Freya Fiore

Dear Diary, Baglin's been made into a jigsaw puzzle, so now while we search for where Ray's been whisked away to, we've got to collect all the pieces of the skellyboy that have been scattered around various volcanoes in the area. I don't know who hates him enough and knows enough about how he works to do all that to the bits and bobs that make him up, but whoever it was must be pretty dedicated. Getting to the volcanoes is tricky enough, what with the lava and the huge regenerating snake-dragon things, but then you have to get *in* the volcano and *out* again, all whilst carrying a bag o' bones and whatever stray meeps happen to be tagging along. The wildlife's really awesome, though. At first we were riding on our Bone Naga friend, but after we lost them we found out that these giant spiky turtles floating about are actually really friendly if you toss 'em a bone or two. I might ask Ray if I can keep one once this is all over. After a few trips of saving meeps and bashing various volcano dwellers, we got given some rocks that heal whatever you hit with them. Percussive medicine- I like it.   OK BYE.

Dear Diary, AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH   OK BYE

Dear Diary, MY PARENTS MIGHT STILL BE ALIVE!!! Baglin used his awesome wizard powers to make that mean ol' wizard spill his last beans, and we found out that some prisoners from my village are still being kept on the island! He said some other guff about using the flowers to become all powerful and that he was looking for something on the island (probably more flowers), but who cares about that? It's hard to be all powerful without a head, and a head's hard to find once it's been drop-kicked into the middle of nowhere.   Anyway, once we'd finished interrogating the dead we started making our way north - not that we made it far, because Mr. Gladiator from hell showed up to spoil our day. Now, it would probably have been a standard affair of us whooping ass and going on our merry way, but Klaus - like the careful thinker he is - decided to kick the guy back through his own portal and take the fight to hell. And us along with it. So here we are in Baglin's holiday home, looking for a way out. Someone needs to get me a leather jacket and shades.   OK BYE

Dear Diary, If I ever say that I want to go back to Redbridge, make sure somebody punches me in the face.   We got out of the sewers after fighting the gooey remnants of the king, and were immediately swarmed by people who wanted to know if we were the ones who killed the king and brought the tower down. Now, we could probably have handled this better, but I wasn't exactly feeling calm and collected and we *were* the reason all this happened. Needless to say the crowd became an angry mob before long. I was surprised by Lazarus, though - he shifted the blame onto himself so we could escape the brunt of their ire, even if it did devolve into chaos immediately after. I managed to fly me, Boris and Baglin out, but we got separated from Ray and Laz.   After a while, I realised that the magic flower I had was glowing blue and used it to track down the other one that Ray had (he was a bird at the time and the glowy pink flower looked very cute on him). I hugged him, and when our flowers touched each other there was this big POOF and all the snow disappeared in this huge area and there was grass and flowers and this adorable little bundle of fluff with long ears hopping around and it was WARM! It was so nice! This must have been what it was like before The Cold, like in the stories Orchid used to tell me. We need to find and grow more of these flowers.   The group headed East towards Locke By The Sea, but Laz stayed behind. He said he couldn't leave the city in this state, which is very noble of him. I'm not sure the people will agree, but only time will tell. We eventually came to a village and found an inn, and the people there wanted money! I haven't seen money in years! I almost forgot how it works. Apparently Boris has quite a bit of it, although he doesn't seem to have used it before. I wonder where he got it from.   Anyway, after getting a couple of rooms, this huge orc guy got knocked out right next to me, and after I gave him a bit of healing immediately got back up and decked the other guy. He ordered like 10 gallons of ale and started knocking 'em back like it was nothing! He even gave me a keg, and I absolutely loved it! I don't remember much else from that night for some reason, but I woke up and he was sleeping on the floor in the same room as me, so we must have got on well. He said his name was Klaus and that he was sent by a red lady to protect us, and then we went shopping!   We found out from some guy that the Elder Rift is frozen over and the only way to cross it is to *borrow* some secret vehicles from a settlement to the north. It's never easy is it?   Ok bye!

Dear Diary, I can't even get a day's peace with these guys. The whole debacle with the king happened YESTERDAY and this guy Boris thinks its a good idea to sneak up on our camp first thing in the morning?! Like, my guy, I am sleep deprived and ready to cry at a moment's notice - one wrong move and Baglin will take your head. And he almost did.   Anyway, we managed to settle things down for a bit and decided to check out the aftermath of yesterdays catastrophe. On the way, Baglin pulled me aside to discuss contingency plans for the less trustworthy members of the group - not complicated plans, mind you: I give the go ahead and he beats 'em up. We arrived back at the base of the tower and found Renjy's body. We still need to do something about that, 'cause we got distracted by a big ol' hole in the ground. And thus we came to the first instance of what I call 'The Boris Problem' - the man is vertically challenged (not just because he's short). Baglin, Laz and I all made it down without issue, but we had to wait for the bearded fool (this may seem harsh, but just wait) to slowly abseil down the side. A minor inconvenience here, but his lack of mobility really got put on full display throughout the day.   At the bottom of the hole we found these gross fleshy blobs that kept calling us fools. Boris immediately punched the first one we found whilst Baglin was holding it, so they got into a fight. I felt like a school teacher trying to get the kids to play nice, but I gave up before long and started burning all the blobs I could find. They split up if you hit them, so the fire was necessary.   We worked our way through and found a lift that led further down into the sewers, which broke partway down. Once again, three of us were fine, but Boris as always lacked a method to stop his plummet. He would've died if Baglin didn't save his ass. The sewers opened out into this huge room which was filled with flammable goop that came from the fleshy blobs. By this point we realised that this was the same stuff the king was spewing, so we were on high alert - especially since we didn't see his body. And then we saw this huge blob of dead people ooze out of a well and it turned out to be the king in a weird flesh womb coming back to life. We killed him again, but he wasn't even the biggest danger.   No, that honour belonged to Boris, who had fallen down the well with the flammable blob of meat. We threw him a rope, but in his infinite wisdom he elected to ignore that and use an untested fuel source (flammable goop) to power his rocket fist to try and fly out of there. Needless to say, he just set his hand on fire, making climbing the rope much harder and more dangerous than it had to be. I remind you that this room was FILLED with explosion juice. One more fuck up from Boris, and a detonation on par with the Bath Bomb incident would have vaporised half the country. I made use of our contingency plan, so Boris wasn't able to make any more fuck ups.   Phew. Ok. Bye.

