Before Kaldalis knew what he was doing, he was storming into the jungle after the drag marks in the dirt. He didn’t have a plan for what he was going to do, but he was confident that he wouldn’t need one. The Contender had drawn first blood with whatever his people had done to knock Garyung out. That was all the permission Kaldalis needed to bleed them to the last.

“Kaldalis, wait,” Bangen said, leaping forward to grab his arm.

There was a shuffling sound as the folder she had been holding hit the dirt, the papers scattering beside the small bloodstain there.

That was what stopped him. He could have easily torn out of her grip to keep walking. He could have easily ignored her warning. But whatever she had to say was so important that she - Bangen of all people - had dropped valuable research documents onto the ground. It shocked him out of his anger and straight into confusion and concern.

“What?” he demanded. Even though he had been rendered willing to listen, he still was no less ready to go out and throw down with the Contender. “Do you think this is a misunderstanding? Do you think something perfectly innocent happened here?”

“No,” Bangen said quickly. “What I think is that Garyung is stronger than you are, and there wasn’t even a struggle here. If you go out there, isn’t the same thing going to happen to you?”

Kaldalis wanted to snap that he wasn’t going to let that happen. He wouldn’t be caught by surprise like Garyung had been. But… Garyung had known the Contender was bad news. He’d known for as long as Kaldalis himself had. Garyung would never let himself be caught by surprise. The Contender had a trick up his voluminous sleeves that had dropped the high-level tank before he could even shout for help.

“You’re right,” Kaldalis said, forcing his muscles to relax. “Whatever trick they used on Garyung might work just as well on me. I can’t rush in half-cocked.”

Bangen blinked at him for a moment. Almost like she was surprised that that worked. Kaldalis wanted to be insulted, but she hadn’t been wrong. He was, after all, about to go running off into the jungle alone before she stopped him.

“I need you to get back to Ikzoz,” Kaldalis said quickly, turning back towards the Cotanaku gates. “Tell him what’s happened. I’ll need to talk to him and the council as soon as possible. If anyone knows what needs to be done, besides my thing, then it’s him.”

“What’s your thing?” Bangen asked.

“I’m getting him back,” Kaldalis snapped, stomping his way towards the town. “No matter what it takes.”

When Kaldalis didn’t elaborate further, Bangen scurried off into the town ahead of Kaldalis. The few extra moments he had to himself as he made his way to the gates let him cool his head. He had to clear his thoughts. He had to know what he was doing. Improvisation would only get him so far.

As soon as he got through the gates, he grabbed the nearest adventurer by the shoulder. He didn’t recognize the man, but he knew instantly that the man recognized him from the look on his face. Kaldalis had to admit that he was something of a celebrity around here. If there was ever a time to cash in on that social capital, it was now.

“I need your help,” Kaldalis said, “I need my friends to meet me at the town hall, in the council chambers. I don’t know where they are, and I don’t have the time for a one-man search of the whole town. I need Balrim and Myrin at least, but if they’re with the others, then I want them with me, too.”

“Uh,” the adventurer stammered, “sure thing, man. Is this, uh, top secret or something?”

Kaldalis considered for one a second. “No,” he said at last. “Speed is the most important part here. The time for secrecy is past, now.”

As much as he didn’t want to start a panic, the man didn’t know what was wrong. A panic wouldn’t begin with this guy running around telling everyone he was looking for Balrim and Myrin in a hurry.

“Joe!” the adventurer snapped, whirling out of Kaldalis’s grasp and towards the nearby dungeon questgiver, where a handful of other adventurers were gathered. “Joe, Sandy, we got a job!”

Kaldalis didn’t have time to oversee how they handled this. If he’d had the time to oversee how a bunch of randos would execute a search for his friends, he’d be doing it himself. He had another stop to make before the council chambers, and if he had to go after Garyung alone as a result of that, then that’s just how it would need to be.

Just inside the beachside gate, Kaldalis found his target. They were gathered in a tight formation there, looking equal parts anxious and shifty. That was a bad sign.

For them.

