Welcome to Halamahi

The God Squad begins their new quest: to venture into the Western seas to cleanse them of dark influences. First stop is the Khilaian Isles, home of the Selkie Khilaia. Then, on to Holy Zeshema and Loanua.   Also, the party decided to bring Imora with them after all, for entertainment value, but would keep her away from combat or action.   The first challenge for the Squad was gaining entry to the isles themselves. The Khilaian Isles have long barred non-Selkies from residing there and required government-issued passes to visit. Recent events, likely related to the Apocalypse, had led to a genera freeze on new passes for outsiders. The God Squad debated between getting smuggled in and going through a Lunar God as a patron to get a special legal exemption. They decided to go with the latter, and chose Emesh (God of Knowledge) as the patron most likely to grant useful clout among the selkies.   Emesh introduced himself to Kipilu and Arzet and the group chatted before moving on to business. Emesh did offer the God Squad a valuable patron who could immediately usher them into the islands with minimal bureaucratic resistance: Clan Manuhel, particularly their wayward author-philosopher daughter Hewedi Manuhel. According to Emesh, the Hanahai have intensified quarantine procedures and made licenses for outsider visitors or quarantine passes very difficult to get. The great clans, however, had enough pressure to basically ignore these tightened restrictions. Emesh also volunteered to coordinate the pickup of the Squad's NPCs who were stuck in bureaucratic limbo: Kebri and Yago, as well as their associated sharks (Fastfin, Lionpup, and Sleekpelt). The downside to this patron-based approach is that the Gods would be tied to a controversial and annoying contrarian-philosopher, but they considered this to be less risky than getting smuggled in.   Before setting out, the Gods also asked Emesh for helping figuring out the background of Arzet's new vestige, Omiani. Omiani, it turned out, was a Vetevic mercenary from the Sacred Kingdom of Nomion who spent time fighting in Loanua. In a strange coincidence, Omiani had actually been secretly corresponding with Fin Sarana and Koro Sarana as well as their parents - as Fin and Koro's parents had been part of a group of rebel mercenaries who fled the Choir's control decades prior. Omiani had been anticipating getting their help to assist his own family in escaping to Garadel - evading the watchful eye of their mercenary company commander. The birth of the Gods and the sudden death of Omiani had ended that scheme. Emesh also revealed that Omiani had three kids, was the child of lesser spice merchants, and had fought in conflicts in Metahn. Omiani loosened up a bit when he heard that Potha was connected to Koro and Fin. He revealed that he had once been inspired by the Way of Brambleshanks to become a mercenary. While Omiani hated Halcyon for their creation of Hiku and the Singing Church of Orisha, he was willing to tolerate Potha as a person. She promised to complete Omiani's work and to smuggle his family out of Nomion.   With Emesh's patronage connection, the squad got Majesty Dashalaji to teleport them to Korathem's Teleportation Circle.   Moving from the Selkie Loremasters Academy into the market square, the group was immediately hit with the post-festival cleanup atmosphere left over from the Otalyoa Festival - the festival of music and love in the Khilaian Calendar. Stages were being dissembled, leftover snacks were being sold cheap, and people were still wearing threaded connected bracelets that couples would wear together while at the fair. Potha realized that this was also the city where she and Eada went on their first date many months ago, before Eada betrayed them and vanished. As Potha sadly took in the situation, the band known as Feral Groove was making their way to the teleportation circles to return to Asalay. Potha asked them to play for her at a discount and they performed an oddly modern tune (something like Adele's Rolling in the Deep). There was a brief dispute that followed over payments, but the God Squad ultimately got away with a 5 gold payment and a promise that they'd bring attention and patronage to Feral Groove's bars in Asalay - Midnight Heart and Dark Equinox.   Funny encounter aside, the Gods met with Yago, Kebri, and Captain Yamoa and headed off to Dahaka. Yago excitedly described reports of the Great Ibyin Reef and tales of communication with whales and dolphins. Makar suspected these might be dark forces tied to the Nemeses, but that would be an investigation for another day. The sharks also reported that the Khilaian isles were defended underwater by a group of Cephapeople loyal to Kailio, which attacked basically all Sentient Sharks on sight as minions of Apex.   The party ventured to Dahaka where they quickly spotted Hewedi Manuhel at the docks flying a large Clan Manuhel banner and debating random merchants in the streets. Hewedi greeted them as fellow radical intellectuals, 'dangerous minds' that would change the world. She was a bit flirty but was also immediately abrasive and seemed to treat every matter as a point of debate for its own sake. The Squad boarded her party galleon and continued past the Selkie fleets into the sacred isles. All the while, Makar and Hewedi debated each other on the matters of natural rights, economic freedoms, and moral responsibility. Hewedi seemed to think of this as entertainment and even flirting, but Makar just hated her constant hyper-individualistic contrarian rhetoric.   Docking in Halamahi, the group settled their luggage and party into the House of Emesh, a kind of Lunar Cult Temple mixed with a coffeehouse, bookstore, and tavern. This was the center of Emesh's power in the Khilaia and one of the most physically diverse structures in the mostly-selkie city. The group decided to go pick up Dailio as a first point of order, though Potha volunteered to stay behind to distract Hewedi with conversation. Potha thought that maybe she could even try to push Hewedi towards more empathetic viewpoints...   