Why does this keep happening? No matter what I do, they keep leaving me. First it was Mum and Mama and everyone in the village. They all burned and Orchid sent me away. And then after finding this group and finally starting to feel like I belonged, Illy left me. It's not her fault, I know - She did it to protect us. But I haven't even had the time to wipe my tears, and now Renjy's gone. It's been 2 days. This can't keep happening. I can't take it.   It started with Lazarus. After being locked up and experimented on for 50 years, he had an admittedly understandable bloodlust. And after finally taking down that mean old wizard, I guess I was riding a high. But we were a bad combination. We stormed into the king's throne room and, though we agreed to try and talk to him first, we didn't try very hard for diplomacy. We didn't listen to Ray's concern, and we charged into violence. And we won. Lazarus blew up his face, we destroyed the king's traps, and we tore the place apart. But what we lost in return wasn't worth it. Not even close.   Lazarus is pretty chuffed. He doesn't seem to care that Renjy died, or that the tower we destroyed crashed into the city and killed potentially hundreds. His eyes just seem to be locked on the throne his Uncle left behind. I know we haven't known him long, but I was under the impression that underneath all that steel was a person with at least a basic level of empathy. Now I see that his heart is just as cold and hard as the rest of him.   Baglin's been a comfort. He comes and goes a lot, but he's here when it counts. Apparently he snuck off in the night to get some of Renjy's belongings, and among them was the ring of protection that Illy had. Fat lot of good it did them, but I'll take every tiny piece of their memory I can get. I need something to hold on to.

B

Begin writing your story here...

Dear Diary, We had a chat with Lazarus (hmm... He'll need a nickname. Laz? Russ? Lazy? Za?). Apparently he wasn't always made of metal, but used to be an elf - I think. Honestly I was kind of distracted by the smell. He's still got a few organs knocking around in there, and whoever designed him perhaps didn't expect him to spend 50 years dormant with no cleaning. Blegh. A quick cantrip later, though, I had him smelling like a stroll through Orchid's forest. I'll have to ask him what it was like before The Cold, though. Orchid told me some stuff, but she was fairly biased towards detailing all the different types of plants that are now extinct.   Once we finished that conversation, we left the lab to explore the rest of the tunnel. I was happy to leave Levi securely tied up behind us, but apparently leaving someone to starve to death in a subterranean research lab doesn't sit right with our conductive companion, so he loosened the knot a little for the insufferable worm to wriggle free. Sorry, that was mean. Worms play a vital role in the ecosystem, and don't deserve to be compared to such a useless wretch. So we wandered down the tunnel, and found ourselves staring down a group of guards (I blame the blatantly magic sigil that Renjy stepped on).   And there he was. The one who burned down by home, turned me into a bug, and endangered the lives of everything in Orchid's forest. We made sure he didn't escape this time. It's almost a shame - he caused us so much pain and suffering that I'll still have to deal with for years to come, but for him it was over in less than a minute. At least I'll finally get some answers - when one of us can figure out how to cast speak with dead. We also got his corrupted flower, which Ray managed to fix up lickety-split.   We eventually reached the end of the tunnel, and found out that it leads to the big ol' tower in the middle of the city. We snuck our way up to the top and found some huge double doors. A bit of reconnaissance from spider-Ray revealed it to be the entrance to the throne room. One way or another, today's gonna be a long day.   Also who decided to let Renjy have the grow and shrink potions? My plan to meet the king wasn't exactly fully formed, but I can guarantee that a bare ass the size of the moon was never going to be a part of it.   Ok bye.

