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[TheBiggerFish]

((PTW.))

[Pencil_Art]

3 Mourn Commoner Favors: Artifact - Crest of Goodwill
A rather small golden crest scrawled over with indiscernible symbols. Those who go near it are more inclined to treat others with goodwill and generosity, and those who come with ill intentions are often turned away or forget about them.
10 Mourn Divine Favors, 2 Mourn Commoner Favors: Loyal, Complementary Moderate Entity - Tee'il, Sister of the Sword
Tee'il was a mortal woman in the party led by The Body of the Shield sent to investigate the missing hunters, who after the incident, requested training from Shield as one of the first members of his religious circle. Interested in this request (and partly because he needed reliable helpers) Shield accepted, and with divine help from the God of protection, Tee'il was soon on her way to becoming a mistress of the sword, her weapon of choice. If all goes well, Shield will request for her to be blessed by the gods and brought along the journey with him, to found the circle of paladins and protect the people.

[IronyOwl]

Beginning of the Journey

Once the Favors have been exchanged, there's the slightly lengthier issue of actually getting them sorted out. Finding and fetching appropriate gifts takes time, even for a power such as this.

Fortunately, you don't have to wait around for that. Instead, you're led to one of the Throne's many exits- to Mourn. Strange as it may sound to leave a dimensional nexus to travel between worlds, you've been assured that Mourn's Underworld is the best, most well understood way to get to your new home.

Trudging through a blizzard, you are forced to question that claim.

You are guided not by an actual person, maybe somebody to assure you that yes, you're close or no, you're definitely not going to freeze to death, but by the periodic Echoes of Mourn's God of Death. It's a long journey with nothing but the occasional, luring ping.

As you start to get close, however, your divine senses start picking out other signs of activity. Trains of mortals struggling against the storm, peculiar beasts ferrying sacks of something or other, divine and monstrous entities assisting or inhibiting the mortals or storm.

Until finally, there ahead of you, lie the Gates to the Underworld. The thick, inscribed slabs of stone form more of a primitive doorway into a mountain than a proper gate, but are somehow more ominous for it; there's nothing keeping you out of the realm of the dead other than your own good sense.

Even as strong and generally far from death as you are, you still feel a chill entering. It's clear this is not a place for the living. Even Orphella knows she doesn't quite belong here.

After a moderately long, dark tunnel, you emerge in a rather beautiful meltwater cavern, dripping and lit by a faint cyan glow. Standing before you are two figures.

The first you all recognize immediately, even if only by reputation: Eternal Echo of Dawn's Lost Glory, Mourn's God of Death. An imposing figure of silver armor and furs, with a lion's head and mane for a face or helm. He carries his trademark silver staff, the source of the echoing that led you here.

The other figure you do not recognize, though you can make some immediate guesses. She's a young-looking girl, probably quite a ways out from growing to her full height assuming she's roughly human. Her hair and eyes are gleaming silver, and her skin is pale but not the deathly pale you might expect from Death's apprentice or maybe even daughter. She even has her own staff, though being scaled to her height it's more like a cane or even baton for most of you.

"This is Faint Flickering Candle of the Wheel's Unending Chime. She will guide you and all who follow you to their destination. It is unlikely any among you will be able to navigate the Underworld without her assistance. She is also to be your liaison with the Throne; unless informed otherwise, she shall make routine journeys between the two points, ferrying news and small packages."

The girl steps forward and gives a short bow to the group, smiling but not saying anything. You notice behind her appears to be a large wooden cart pulled by skeletal oxen or similar. A ghostly lantern sits atop it, and the more perceptive of you notice her staff/cane/stick appears to have a hook at one end.

She then gestures to the cart, climbs atop it, and gently guides the skeletal oxen- they're very large- around and down a given path. You follow, on the cart or otherwise, and behind you the Echo continues, apparently drawing in more than just you. You even notice a mortal caravan struggling down the tunnel as you leave.

The caves and tunnels mostly follow the theme of meltwater caverns. You suspect that will change later on- nobody can agree just what the Underworld is or how it works, exactly, but the fact that different areas are wildly different from each other is well agreed upon. For the rest, the closest thing to a consensus is that it functions as a sewer of sorts, catching runoff from all the known worlds and supposedly this new one as well.

