The Belligerents #12

The Belligerents spent the night in the jungle and awoke the next morning with a need for answers from Caster

• Caster committed himself to finding the Daughters of Eve to revive Gork, who he considers his life's work, and the Belligerents agreed to help on the condition Caster told them everything

• To the end, Caster explained his brother, Klem, was capable of reaching through planes and pulling beings into the material plane. His power is not accurate and he often pulls in creatures he doesn't intend to pull.

  • When Caster and Klem were children, this resulted in their untimely deaths, which their mother remedied through the help of powerful necromancy.

• Caster went on to explain that almost five years ago, himself, Klem, and the Word tried to trap an Abyssal being in the body of a marionette. Something went wrong and the marionette was possessed by something unknown to them, and they had to bind a powerful entity to one of the Word's paintings to keep it from tearing Ephemeraldion apart.

  • That marionette escaped and goes by the name of Wisp. Caster believes this Wisp still is out in the world somewhere.

• The black ichor is a byproduct of the Abyssal creature they attempted to control, and as the painting traversed the world, the ichor leaked out into many different locations.

After hearing the story, Hukbi admitted to killing Glum due to not agreeing with the ability to control dragons without their consent.

• Caster was upset but warned Hukbi to never allow Glum's apprentice to find out, someone by the name "the Lavender Lie."

Raithe communed with the entity in his blood from ingesting the ichor, asking for guidance. The entity said there were some of its "children" nearby and Raithe should seek help there.

The group made their way to the coast. Meanwhile, over the night, Flapjack has grown over a foot and his body had changed drastically. This lead to the revelation that Flapjack was in fact a Verdan, a creature touched by chaos. The group figured out the Verdan were a species associated with a being known as "That Which Endures," though it is also known by the name, "Vast the Immeasurable."

• Caster expressed concern that the group was traveling with a Verdan to Druvigan

Eventually the group found a ship called the Forge Ahead which had just traversed the Tenth Layer out of Grugar's Anchor, carrying passengers to a large church on the south-eastern tip of the island. They were invited to come along by a priest of the "Church of the Mire Made."

Arriving, the group found Brine the Baleful and the Word safely inside, and a group of people who all worshipped the transformative properties of the black abyssal ichor.