Dear Diary, It's been rough. We buried Illy in the playground. She never wanted me to have that cursed spear, so I thought I'd finally listen to her. I crushed it, destroyed it with magic, and it slithered away in a goopy puddle. It's a bit late now, but it's the best I can do. I've taken her lightning scimitar, too. I can only guess that's what she would want - certainly better than me going around with no weapon at all.   We also dealt with Malakos' body, and it seems he was secretly doing... something...? He had a note on him that led to a tracking device hidden beneath the frozen fountain, and after all he and Illy have done for us it only seems fair we follow through on what we can. We followed the tracker to a tunnel underneath where the dragon crashed, and used the key it pointed us towards on a door to some sort of... lab? Whatever it was, it was weird. There was a metal man hung on the wall, and we had to fight a few others that attacked us. Levi showed up - for whatever godsforsaken reason - but it wasn't long before he got himself knocked out. Turns out he's not much use without daddy gobble bath backing him up. Arsehole.   Anyway, once everything had calmed down a little, we figured out that the metal people somehow harness lightning to move about, so I charged up the one hanging on the wall and it sprang to life! Though we didn't have much time for a chat before a visitor from the hells popped up to steal Baglin away - some gladiator type with all the patience of a puppy in a boneyard. Couldn't even wait for us to wonder what this place was or what it had to do with Malakos. Well, we beat him and learned that Mr. Metal has a name - Lazarus. Though any more information about who he is or what he was doing dangling from the ceiling in a secret underground chamber remains a mystery. He does seem to like Levi's shoes though, and anyone who's interested in stealing from that prick is a friend of mine.   Bye.

What do you do, when someone so precious is suddenly ripped from your life? How do you deal with the gaping wound that's left in their place? You can try and stitch it up, stop the bleeding, but no matter what you do the blood keeps seeping through the cracks. You can cover it up, hide it under you clothes, but it soaks straight through to the surface. It gets on your hands, your face, and then everything you touch just grows the mess further. And so you grab a sponge, and it helps for a while. But then you realise the sponge is completely sodden with ichor, and the more you scrub the more you're spreading it all over the place. And as you're desperately trying to figure out how to fix it and panicking so much because you're just making the mess bigger and getting in everyone's way and everything you try fails and nothing you're doing is working - you still feel it. The pain. Oh, Gods, the pain. The searing agony that shoots through your body every time you dare to move an inch.   What do you do? What are you *supposed* to do?   Because I don't know. I can tell you what Illy did - even though she was hurting so much, she found it in herself to turn that pain into action. She chased off the shadowy fuck that was trying to take Malakos' soul, and then when his self-righteous, holier-than-thou alter ego came along - the so called deliverer of souls or whatever - she chased him off too. Because 'who are you to judge us?' Who has the right to take all the complexities of a life and boil it down to one singular moment of either right or wrong? And then, after standing off with the primordials themselves, she immediately jumped back into action, making sure her friends were safe and accounted for, and looking for the one's who weren't. Saving the one's who weren't. Because that's who she was - she'd sooner dive-bomb her enemies into the ground, taking herself out with them, than give them even a chance to hurt anyone she cared about.   But that doesn't help. The fight's over. There's no pseudo-god to battle, no dragon wrestle out of the sky. Nothing to channel this agony into. Just me and this wound that won't stop bleeding. And it hurts. It really hurts.

Dear Diary, So part 1 of our prison busting was a success - we got in and got everyone out of their cages - but it wasn't long before soldiers were streaming down the stairs. We had to get out fast, but they blocked the way we came in. Through a random door it is, then. After using some magic to hide in a supply closet, we found our way down to a lower level of the prison. We checked around and found Mr. Cheese, but still couldn't come up with a better plan than 'blow stuff up', which is unfortunate because the odd clock tinkerer man that altered our magic items for us was sat squarely in the explosion radius. I'd have a conversation with Illy about making sure you know what you're blowing up, but I think she regrets it more than anyone else. She's learnt her lesson. Either way, I think she's got enough on her mind at the moment.   After a brief scrap, we managed to escape into the sewers. I took a bit of a tumble into a horrifying pit of rotting flesh and bones, but wasn't too intent on sticking around to find out any more. We finally made it back to Illy's home, and Illy buried the clock man. It seems that Mr. Malakos doesn't like Levi, so he was promptly kicked out. I don't blame him. Levi can go chew on a brick.   We finally made it to bed, but I didn't sleep well. I had this awful dream where everyone left me. I tried to catch up to Mum and Mama, but I tripped and they vanished. I was walking through Orchid's forest, but when I found her she said she didn't want me. Then the mean old wizard put me on a boat and sent me drifting into the ocean. I was so cold. So lonely. Then I was chained up with the others in this horrid place, and when Illy got us out we had to fight this skeleton and these horrible fleshy monsters. I tried to help, but one of them got me and started strangling me. I couldn't breathe, I couldn't speak. I was helpless. And then, when the others had killed them all, Baglin got dragged away and crushed. It felt so real. So terribly real.   I woke up eventually, and it appeared that we all had these nightmares. We had no time to process it though, as Levi was trying to kill Malakos downstairs. We ran down to stop him, but before we could do much of anything Sadir appeared! Seems like Grobthack somehow brought him back, even though we definitely already killed him. Levi managed to escape with Malakos and we were left to fight the dragon that was now transforming before us.   It didn't go well. Ray ran off to try and get Levi, Renjy was too scared to fight and Illy kept going down, which meant I was trying to stop her from dying and none of us were hitting the dragon. Pretty quickly I was down too, and it wasn't until Ray came back that we were able to drive it off. Literally, in Baglin's case. He mounted that thing and flew it off into the distance. Which was less fun when it was hit by a massive beam of energy from the tower in the middle of town. We followed it to the crash site and somehow killed it. We even got this cool dragon armour but... Malakos is dead. We somehow survived... but I'll never get to hear those stories about Illy he promised me. He's gone.

We got out of there - we saved them... so why did it end like this?

