C1E15 — Hunting the Husband pt. 1

Milady's Account
Just two days ago I was in the southwest of the city of Guavira, in Toothsome, learning as much as I could of my craft. Two days ago, I learned that a certain merchant, Jambis Dartheur, was seeking a cook for himself and his guards, about twelve in number. It seemed a worthy career choice, and a fine place to find a fa—a group of like-minded individuals.

Many of the guards are kind. One of them, Tamas, seems as though he is missing his friend, one he called Durm. Apparently he has been gone for the past two weeks on business.

Jamra seems to allow these guards to do much as they wish, at least until he has need of them. It does not seem as though there necessarily need to be guards on duty. The man eats simply and does appreciate the oatmeal I make in the morning.

As to the rest of them...

Orentha's Account
I came downstairs to the kitchen in the morning to meet my compatriots and was met with a curious sight. There was an elephant in the kitchen. A person shaped elephant. Wearing an apron. I approached her and she talked to me - her name was Milady. I don’t remember what I said back to her, but the food was delicious.

I am learning as my time in Guavira continues that just as my life seems like it is approaching normalcy, a very particular wrench gets thrown into it. This time, the wrench in question strolled right into the kitchen of Jambis’ house. Nix clearly hadn’t gotten my note about being less creepy. Or they had gotten it and had then proceeded to completely ignore it. Probably the latter.

Nix offered us a job. There was apparently a man in the city with connections to the Nicto Kurasis who had recently lost his wife, and in his grief he had turned to some sort of magic to bring her back to life. The Nicto Kurasis wanted us to stop this man from raising his dead wife, but they also wanted us to return his book of golemancy to them. I had no qualms with stopping someone from committing a wrong, but giving an instruction manual for creating golems to a shadowy organization that's friendliest agent is Nix seemed like a terrible idea. But that was something to worry about after we fought a golem. For now, it was more important that we stop him.

We were led to the tunnel entrance where our group had first encountered the Nicto Kurasis. We proceeded down the tunnels and I tried to keep track of all the turns we made on a piece of paper, but after a while my map overlapped too many times to be correct. I gave up and resigned myself to the fact that I would never be able to navigate this place without assistance.

After winding randomly through the tunnels for a time, Nix led us to a passageway that looked different than the ones we had came through previously. The walls here were made of carved stone, and the halls looked like they had been lived in. We explored the halls slowly and came upon a large chamber where a few items seemed to be floating in mid air. Some of us moved forward to investigate and as the light in the room shifted, the giant cube became visible and moved towards us.

It was a nasty thing to fight - whatever it was. Every time I lashed out with my sword or fists, my hands came away burning with pain. I saw a few of my companions were experiencing the same, however it seemed like we were carving away at it nevertheless. When it was nearly defeated, I heard behind us a familiar sound, and what looked like dozens of Troglodytes swarmed up the hall Jamra was standing in.

Calmly, Jamra extended his hand and an almost imperceptible bead of light flew from him before erupting into a massive ball of fire. The troglodytes were immediately incinerated; the scorch marks left on the ground the only trace left of them. I thought back on how much trouble those creatures had caused us just a few weeks ago, and wondered at what we would be able to accomplish with even more time.