===== Has Anyone Seen Duchess Parnth? =====
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Our plan for the [[farne:organizations:Gatekeepers of Enma|cultists]] ended up boiling down to "run in with swords blazing". I guess that was okay, as long as we ended up getting the drop on them and being the ones to control the sitch. I made sure to indicate to [[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]] that he was NOT TO KILL THE VILLAGERS even if they were possessed. He seemed hum-drum about that, but agreed not to. Hopefully it wouldn't even be an issue. 

Anyhoo, we stood outside the house the day before, hidden of course, gathering intel. Exactly 9 people wandered the structure, in and out of the rooms of the house, which lead us to discover that there was an unnaturally large sub-basement below the house, which also had ... an open portal to god-knows-where. There was also a magical Ward around the sub-basement.

We went to the city constabulary to acquire permits and such for a bit of a ruse, and then outside of the house of the [[farne:organizations:Gatekeepers of Enma|cultists]], we set up caution cones and signs saying we were repairing some sewer lines. Instead, of course, [[farne:protagonists:grey:index|Grey]] was tunneling beneath the house and over to the bottom sub-basement. [[farne:protagonists:trent:index|Trent]] was quite confident that he could take care of the magical Ward.

After tunneling over, we waited just on the other side of the sub-basement wall for a little while in order to engage when there were only two people present. Once that circumstance was fulfilled, [[farne:protagonists:trent:index|Trent]] suppressed the Ward while [[farne:protagonists:grey:index|Grey]] pulled back the wall, creating a doorway, and [[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]] and I burst into the room to engage the two [[farne:organizations:Gatekeepers of Enma|cultists]].

Yes, they were surprised. They kept trying to charm us, ugh I hate that. [[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]] was susceptible, so I dropped a Mind Shield on the two of us. I ended up cutting down both [[farne:organizations:Gatekeepers of Enma|cultists]] just as one of those aggie-dealing warrior types came down the stairs, with two [[farne:organizations:Gatekeepers of Enma|cultists]] behind and another warrior behind. Later, we would learn the warrior types are called [[farne:organizations:Knights of the Temple of the Tattered Sash|Templars]]. Anyway.

I engaged with this [[farne:organizations:Knights of the Temple of the Tattered Sash|Templar]] but he eventually got past me and into the room. I let [[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]] take him on while I cut down the [[farne:organizations:Gatekeepers of Enma|cultists]] that he left exposed behind him. I cut up the first [[farne:organizations:Gatekeepers of Enma|cultists]] but somehow the second one managed to get past me. Well it was good that [[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]] had taken care of the first [[farne:organizations:Knights of the Temple of the Tattered Sash|Templar]] cause I had another one to deal with. I was definitely hurting a bit after cutting him down, then turned to assist with the [[farne:organizations:Gatekeepers of Enma|cultist]] because she had apparently done some kind of mirror image trick. I channeled my powers and determined that... that one was the real her.

She got mad about this, but I approached her and together, [[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]] and I cut her down. He seemed annoyed that I showed no signs of wanting to heal her, but she obviously wasn't the leader of this dog-and-pony show. I sensed three more people upstairs. One seemed to be at the front door engaging [[farne:protagonists:trent:index|Trent]] and the tree, who had moved out of the tunnel and up there to ensure no one escaped. The other two were in a room upstairs, not really showing signs of going anywhere.

We checked the front door and since we saw the person wrangling with the tree was just a [[farne:organizations:Gatekeepers of Enma|cultist]], we left that alone and headed upstairs (the [[farne:organizations:Knights of the Temple of the Tattered Sash|Templars]] were particularly nasty so we wanted to ensure that [[farne:protagonists:trent:index|Trent]] and the tree could handle whoever was at the door). Before heading into the room, I did a quick healing of [[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]] and I, as we had both taken a bit of a beating. After coming up with a quick-and-dirty plan, I burst into the room, drawing attention while [[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]] sneakily Phase-Door'd in.

I had enough time to see a guy with a big hat standing in front of me before a fireball got blasted into my face. As I attempted to dodge the inferno, a smile grew across my face. Despite taking some damage, when the smoke cleared, [[farne:actors:Pope Magenes|Pope Magenes]] (whose name we would learn later) there was able to see my insane grin as I strode confidently toward him, sword preparing to dish out some well-deserved karma.