Dear Diary, So last you heard, we were probably gonna be executed or something because the villagers are too dumb to know about ghosts. It was a tricky situation and we tried to convince them, but apparently some people can't grasp the concept that ghosts are already dead, so they don't leave bodies behind when you stab them. So eventually, we just ran the heck outta there. Hope we don't need to go back there any time soon...   But then we made it to Redbridge! Illy's home! (And also the king that tried to kill us and now wants to see us but shhhhh) We didn't want the king to know we're here, so we used disguises - I made myself look human, Ray turned into a dog, and Renjy just... made himself really dirty. Like, just grabbed handfuls of dirt and smeared it all over himself. And I think maybe some poop also... But hey, it somehow worked. Illy just flew over the walls. She was seen, but none of the guards could fly, so there wasn't a fat lot they could do about it.   Once we were in, we met back up with Illy and she told us where we could stay. She didn't come with us, which was weird, so we had to make our own way there. It was a bar on the lowest level of the city and after some talking to the bartender we were sent to meet this guy called Malakos. He was a big dragonborn that was pretty scary at first, but once we mentioned Illy, he melted like butter. Turns out he's Illy's Dad! He's a really cool guy and he promised to tell me tons of stories about Illy when she was younger! He tried to tell me some there and then, but Illy burst in through the window before he had the chance - apparently she gets embarrassed easily (heheheheheh). But also she's adopted, which is really cool because I'M adopted, which means we're basically twins. But it seems like Illy doesn't get along with her dad - it's like they want to, but something obviously happened.   After that, a Rock Gnome called Raivia met up with us because she wanted help getting the gang back together. I've always wanted to get a gang back together! And it's Illy's gang! And to do it, we needed to break some people out of PRISON!! I already thought Illy was cool, but after this? Renjy got nothing on her. Anyway we got to the prison, and to get in Raivia handed Illy a REUSABLE. FLIPPING. MAGIC. BOMB. It's like she read my bucket list and tried to tick as many thins off in one day as possible! So, we lured the guards over to the wall we were behind and then BLAM! BOMB TO THE FACE!   We fought the rest of the guards, and managed to get everyone out. We got Moff, the Goliath cleric. We got ma Kobold boys Drip and Drap. And finally we got Levi - a Wood Elf that apparently knows Glorbash. Veeeery interesting...   OK BYE!

Dear Diary, Holy MOLEY! SO much has happened, I'm not even really sure where to start. Sorry if my handwriting's messy, I'm still getting used to my new (old?) hands - but I'm getting ahead of myself.   I guess let's start at the beginning - Illy asked us to gather 'round and focus on her creepy book to see if we could figure out what was going on with whoever it was that helped with Golaff. Well, we did, and we were all transported to this freaky white void. My jeebies were thoroughly heebied, and that wasn't helped when this floating cloak appeared and started talking to us. It called itself a "friend from an outer plane" - but I dunno. It did this thing where a hand appeared out of it, but it wasn't attached to anything. Creepy. Not sure Illy has much of a choice, though. It's get help from whatever that thing was, or we face Gobsmack alone. Not that I'm scared - we could totally take him - but some extra help probably wouldn't hurt.   Anyway, enough about that. We left the weird purple tree and want back to The Hold. We made the rounds, saying goodbye to everyone before we left for Redbridge, and I gave a name to the doggy!! He's called Sprinkles and I love him. We also spoke to Forge, who continues to leave his name an aspiration rather than an accomplishment. It turns out he has a friend or two in Redbridge that we might be able to convince to come here and help him suck less. I like the guy, but apparently hard work isn't everything.   Ray used the Dreamwalker Ring on our magic flower and saw a vision of them growing on a mountaintop. They were struggling to grow in the cold, but every year someone came up to tend to them. Then some funky looking humanoids started growing out of them.   Before we left, I decided to pop in on the old lady and OOH BOY! I'm SO glad I did! We went in and I was expecting the usual imaginary tea party treatment, but she was surprisingly composed and... well.... present. We said hi, and then all of a sudden she TRANSFORMED!! INTO ORCHID!!!!!! That mean old wizard apparently decided that turning me into a bug and shipping me off to the Wildlands wasn't enough, so he went after Orchid and turned her from a dryad into a bumbling old human with enough lost marbles to trip a mammoth. And somehow me trying to magically search for her in that messed up tree was just enough to jog her memory and break whatever spell was put on her. I swear, if I ever gent my hands on that stinky, no-good, ugly poopy head, I'll strap him down and individually pluck each of his beard hairs until he's BALDER THAN A NEWBORN BABY!!!   Ahem. Anyway. Once she'd returned to her usual self, Orchid was kind enough to return the favour - I'm BACK to my usual bejewelled self - but something was slightly off. For some reason I had some white scales on my body. Now, Orchid didn't say much on the matter, but she showed a vision of my parents going into a building and leaving with me. So apparently I'm ADOPTED. Wild. Mum and Mama have some explaining to do. Oh yeah she also said something about a dragon? I dunno. But I can use really cool magic now!   But that's not all. She also upgraded my orchid so now it can check on both The Hold and Orchid's Forest. And it should actually work this time. I decided to leave our magic healing flower with her, and Ray showed her the vision about them. She got very excited and told us where the vision was - a mountain to the south, below Redbridge. I wonder what grows from these things for Orchid to get so worked up.   Finally, after saying goodbye to everyone, we left on our journey to the capital. We were on the road for quite a while, before stopping at a village about halfway through called Valenthorn. And lemme tell ya, the people here are WEIRD. We went to this one shop, and there were clocks EVERYWHERE. The guy running the place had a few screws loose and was pretty cagey about anything magic related. After some persuasion, he revealed that he's a magic tinkerer, and he even upgraded some magic items for us! Then we went outside and these adventurers came up to us out of nowhere. They introduced themselves as Sofalia the Firbolg bard, Charles the orc barbarian, Ryansworth the gnome wizard, Angusival the Satyr artificer, and Just Jack the Goblin cleric. Then they told us about an inn and just left.   We looked around a bit - Renjy found an altered wanted poster of himself - and went to sleep at the inn. a bad choice on our part, as we were woken up by horrific screaming and dead bodies around the place. These sneaky shadow creatures had killed everyone, including the adventurers we met earlier that day! Well, we did what we do and fought the things - which really sucked for Renjy as they drained the strength of their targets. Strength is his whole thing :( Anyway I was awesome with my cool new powers and we killed them fairly quickly, but then we saw this ghost out the window. We ran over as fast as we could, I stabbed it real good, and then it screamed and I was knocked out. Apparently Renjy was the one who managed to kill(?) it for once - I just think that's Ray being nice and letting him take credit. I'll believe it when I see it.   Anyway the townspeople came out to see what the ruckus was - which isn't great, cause right now it's just us and a bunch of bodies. Not a ghost in sight.   OK BYE!!