You come to a stop in a fairly large chamber missing one wall, which looks out over a myriad of mortal caravans trying to organize themselves far below. Your guide just sits and waits, so you presume you're intended to do the same. Not long after this proves correct, as another pair of land angels arrives to hand you several papers- apparently the manifests and technical estimates for the expedition. They also mention your Favors are being assembled and should start arriving shortly.

Spoiler: Expedition Mechanics (click to show/hide)

Expedition and Purpose
The expedition is composed of five separate caravans, one from each world. Each caravan's purpose is to establish a settlement on arrival to Paradise. The initial quality and attitudes of this settlement will be greatly influenced by the state of the relevant caravan. In the event that a caravan is lost entirely, no settlement from that world will be established.

Each caravan is further divided into five trains, each with their own leader. One of these will also serve as the leader for the caravan in general, and disproportionately influence its opinions on various topics. You may spend an Interaction to investigate, get to know, or attempt to influence a caravan or train leader.

Health and Movement
Each turn, the expedition moves, eats, loses Health, checks for Health, and performs actions of its choice. Movement is expedition-wide, while other actions are per caravan.

The effects of speed and food consumption are detailed below.

Speed
Plodding	+1 Health, move 0.5 tiles
Steady	+0 Health, move 1 tile
Grueling	-2 Health, move 2 tiles
Rations
Generous	+1 Health, consume 2 Food
Adequate	+0 Health, consume 1 Food
Stingy	-2 Health, consume 0.5 Food
None	-4 Health

Each turn, each caravan loses 1 Health from the rigors of travel. It also makes a Health check, gaining 1 Health on success and losing 1 Health on failure. At especially low Health, a failed Health check may sometimes cost it a train rather than another point of Health.

Finally, each caravan has an action to undertake each turn. This may be something practical like attempting to treat the disease running through its ranks, or more exotic like attempting to capture and domesticate some exotic Underworld beasts. Failing these actions may carry unfortunate consequences.

In addition to expedition actions, external events and forces may act upon it. As might be expected, these may help or hinder the expedition, presumably with a focus on the latter.

Spoiler: Current Manifest (click to show/hide)

Mourn Caravan
5/5 Health
5/5 Trains
30 Food
Led by Archer-of-Dawn, Greedy Proud Hunter

Fray Caravan
5/5 Health
5/5 Trains
30 Food
Led by Princess Kur, Scheming Ambitious Sage

Wrack Caravan
5/5 Health
5/5 Trains
30 Food
Led by Chorus, Wise Kind Sage

Praise Caravan
5/5 Health
5/5 Trains
30 Food
Led by Stemmas, Ambitious Proud Rogue

Soul Caravan
5/5 Health
5/5 Trains
30 Food
Led by Cordion, Cautious Inquisitive Commander

[Pencil_Art]

"Anybody else already regretting not bringing more food?"

[vishdafish]

"We could always hunt if we run into a desperate situation. Although I am sure the meat from there wont taste the best, it should (hopefully) be edible."

[IronyOwl]

Beginning of the Journey

As you mull over the papers, your Favors start trickling in.

Spoiler: Orphella (click to show/hide)

"Mistress, baby, darling! So glad we could meet like this, really just fantastic work you've been doing."

The jewel-encrusted (not real jewels, of course, those would cost money) mirror-shine brass golem is as seedy and unrepentant as ever, but beneath his many, many layers of self-destructive lies and greed sits one of the finest architectural minds you've ever met. He also knows keeping close to you is one of the best ways to avoid being punished for his innumerable crimes.

Higo
4 Str
Eternal Splendor: +2 Str to actions involving construction. You may gain or save resources on construction projects by compromising on material quality and supplementing actual work with illusory equivalents.
Targeted: Most people who do business with you wind up hating you, and people who hate liars and swindlers on principle tend to take issue with you for no reason at all. This doesn't exactly endear Mistress to them either.
Complementary: You don't know nothin bout helping or protecting people. Mistress don't know nothin bout building hospitals or schools or whatever. But together, you make an unstoppable duo! She's stingy about it, though.