I knew there was another dude in the room, and as I whacked the fireball wand out of [[farne:actors:Pope Magenes|Pope Magenes]]'s hand, I heard [[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]] engage the other. [[farne:actors:Pope Magenes|Magenes]] drew a short sword and I exchanged a few blows with him, but I could tell that [[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]] was taking some heavy damage. So he disengaged the other and moved toward me. I dropped a fairly weak heal spell on him and we switched opponents, since [[farne:actors:Pope Magenes|Magenes]] wasn't actually that skilled with his sword.

The guy [[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]] had been facing was wielding two blades pretty skillfully. Ah, Okay. While he was pretty good at dishing out the damage, he wasn't as good at defending against it. I took another round to drop a much better healing spell on both [[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]] and I, and then set myself into an offensive position. He was able to deal some damage to me directly after the heal, but it was still a net gain for me. It was also at about this point that I heard [[farne:actors:Pope Magenes|Pope Magenes]]'s short sword go flying. I guess [[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]] was echoing my intentions for this joker before me.

On my turn, I lunged out at the double-wielder and sent one of his two swords flying into the corner of the room. It was my assumption here that his skill at this two-handed fighting style hinged on the fact that he need to be wielding two weapons. And sure enough, his effectiveness dropped back a good bit after his first weapon was gone. He attacked again and dealt a lot less damage, and then I lashed out again and cut him down.

Then I turned to [[farne:actors:Pope Magenes|Pope Magenes]], who was wielding a dagger. I stepped up to him, next to [[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]], took one swipe of my sword and sent his final weapon flying into the pile in the corner of the room. I stepped up to him and got all up in his face and sternly and loudly commanded, "stand down, BITCH." Fortunately, he surrendered. I tied him up and marched him down to [[farne:protagonists:trent:index|Trent]] and the Tree, who had made minced meat of the last [[farne:organizations:Gatekeepers of Enma|cultist]], but then we heard fighting sounds coming from the sub-basement. We left [[farne:actors:Pope Magenes|Pope Magenes]] with [[farne:protagonists:trent:index|Trent]] and headed down to assist [[farne:protagonists:grey:index|Grey]], who had been holding our entrance.

[[farne:protagonists:grey:index|Grey]] was engaged with a [[farne:organizations:Knights of the Temple of the Tattered Sash|Templar]] and [[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]] and I joined the fight while [[farne:protagonists:grey:index|Grey]] stepped out of it. She was wielding some gigantic thing, but I ended up dropping her like a rag doll, but not before taking several more hits. Dang. Much to my annoyance, we restrained her quickly and then I healed her so she wouldn't die. And then I patched the rest of us up. Although I had taken some aggie from one of the [[farne:organizations:Knights of the Temple of the Tattered Sash|Templars]] and I'd just have to heal that over the next day.

Anyway, [[farne:protagonists:grey:index|Grey]] escorted the [[farne:organizations:Knights of the Temple of the Tattered Sash|Templar]] up the stairs to join [[farne:actors:Pope Magenes|Pope Magenes]] in our collection of captured enemies, and they headed off to summon the constabulary, [[farne:actors:nicele hames|the Baroness]], and [[farne:actors:Dulvan Rowth|Prince Elector]]. [[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]] and I remained in the sub-basement staring out through the now open gate from which the last [[farne:organizations:Knights of the Temple of the Tattered Sash|Templar]] had emerged. It was a village. A village I vaguely recognized, and was almost entirely sure was the missing village of [[farne:locations:Manderbel]].

[[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]] stepped through and went to find the people. It took some coaxing, but we convinced them to step back into the Material plane, and while the constables were cleaning up the scene, we escorted the couple hundred townsfolk to [[farne:actors:nicele hames|Baroness Hames]], and she got the ball rolling on getting these people cleaned up, debriefed, and shacked up somewhere before sending them all home over the next few days.

[[farne:actors:nicele hames|Baroness Hames]] thanked us profusely, let us know that the banishment was ended, and told us she intended to follow through on her offer; a party would be arranged for the next evening to induct us into the ranks of nobility. It was weird how I sat there and listened to her say this and thought briefly how I really kind of didn't care about that anymore. I mean, I definitely used to. It all seemed so arbitrary and artificial, the dishing out of titles to people. We obviously had a significant value outside of whether or not we were nobility, so why bother? Ah well.