The Contender’s actions had clearly put an end to the political part of this dance. The first blow had been struck, and to Kaldalis, that meant that he was in the clear to strike the second.

“Move,” Kaldalis barked loudly. “I won’t ask twice.”

The tight ranks of guards in the church’s green-and-gold color scheme tightened briefly, but when Kaldalis called his weapon to his hands, it was not a normal spear. It was the menacing blood-red of a War Weapon. The sudden appearance of such an item made the guards flinch back. It opened just enough of the formation that he could see Brother Gnider in the middle of them. He had been having a furious argument with the other of the Contender’s advisors.

But Kaldalis had put an end to that, drawing every eye with his approach.

Kaldalis’s blood-red spear lanced out with expert accuracy and finesse. The point stopped just a half-inch shy of Brother Gnider’s nose. To his credit, the man didn’t flinch, even as his fellow priest flinched back so hard he fell over on his ass.

“What has he done,” Kaldalis demanded firmly. “Again, I will not be asking twice.”

“I don’t know,” the priest said, his voice calm and even, as if Kaldalis wasn’t holding the point of a deadly weapon within easy striking distance of either eye. “That’s what we’ve been wondering for the last hour. We were ordered to return to Panbu without him, and he left with a handful of his personal guard. That’s unusual.” He looked down at the other priest with open disdain before adding: “Too unusual of an order to obey blindly.”

Kaldalis wanted to give Brother Gnider a quick jab with the spear. He wanted to lash out violently, both to get across that he was not here to be lied to, but also to try and let out a little of the aggression he felt. But the priest was not his enemy. He’d earned a little more patience than that.

“Give me one good reason to believe you,” Kaldalis asked.

“I am a priest of the Glorious One,” Brother Gnider said, tipping his head back to look down his nose - and the spear before it - at Kaldalis. “I am willing to die for my ideals because I know my reward awaits me in the hereafter. That I am talking to you at all should be a sign of good faith, because I don’t care if you kill me or not.”

Kaldalis didn’t believe that. But just the same, he lowered his spear, though he didn’t put it away. If this was a bluff, it was a very good one.

“Garyung is missing,” Kaldalis said. “He was last seen with the Contender. There are signs of violence outside of town, leading into the jungle.”

Brother Gnider’s eyes widened with a start at that. It certainly sold the idea that he wasn’t in on this development. The spear in his face hadn’t surprised him as much as that.

“I expected this,” Brother Gnider lied calmly, “only not so soon. I warned you, didn’t I? You’ve done an admirable job of sweeping the Contender into a corner. I don’t think it’s surprising at all for him to leave boot prints stomping across your newly-cleaned floor.”

“Considering all the hoops I’ve had to jump through to avoid declaring war with Zara by simply defending myself,” Kaldalis said firmly, “I have no choice but to consider this to be just that.”

“We wouldn’t-” the other priest started to stammer from his place on the ground nearby. “He wouldn’t-”

“Enough,” Brother Gnider barked firmly. “As the ranking official still in Cotanaku, I unequivocally deny any act of war or violence against Cotanaku. We are allies.” He made a gesture and the guards stood down. Kaldalis hadn’t even noticed them encircling him with hands on their weapons. He was going to have to watch out for that tunnel vision in the fight to come.

“So what are you going to do about this?” Kaldalis demanded.

“I put myself at your disposal,” the priest said. He bowed his head and offered his hands, as if to be manacled. “If proof can be provided that the Contender has gone rogue, I put my authority in your hands to declare him rogue and remove him from power. And even if he has not, then all the forces under my command are yours regardless, to recover Garyung from whatever has happened.”

It was the most politically savvy way for the priest to help Kaldalis. He went out of his way to not admit fault, and to call into question the Contender’s guilt where possible. But he was offering everything he could. Their interests were aligned here.

As much as he was enraged by what the Contender had done, Kaldalis had to remember. There were still allies among the Contender’s forces, and he couldn’t let his anger alienate them.

“Come with me, then,” Kaldalis said, finally putting away his War Weapon. “The council should be waiting for me by now. And with a little luck, so will my friends.”