(TW: Roll for Fortitude or Constitution if you’re coming off of DND because shits gonna get… Shit… really! :P)

“Oh Navideh! You are here… and you brought a… a…” the High Priestess Kamala was quite stunned for herself when the blue-haired Bard came barged into her private quarters without so much as a knock. Let alone with the Outlander David.

“He’s our friend. And… that’s her!” Tutoria vouched for David. “That’s the Desnan Bard we are looking for!”

“We remember you from the Monastery Spherewalker.” Tomos smiled in relief

Navideh smiled, and with a youthful gip shook the hands of the Neophyte Twins. Before standing aside to give a light bow to the Sarenite High Priestess.

“Then it appears that you are indeed speaking the truth… thank the Dawnflower.” Kamala pressed her palms into her eyes whilst she sagged across an empty pedestal. “And… I am sorry I was too quick with you earlier.”

“No mention it… I would do the same too.” David accepted the Priestesses’ apology. “But what the hell is going on with you lately? I thought you were supposed to be in the Temple of the Dawn—whatever-whatever and not here.”

“That unfortunately is where I was about to tell the young Neophytes here why so…” she wistfully sighed. “We exchanged pleasantries… though I wish I could mourn of the loss of the Monastery, alas, I am caught at an inconvenient time.”

“What is going on Master? The Mujahidin aren’t normally this so… indignant to strangers. Are we not supposed to share grace with every stranger that comes our way?” Tomos asked her.

“If what you did two showed me and Isaiah ‘grace’ then I would hate to see what you do to your friends.” David bit his lip. But on second thought, he may have chosen his words wrongly…

“Burn your skin… just a little bit darker perhaps? Perhaps try doing that…” Tutoria glared at David as she crossed her arms.

“Show some respect here Outlander. The only reason why I am not telling Tutoria to cut you down as you stand is because of her words alone.” Kamal frowned disapprovingly. “Now tell me, why are you so interested in finding our Spherewalker, Navideh.”

“Desna… where do I begin? She plucked me and Isaiah to her place in Elysium from our world. Told me to go look for Navideh to ‘mend’ Nethys’ wounds or that’s how I remember it all.” David blinked twice.

“That is Absurd! How could SHE choose you, Outlanders… Outworlders?” the High Priestess was taken aback by such a preposterous account.

She was just as ready to banish away the Outlander when Navideh thrust herself forward with her hands clasped together with pleadful beating through her breasts. Her star-lit eyes unwaveringly fluttered with a darting gaze towards the High Priestess. Even the little blue butterfly that now accompany flared its azure wings to join her silent plea. There was no word that was needed to show Kamala just how truthful her testament was to her.

Kamala froze, her hands shaken by Navideh’s counsel. Brushing her dress off the dust aside and with a slow nod to the Bard she crumpled before the chair behind her.

“Perhaps I allowed my anger to blind me to what can still be saved…” Kamala sighed. “Desna continues to play by her own rules.”

“What can still be saved? You haven’t told us what is happening here!” Tomos pressed.

“I have grave news to share with you Neophytes.” Kamala swallowed her throat. “But the Temple of Dawn’s Grace has fallen, defiled, and enslaved to the selfish might of the Outworlders. Outworlders likened to your friend here…” she still shed her suspicions down upon the Desert Ranger.

“What!?” David, Tutoria, and Tomos both exclaimed at the same time.

“We had been besieged by these ‘Shining Cloaks’ who managed to storm our defenses and overwhelm us that we were forced to retreat here.” She held out Tutoria’s Blue Poncho. “They wade through our streets whilst we hide ourselves during these devil-borne showers with such impunity. They raid, loot, rape and destroy anything they touch.”

“How do you know these are Outworlders, Priestess?” Tomos inquired.

“And what do you mean by ‘Outworlders’? Like more like me?” David questioned, his breath skipping a pace.

“Your firearm, those strange clothes you wear… and of course this Cloak!” Kamal pointed out. “We could have stopped the likes of you not until our own Runes turned against us and forced us to be casted off from the Temple. No thanks to that Nethysian Wound that struck out the Cistern near the Canal.”