A clerk also arrives to see where you'd like your extra rations and tools to go, and brings both samples of each and your artifact for similar distribution. The rations contain much more smoked meat than you'd expect from most other worlds, but a healthy dose of nuts and tubers rounds them out. The tools are a bit strange looking, but still mostly identifiable as mortar and pestle, glass vial, bottled clay bug to test serums on, and so forth.

The Candle of Thought is brought in as well, in all its peculiar glory. Its base appears to be made of melted metallic skulls, too deformed to positively identify but leaning towards draconic character and perhaps double or triple normal mortal size. Each is a different color, ranging from a relatively normal silver to a somewhat more exotic deep magenta. The origins of these artifacts are unclear, but most legends put them as the result of a relatively benign civilization or kingdom, draconic or otherwise. They're a common sight in especially knowledge-obsessed monasteries along the borders of where they're usually found.

30 Mourn Rations: Unassigned. Cart after cart of smoked meats with varying plant life on the side.
Pharmaceutical Tools: Unassigned. Peculiar-looking but functional tools for medicinally-inclined alchemy and herbalism.
Candle of Thought: Unassigned. Large candle of what look like melted metallic draconic skulls. Boosts learning rate of mortals studying near it.

Spoiler: Bubbling Mirror (click to show/hide)

You know it's going to be one of those days when they haul in your material. You're not entirely sure what's hauling the cart it's mounted on, but you have little difficulty believing some kind of golems or revenants were the only suitable subjects for the job.

At first glance, it's a spherical chunk of ice about as tall as a person is. Closer inspection reveals that it's actually a perfect sphere of frozen something still encased in a rough layer of ice on most spots. More importantly, there's an utterly alien figure trapped in a writhing position inside. Generously speaking, you'd call it a squid man, as the head has a sort of flare or cowl look to it you could describe as squid or cobra like. Most squid or cobra men aren't in several different clean pieces, however, so whatever's in there either had a rough time prior to the freeze or was always a floating mass of segments in a very, very vaguely humanoid shape. The material of its body has a carapacey feel to it, but you get the feeling that might be armor or some other unnatural casing. Of course, for a being like this, the line between natural skin and unnatural armor might be an overly fine distinction.

On the bright side, the inner, perfect sphere material appears to be some kind of protective field. You're guessing it shielded itself from something, though whether being frozen was part of the plan or not is open to discussion.

Your new servant goes considerably better, meaning it goes considerably worse. You immediately know something is terribly, terribly wrong when you spy a perfectly normal looking Mourn tribeswoman smiling at you, and when she opens her mouth to speak a thrashing mass of tentacle-like tongues confirms everything. Otherwise, she looks fairly normal, having a squat, somewhat rotund body covered in plain white fur, and a tall, mostly featureless head sporting six purple eyes in two columns of three, slit nostrils than seal completely when not in use, and of course her plain, flat-toothed mouth.

She introduces herself as Useful-Scribe, a name that might or might not be real, and explains that she's your backman- while you handle all the dangerous, immediate stuff, she just hangs back and makes sure all the boring, long-term, background stuff goes exactly your way. Her numerous references to her Father always telling her this and teaching her that gives you a good idea what's going on here.

Oh, and she off-handedly mentions long-term exposure to her commands gradually breaks down the target's will, leaving them a much better puppet than before.

Useful-Scribe
4 Str
Whispers of Tides Unforgotten: +2 Str for actions involving administrative or logistical work. Long-term exposure to your commands tends to warp victims into fanatical pawns.
Loyal: Father's Best Pawn is on the move! Time for Father's Second Best Pawn to make sure he has everything he needs!
Motivated: It's important to love your work, especially when that work is slowly molding the world into the proper shape for what is soon to come.
Bound: Father's Best Pawn is super important. Sure, there's always other paths, but this one's a real special path. It wouldn't do to lose it.
Exotic: Most beings are so flat. They exist here, and nowhere else. No wonder a bit of tickling from beyond and they change shape so easily.
Complementary: Father's Best Pawn is an action guy. He does stuff, frantically, desperately, reluctantly. Which is nice, but sometimes you need a framework for all that activity. That means somebody's gotta handle the gradual, deliberate, long-term stuff in the background. Somebody like Father's Second Best Pawn.