Dear Diary, We were tracking Mr Meanie Wizard through Ray's magic, and came across this HUGE tree (not as big as Orchid's though) . It was purple and globby and weird, but before we had a chance to get a good look at it, we were ambushed by the doggie murderers! POOPIE HEADS! It was a tricky battle - I almost died once, and Illy almost died 3 times! And it wasn't helped by this stinky Gorlash guy floating about like a ghost with abandonment issues. He was probably trying to steal my soul or something, but we managed to avoid that catastrof... cattastrof... outcome, somehow. Renjy wasn't much help, despite his best efforts - seriously, don't let that guy become a doctor. But yeah, we beat the dog killers (even though one of them turned into this freaky eye monster), burned the tree to the ground, and prevented any souls from being stolen.   After the fight, we did some snooping. Ray used his dreamwalker ring and found out that the wizard planted his messed up ritual flower to turn the tree funky, and a long way to the west through the root system is a big ol' wall of eyes. Icky. I also did some meditation in the burnt tree trunk, and found out that some absolute melon decided to mess with my orchid! Turns out the forest isn't doing as well as I thought, and I think Orchid's gone missing. Which sucks, because I can't just go over there and help, because Illy has stuff to do in Redbridge which is closer. Also the king wants to see us but screw that guy.   OK BYE!!!

Dear Diary,

Dear diary, We finished exploring the dungeon, and we found this weird room. It had a weird sigil on the floor, and when Ray used the dreamwalker ring he got this vision of someone performing a ritual to turn one of the special flowers black. I don't know why - the original purple looks much better. They should try blue next time, like when Ray holds them. Anyway we searched the room and found a bunch of cool stuff. I got some awesome spiky boots that are really warm and cosy.   We then looked through the spooky orb in the middle of the floor and saw that there was a group of wizards mooching about the dungeon. And the leader was the one who turned me into this bug thing. In the moment, we charged after him and kicked his butt till he ran away, but is that what I want? Do I chase him down and make him turn me back? I don't want the others to stop liking me if I change. And this body is weird, but I don't hate it. But if I don't change back, what if I go home and Mummy and Mama don't recognise me? What if I show up and they chase me away? I don't know what to do...   Anyway, we followed the mean wizard guy out and saw him fighting the dragon general Illy stole the spear from. The wizard got away, but we bashed Sadir up and took his stuff. At least he won't be bothering us anymore...   Ok bye...

Dear diary, I'm in the middle of a dungeon at the moment, so I don't have much time to write - I'll give you the short version.   * We went to find doggie murderers   * The big hole in the ground Illy found earlier was blocked up - Ray turned into badger to have a dig around and was very cute   * looked around and found beat up house   * Found secret entrance behind bookshelf   * Slide (WHHHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE) into a dungeon   * Dungeon was fine on the way in, trapped on the way out. We saw a bunch of dead people dressed up like scarecrows. It was nasty.   * We got split up on the way out, but the traps were pretty easy - Although I got absolutely terrified by Bagoblin; it turns out he's undead. Also Bagoblin is too long. Hmmm... Bag boy? Baggy? Bagsy? Baglin? I'll need to workshop that one...   * I saw Renjy trying to sacrifice my squirrel (Hmm... Aha! Ginger!) Ginger was fine, but it was mean that he tried in the first place. Friends don't put friends' pet giant squirrels in giant vats of acid! I'll need to tell him off later.   * When we eventually met back up, it looked like Renjy had a bad time. I don't know why - Team Tiny found it easy as peasy!   * As we tried to leave, we saw a scarecrow on the other side of the room. It didn't have a chance to do anything before our entire group smashed it to pieces and left it burning at the bottom of a hole in the ground. I hope it wasn't friendly.   OK BYE!