Kamala walked across the room and opened a window. Outside the Visitor’s Center lay the view of the Temple of Dawn’s Grace. Its massive minaret dome lay cracked open like an egg as auroric green lights bled upwards to the sky. More akin to smoke coming borne from a fire than lightning tearing down from the sky. An abominable stench permeated from the now defiled Temple that threaten to turn even the grizzled-nosed David and Tomos inside out. It’s virgin-white walls blackened with decay that festers like a cancer that threatens to ruinate what is left of hope within those once-sacred halls. Just looking at such a sordid sight for such a long period of time can crush the constitutions of even the most resolute of those faithful to Sarenrae.

Navideh’s jaunty poise disquiets as she cowered behind David. Sweat wettening her resplendent blue hair and purple scarf.

“This cannot be…” Tutoria’s mouth was left agape to see the Temple in such a disgrace. She collapsed on her knees, unable to veer away.

David however, bravely if still trying to keep his insides from spilling out of him at the Nethysian Wounds. He knew by what Desna told him it was these damages to the World what he and Isaiah were destined to repair. He remembered the Staff of Habir with its anti-magical capabilities on his back. The Ranger now fully acknowledged what he must do to mend this Wound from this world.

“Just looking at the Temple now… it chills my heart…” Kamala glowered and gaged as she closed the window. “To see all of its holy runes, the runes, and its grounds be turned into evil.”

“Your Runes?” David asked.

“Divine Runes that were enchanted to protect the holy Temple from intruders. Now they turned against us and are now the answer to the Outworlders.” Kamala answered. “I know that they were enchanted to smite any evil-doers with Holy Fire to whatever dared defiles the temple with their presence. But when the Nethysian Wound descended upon Golden Katheer, it caused our Runes to turn against us. As if they came alive and found us wanting of our Faith and then smitten us with their infernal gazes. Then came the Outworlders… their Evil… their Evil weapons and their filth defiled every sacred white marble block of the Temple. I lost so many… so many…” the High Priestess fought to keep her tears away.

“We must not Despair! There must be something we can do!” Tutoria pleaded to Kamala. “We can’t allow such infidels to trample the Dawn’s Grace.”

“Runes right? Magic-shit so… uhm Tuturia. Can the Staff stop them?” David raised, and he pulled out from his back, wrapped in cloth. Unfurling its covering, he presented the Holy Rod to the High Priestess.

“Saint Habir’s Staff!” Kamala bowed before the holy relic. “Used by one of our most famous of Champions who slew the Cruel Masters of the East. I remembered it was housed in the Sunhill Monastery before it fell! I am glad, very glad it is safe… though under to possession of one of the Outlanders.”

Navideh’s fearmongered demeanor heartened when her eyes glinted before the Staff’s majesty. Its bronze shine like the zeal of the rising sun.

“Be at ease, High Priestess. After the fall of Sunhill, David helped us save most of the Relics from the Sandstorm.” Tomos reassured her. “They are at our cart at the back… and… if you want to know… belonged to the Sandstorm, before we kicked that tiny little bastard into the sands.” He chuckled.

“You… bested the Sandstorm! What a glimmering light that shines beneath all of this Darkness now.” Kamala gratefully praised her gaze looking skywards. “Perhaps I was wrong about you then Neophytes, and the Outworlder. My apologies for our inimical receptions. But still, there persists the problem of those Outworlders who roam the streets and chip away at what little hope is left for us.”

“Don’t mention it.” David nods. Relieved he can finally push things forward with his task. “How can the Arizona Desert Rangers help?”

“Rangers? A noble sounding name.” Kamala gently beamed. It was a soft if momentary comfort in such a sea of woeful misfortunes after another.

“Right now, the Mujahidin’s priority is securing what is left of what clean water wells are left in Katheer. So far, they remained pristine despite the invasions of these filth-spewing Otherworlders despite numerous attempts of them to defile them. So far, my Mujahidin have fought to protect them, to purify them. But for every well we take back, those marauding Outworlders would have taken two more. Just now we had just lost enough of our wells that we are already being forced to ration water as we speak.” Kamala briefed them on their dire situation.

“Tell me more of these… these Outworlders your fighting ma’am.” David analytically absorbed what he is hearing. “I know a thing and two of fighting people like them.”

“They attack typically when the rainstorms happen where we are forced to withdraw to our shelters. They wield firearms similar to yours and wore these Cloaks that protect them from the Demon Showers outside.” Kamala answered, her chestnut fingers gripping Tutoria’s blue poncho at hand.