Frozen Barrier: +6 Str to a crafting attempt. Affinity for protection and stasis, as well as unknown alien qualities.

Spoiler: Fuzzy (click to show/hide)

Your material and friends arrive together, fuzzy little griksnitches riding around a shuddering lead chest. A quick peek inside reveals a radioactive green chunk of something bouncing around with unrestrained energy.

The trio introduce themselves as Gio, Mio, and Rio, and explain that as the largest among them, you're clearly the boss.

Gio, Mio, Rio
0 Str
Voice of the Heart: +2 Str to actions involving emotional persuasion. You have an instinctive read on most beings' emotional states and triggers.
Loyal: You like to follow the biggest one of you around. Currently that's The Boss.
Exotic: Turns out most critters can't actually see emotions or what's causing them. Weird, but bonus points for you, you guess.
Duplicated: You and the Boss are basically the same critter, so it makes sense you'd do basically the same things- notably, convince people to do things they probably shouldn't.

Furious Star: +4 Str to a crafting attempt. Affinity for boundless energy and lack of restraint.

[micelus]

"Oh? Higo dear, don't flatter me! Its not like I've been spending all my time doing good deeds. After all, you aren't being slowly melted into some fop's vase or pot, which would be quite fitting once you think about it..."

"Never the less, glad to see you again Higo. Now, don't cause too much trouble on the trip and I'm sure you'll continue to have my friendship and Sapphire's love. Surely."

Orphella knew of course, that Higo was an awful man but she still found some amusement in keeping his company. Even if she didn't, Sapphire's teachings do have quite a bit to say about forgiveness and Orphella was never one to go against good ol' Sappy's words.

Turning towards the other 'divines', and ignoring the existential dread that underworlds seemed to have, she wondered.

"One of you said something about speeding up the caravans. Mind explaining the plan in more detail?"

[Roboson]

Moreau looks over the mortals and other divines with radiant enthusiasm. Literally. The shining energy that normally gives his body a gentle swirling mildly colored glow has brightened several notches with excitement. His eyes and hair which normally release a small amount of similarly glowing smokey energy are billowing out energy. Given the seemingly endless gloom of the underworld, Moreau looked like a beacon of light and enthusiasm.

Such divine favors wisely spent! Moreau looks at the wagons delivered to the other gods with excitement. His energy and spirit bordering on boyish and ungodlike. The odd items, materials, and beings were sound building blocks for his great adventure to an unknown land. Smiling after seeing some of the more interesting objects he turned to see Useful-Scribe and Higo. He stopped, and for a fraction of an instant, less time than an mortal could comprehend and just a split second for a divine, his radiant energy turned dark and malevolent. Yet, as fast as it came, it went and barely enough time passed for less than a divine to even notice. Huh. What strange beings have come upon our journey. Surely this story will be ripe with intrigue and wonder.   

He turns to his antlered companion (Vineheart): I agree, hunting wild and unknown beasts of the underworld sounds like an adventure that mortals will sing of for ages to come.

[RAM]

The spidery thing looks over its caravan and speaks to its little doppelgangers.
You three are just perfect! When the time comes you will each be needed so stay safe! This Underworld, it worries me... so don't go wandering off, I doubt the locals will be much fun anyway.
Looking around at the caravans, seeing the desiccating landscape, the food stores seem to pale and shrink before the size of the task... Lumbering after the somewhat intimidating angels as they departed from their deliveries...
I, uh, apologise for the lateness of this request, but I seem to have some favours remaining, could I trouble you for some few last supplies?

5 mourn mundane favours: rations
1 mourn mundane favour: basic material

[micelus]

Interaction: speak to Cordion, Cautious Inquisitive Commander and appraise him and his caravan in a tone most motherly.
Interactions(s): if possible, have short conversations inquiring as to the goals of each of the other caravan leaders and their demeanour.
Interaction: Try and see if there is any interests amongst the settlers for an improptu school for both young and old run by Orphella herself.
Miracle: Protect the caravans from dangers.
Miracle: go around the caravans helping people with any minor ailments or other things that can be dealt with quickly.