The party were able to locate Dailio in the Pilgrim's Port district thanks to large bulletin boards arranged to help crews locate their wayward youths. Dailio was waiting in a hostel for them and finishing a meeting with an older woman. He was thrilled to see them and introduced them to his new contact: Shanua Yavala, semi-official ambassador of Aysha to the Khilaia. Shanua seemed suspicious of the group and Makar used Detect Thoughts to try and figure out her intentions. It remained ambiguous whether she was aware of the God's identities or whether she had some darker secret - but there was not enough evidence of darker motives to bother much. The group settled that she was likely just a politically marginal figure, given Aysha's historical bad reputation with selkie governments, who had enough information to register Dailio's letters to various public figures as important. Dailio had been mailing many politicians hoping to advise them about the Apocalypse, but only Shanua had answered. Dailio was a teenager from a poor and distant clan, after all - not a voice with a lot of sway.   After introductions Dailio seemed on-edge and strange, more energized and anxious than usual. He seemed particularly weird about his old friend Ezia Mahabatu, who he kept asking questions about. Dailio talked a lot about how his Test of the Depths was a profound spiritual experience that had completely changed how he related to this place and the Khilaia and about how many friends he'd made. It also seemed he was sleep deprived.   After returning to the House of Emesh, Makar decided to confront Dailio with Arzet and Kipilu as soft backup in the wings. In order to try and make space for the squad to do so, Potha set about seducing/distracting Hewedi, who was eager to bother Makar some more. Hewedi hadn't been really swayed by Potha during the squad's time getting Dailio - Hewedi agreed to opposing imperialism in Loanua but kept insisting on the rights of individual people to raid or trespass there, or at least that there shouldn't be any system to stop smaller-scale imperialism there. But, at least Hewedi was deeply sympathetic to Indigenous Loanuan struggles and had found Potha's argumentative spirit attractive. This made the distraction plan fairly easy to launch and at least Potha got to change the topic from politics for a bit.   With Hewedi distracted, Dailio talked about how he was deeply guilty that he almost ran off and abandoned the God Squad after he earned his Selkie Pelt. He had met a girl who he deeply bonded with during the Test and ritual who he entered a brief five-day relationship with and promised he'd start a small business with. The girl had turned out to be an Imperialist from a clan of Imperialists, with a very strange family. Her dad had taken Dailio onto the family ship and insisted on hard drinking with him while talking about old traumas - the dad's mother had apparently been killed by a strange Karbeetle many years ago, which stood out to Dailio as especially notable. The dad had called Dailio his best friend, and the family had almost gotten a marriage agreement out of Dailio before the relationship began to explode and both parties cheated on the other (after the relationship had mostly dissolved, making the whole thing very messy). Dailio felt that he had betrayed this girl's family, the God Squad, and Ezia by doing this. Makar reassured him that this wasn't a big deal and that Dailio hadn't really done anything particularly bad. Amidst it all, though, Makar picked up that Dailio was having weird nightmares. That seemed worth investigating...   Dailio's weird nightmares seemed persistent and ominous, and they started after he got his Selkie Pelt. Apparently, some other graduates had seemed like they weren't getting a lot of sleep either. This immediately struck the party as a red flag. Makar pushed into Dailio's mind (with consent and approval) using Detect Thoughts and felt that a magic presence had touched Dailio in magical dreams of deep crimson seas. The party encouraged him to sleep and he passed out suddenly; Makar felt his mind travel away from his body, to somewhere else. Arzet had Kipilu cast a Sleep spell on them to try and see if they could connect to Dailio's dream. Thanks to Arzet's previous use of the Corrupted Contact and the rapid reaction, he was able to leapfrog into Dailio's dream.    In the dream, Dailio and Arzet were underwater in an endless ocean lit with red moonlight from the Crimson Moon. Statues of many cultures and of distant lands were falling into a great darkness below and melting. A sense of impending doom was overwhelming and Dailio fled upwards and forwards from the uncertain danger that raced towards them. Arzet instead swam towards the danger and power and was drawn into the darkness. The fear turned to hunger and Arzet was welcomed into the deep trenches, where the masses of statues melded with eldritch god-flesh that made up the seafloor in a tangled mass. Twisted figures worked great saws that dug into that fleshy floor, releasing bubbling crimson blood that glowed with a soft light that served as the only illumination. Arzet was welcomed by a figure that looked vaguely like his brother Aslo Devadov, a welcoming and friendly face. This false friend promised Arzet that in time he would have the chance to take the skin of the very gods and become something greater. He then gave Arzet the sigil for the Corrupted Contact and told him to wait until the time was right.    Arzet emerged from the dream and helped wake Dailio, who couldn't remember much. Clearly, the Nightmare was recruiting. The squad sent Dailio off the bed to get some better, magically-aided sleep while they planned. Makar proposed that maybe they could try undergoing the Test of the Depths to try and see what might be causing this; they also had two friends of Dailio that were also struggling to sleep and were part of the same graduating class. And lastly, something had obviously set off the Hanahai to make them close down the islands from outsiders in the first place - that might be linked to all this as well. There may be further leads, but the investigation has just begun. Now begins the adventure in the sacred isles!