“Acid Rain. It’s called Acid Rain. Very nasty without that Rain Coat you wearing.” David explained.

“Is that so? Interesting…” Kamala nodded receptively. “There is also the way they would defile the Wells and thus taking the Water Supply away from us. They performed some kind of ritual where they… forgive me… defecate on the Wells then drink from it. They would dance themselves into a stupor before continuing onwards with their blight once again.”

“Are you saying they can drink all of that… dirty water? Like… VERY dirty water?” David gulped. Not even the most desperate of folks would want to take a sip from the likes of that filth.

“My Paladins reported that after they defiled the wells, they have observantly had no trouble whatsoever helping themselves to its waters. The same obviously cannot be said for us, however. It seems they can stomach the water, dung, dirt, poo, and all… My Mujahidin call these shining coated pillagers the Filth-Drinkers.” Kamal cringed as she described her words.

“Area Denial they call it. Turn your resources against you… an odd kind of ploy to play it in my experience. I have never encountered such folks who can stomach literal shit water. But then again, I fought Radiation worshipping Mutants, Killer Clowns, and the God Fishers. So this only surprised me a little bit.” The Ranger nodded. Getting a better picture of how these pillagers operate.

“God Fishers?” Tomos asked.

“Gruesome stuff… all of them equally. But this filth-drinking bandit problem of yours takes the damn cake.” David commented.

“Take the cake? You feed the people you fight cake?” Kamala confusingly furrowed, taking David’s metaphorical speech at face value.

“Oh yeah…” David paused himself, he forgot these were Golarionites were unfamiliar to his native Earth’s aphorisms and metaphoric similies. “It means where I am from, they are so extremely special from what I had experienced fighting off that. Say if there was a prize, say a big giant cake. Then these Filth-Drinkers would win it.”

“But before that, they would muck it all up with all the dirt and trash they could find to ‘garnish’ it.” Tomos pulled out his arm back and scrapedthree of his fingers to mimic the culinary act, he had dryly kept his stomach inside of him as he made light of the preambles of the High Priestess.

“Not now Brother! Oh, sun and Fury save me from your buffoonery!” Tutoria moaned, pulling her iridescent hair angrily upon hearing such blasphemies.

“There is no time but at the present Neophyte Tutoria. The Outworlders thought they have us cornered but only now, desperate times come for desperate measures.” Kamala turned to David. “If that is to be believed, these Silken-felt coats… they can protect its wearer from the Devil--- Acid Rain?” the High Priestess asked the Ranger.

“Prevents yourself from getting burned from it yes.” The Ranger Nodded. “Tutoria wore that during the last rainstorm and she came out fine.”

“A scroll of Resistance to Acid should also work just as well if the rainstorms are damaging us through such applications. My sister can draft some.” Tomos, recalled his Alchemical intuition to add.

“If you’re saying these Bandits also wear them and they come out during the rainstorms to attack the water wells then we can move to stop them.”

“Yes, but is it possible you can stop them… AND take their coats too?” Kamala proposed. “If I can equip as many of my warriors with these Coats, we should be able to amass enough of our strength to assault and if Sarenrae has not forsaken us, take back the Temple.”

“Sounds like a plan.” David agreed. “Depending on how many coats we can grab… it could take about days or so for us to make it.”

“Numerically speaking Ranger, it should get easier for us to equip enough of my twelve of my remaining Mujahidin to with those coats over time and then adding upon you and your companions too.” Kamala eruditely counted the numbers in her head. Putting her ringed fingers onto her chin. “I know that the Filth-Drinkers come in small but powerful patrols that roam the streets of Katheer at groups of three to six. Be wary when you face them, they had slain many of my bravest of Champions and they fight as if bewitched by some wicked spirit. They seem to permeate evil with every step they take.”

“Are you saying we must delay? I say we should storm the Temple now whilst they cower inside it. Cut all of those infidels where they stand and then… purify all their filthy blood away from the Dawnflower’s sacred grounds.” Tutoria Zealously argued.

“You are getting too much ahead of yourself young Neophyte. If we attack now, we risk them taking destroying all of our water left. If we have no more of clean water to nourish us then we are all doomed! Kamala argued back.

“But if we don’t cut the head snake off now, we will be forever fighting this… this… losing crusade of yours. We MUST cut cancer off now before all of the body is lost.”” Tutoria unleashed her religious anger into a sentence. Zeal engulfed in fire-branded power upon the bellow of her voice.