Maybe it was just my wound hurting. It wasn't a deep wound, but man, it felt like my side was on fire. Which brought my mind back to the battle this evening. I was becoming a bit alarmed at how casual I had become at dealing out death to people, even if they deserved it. The only reason I hadn't cut [[farne:actors:Pope Magenes|Pope Magenes]] to ribbons as well as leaving the last [[farne:organizations:Knights of the Temple of the Tattered Sash|Templar]] to bleed out on the floor was so that we could interrogate the two. That was really the only reason that stopped me? I seemed to be mentally invalidating the existence of people who pissed me off lately, and I wondered where I would draw the line when I stepped into a situation whose badguy was less clear.

Either way, I felt purged of the poison that was infecting my mood lately. It wouldn't bring [[farne:actors:bagram_fossil|Bagram]] back, or [[farne:actors:philip_madrigal|Philip]], but I felt as if the impetus to murder everyone involved in [[farne:actors:Sanria Veris|Veris]]'s [[farne:locations:upper_thalia|Upper Thalian]] gambit and especially this little cult of hers had dropped off a good degree, leaving me feeling more-or-less numb about it all. Which is good, because I couldn't keep up this level of negative energy for much longer without falling into vice.

After hearing about the particulars of the party thing the next night, we headed out and stopped by to interrogate the prisoners. Here's what we got from [[farne:actors:Pope Magenes|Pope Magenes]] and [[farne:actors:Anora Levillet|Templar Anora Levillet]].

  - [[farne:actors:anzja_of_the_rivers|Anzja]] is a High Priestess of [[farne:cosmology:lesser_powers#fugiri|Fugiri]] (at least, they think so)
  - Enma is the type of devil that the cult summons and puts into people
  - There are a few hundred [[farne:organizations:Knights of the Temple of the Tattered Sash|Templars]] in the Church of [[farne:actors:anzja_of_the_rivers|Anzja]]
  - About 50-60 priests in [[farne:actors:anzja_of_the_rivers|Anzja]]'s Church
  - The flag flown in the [[farne:locations:samprin_hills|Samprin Hills]] is theirs, they use it sometimes
  - In the Samprin Hills, there are about 40-50 [[farne:organizations:Knights of the Temple of the Tattered Sash|Templars]]+lackeys harassing [[farne:actors:tenris_melfir|Melfir]], [[farne:locations:alestia|Alestia]], and kidnapping people.
  - Doesn't know specifically how Kazgem is used or what for. They were just told where/h ow to access the pocket dimension that held the village.
  - [[farne:actors:grave|Grave]]: he trains the [[farne:organizations:Knights of the Temple of the Tattered Sash|Templars]], seems to be the muscle of the group, but he is intelligent too.
  - [[farne:actors:nemesis|Nemesis]]: She does info gathering; [[farne:actors:Pope Magenes|Pope Magenes]] works with her a lot, gets his information from her (about our whereabouts, etc).
  - [[farne:actors:serendipity|Serendipity]]: They don't know anything about her.

After the interrogation, I had [[farne:protagonists:trent:index|Trent]] do a blood test on us and we all came up negative except for [[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]]. I guess the test was for devilish blood, not for [[farne:cosmology:azranael|Azranael]]'s bloodline specifically. Perhaps during our up-coming research in Dis, we can determine a way to test for [[farne:cosmology:azranael|Azranael]]'s bloodline specifically.

Anyway, by this point in the evening, I was utterly beat. Following all of this, I crashed completely in my bed at the Occluded Rainbow Inn. The next morning, I grabbed [[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]] and we headed out to do some clothes-shopping for the party that night. While out shopping, I decided to gather together a [[farne:locations:Masayume|Masayuman]] and an [[farne:locations:Alestia|Alestian]] tailor/seamstress together to do a collaboration to create a sort of battle costume for me. It was to be white with only silver for any trim and/or design work, it was to appear very obviously [[farne:locations:Masayume|Masayuman]] in basic flavor, but completely unrestricting of movement with the caveat that riding a horse must not be impossible (so no dresses/skirts-only). And of course, stylish. I let [[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]] volunteer some opinions as well, since he was in tow. After, we headed back out to do some more shopping.