Assign all rations equally amongst caravans.
Assign Pharmaceutical Tools to Soul caravan.
Assign Candle of Thought to Wrack caravan.

Orphella was curious and as she had been assigned to Soul she felt an odd almost motherly desire to worry about Cordion and his caravan. After all, the only reason she was here was because of his caravan and of course, the Echos.

[Pencil_Art]

Interaction: Talk to Archer-of-Dawn and see how capable of a leader he is, as well as seeing what kinds of people are coming to make the settlement in the Mourn caravan.

Curious as to how the Mourn caravan was faring, Shield went to inspect it. He was rather concerned over the behaviour of the leader of said caravan, who had immediately struck him as having a rather irritating and perhaps harmful personality.

[Demonic Spoon]

Bubbling Mirror grumbled, even as he kept out a wary eye (or several) for the hungry monsters no doubt lurking in every shadow and corner. Fear of death gnawed at his mind. Why couldn't he be the one to do the nice and safe background work and his minion risk life and limb. *mumble mumble*

He felt unease when he considered their "guide". Candle or whatever had "untrustworthy traitor" written all over her. He wouldn't put it past her to lead them all into the maw of some hungry dead titan or something. He would definitely be watching her, oh yes.


Surprisingly, Bubbling Mirror was usually better interacting with mortals than his fellow peers, mostly because he considered it unlikely for them to be able to kill him in one hit in a sneak attack. Of course, better doesn't equal "good", and his insistence of testing everything they gave him for poison put a bit of a damper on such interactions. Bubbling Mirror stuck to his principles however, even mortals could get their hands on poison capable of felling a god.

Thus Bubbling Mirror was spending his time buttering up the mortal leaders rather than fraternizing with his fellow gods, who were all out to get him.

Turning towards the other 'divines', and ignoring the existential dread that underworlds seemed to have, she wondered.

"One of you said something about speeding up the caravans. Mind explaining the plan in more detail?"

Said existential dread was putting Bubbling Mirror even more on edge than usual, and he glared at Orphelia for having interrupted him during his never-ending survey for threats.

"Haven't I already said? I have a divine knack in speed, and am going to bless the entire expedition to increase their speed. Duh. I see no one followed my advice to get healing artifacts, so we can't go at a gruelling pace, and thus have to spend longer than necessary in this underworld deathtrap. Wonderful.

Now stop bothering me! I think that shadow is trying to sneak up on me! It might be a wraith or something."

Bubbling Mirror:
Interaction: Investigate all the train leaders of the Mourn Caravan
Interaction: Map out the path we're taking through the underworld. It'll be useful once we want to sneak agents back into Mourn

Miracle: Bless the entire expedition with increased speed (6+2 = 8 Strength?)
The rainbow mists surrounding Bubbling Mirror winded into thousands of strands, covering the wheels, hooves, boots or other means of locomotion of the expedition in a layer of cloud, causing them to move faster.
Miracle: Protect the expedition from dangers. (6+2 = 8 Strength)
Like a guardian shadow, Bubbling Mirror flickered around the edges of the expedition, looking for predators trailing them from behind, ambushes waiting in front of them, or dangers springing from the sides. These were his worshippers, or at least they would be eventually.

Expedition: Vote to set Rations to Generous and Speed to Steady

Useful-Scribe:
Miracle: Help administrate the logistics of the Expedition
Getting the various train and caravan leaders to listen to her was hard at first. So she settled for giving advice, and with her skill steadily getting proven and a few helpful nudges, they started to come around.

[vishdafish]

"A fellow native from Praise, a welcome sight amongst unfamiliar people. I see you have great potential- perhaps I can teach you a trick or two?"

Interaction: Talk to Stemmas, The Rogue and attempt to befriend him.
Interaction: Train his combat skill.

[RAM]

Returning to the little ones: I shall be needing champions. No point in worrying over things passed, let's go find one! I'd not put much thought into the qualities to seek in a champion, but I expect they'll need both courage and calm. I expect that power can grant courage, but I don't see much calm being found in this place. Seek out those who are alone, be they abandoned or wandering, we want someone who is at peace with themselves. Ask them about their troubles, we should avoid a champion who is set upon revenge or their own glories. Now I want you to go forth and seek such a person, but try to stay hidden, I would rather these peoples not notice our doings. I think that the best champions are mysterious... But I shall be following you, stay near to one another and be swift to sound the alarm if you are imperilled.