“Young Neophyte, you still have much more to learn.” Kamala calmly crossed her arms. “There is more to being a Paladin than just zealously marching, sword up high to your next ‘Crusades’ against the evils of this world. One must also show companionship to those under your protection and our priority is their well-being. You seem to lack the practice of one of the Tenets of our creed… Selflessness.”

“Just a bunch of bandits, right? Nothing to worry about.” David callously bowed.

“Y-You… you don’t get it to do you, Outlander. Of ‘Evil’ in this world, don’t you?” Tutoria bared her teeth as she turned around to the Ranger. “

“Evil is just an absence of good. But what is good? To work for the benefit of yourself? To work for others? Back on Earth, in my world, nothing is all black and white. We all do what we must to survive.” The Ranger discoursed his lifelong experiences.

“I understand where you come from Ranger, whatever alien viewpoints they may be. But here in Golarion I am afraid... the lines between what is ‘Good’ and ‘Evil’ are much more… definitive, material even. I do not know what God nor what beliefs you have but here. Evil is… it’s like it is its own font of power one can tap into that is the building blocks of creation. A fundamental as you can say that exists around us. Law and Chaos, Positive and Negative, Good and Evil. Cosmically, there is an equal amount of each for existence to be into reality. But they remain so, polar if one is overwhelmed by the other. Both sides of each other in balance. But oftentimes, such as now Evil for say, it always wishes to seek to overpower the Good in us. Like a disease, cancer even. You can either fight it off or you can let it be the damnation of your soul.” Kamala explained.

“I am not the kind of man who talks about Religion much.” The Ranger once more callously flicked away Kamala. He had a job to do and that job is to hunt down a group of bandits, a bunch of shit-water drinking bandits. “Nor this mumbo jumbo you speak of…”

“Outlander.” Kamala uncoiled her piercing golden eyes to David. “Whatever ‘Evil’ is in your world is all for naught here in Golarion. Right now, Evil must be purged from our world, or all will be lost. You have seen what just seeing what such an Evil presence can do to us. Of how it sickens the likes of me and Tutoria.” She gripped her aching stomach.

“You’re serious aren’t ya ma’am?” the wrinkles on David’s forehead creased. Seeing just how drained they are, even the typically hearty Tomos skin paled from his rosy cheeks to a blue dread just by thinking of what profanity the sorry sight of the Temple of the Dawn’s Grace becometh of.

He had his own share of seeing the worse of what humanity is capable of without laws or morals to tether them back at the Wasteland. But to hear that ‘Evil’ here is a malignant outside force that corrupts the whims of man like an infectious disease. The old bones inside of him quivered at just how ruinous such powers could be if these Golarionites testified to him. If Evil is ‘material’ as they say, then he’s in for a whole new world of hurt.

“K-Ka-Kamala is still right Tudie. We need to get those Rain Coats for everyone. An assault now could be dangerous.” David regrettably said.

Preparation pays in the likes of dislodging such outlaws in his and Isaiah’s lines of work.

“Must you always hesitate Outlander!? We must purge these infi—” Tutoria, her emotions still flared to a boiling point, wailed at the Ranger.

But before she could smite this blasphemous bloke, Tutoria’s brother interjected her. A firm yet brotherly hand held her advance.

“High Priestess, we shall do as you command. My sister… can write down a few Scrolls of Protection from Acid, Priestess. It is the least we can do for the Temple. Right sister?” Tomos clicked his tongue to signal to Tutoria, his soft blue eyes looked towards her. Despite their quibbles, both the siblings still care for one another. “Please…” he whispered beseechingly for her.

“Y-Yesss…” Tutoria hissed. Her fists clenched firmly shut with a vengeful grip. The anger festered into her heart and without the catharsis to unleash it into her soul, she fell to a depressed sulk.

Navideh scampered herself to Tutoria’s side and held her hand gently. A soft tune and a soft smile from the Bard

“Come now then Navideh we have journeyed far to speak to you, I have so many questions I need some answers to.” David pried for her attention.

“Have the Spherewalker… ‘speak’ to you? You don’t uh… you both don’t know about that Ranger.” Kamala averted her gaze and fidgeted with the bronze cloths of her ecclesiastic robes.