[[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]] and I parted ways mid-day, and I headed over to the Temple of [[farne:cosmology:lesser_powers#hathandar|Hathandar]] to meditate to him for a while on my Oath of Vengeance against [[farne:actors:Sanria Veris|Veris]], and the raid we had executed the previous night. A young priest named [[farne:actors:Arilus Merkus]] kept me company for a while, helping me to defuse a good bit.

As the day went on, and especially after spending some time at [[farne:cosmology:lesser_powers#hathandar|Hathandar]]'s temple, I started feeling a lot better about the party that night. I actually managed to purge enough of the anger and hurt of the recent days in order to be in a good mood by the time evening rolled around. Thinking that it's probably better that I wasn't a grump at party specifically thrown for me (and the others), I resolved to not think about any of the bad things that have happened recently, at least for tonite.

-------
\\ 
The party I saw as quite a grand opportunity to accomplish several things that I had been needing (and wanting) to do. Muwahah.

They had some ceremony thing for us at the beginning, before the party really got underway. After all the formal stuff, I flitted around the party, talking to various electors, introducing myself, asking them what they thought about the recent goings-on in [[farne:locations:Upper Thalia]] and getting them to fill me in on the particulars about their duties as Electors. I made it pretty clear why I was interested, although how I would acquire an Electoral seat was a problem as yet unresolved. But anyway, I probably wouldn't be able to dedicate any time to such a position until this [[farne:actors:sanria veris|Veris]] stuff was over. But I still took down some dates in which the Electoral body would be having an open-to-public session so I could go sit in on at least one of them.

After I was done politicking and making some new Linked-In connections, I migrated over to the younger groups so that I could get to know some people who were closer to my age and add some new Facebook friends. I realized as I stood amongst one group that I didn't really have any friends my age. It seemed kind of weird when I took the time to think about it.

Anyway, I met lots of people, danced with a few of the boys, "got some phone numbers", and made some tentative plans to meet up with various people sometime in the near future, probably after we returned from our upcoming trip to [[farne:locations:Upper Thalia]].

Surprisingly, I ran into my priestly friend [[farne:actors:Arilus Merkus|Arilus]] from earlier in the day. I would never have expected to see him here. I guess he was here representing the Temple of [[farne:cosmology:lesser powers#Hathandar]]. He came over to talk to me while I was taking a break, saying he was surprised, that after speaking with me earlier in the day he had had no idea at the time that I "was so famous" as he put it. Heh. We talked for a while, and then we danced for a little bit. There were still some other people I wanted to talk to, so I headed back into the swathes of people to "get some more phone numbers", and then I reappeared next to [[farne:actors:Arilus Merkus|Arilus]] about an hour later.

We escaped from the party to pursue our own two-person shindig for the remainder of the night. It was quite enjoyable, although there really is something a little weird about doing such things with priests. I couldn't really put my finger on what it was, maybe their absurdly insightful intuition. Anyway, I was definitely going to see him again whether I wanted to or not since I'd be back to the temple of [[farne:cosmology:lesser_powers#Hathandar]] pretty regularly. So it was quite fortunate indeed that I did in fact look forward to seeing him again.

-------
\\ 
Following the party's escapades, I made it clear to the others that I wanted to somehow find [[farne:actors:elina_parnth|Duchess Elina Parnth]]. I didn't know how we were going to do it, but we needed to at least try. We were seriously lacking in allies and I felt that she could be a good one. That we could do each other a favor. Especially considering someone was going to have to takeover rule of [[farne:locations:upper_thalia|Upper Thalia]] after we rid this world of the [[farne:actors:Sanria Veris|infernal Duchess Veris]], and [[farne:actors:elina_parnth|Elina Parnth]] seemed not only well-equipped for the job, but of all the [[farne:locations:upper_thalia|Upper Thalian]] Dukes, to have at least a shred of integrity to her.

