Chasing Orudon

If Orudon's hovel had been organized before then what they came across when they crawled inside was a disaster. The entire floor was covered with Orudon's notebooks, stacks of paper, and old clothes. A bunch of rats disappeared into their hiding spots when Harim entered the darkroom. They both looked around the home. Clearly, something had happened in here.

"Fuck...I was kind of hoping he may have gone unnoticed." Rothox half-heartedly kicked a strewn pile of papers. "Let's go," he turned to leave.

"Rothox, wait." Harim pushed his way through the mess to the back of the room, to the desk. Scattered on the desk were more stacks of paper. Orudon had scrawled his name on hundreds of sheets, scribbled in a language Harim couldn't read, and drawn more drawings of the surface.

"What are you doing, you aren't going to find anything in this mess." Rothox grabbed a random paper. It was a drawing of a male gnome, a female gnome, and a child gnome with the sun shining in the background. "Harim he had a family on the surface." He tried to show the picture to the monk who was searching the desk. "Harim?"

"We know he had a family." He kept looking through the desk.

"But the book didn't say he had it on the surface….Harim what are you doing?" Rothox walked over to him. Harim was rifling through different papers. Rothox watched him for a while until Harim stopped, staring at one sheet. It was a drawing of a home, surrounded by icicles and snow.

"This is where he went." Harim tapped the page.

"What makes you think he survived?"

"He was a great wizard with a powerful staff. Plus there's no blood or body."

"He's also insane...Maybe they took him?"

"I doubt they even knew this place existed, it's nearly impossible to find." Harim was right, the entrance to the home was behind a cluster of rocks away from the town.

"Say you are right, where is that?" Rothox took the sheet. "What place is covered in ice like this?"

"Xecatan." Neither of them had ever been to the frozen Kingdom of Xecatan. It's a vast area covered by glaciers.

"You want to trudge through the Ice Desert to Dubahar, one of the most dangerous places in Yulandi, on the off chance a crazy gnome traveled there after his village was destroyed…"

"Exactly...and he didn't travel there he teleported."

"What?"

"Look," Harim pointed to scorchings on the cavern wall. "This is created by certain powerful spells, one, in particular, being teleportation through arcane gates."

"How do you know about this stuff?" Rothox touched the charred marks.

"The Faceless have many powerful arcane friends. I remember seeing one teleport from the monastery and on the stone afterward were these marks. I remember because I had to scrub them off.

"And, what about the gnomes, what are we to do about this place...we promised we would help them and now look at what happened." Rothox was getting emotional, he shoved over a half titled stack of notes, the books crashed to the ground and the papers fluttered through the air. "You were emotional last time, you wanted to help, what changed…?"

Harim flipped the desk, sending it's contents everywhere. "You think I don't care...I feel terrible, I'm so angry...but that doesn't help us now," he snapped. That was the most emotion Harim had ever shown.

"Harim…what are we going to do about the…"

"I don't know Rothox... I don't know."

It would have been a massive undertaking to bury all the gnomes but the Sect took the time to dig three graves, one for Lydia and two for what remained of her parents. Erigos said a prayer for them, Alissa hugging him the whole time. They decided to stay and rest in the cave before leaving. It wasn't easy to fall asleep but eventually, their minds gave in to the exhaustion and emotion of the day. It was a quiet climb back out of the Depths and out into the valley.

Once they were out of the Trezen range, they turned east instead of heading south towards Merigrand. It wasn't going to be an easy journey once they reached the Ice Desert. They followed the Trezen Mountains, keeping to cover as best they could.

On the second day of travel three giants attempted to ambush them. Harim spotted them high up on the mountain waiting for unsuspecting travelers. Instead, the Sect got the jump on them. Two giants fell quickly. Rothox snuck within range using the cloak. His daggers found the neck and of the head of one. Alissa summoned a massive ball of fire that exploded hitting all three. Erigos used the lightning to finish the second one-off, the third ran away. They could have chased him down but they let him go, it wasn't worth it for them. This wasn't the first time this giant had fled from the Silver Sect, he had now lost three friends to them.

After the giants, they didn't encounter any other issues and they knew it was only a day from the desert when their breath became visible and the air grew colder with each step.

Wind hollowed tossing snow and hail around, it had only been a few hours since they had set foot on the frozen glacier. The Ice Desert is a cluster of gargantuan glaciers, a frozen tundra. It's a harsh environment that is inhabited by only the toughest and fiercest of creatures. A small fringe village gave them the chance to buy clothes for the freezing weather for the trek ahead. The road to the capital city is carved into the ice and snow. Strategically placed along the road are independently run inns that offer an escape from the extreme temperatures at night, so cold that any exposed skin freezes in minutes.

Four figures arrived at one of these inns as the never-ending blizzard raged on. A magical lantern signified the entrance, only visible when they were right outside the door. The inn wasn't a standing structure but rather it is carved into the ice. Nonetheless, it was reminiscent, for Rothox as he fought the door closed, the cold air and snow fighting against him.

"Welcome, travelers." A large pale blue man welcomed them. He wore a giant brown fur coat. His bald head is covered in tattoos. He was a goliath, a man born with human and giant blood. They tend to live in the outskirts of society in places the majority of people don't want to live. The inside of the inn was simple, a fireplace made of ice and brick warmed the room, the ice unmelting. He saw their eyes wander to the fire. "It won't melt the ice, it's too thick and cold for that. There was just one other room for the keeper. The main room had a small kitchen, storage area, and a handful of beds. "Please make yourselves at home." The giant man continued to mind whatever he was making on the stove.

"Thank you, sir," Harim said. Each bed was a block of ice with furs laid over top.

"It's a gold per person, food is extra." The goliath whipped his hands clean on his clothes from his cooking and waited for their response.

Harim walked over to him. "Here's ten." The goliath grinned, a few teeth missing. "Whatever you need, I am Losg. I am making a stew if you would like something warm before bed?" He said with his thick accent.

"That would be wonderful, thank you Losg," Rothox said. His stew was surprisingly good. It had chunks of weird meat and some sort of vegetable.

"What's in this stew?" Alissa asked as she chewed the meat.

Losg laughed, "Wolf and snow carrots, with a few of my own spices I get from traders."

"Wolf?" She gulped down an already half-swallowed bite.

"It's good, ain't it. Killed it this morning, nothing like fresh meat." He shoveled a large spoon full into his mouth. They chatted with Losog, learning the placement of the inns, how far they had to travel to not get caught out at night. He cleaned up for them as they got ready for a weird sleep on the blocks of ice. Somehow they weren't terribly uncomfortable and with the thick furs and the fire they stayed warm through the night.

In the morning, they had some more stew, thanked Losg, and ventured into a sunny yet freezing day. A couple of hours from the inn they felt the ground begin to shake. Chunks of ice broke off the wind-shaped shelves and rattled at their feet.

"You guys felt that right?" Erigos checked with them. The ground shook again, more vicious this time.

"Nobody move," Harim said. The shaking grew closer and more violent when fifty feet away from them a giant blue insect-like creature with dozens of legs smashed out of the glacier. It roared and a blast of icy breath escaped its maw before its bug eyes fell on them.