“About what of the Bard?” Tomos asked.

“Navideh is… how should I say this… when we found her after rescuing her from some Slavers she is.”

“Speak? But I heard her sing just fine earlier.” David touched the base of his neck. Befuddled by the High Priestesses' claims.

“You see, Ranger, Navideh isn’t like any normal Sulli-Blooded Bards. She can only ‘speak’ through other Desnans, dreams, or through some other magical means. For you to hear her actually sing only proves you are in favor of the Song of Spheres.” Kamala explained as best as she bumbled through how to explain the bashful Bard’s quirks. “We knew she was someone special when we saw her with a Butterfly, the Holy Symbol of

“Well, that connects the dots on why Desna wanted me to find her. But a mute Bard? How does that all work…” David blinked thrice.

“Yeah, I thought Bards are meant to be great singers!” Tomos joined in ridicule.

Navideh pouted angrily at the two men. The azure-haired Bard was more than slighted that they didn’t appreciate her musical acumen in spite of her inability to talk.

“It’s not that Navideh cannot ‘speak’ to you normally. It’s just that… for reasons unknown, she can only ‘speak’ through other means. When we had rescued her many years ago, she had always been unable to talk to us, only resigned to ‘speaking’ to us via dreams or what magicks she was gifted with. Then again, nothing ever makes sense with Desna except to those of her own followers such as her and you. But both she and Navideh I put my immense trust on and if Navideh trusts you. I can too.” Kamala answered.

The sapphire-haired Bard raised her finger as she turned away from Tutoria and grabbed hold of several soft pillows from a nearby bed. She dropped the pillows onto the carpeted floor. Navideh unsheathed her Mandolin and then beckoned Tutoria, Tomos, and David to come to her. The Bard clasped her hands together and tilted her head sideways to her right whilst tucking her two hands above her cheek.

“You want us to lay down here?” David asked as he knelt down to bury his head in one of the pillows. Navideh concurred, confirming the Ranger’s reading.

Just by touching its silken surface, ease fell upon David. A longing peace that was only comparable to the softened whistles of Elysium.

“Do what she needs you to do. Whatever the Great Dreamer will say to you is likely going to be of importunate value to you all. Especially you Neophyte. I will inform the rest of the Mujahidin that they should treat the rest of your companions with the respect such as yours right now.” The High Priestess begged her to leave. But not before giving austere regard towards Tutoria.

Tutoria and Tomos bowed to Kamala as she exited her chambers. They then turned to Navideh and followed her bashful instruction. Following David, the twins fell down to the warmed floor with their heads resting upon the pillows. Navideh began to strum the strings of her mandolin and began to hum with a starlit gaze at the dark sky above. A small glimmer of light descended upon her azure crown as the room became a cynosure guarded and blessed forth by the Great Dreamer, the Song of Spheres. The air became writhed with tonic melodies that heavied the weight off the shoulders of the three adventurers. They collapsed into a transient doze below the plum and plump pillows the gentle bard caroled.

[-]

When Navideh’s lullaby stopped, as if it all happened in a blink of time from the moment, they closed their eyes in their world, David, Tutoria, and Tomos awoke into another.

A soft moonlit twilight illuminated their new surroundings, a lightening Oasis that succors those who seek its freeing comforts. A choir of dancing star lights kindled to reveal a peaceful spring whose shallow murmurs of comforted the weary with its welcome. Cutting the stream into half was a wooden bridge that arched the greatest height within their immediate surroundings. Upon the grounds, the scent of fragrant grasses and bountifully kind trees eased the minds of those who rest in their lush embrace. Across them was however a threshold that leads them in all four cardinal directions of empty void. The spring water, in its infinite spout, exudes downwards into a misty spray in front of where the three both awoke from. Beyond what is impossible, the three realized they were on some kind of floating Island.

“It’s like… Elysium again. I know it… I know it because I felt this way too when I first got here.” David’s eyes glowed with dolorous fluster.

It was so easy to let go in Elysium. Even if this is just a mere sliver of that Eden.

“I can’t believe this… it’s all so… so…” Tomos joined in his lachrymose.

“Beautiful?” a mellow voice rang upon this Dreaming Oasis. “Come to the Bridge. Come by the River to pray oh wayward souls, united by Fate.”

Once more a melody blew across the winds of the Oasis. Composing tunes of one of revivified faith standing amidst what darkness the outside world came to offer.