But first, we went to visit our dubious god-in-a-box. [[farne:cosmology:kaz|Kaz]] was playing a game of grab-ass with the two bimbos when we appeared in the gem. Hmphf. Well anyway, we told him about the raid, asked him if he knew how his gem was used to shove [[farne:locations:Manderbel]] into a pocket dimension, and if he'd ever done it before. He seemed to recognize that a lot of power was pulled from him to do that to [[farne:locations:Manderbel]], but didn't seem to think that it had ever been done before. Okay, well at least we had no one else to rescue for the moment.

We also mentioned that this [[farne:actors:anzja_of_the_rivers|Anzja]] chick was a High Priestess of [[farne:cosmology:lesser_powers#fugiri|Fugiri]]. That seemed to ring some bells, but he wasn't sure yet why. Perhaps he would have some information for us next time we visited after he had time to meditate on it. And we mentioned that [[farne:actors:Sanria Veris|Veris]] was trying to usurp the powers of a devil named [[farne:cosmology:azranael|Azranael]]. That also seemed familiar to him, but he'd have to think on it. After updating him on the sitch, I told him we'd bring him some reading material next time around, and with that we had him send us back to [[farne:locations:alestia|Alestia]] so we could decide our next move.

We planned to put off the research in Dis for a bit, but here's a list of things we now needed to look into:
  - A devil named [[farne:cosmology:azranael|Azranael]]
  - How to determine if someone is of [[farne:cosmology:azranael|Azranael]]'s bloodline
  - [[farne:cosmology:kaz|Kazuya Fujikawa]] and what happened to him, who imprisoned him, and why. What role does [[farne:cosmology:lesser_powers#fugiri|Fugiri]] play?
  - The Nuke That Happened Before (that [[farne:cosmology:kaz|Kaz]] mentioned).

We decided [[farne:locations:upper_thalia|Tusbel]] would be our best bet to begin our search for [[farne:actors:elina_parnth|Parnth]]. Both Blargh-Dukes seemed to be in Dimmersdel working on that [[farne:events:drithendaar_24th_4377|most disgusting of marriage arrangements]], so we wanted to stay as far away from that place as possible. Into the library [[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]] and I went, hunting for a picture of [[farne:actors:elina_parnth|Duchess Parnth]]. We bluffed our way through the librarian's questions, and eventually found a recent picture of [[farne:actors:elina_parnth|Parnth]]. I used magic to copy the picture onto a piece of paper that I took with me, and we headed back out into the city.

We looked around the city, but noticed no temples to an unknown god, nor any suspiciously large temples to [[farne:cosmology:lesser_powers#fugiri|Fugiri]] or anything. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. I took to the skies to survey the keep from above, and, after watching for a bit, seemed to think there were fewer redheads here than when we visited before the Nuke was dropped. Hm.

I returned to the boys and mentioned this. I speculated that we could consider kidnapping one of the red heads for questioning. I mean, they all seemed to just be walking around, going about some daily tasks they had been assigned like it was simply their job. But I thought back to the kidnapping of Sina Falric and her comrades, and pondered that many of these people probably did not want to be brought here, or at least there must be a larger portion of people in some location somewhere that were being held against their will. Something fishy was going on here. Did these people even know their purpose for being here? Were their memories rewritten or were they simply resigned to their fate? Did they even realize they were going to be killed at some point (an assumption) to have the power flowing through their veins harvested? I really wanted to find out what they knew, but we decided that that would be for a different time. Right now, we were on a mission to locate [[farne:actors:elina_parnth|Duchess Parnth]].

I acquired a map of [[farne:locations:upper_thalia|Upper Thalia]] that had the Duchies quite well defined, with as much in the way of detail on the map as I could find. I looked over the [[farne:actors:thalian_duchal_families|Duchy of Pal'parntha]] and attempted to put myself into [[farne:actors:elina_parnth|Duchess Elina Parnth]]'s shoes. Where would I hide? I would stay in my own Duchy, as I know it best, and the people here will be sympathetic to me. I would... stay in a larger city, as more people means I would be less conspicuous, needle in a haystack so to speak. Also, being important/nobility/rich, I would prefer to stay somewhere that had something in the way of nicer accommodations, as I would not be used to living like a pauper, and would probably avoid such if at all possible. With that in mind, I picked the next three largest cities after the [[farne:events:earondaar_38nd_4377|now defunct Seldermoor]], and we gated to Ward, bought some horses, and set out toward the largest of the three, [[farne:locations:Arkenfels]].

