Chapter 10

The morning after the party, I woke up in bed with my love, Irabeth. The one thing that was wrong with that morning was the storm brewing to the west - dark and hellish and unnatural and unlike anything we'd ever seen. Irabeth and I made our way to the palace to consult on this matter with the queen; we decided to send Garnet and Wyn to scout out the borders of the worldwound, while myself, Fay, Felix, and Arueshalae went to investigate a location of interest - the crypt of a heroic crusader from times past.

As we flew to the location, a very strange and unnerving thing began occurring. White walls began growing out of the ground in the formation of a labyrinth; the inside was filled with demons, minotaurs, swarms of insects, and all sorts of unsavory creatures. When we reached the tomb, we found ourselves accosted by three... I hesitate to call them treants, because they appeared to be made of disfigured flesh. In addition was a small quasit that appeared to be giving them orders. The quasit teleported away quickly, and we took down the flesh-trees quite quickly.

Inside the mausoleum, there was a phrase written on the wall in Celestial, which Fay translated - "Only the purest heart can find the treasure." The hallway in front of us was lined with statues of angels with their hands outstretched as if to accept a gift, but at the end of the hallway was a dead end. Arueshalae and I attempted to find another way through, to no avail, while Felix began pounding the wall to make a hole. It soon got big enough for us to teleport through.

The room beyond had six more angels on the walls, as well as a stone coffin and a dry fountain. Through trial and error, we figured out that the angel statues would respond to phrases spoken in Celestial; with Fay translating, we realized that I had to offer certain things to prove my pureness of heart. Once this was done, the coffin opened, revealing the skeleton of an angel in ornamental armor. 

Suddenly, time froze. I turned around and standing before me was the spirit of the angel that lay there. He said that I had proven myself worthy to bear his mantle; he removed his halo from his head and gave it to me, then disappeared. I felt invigorated with sacred energy, and what's more, I had sprouted two large white angelic wings from my back.

We left the crypt and were confronted with the Black Rasper's dragon that we thought had died at Drezen. Apparently, the Black Rasper had spun some foul magic to place his own consciousness in his dragon's undead body, thinking to hunt us down and destroy us. He didn't count on us being far too powerful for him at this point.

So we flew back to Kenabres; distressingly, the stone labyrinth had stretched almost all the way back to the city's gates. We will meet with the Queen tomorrow to discuss our assault on Iz and other plans for the future.

Chapter 9

Having snuck off from this accursed party for a moment - Irabeth thinks I'm getting more drinks - I can begin chronicling the events of today. The battle went... adequately, although we apparently required aid from Nocticula's newest pet to defeat the Black Rasper, the army, and the so-called "Prince of Blades". The good news is that I threw Bob into the newly-created Redemption Forge, turning it Good, and retrieved the Sword of Valor. The bad news is that when we got back to Kenabres and resurrected Fay... things got strange.

While dead, she must have found some way to steal a small amount of divine power, and now fancies herself a goddess. What's even worse than these delusions of grandeur is that it's actually working. When she started glowing upon rising from the dead, a large portion of the people watching spontaneously bowed down before her and cast aside their holy symbols! The queen would not listen to me when I said that this turn of events could be dangerous, and nobody else seemed to care. The worst part is that Garnet is now the "high prophet" of this so-called faith.

And then I had to attend Garnet's party, ostensibly to celebrate the battle, but in reality it's merely a way to convert new followers. I would have stayed home, but Irabeth wanted to attend, so she talked me into it. At the party Garnet was passing out strange drinks of her own creation, which I didn't trust, but people forced me to partake and kept telling me to "loosen up". Don't they know the war isn't over? Don't they know that things are only going to get harder from here on out? I have more important things to be doing than partying. I will admit that dancing with Irabeth was nice, but... no. This is a waste of time.

And now I've been gone too long... I must return to the gala. I pray by the sword of the Inheritor that I don't strangle Garnet after she makes fun of my horns one too many times. I'm sure Irabeth will keep me in check, though.

Chapter 8

After defeating the monster, we tried going across the dried riverbed to the city, but we were spotted and accosted by minotaurs and locusts. This series of battles left us bruised and battered. We needed to recuperate, so we went back to the army and took an hour’s rest. Wyn and Garnet were particularly rough, so we left them behind; I brought along Mishra instead.

We went back to the city and thankfully went unattacked until we got to the watchtower. Fighting our way up, one of the rooms had an empty cage in it. Fay, however, insisted that a cloaked figure was inside. Once we cleared the room of demons, she went over to the cage and started having a conversation with nobody. This was somewhat troubling, especially when she seemingly produced a demonic glaive out of midair! Apparently, she had been talking to her goddess Shelyn, who cloaked her presence from the rest of us. Shelyn gave Fay this glaive to put in the Corruption Forge after we figured out how to reverse its effects, turning the glaive into a holy weapon.

We reached the top of the watchtower and defeated the demons there, then I signaled to the army to advance. The six of us used magic to fly to the top of the Drezen citadel, and we went inside. After a couple more battles, we discovered the Corruption Forge. We realized we couldn’t change it then and there; we’d need powerful arcane magic to do so, so we decided to come back after the battle was won and have one of the army’s mages do it - perhaps Ruta.