As I went down in the river to pray

Studying about that good ol' way

And who shall wear the starry crown

Oh Gods, show me the way

O brothers and sisters, let's go down

Let's go down, come on down

O brothers and sisters, let's go down

Down in the river to pray…

The song guided the three to the bridge, where there they see none other than an elated Navideh, her cerulean mane shined like a newborn star. As soon as their feet touched the bridge, the wooden frame glowed prismatically likened to a rainbow as the Bard turned around them with an ecstatic beam.

“I knew you would come! Desna told me so many stories about each of you.” Navideh spoke to them, not moving her mouth. “Thank you for bringing my little friend here to me.”

“Why bring us here Spherewalker?” Tomos asked her.

“I am here to warn you of something. For the road ahead is beset with hardships both new and of old.” Navideh answered. She turned her gaze away from them as she loomed over the great beyond from the end of the floating island oasis.

“Look.” The Bard directed their attention.

Revealed amidst the sea of darkness, amongst the chatoyant stars lay a great spherical orb, adorned in cracked amber and emerald brushes alongside a sea of cerulean milk. David can at first faintly recognize the engravings of the emerald and amber carved itself beneath all of the beryllium shells until it finally clicked. It was the World. So familiar yet oh so incongruous, if not of both strange and real of his own native Earth. Yet this planet for all of its astronomical parallels was not Earth.

“It’s the entire world… Golarion.” Tomos muttered, his eyes locked in between the realms of awe and terror. For such an erudite like him, to see the entirety of the world before him made him feel so inconsequent of the great siege that befell upon the Aasimar, and his sister’s ravaged world.

“And of yours too Earthling.” Navideh added. “The Cataclysm brought forth not only the Death of a God but the conjunction of your People’s destiny now being forcibly, for better and for worse with Golarion.”

Above Golarion, lay a set of crimson and pearlescent stars. Their light aligned to form dot by dots into a constellation. It limned themselves into the body of a polarized celestial being split between pallid white and bleeding ruby. The pearl stars invoked vigor and serene youth, in contrast to the red ones who invoked unknown primal and dark power that smolders like the waking song of ticking RADS. Between the being’s vaguely human-like body was a bright green cavity that split his heart open. The entity lay above the planet with Borealis lights of his star-studded body falling upon Golarion like blood, nay, like a malignancy falling into the world.

“Who’s that above?” David asked, pointing to the constellations above Golarion.

“Nethys, the All-Seeing Eye, the God of Magics… or what is left of him.” Navideh pointed her finger towards the God’s corpse. “Do you recognize all of those green lights that poured out from his corpse? That is his blood, his wounds. All of it the Aether of all Magics in the world. The cataclysm has caused all of his dominion to run amok on our and your world.”

“Son of a bitch…” David breathed in both terror and wonder over such a macabre marvel.

“Just like the Temple.” Tutoria realized, her eyes widening.

“If we do not stifle the Dead God’s bleeding. I… we… fear all will be lost.” Navideh explained. “You have the Staff of Habir with you, Arizonan Desert Ranger. With that, you can be the seed to mend our broken worlds back together.”

“But we are just four? Not counting Merizi and Leon too…” David remarked. “How can just us repair… all of that!” he ridiculed such a monumental scale.

“You are, as a friend once told me just a seed for greater unity. No single tree can make a forest. You Rangers are famed for building bridges between all peoples… just like this very bridge you stand above you that now connects us together. Every star that twinkles around us, has their own place in the sky. All you need to do… is to believe in the Good of everyone around you amidst all of this sky full of selfishness, of Fear. To triumph in spite of Evil and Chaos. For today, Katheer, tomorrow the world.” Navideh incuriously preached.

Her body swayed back and forth. The blue-haired she spoke like a storyteller speaking the tale of valorous heroes who one way or the other answered the call, spun from the infidelity of extra-fortuitous Cataclysm that had struck each of all of them.

“Today… Katheer…” Tutoria muttered as her eyes swam into a sea of her own thoughts.

“Mend our worlds.” Navideh whispered to each of their ears as the Dreaming Oasis collapsed around them.

[-]

“Finally, some good fucking food…” David chowed down on the warm wooden bowl of spiced porridge into his gullet.

