Information from the fantastic frozen front of the fray. The battle began with Heseli utilizing his siege magic, Jonne raising the dead, and Firebeard taking his men into the town to raid and annihilate all resistance. Casualties were favorable to us in terms of kills to death, but their entire village took up arms to defend themselves meaning it was a very long battle. Jonne died in the midst of the conflict when they mobilized and found him to be the cause of the undead that was keeping their numbers from being a major factor. By then most of the village lay in ruins. Heseli’s magic drew in monsters, forcing him away from the encounter along with Sakki who was acting to defend him.

Then the problem hit. Heseli is capable of such powerful magic that he summoned a gargantuan beast from the ocean. On the upside it attacked the village first since that was closer, on the downside this has dramatically reduced the number of captives we stand to take, and the village is now completely gone. Well I mean technically you could mine it out of the ice but the ice isn’t going to melt any time soon and it would be less work to just build a new village slightly to the left of it. The captives we have are stuck with us almost by default since they have no home, its cold, and a giant sea monster wanted to eat them. Effectively both sides retreated once the sea monster appeared.

So end tally, we’re down to 10 soldiers, Jonne and Firebeard are dead. We walked away from all this with a thousand captives though, normally we wouldn’t be able to even hold that many buuuut they’re homeless so sucks for them.

In other news, the village on the south side of the lake has finished construction. You should come up with a name for it.

With Tethalyn’s treasury currently secured we’ve gained a significant boost to our economic resources. After being informed of the curse there is significant…resistance to our occupation of the city. Actually about ninety nine percent of all occupants simply left down the river southbound in a mass exodus. Apparently they intend to retreat to another of the elven cities. While that is a significant risk due to the monsters about, mob mentality. Amare however has stayed behind for some reason. She’s been tending to the druidic temple and is often seen talking to Areti. It is making people nervous.

The new commander has been selected from among the coven. Rhea is a particular study of the monsters in the wild. Despite her appearance she is surprisingly hard to kill, of the three candidates I could find she fared the best with hypothetical command situations. I should caution that she is prone to risk taking, with mixed results. Two thirds a genius strategist and one third a complete idiot depending on the aftermath at least.

She is freakishly adept at manipulation though, having moved both monsters and women to fit her own plans. She’d also make for a good politician if we had any of that.

For the most part the rest of the details I have to bring are covered in our financial reports.

Greetings keeper! It is a glorious day for the Oda people. Unfortunately, due to the Witch Queen’s offer to let them take to the wilds instead of stay home, the druids are not likely to be joining us this day. However, I may have some good news on that front. Iwanagi has gone forth to see what that huge city near the coast is.

He has met someone called the Queen of Wolves, also known to us as the Archdruid. She got her title because she rules over strange people called ‘werewolves’. Half men, half wolf. There are some other hybrid variants but she is apparently known for her command over the wolves. She rules over this forested city, what was once a small “pack” grew as she offered sanctuary to more and more individuals.

Iwanagi says she could be described as “intense”. She isn’t exactly hostile but she isn’t friendly either, she humored his visit and showed him around, being an amicable host. But Iwanagi says if the concept of a predator was rendered incarnate, she would be it. She also apparently knows about every member of our alliance in more detail then you would be comfortable with, except for the Nalkas. Evidently the forest is the extent of her influence.

According to Iwanagi, the city was also filled with the very monsters that plague us all. They act under her bidding, she mentioned the only reason he wasn’t being eaten alive already was that her city was a safe sanctuary to facilitate societal interaction. Soon as he left he was advised to run very quickly.

This city of hers is so abundant with natural resources that its population is quite large, and despite her predatory nature the sanctuary is fairly peaceful. Politically this gets strange. She claims a vast empire, but Iwanagi noted she claimed our own city. She sees the sanctuary as the capital of an empire that stretches across the western forest, and us as her vassals, Nalkas and Fukuchi excluded. So the sanctuary is her only city that directly responds to her, and everything else she considers hers but has never bothered to give a standing order and doesn’t need to collect taxes since she controls the forest itself.

Related to all this, Iwanagi reports that Shime is not here at the sanctuary. He refrained from further political engagement until we could come up with a response to this information and remained polite as not to piss off someone who was surrounded by werewolves.

Personally, it comes down to where Shime is actually going. If she isn’t headed to the archdruid’s sanctuary, she might be headed to the elven city south down the river. If she is going there then it will be difficult to beat her there, but also to gain access to her. After all this business in Tethalyn it is likely that any further elven establishments will be a bit more guarded then the last time.

In other news, the wall has been completed for our neighboring village and we have seen to the escort of those more interested in living within our much larger walls. Some of our own moved out to the village as well, particularly one enterprising fellow with an interest in their lake. We will see the results of this migration and our expanding kingdom.

In light of this we were all the faster to consult with the Nalkas about druidic magic. They don’t have much to go on with all this either. It seems that by contacting the archdruid, even if unintentionally, we are now the foremost experts on the subject unless the Witch Queen can get anything out of the elves.

Ryo reached the Nalkas and has brokered some deals for us to purchase their armor so that we can foray into the wastes depending how much you want to have prepared. Their cost comes out to about 4g3m, though that is just the armor. Still need to put it on our own men once its brought over. It will also bring up the maintenance cost of anyone to be equipped like this up to 3g1m. Though it may take a little while to ship it all the way back to the caravans.

In regards to the horses, figuring out how long they live will be a bit. According to the village that Take is at – about fifteen to twenty years. As for the diagram of the badlands vehicle, google has failed the cosmic force of all things. Though one is still out there somewhere and being sent off to the Nalkas.

Takota made it back to the caravan at least with some greater details into his adventures. The badlands are a dry, though not quite desert, place with many hills and rock formations along with some bushes. Little to nothing of trees though, however the deeper we go in the more we can expect some scarcity of resources.

In his time with them as a captive, he described them as eccentric and vulgar fellows though there was no shortage of tieflings among them. In hindsight first contact may have gone better if we sent someone with horns, then again perhaps they’re just all assholes. Curiously, this group lacked for armor except the higher ranks. It is clear they invest more into their offensive capabilities then defensive, judging by Takota’s experience they prefer to hit hard as they can as fast as they can from an ambush position among the hills.

The caravan should be fine from small groups like these though, along with the army itself. Though they did mention taking Takota “back to base” implying that this group has perhaps even more members, or at the very least some stuff worth stealing if we’ve a need to kill them.