Dear Diary, DOGGIES!!! BIG ICE DOGGIES!!!!! Sorry, had to get that out of my system. We got a letter from Mr. Cheese himself the other day. It sounds like Ray and Illy have been busy on their little trip - that dragon guy sounded scary. But we've been busy too. Renjy gave a wonderful little speech about rebuilding The Hold, and then we went to talk to Mr. Bjorn. We met an orc called Lockey, and it turns out he's an old friend of Bjorn's. He's a very good hunter, so he should be a big help in defending this place. But anyway, he found out about this really big ice wolf like the one we fought when we all met - he wanted to kill it, but I think they'll be a big help in the fights to come, so I managed to convince him to let us try and befriend it.   So me, Renjy, Lockey and Bjorn went to find this wolf, and it turns out there were two of them! We just about managed to get on good terms with them (despite Renjy's shennanninanigans), but just as we were leaving we got attacked! These weird tattooed guys with no eyes shot at us, and nearly scared off the doggies! We killed them (thanks to Lockey's surprising speed) and took the dogs home where we kept them behind a waterfall. We became really good friends with the dogs, and once Ray got back, he looked at the dogs memories. He didn't tell me what he saw, but he looked sad afterwards. But he did learn from that that the old lady's flowers helped the dog, so he gave it one and it seemed to really calm it. The flowers keep glowing whenever Ray holds them. Maybe he has super awesome flower magic that could help Orchid's forest. Anyway we let the dog sleep and want to camp.   So, Illy opened up a little about her whole thing with Gilgamesh (at least I think that's what he's called) and even though I was really super sneaky and secretive, the group found out that I still have the spear tip. They weren't very happy about it, but honestly they weren't as mad as I was expecting. But that argument did get interrupted by the sound of howling. It turns out there were more of those blind guys and they found out we were hiding the doggies! We rushed back as fast as we could, but we were too late and the bigger one was killed... Illy went off to chase them, and I made sure the doggy will rest in peace. I didn't even get to give it a name...     Ok. Bye...

My Dearest Freya, I've just had the most exhilarating day with our good friends Raoden and Illyana, sticking it to those scallywags who call themselves knights. A true knight would never stoop so low as to capture innocent civilians from as meagre a place as The Hold - the scoundrels... But I digress.   Our foray into the world of espionage began when I met your two compatriots during my own investigations into the checkpoint. With knowledge of the incoming influx of prisoners, we decided the best way to aid them would be to infiltrate the guard. So, with a bit of magic to silence our little scuffle, Raoden and Illyana commandeered a couple of uniforms to assume the role of guards - a perfect disguise that was unfortunately too ample for my modest frame (If I am to join in the future, the knights of Kael shall need to employ a more versatile attitude in their tailoring endeavours).   With those two in position, we quickly learned where the prisoners would be held and started formulating our plan. But, with as much time on our hands as we had, we decided to further our reconnaissance and learn all we could about our enemy. Some deft lockpicking from Illyana allowed me to slip into the quarters of the General, Sadir, and peruse his curious place of rest. It held little in the way of furniture, with just a singular desk and chair (an interior designer was sorely lacking) - not even a bed! Atop his desk I found a list of the Empire's most wanted, with pictures of Illyana and Renji (please give my condolences to Renji - Illyana is evidently the more fearsome of the two). I made sure to alter the pictures to give our friends a modicum of anonymity, and left as swift as I entered.   Then came the arrival of our soon to be escapees, and a soon to be very angry man. He had a striking presence - in more ways than one. He announced his entrance with bolts of lightning, at which point the entire camp rushed to stand attention before him. He proceeded to carefully inspect each member, and upon reaching Illyana motioned towards her un-helmeted head. A timely message from me gave her a suitable excuse - that the helmet couldn't accommodate her horns - at which point he proceeded to take another guard's helmet and violently beat it until it fit her head. Then, upon the aforementioned guard's protestations, promptly skewered- I mean... Knocked him out...   Anyway, during the kerfuffle of the many prisoners being escorted to the cell, I slipped into the crowd and prepared for the moment to make our escape. Raoden and Illyana took the watch outside the cell and, once the time was right, set our plan in motion. With some magical silence we picked the locks of the manacles and door, then I slipped out to cause a distraction. A little magical trickery started a brawl, and Raoden shrouded our steps. Before they knew what hit them, we were gone. Sadir was the only one to notice, and in an attempt to spear Illyana actually lost his weapon! She stole it and fled, and now we're in the wind!   Oh, how marvellous it feels to scupper the plans of the wicked! I do hope that next time I can share this elation with you and the rest of your troupe, though.   Yours, most sincerely, Ser Reginald Cheese