Service to the Outworlders had changed from a chilling apathy elevated to lightly gracious hospitality as the Mujahidin and the Qadirans in the Visitor’s Center with the gracious words of High Priestess Kamala. For once, a sparkle of hope seemed to ember unto the once Golden City and its denizens. There was still tension that roamed above the air, however, with bad blood that only just now slowly simpered with the Mujahidin with the Outworlders due to their unfortunate histories with the likes of such folks. It was only through the grace of their mistress and Navideh’s ingratiation to the Rangers that they only reluctantly accommodate for their basic commodity of a warm bed and a warm meal.

“So you guys and me, in the middle of a loco-ass temple filled with shit drinking monstruos? Kinda sounds like a Rock Album.” Leon leered. Some of the Magical effects of the ‘Comprehend Language’ spell seemed to crack allowing a few slips of his native Spanish to leak into his speech.

“You can sit on your ass or come with us; I can use an extra Gun. If it makes you feel better you can grab whatever you can scrounge up whatever loot comes up for your fat ass when we take the fight up these assholes.” David proposed with a casual snark as he wiped his mouth.

“Poo-drinkers. Som’reel hickey shit not even I would do…” A now fully restored Isaiah cringed.

“We’re in a Dinner Table Ice.” David bluntly reprimanded him, spitting some reconstituted snot off his saliva onto the ground. Much to the chagrin of the now-friendly Mujahidin. But even then, the crassness of the Outworlders still didn’t fully dispel their reluctant hospitality upon them.

“I am not fat! I am just big boned pendejo!” Leon huffed. “But… you make a point. I do love the thrill of a good ole treasure hunt. The Oro!” Leon nodded.

“What are you talking about? O’er dere?” Merizi scooted over their seat.

“It looks like we are going on a Rat Hunt. We gotta clear a bunch of bad guys from screwing over the people of this Visitor Center further. If we don’t help this place now, it’s literally gonna be up at shit creek. Unless they don’t mind drinking shit water for the rest of their lives.”

“Can I… come with you? I can fight, I can help pick any traps and locks for you too…” Merizi’s gills jived eagerly on hearing of David’s rundown of the scenario in Katheer.

“I still don’t have a reason to trust you just yet Merizi. I told you we will hand you back your Gun until we finish our business here in Katheer.” David shot her down.

“Please! Where better else to earn your trust but out there!” the Azarketi protested.

“Come on Dave, give’r Fishy Lady a chance.” Isaiah implored him.

“I will consider it.” David shook his head. “We need to wait until the next rainstorm, however. These so-called ‘Filth-Drinkers’ only come out during those downpours. We will be dressed up with Scrolls of Resist Acid from Tudie before we move out. At least until we can loot of some Rain Coats to wear ourselves.”

“Entendido.” Leon nodded followed by Isaiah. “Hope they got one for my size.” The merchant rubbed his heavily tattooed belly and rotund belly.

[-]

“Outlanders Outlander!” Tomos woke up the sleeping Earthlings from their slumber.

“Eyyo, it’s the Birdie Boy again…” Leon rubbed his eyes out as he arose from his sleeping mat.

“Is it raining now? Is it time for us to get to work?” David asked the Aasimar Boy.

“Afraid not, but alas, calamity just happened!” Tomos bawled worryingly. “It’s my sister! She’s gone, and she took Navideh and the Staff of Habir with her!”

David looked around his personal items and to his horror, the Staff of Habir that he kept a foot near his bag was indeed missing.

“What in God’s name is that idiot getting herself into?!” David exclaimed. Fear and concern raced into his head as he could only fear the worst what treacherous state they are likely going to be in. That, and the Staff, their best weapon against the Nethysian Wound and the Living Runes could fall into the Filth-Drinker's hands.

“She’s probably going to the Temple on her own with Navideh to take the fight to those Filth-Drinkers herself. That’s why” Tomos speculated. He knew how zealous and martial his sister can be and he could only regrettably curse himself in penance that he didn’t do everything to temper the ardent fire her Paladin Sister beheld in her.

“Get the guns. We need to find’em.” David ordered Leon,

“And me?” Merizi arose from slumber. She reached out her hand towards the Ranger expectantly.

“Don’t make me regret this.” David sternly handed over her Piercing Wind Jezail.

“Lock and load boys. We’re going hunting.” the Elder Ranger picked up his Marksman Rifle and cocked its charging handle.