and see what was out there in the desert. As the party came upon the area that Abe had seen the pair, the area was emptier than what was seen from the fortress. Despite this the party was able to notice signs that a warjack was hidden in the area, and was concealed in a low power mode. From that the party began looking for a person in the area, with Abe calling out for his sister Abigail in a shared tongue taught to them by their grandfather. The person who came out of the rocks wasn't Abigail, but rather a young girl of about 15 or so. The girl wore armor similar to that of the Order of Illumination, though Xavier was able to notice inconsistencies with the design. With the girl in front of them the warjack also rose from its position and trained its two chain guns on the party to defend its controller. Charlotte sensed around and was unable to sense any warcasters in the area, which lead the party to inquire who they were dealing with. When Abe introduced himself as Abel Mudokon, the girl's eyes widened and then she in a rather empty tone murmured that he must be the brother before telling the jack to stand down.

The girl introduced herself to the party as Kita Safoha, and while she only knew Abigail for a short time, Abigail had saved her life and given her a second chance. Kita explained that she met Abigail while Abigail was dealing with a Thamarite cult that Kita was a part of, though Abigail seemed to see that Kita wasn't beyond redemption, and wasn't aware of the hurt that the cult was causing. When Kita was shown the truth, she not only renounced the cult, but also asked to help Abigail in dealing with the cult once and for all. During that fight with the cult, Abigail placed herself in front of an attack meant for Kita and was mortally wounded. Kita told the party that she had tried to tend to the wounds after the battle though she was no healer and after a week or so Abigail died from her wounds. Kita also told Abe that Abigail hadn't forgotten about him, and about a year and a half or so ago went back to the family farm in search of Abe. Though by the time she reached there he had already set off. Despite this she believed that he was out there somewhere. This revelation hit Abe hard, as there was a matter of months between his departure from the farm and Abigail's attempt to find him. The party really only had two and a half further questions, the first being why take up Abigail's name,and the second being what Kita was doing out here and if she was aware that there were others looking for her as well.

Kita said that she took Abigails name mainly as she was a known member of her former cult and without Abigail to vouch for her, she feared that she wouldn't be able to explain herself. Secondly she felt that continuing helping people in Abigail's name would be a fitting continuation of her legacy, and while she was no warcaster herself, she owed it to Abigail's memory to help others in the way that she did. In regards to the second question and its corollary, Kita said she wasn't surprised that there were people looking for her, as she was out in the desert as she was tracking a cult that from what she found in Corvis was in the process of constructing an infernal gate. The magnitude of the situation didn't need to be explained to the party, as a gate would be a significant piece for an eventual second round of the claiming. So with that knowledge shared, the party asked if Kita wanted their assistance with dealing with the cult. Kita did accept their offer, though mumbled that she knew that she didn't have much of a right to ask it of them, especially Abe. The party didn't pay much mind to that however, and brought Kita and her warjack back to their camp.

At the camp, the party began cooking the hydra and having light conversation, though Abe stepped away for a bit to play his banjo and mourn. Kita felt guilty about this, though Charlotte told her that Abe just needed some time to come to terms with this. After a while, Abe returned to the fire and the party began to share stories among themselves as the sun began to pass below the peaks of the mountains. As this was going on the shadows in the area began to behave rather strangely, lightening and darkening in a rather peculiar way. This put the party on edge, a feeling even further reinforced when Kita told them that she didn't have any particular dominion with shadows, rather she held an affinity towards mind magic. The party then asked Kita if she was able to sense the thoughts of people in an area. Kita wasn't particularly good at that aspect though searched the area as best as she could. The search did locate one set of shadows that were different from the rest, so the party fired a shot into it and demanded whoever was there to show themselves. From the shadows, stepped forth the Ossander brothers and third person. Gregory adressed the party, that while the girl needed to die they didn't and that they too could benefit from aligning with their infernal masters. The party rebuffed their offer, as the brothers expected and then they stated that they might as well dispense with the pleasantries and get to the inevitable fight.

The fight in question was complicated by the fact that the cultists weren't alone, they were also accompanied by an umbral guardian, an infernal being that exists adjacent to Caen and can pass through to Caen when called forth. The umbral guardian made itself known as Shakes tried to shoot one of the cultists, stretching the instant that the bullet was in flight many times over so that it could appear in the way of the attack. With the appearance of the infernal, the area was covered in a miasmic darkness, through which only faint outlines of light sources such as the jack's boilers or Xaviers armor and sword could be made out. The fight then began in earnest, as the cultists weren't particularly bothered by the darkness, throwing spears at the party with deadly accuracy, meanwhile the umbral guardian was flitting about the darkness striking at the party with powerful blows. The party focused on the cultists in the hopes that they were the ones keeping the infernal here on Caen, though Charlotte figured that she could try and speed its departure along with dispel magic. The infernal clung to Caen rather tightly and resisted both Charlotte's attempts as well as the deaths of its allies. Eventually the party was able to defeat the being, and it and the darkness that it brought vanished the instant it was slain. Kita then mentioned that the situation was even more dire than they had previously thought, given that the cult had the services of true infernals before the gate was fully complete.