Date: Twenty Fifth of Febuary, year 810 Post Seminal War (810 PSW)

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Job popped his back, “getting stuck in a flooding cave with no way out sounds like a rather bad idea, so let’s start with the cave in the field.”

There were nods of agreement all around. With that matter decided, the party set out on a short hike to the cave

The stench of wet fur greeted the party when they reached the cave entrance. Baar’miin scrunched up her snout, “cave bear. Fire usually frightens them away…”

A great shaggy head poked around the corner of the cave, snout stained with the blood of some dead beast, beady black eyes squinting against the morning sunlight. It blinked, then roared a challenge and rushed the party.

Baar’Miin took to the air, “...unless they’re hungry! Guiding Bolt!” A ray of bright light smacked the cave bear in the face, causing it to bellow in confusion.

“Flurry of Blows! Tripping Strike! Suplex!” Index stepped into the path of the bar and unleashed a flurry of punches and kicks. A puch connected with the cave bear’s nose, causing it to cross its eyes on confusion. A sweeping kick pulled the front legs of the bear out from under it, sending it to the floor. Index reached down, grabbed the bear about the scruff of its neck in a two armed grasp, and heaved it over her shoulder and over the heads of the party.

Sly pulled her rapier and dagger, lunging in at the cave bear before it could regain its feet or senses. The rapier piered deeply into the bear’s side and her dagger found its mark in the back of the bear’s neck.

“Scorching Ray!” Job unleasahed a trio of firy-streaks towards the cave bear. One buried itself harmlessly in the dirt, one only managed to singe fur, and the third barely grazed the bear.

“Ray of Frost!” A streak of blue-white light lept from Enra’s outstretched finger and impacted on the bear’s chest. It shuddered, twitched, and then lay still on the ground.

Baar’Miin fluttered to the ground, “Well, that was exciting, I guess. Cave bear not good meat to eat, but better then dry rations.”

Enra bent over and puked. Slay moved to offer her fiance comfort, “first time?”

Enra used a quick Prestidigitation to clean her boots, “killing you mean? Yes.”

Job let his hands shake freely, “least it wasn't a person. Weren’t no rat neither, but…”

Index nodded, “post-combat shakes. I am surprised Sly and Baar’miin are not suffering the same.”

Sly flipped index the crux, “seen worse in the gutters. Don’t make it easy, don’t make it good, but it makes it bearable.”

Enra gave a shaky chuckle, “pun intended?”

Baar’miin twitched her wings, “should we camp and cook bear, or just leave it to rot? Not much meat after winter sleep, pelt all torn up by magics.”

Enra shook her head, “I don’t think I can camp here, but it’s too late in the day to explore the cave so we should look for a place to rest.”

They left the bear corpse behind, despite Baar’Miin’s grumbling over the waste of meat. Job could see what she was on about, having grown up in the gutters without any reliable source of food, but he could also see the revulsion on Enra’s face. Rubbing the Princess’ face in the blood of her first kill by making her eat the body was probably a bit much.

Date: Twenty Sixth of February, year 810 Post Seminal War (810 PSW)

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Enra led the way into the cave, having used Prestidigitation to clean away the blood and stench left by the bear. As the young elves had mentioned, there were quarried stones in the cave. Near the entrance they were few, and scattered widely. But the cave went deeper than the youths had dared to go, and the deeper the party went, the more frequent the bits of debris became. Several hours of cave exploration later, after descending down a short shaft with the aid of a rope and crawling through a narrow, masonry-lined cleft in the wall, the party found the first evidence that the old legends of Mevada might be true.

The wall around where they emerged from the cleft was not rough stone, nor even the increasingly frequent clusters of quarried stones. Instead it was smooth, like fine clay that hand been glazed and fired. It even shone dully in the glow of the Light cantrips the party was using in place of smokey torches; a glossy black shine just a shade too dark to be called purple. Looking about showed the walls and rooves of houses, the broad stretch of a four-wagon thoroughfare, and what looked to be a statue with hands outstretched, holding up an immense weight. Bones of people and animals lay where they had died in life, still and unmoving. Skeletal hands clutched hollow stomachs, draped across eye sockets and nasal cavities. The bones of children clutched the legs of adults. The faint smell of salt permeated the air as a chill breeze stirred the dust in the corners.

Enra gaped at the stonework, stepping gingerly over the bones to examine a shopfront with weathered paint still clinging to the carved letters, “some of this script is similar to the Varr Barak tablets, and other parts of it look like old elvish. A multilingual sign perhaps? Not enough for any sort of complete translation…”

Sly had already climbed to a rooftop and was looking down the length of the thoroughfare, “was the library of Mevada supposed to be big? Because there are several large buildings further down the street. Four stories at least, I think. It’s hard to tell in the darkness.”

Enra shook off her amazement and thought hard, “large enough to be well-known. It was commonly used by and associated with the nobles of Mevada, who were mostly spellcasters of one sort or another, and the adventurer’s guild. Near as I can tell from the records, the latter is still around as the armed branch of the Guild today.”

Sly pointed down the street, “so it could be in that cluster of buildings that look like they were magically shaped, or that five-story fortress of a place with the shield, sword, and staff emblem carved into the stone and lit by a Faerie Fire enchantment.”

Job nodded, “that’s the Guild emblem alright, though they usually don’t make it a full story tall. Let’s check the statue out first, it’ll be a handy point of reference if we decide to split up.”

The part gathered at the statue, and found that it was not a statue in the typical manner of the term. It had no plinth or base, and stood only slightly taller than Enra (which brought it to Sly’s chin). It was not beautiful to look at; the face of the elf was twisted into a rictus of pain and exertion. His hands were clawed and twisted, feet driven into the cobblestones almost to the shins, clothes rendered into burnt tatters twisted by an invisible wind. The whole thing was made from the same glossy black stone as the walls of the cave. It was as if the statue had once been a living elf, rendered into stone by some foul magic in the act of casting one final spell.

Index bent close, examining the statue at close range, “obsidian, pure and unadulterated by impurities. Not a single toolmark, and sections so fine I would think that such a brittle material would shatter rather then be shaped. Either an artist spent a literal elven lifetime grinding this down form a solid block with nothing more than water and obsidian dust as an abrasive, or this was created by magic.”

Job cleared his throat, “could this be the remains of Ololen Yinkian? None of us have the slightest idea of what a Death Curse really entails, and it would explain the utterly smooth wall of the cave…”

Baar’miin tapped a claw on the cobblestones, “if entire wall of cave is domed sheet of obsidian, then it is magic-made. Hot earth-blood cooling against spell-shield. Might turn death-curse casting mage into obsidian too.”

The party stood in silence for a long moment, now realizing that they were standing about the mortal remains of a hero of old. Eventually the moment passed, and they turned their eyes to the old Guild complex and the cluster of noble spellcaster’s houses. The knowledge that they had come to find lay in one of them, if it was here to find at all...