It was just over four days to our destination of [[farne:locations:Arkenfels]]. We ran into a patrol the first day flying [[farne:actors:Sanria Veris|Veris]]'s standard who stopped us and questioned us about where we were going, what we were doing, and if we'd seen anything suspicious (brigands)/magical (heh!) going on. We told them we were heading to [[farne:locations:Arkenfels]] from Ward now that the fighting is over because that's where we're from, and that we'd seen no magic or anything out of the ordinary. They let us continue on without a hassle, although the captain winked at me and asked if we'd like an escort...? I told them sure if they were going in the same direction (which they weren't), but that they shouldn't go out of their way for us. We parted ways and continued on our journey.

We camped out that night and nothing particularly interesting happened. The next evening we pulled into a small town and got some rooms at the Red Turkey Inn. We all sat in the common room listening to rumors of what had happened to [[farne:actors:elina_parnth|Parnth]]. [[farne:protagonists:grey:index|Grey]] enhanced his hearing in order to hear more clearly what the townsfolk were whispering. He broadcasted it over the Telepathic link to us. I felt sorry for these people; they really seemed to like [[farne:actors:elina_parnth|Parnth]], and they were clearly disturbed by the circumstances under which her forces were defeated. Some dejectedly wrote her off as dead, obviously unhappy about it, while others professed hope at rumors they had heard about her appearing here or there.

[[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]] had recently done some scrying on the subject and we knew for pretty-damn-certain that [[farne:actors:elina_parnth|Parnth]] was still alive. We were also pretty sure she was in [[farne:locations:upper_thalia|Upper Thalia]], somewhere in her Duchy. But any more specific than that, and it all just became very unclear.

It's not really these peoples' faults that they are ruled by a bunch of greedy, self-important asshats. On perhaps an incredibly stupid whim, I decided to do a little masquerade. I made like I was going to bed, and headed up to my room, climbed down the fire-escape in the back, turned into the rendition of [[farne:actors:elina_parnth|Parnth]] that I had printed onto my piece of paper, and walked into the Inn. Why was I doing this again? I am an IDIOT!

Everyone was expectedly shock-and-awed at my presence. I spoke to them, gave them a rousing speech about not losing hope, that my peeps and I were working on a plan to unravel what had happened, and I assured them that I would be safe and that we would restore order and the proper rule of the [[farne:actors:thalian_duchal_families|Duchy of Pal'parntha]]. They peppered me with questions and the pointed ones I either deflected or replied ambiguously. The longer I played the role, the more I settled comfortably into it. I spent about 15 minutes conversing here before taking my leave out the front door, hurrying into the ally and changing back to myself, and then climbing back up to my room. The towns people seemed more at ease, and happier for it, I just hope it wasn't as stupid a thing to do as I was beginning to feel it was. Much much later that night, I had [[farne:protagonists:trent:index|Trent]] and [[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]] go out and clean up my magical residue, and attempt to hide my change-into-and-out-of [[farne:actors:elina_parnth|Parnth]] from Time-Scrying (but not my big charade as [[farne:actors:elina_parnth|Parnth]]).

The next day the [[farne:actors:Sanria Veris|Veris]]-patrols seemed to increase, and were heading toward the small town we'd just come from. News travels quickly I guess. I tried to deflect and confuse some of the information they had, indicating it was from some other town, a different Inn, etc. The last thing I needed was for the townspeople to get in trouble for my charade.

That night was spent under the open sky, with similarly increased patrols, and the next night we were in the last small town before arriving to [[farne:locations:Arkenfels]]. I decided to go ahead and do it again, as the atmosphere was similar in here to the Inn in the previous town. I "went up to bed", snuck out, changed into [[farne:actors:elina_parnth|Parnth]], walked in and gave a speech, left, and had [[farne:protagonists:trent:index|Trent]] and [[farne:protagonists:boyce:index|Boyce]] clean up my magical residue later.

It was nice to see these people be so excited. They must really like their ruler. I sure hope she lives up to the hype.

The next day we arrived at [[farne:locations:Arkenfels]]. At the very least, even if she isn't here, we should hopefully be able to dig up some more reliable information on her whereabouts in a city big enough to have a business of information-trading, unlike dinky villages full of whispering, gossipy townsfolk.