Dear Diary, When we got back to The Hold, it was awful. The walls were broken down and there were bodies everywhere. I ran to check on Granny (I really need to ask her name sometime) and luckily she only had her flowers trampled. She didn't remember the attack at all, so we just had an imaginary tea party. She got really serious at one point and said that I needed to find her flowers, but then immediately forgot and went back to her 'tea'.   But everywhere else was a mess. Those soldiers from Kael had come and taken a bunch of prisoners and destroyed as much as they could in the process. Illy found one that got left behind, and I did my best impression of Mummy to talk some sense into him. He's helping out with the rebuilding efforts now, but he told us that the soldier that escaped the fight with the huge dog when we all met was his brother. That sneaky man followed us to The Hold and told his general (who's a DRAGON!!!!) where we were. Meanie. Though it didn't work out for him, cuz apparently the general (who wears fancy gold armour) killed him anyway. Serves him RIGHT.   Anyway, we decided that we're going to split the party. Illy and Ray are chasing after the baddies that kidnapped everyone, and the rest of us are staying to build defences and traps and teach everyone to fight (after convincing Baldy Bjorn that that's a better option than them all being enslaved in Kael). Maybe I should call Sir Reginald Cheese - he could help.   OH also the map we found is MAGIC!!! It changed to show the absolute mess that we caused earlier by blowing up that ocean of blood. Turns out it was pretty big. I LIED IT WAS ABSOLUTELY FLIPPING GIGANTITANENOURMOUS!!!!!!! I HAD TO MAKE UP A WHOLE NEW WORD FOR HOW BIG IT WAS!!!   OK BYE!!

Dear Diary, My ears are still ringing (wait - I don't have ears. How on earth do I hear anything!?), but that doesn't come until later. Let's start from where you last heard.   We decided to go deeper into the icky-sticky forest to see if that weird dream I had meant anything. It took a while, but eventually we reached this HUGE stone wall that surrounded a temple. It looked EXACTLY like my dream, which was strange cuz I'd NEVER been there before! NEVER EVER!!! There were a bunch of snake people guarding it, but I got in anyway because I'm basically a ninja. Mummy used to call me the princess of sneaking - she always made funny noises when I jumped out at her.   But anyway, we got in, and that's where it starts to get messy. There was this GIGANTIC room absolutely COVERED in blood. There were LOADS of dead... Anyway these two guards came in and me and Renjy hid behind this HUGE fallen pillar. They talked for a bit about boring adult stuff, and then we heard a bunch of shouting from outside - turns out Illy and Ray set THE ENTIRE FOREST on fire to act as a distraction!!!!! Awesome!!! We used that moment to surprise the guards and... put them to sleep... and had a look around the room.   Eventually Illy and Ray came in, and as we looked around I heard the whispers again. They got stronger as I moved closer to the GINORMOUS POOL OF BLOOD, and then this big hand reached out and threw Illy across the room!! The big man stepped out of the pool and said something about wanting to consume the blood of the world or whatever, so we had to fight him. He had this spear made of blood that he pulled out of himself and he NEARLY KILLED Renjy!! Ray turned into a badger though, which was cute enough to make up for it.   Anyway, after we killed him, he dropped his spear. The others tried to pick it up, but got really poorly all of a sudden. The whispers kept getting stronger, and when I picked it up they said it was good, and that I did the right thing. It felt really nice to hold it, but the others really didn't want me to. I kept holding it tight, and Ray used his magic to heat it up and burn me. It really hurt, but I kept on holding it. Then Renjy snatched it from me theJEALOUSLITTLEBUGGER and I suddenly felt awful.   They stamped and snapped the spear and Illyana captured its spirits in her book.   Then, for our GRAND ESCAPE, Illy set a fuse running to the ENOURMOUS explosive blood pool, and we ran and ran and RAN! We had to go through the BURNING forest, and Illy only just escaped the GIGANTENORMOUS EXPLOSION!!! Her WINGS were on FIRE!!!! It kept exploding for AGES cuz the pool was so huge. It made this CRAZY crack in the ground where the pool stretched under it. Renjy called it 'the genesis of the bath bomb', whatever that means.   I'm so tired.   OK BYE!!

Dear Diary, Travelling with these people is tough, but holy HECK. I don't think I'll EVER be bored again! Just the other day, this little red guy called Rederick Devilson poofed in out of nowhere and said we broke the rules by taking an undead with us! I don't know any undead! I don't even know WHO'S rules we broke!! It'll probably be ok though, cuz he said we were friends. Friends don't put friends in jail.   After that whole malarky, we went off to find some snake people and tell them off for stealing and stuff. On the way there, Ray found some poorly trees and we went to try and make them better. When we tried that, though, they EXPLODED and we got covered in this icky red goo. I kept trying to wash it off, but I still can't get it off my hands. And I keep hearing these whispers. I wonder why they're so secretive.   Anyway, we carried on to tell the snake people off and... we... they agreed to stop stealing. There was one guy there who REALLY liked the food he was eating. No matter how much we... told him off... He just kept on munching. I've really got to try whatever that was - though maybe not. He was just eating, but Illy still... Maybe he was just cold. He didn't scream, after all, so Illy was just warming him up. She just warmed him up, and then he went to sleep. I sometimes want to nap after dinner, so that makes sense.   Ray turned into a BIG white bear, which was really cool. He was so fluffy and cuddly and strong. He even snatched away the person who was trying to hit me, which was kind of him. I think he also had a picnic with him, cuz when he turned back around, he had red jam all around his face. He's a very messy eater.   Illy doesn't want to talk about what happened. I don't know why - we might be able to help. I always told Mummy when I was struggling with something and she would find a way to make it better. I guess Illy can't talk to her mummy, but we're here. We can help. I just don't want her to lose control again.   I had a dream last night. I haven't had a dream in AGES, so that must be why it was weird. There was a big forest covered in blood, and it had a castle in the middle with a throne. Come to think of it, the tree that exploded was covered in blood, and so were the other trees there. Maybe we should go back.   Baglin is still missing. I don't really know what's happening with him, but I hope he's ok.   OK BYE!

