After-Action Report (Session 6)

Location: Eastern Forests, Wildermarch Frontier

Date: Year One of the March

Subject: Purification of the Cave and Identification of Cult Activity Near the Great Tree

I write this following our return to camp, armor still damp with the cave’s foul water and my thoughts sharpened by what we uncovered. If this report reaches the Order, know this: Tyr placed me on this path. The corruption we faced was no mere natural blight - it was engineered, worshipped, and fed.

The hand of justice guided my blade today.

Initial Movement

We departed the beached-ship outpost at first light. The river’s taint had grown thicker since our prior mission at the Great Tree, its color darkening into something that barely resembled water. The chwingas insisted the source lay deeper inland. Personnel morale varied:

• Kouzlo rationed his final days of coffee with the grim determination of a besieged quartermaster.
• Quick sought Shadow’s guidance after the incident with magical Darkness at the Tree; he spoke of a fear of losing his bearings. Admirable honesty.
• Shadow, ever the enigma, trained blindfolded and offered only a single word regarding his scars: “Magic.”
• Madame Helena communed through her cards, an unorthodox method but one I have learned not to dismiss.

Camp has begun to feel like a home to these companions. For me, it has become a staging ground.

Entry Into the Cave

The river forked and led us to an arched cavern mouth. The water pouring from it shimmered with sickly hues - purple and black, as if bruised. Kouzlo’s arcane senses reported magic beyond the eight known schools. My own Divine Sense recoiled at a presence that was neither celestial, fiend, nor undead.

Something wrong, and wrong by design.

Within the first chamber lay a still pool. Quick and I approached - too boldly, in hindsight - and were struck by psychic visions. His memory was grief. Mine was judgment.

I stood again in the Royal Court, sword in hand, the accused man kneeling unjustly before me. I felt once more the weight of my refusal to execute the innocent. I heard my brother’s quiet, damning words:

“You are such a disappointment.”

A false whisper slid over the memory like oil: Your beliefs mean nothing now. Dive in. Join us in the current.

The corruption sought to twist my truth. Shadow and the others dragged me free. I will not forget that.

The Gauntlet of Tentacles

We progressed through a narrow tunnel lined with questing, flesh-colored appendages. They attempted to tear memory and thought from us as easily as flesh. One struck Shadow and briefly erased part of his past.

This was not a cave. It was a feeding chamber.

The anger that rose in me then was pure. Righteous. Tyr’s teachings leave no room for predators of the mind.

The Cult and Their Abomination

We entered a vast cavern. A waterfall fed a central pool, suspended within which floated a massive green egg. Three cultists in star-speckled robes chanted beside it - the source of the rhythmic hum echoing through the stone.

Under Madam Helena’s Pass Without Trace, Quick and Shadow executed a surgical strike. One cultist was felled instantly; the others summoned sea spawn, weaker but unmistakably kin to the horrors we fought weeks before.

When driven to desperation, both cultists cried out:

** “I give myself to you!”**

And leapt willingly into the pool.

I could feel Tyr’s scales tipping even before the creature rose.

Engagement: Aquatic Aberration (Designation Pending)

It surfaced silently - three eyes, tentacles, a presence that pressed not upon the ears but upon the mind. Two additional eggs pulsed with embryonic movement.

The battle was chaotic:

• Kouzlo’s lightning split water and egg alike.
• Quick’s arrows struck the creature’s hide with unerring precision.
• Shadow, poisoned and suffocating upon contact with the beast, dove into the water purely to survive.
• Madam Helena burned the remaining eggs and sanctified our efforts with Bless.

As for me - I met its gaze and felt its judgment. I answered with my own.

“You give yourself to this beast? I give myself to Tyr.”

I invoked Vow of Enmity. Divine power surged through my blade. When the creature tried to bend my mind, when it tried to crush Shadow’s lungs from afar, I stood firm.

Justice does not kneel.

With a final strike, guided as though by Tyr’s own hand, I split the thing as one splits a rotten log. Divine light erupted, and its death cry echoed through our minds like shattering glass.

The water began to clear. The blight had been the creature’s lifeblood.

Post-Combat Findings

Among the remnants we recovered:

• A star-shaped amulet, imbued with psionic energy
• A letter referencing cultist reinforcements delayed by lizardfolk
• Arcane scrolls and potions
• The recipe for a Potion of Bottled Breath
• A drawing depicting larger versions of the creature surrounding an underwater tower capped by a red crystal

This was no isolated sect.

This is a widespread cult - organized, resourced, coordinated.

And I believe Tyr has placed me here to dismantle it.

Assessment of Personnel

• Shadow: Reckless, but driven by fierce loyalty. His willingness to leap into the unknown may prove either asset or liability. Today it was the former.
• Quick: Deadly accurate and increasingly attuned to the darkness stalking this land. His Gloomstalker awakening was well-timed.
• Kouzlo: Cold logic paired with remarkable magical output. Continues to be indispensable.
• Madam Helena: Her faith and cards shielded us from both detection and disaster. The amulet’s responsibility sits well with her.

Operational Notes

With the creature slain, the river clears and the land exhales. The Great Tree - wounded but healing - may now open the sealed passage we discovered on our first mission. I made a promise to the Tree that I would make this right.

All paths now point downward, beneath the Tree, into whatever truth lies hidden below. The cult believes the stars are watching.

Let them watch. Tyr’s scales remain balanced for only so long.

Soon, judgment must fall.

My focus now turns not only to the Tree, but to the swamp where the reinforcements were last seen. Cultists who flee justice carry truth with them - and I intend to extract every answer they hold.