Dear Diary, Illy just got WAY cooler! She has WINGS!! I don't understand why she hides them all the time - they seem really helpful. She just flew over all the crazy spikes Ray made that really hurt all the bad guys. Although, it might be because they make her scary. When she took off her cloak, she turned into this big shadow monster, which I think even Mama would be scared of!   But woah, that fight was scary. There were these snake people who set their own BLOOD on FIRE, and they kept on fighting us even though I didn't even know them! I think Mr Bald man said they were called Rakashaka or something. Illy scared lots of them away, which was good, and we managed to keep the people in the house safe, which was also good, but there was so much fighting... so much blood... Baglin got stolen by skeleton ground hands. I just... I... I want Mummy...   I gave Illy a big hug afterwards, and her cuts all went away. I think I'm secretly magic, which means Mummy and Mama have a lot of explaining to do. How'd they keep that secret for 9 WHOLE YEARS??? I can't even keep it secret when I take cookies from the jar... Maybe they're also magic.   We got everyone back to the hold, and Ray gave me this super awesome figure of ME!! It was really cool, because it's the only time I've seen my own back. It was nice to see what I look like in this body, but I liked it when people said I looked like Mama. I don't think that's going to happen any more... Ray also made a bunch of clicky noises when he gave me me, which apparently is another language. I think I want to learn it - it's like the noises I make when I try to speak with my mouth. I gave him a big hug (I've got SO MUCH BETTER at hugs!! More arms means more awesome).   The old woman who keeps forgetting what to call her flowers gave us all one, but when Ray got his it CHANGED COLOUR!!! I gave him my orchid and THAT CHANGED TOO!!! He must have some special flower magic, so I asked if he knew about forests and he DOES! He's got FOREST FRIENDS like ME!!! He said he'd help save Orchid's Forest! I can't wait for him to meet her! It's weird though - something about that old lady feels familiar...   We eventually decided to go look for the Rakashakalaka to ask them to stop being so mean, and on the way met this TINY LITTLE RAT MAN!!!!!! CALLED SIR REGINALD CHEESE!!!!!! I had a fencing match with him (I won) and Renjy told him he should start his own group of knights. If he does, I'm joining.   Ok Bye!!!!

Dear Diary, I'VE MET SOME NEW FRIENDS!!!! The past few days have been rough, but I think I'll be ok if I stick with them. We first met because we had all been captured by the meanie soldiers - well almost all of us, but I'll get to that. We all got tied up and taken to the middle of nowhere and were forced too walk for AGES. It was really REALLY cold, and I couldn't feel my toes. It was ok though, because I did something really clever. I found out that I can change the colour of my weird body armour, so I hid on the ground and pretended to be gone. Then, when the guard came over all confused, Renjy hit him really hard IN THE FACE! OH, I should probably introduce you to my friends:   First is Renjy - He's really strong. So strong he cut someone's entire face in half... he can be pretty scary in a fight, but I think he's a big softie, really. We were walking through this really deep snow, and he let me ride on his shoulders! I was even taller than Mama! He wears the same armour as the bad soldiers, though, so I don't know why he was tied up with us.   Next is Rayo... Raeden... Raeyo... Next is Ray - we haven't talked much, but he's really pretty. His skin makes shimmery colours when he moves, and his hair is this really bright white. He also made these golden berries appear out of nowhere, and they tasted really good. He's nice.   Baglin's up next - He's silly. He wasn't captured like us, but he just walked over and the soldiers tied him up. I'm not even sure if he can see - he always has a bag over his head, and he doesn't even take it off to sleep. He talks funny and snores really loud.   Last is Illy - She's really kind. I've been scared a lot, and she helps calm me down. She reminds me of Mummy - she's nice to be around most of the time, but if someone does something naughty she gets very cross. I think she shouts even louder than Mummy.   Once Renjy hit the bad man and got us out of the rope, this huge dog appeared and started attacking people. It was really scary, but we managed to stop it. One time I poked it with my sword and it glowed with this bright light and these huge prickly vines grew around it. I think I might be magic. Or maybe it's Orchid's orchid, because that also glowed at the same time. I dunno.   But anyway, when we stopped the dog, this bald man showed up and took us to this place called 'The Hold'. There are a lot of people there - maybe even more than in Vilterra. We got a room there and it turns out a lot of my friends don't sleep either! That's really nice because I was starting to get lonely at night. I watched Ray whittle for a long time, which was very relaxing. Apart from the loud snoring. When it was morning I saw Illy reading a weird book. I tried to read over her shoulder, but it made me feel funny so I stopped. I don't understand why she chooses to read a book like that. It didn't even have any pictures...   All the people in The Hold eat together. There isn't much food, and from the look of Illy's face it doesn't taste good. I'm glad Ray was there with his magic berries, although one man got mad that we weren't sharing. Illy shut him up real fast, but it turns out he was just worried about his family - luckily Baglin is very good at sharing.   After food, we went to a supplies cabin as thanks to find out what happened there. We showed up and Illy terrified the man there (I think he might have wet himself)(I wasn't scared at all)(not even a little). Then, I did the most AWESOMEST shield sledding you've EVER SEEN, and made even more friends with the people downstairs. But then at night, I saw a whole bunch of people with torches and weapons come to the shack. I don't know what they want, but they don't look very friendly.