Interaction: Seek a prospective champion amongst the people of Mourn.
 Maybe a homely maiden who was left to tend the animals while their wicked stepsisters mingle with the well-to-do merchants or the leaders of the trains.
 Perhaps that weird kid who wandered off to poke at the things that look like dead trees...
 Could be that old mercenary who would rather be on watch-duty than sharing stories.
Try to find someone alone but not vengeful...

[IronyOwl]

Beginning of the Journey

The remainder of the Favors start to arrive.

Spoiler: Elythus (click to show/hide)

They haul over a sample of the forging tools, a fine anvil, fine hammer, fine tongs, and so on. Whichever caravan gets this will be able to pull up a truly industrial scale forging operation in short order. The clerk wants to know who that's going to be, though, unless you intend to haul the entire thing by yourself.

Your new friend arrives next. You don't deal with hags very often, but even you recognize Magha the Maimer, a truly vile being hated throughout Praise. She rides inside a spherical gibbet, presumably having been captured at some point, but seems rather cheerful for her predicament. Her gnarled limbs hold unnatural strength even by hag standards, and the lengthy hammer she grips is known for striking metals and flesh alike just as she decrees it.

"Ohhhhh, hello there Pretty One. If this doesn't work out for you, I can suggest a few alternate means of employment!" she says, cackling maniacally. She's well known for maiming attractive men so she can keep and use them as she pleases, alongside her more smithing-related crimes of fusing metal to flesh to produce shambling abominations.

Finally, they carry in your material. It's smaller than you were expecting, but no less dangerous for it; the handheld box is appropriately runed against intrusion, and still can't keep out all the ominous whispers coming from the blood red gemstone inside. Apparently it houses some kind of evil, most likely sealed or reduced down to that gem before being flung beyond the world, where it eventually landed on Praise.

Magha the Maimer
6 Str
Bonesong: +2 Str for actions involving smithing or maiming. You may meld metal and flesh relatively seamlessly, and such creations tend to be more obedient or at least addled towards you.
Hated: Maybe it's the reputation for turning screaming victims into shambling horrors of flesh and metal. Maybe it's the way you leer at pretty boys while telling them how much nicer they'd look without their limbs, or sneer at pretty girls while explaining that their face is far too symmetrical and free of pain. Or maybe they're just jealous of your good looks and superior craftshagship. Whatever the case, most other beings don't like you very much. Their loss!
Targeted: The name Magha the Maimer is known far and wide as one of the vilest sources of crimes against man and god this side of The Masters. While this is among the highest praise, it also means your enemies include, oh, just about everyone and thing that takes issue with wanton crimes against the innocent. Oh, that also means your particular Pretty One might get a few dirty looks himself, which just goes to show how petty and unfair some people are.

Forging Tools: Unassigned. Fine Praise craftmanship intended to produce fine Praise craftmanship.
Whispering Heart: +6 to a crafting attempt. Affinity for released evil, feasting upon or corrupting others, and containment.

Spoiler: Moreau (click to show/hide)

You have only one request, and she arrives alone, striding confidently towards you. She's tall and athletically built, with red hair and blank white eyes. She bears only a pair of daggers in armament, but her clothing is the kind of sparse but functional-looking leather you'd expect on an adventurer.

"Essa of Demon's Reach," she says with a slight bow. You recognize Demon's Reach as a city-state of Praise, built around an active volcano and dedicated primarily to the forge-goddess Kasha. "My specialty is healing under duress, though I often end up as the party face as well."

Essa
6 Str
Fleshfire: +2 Str for actions involving healing or attrition. You can heal or modify flesh as though it were second nature to you.
Loyal: Your nephew looks like he's going places. Best make sure they're relatively safe places, you wouldn't want kin getting hurt and staying that way on your watch.
Bound: Close family becoming a new God of Paradise is pretty amazing. You'll have to keep an eye on him, though, make sure that works out okay.
Loved: Who knew running into danger healing other heroes made one so well-liked? The slightly forbidden enhancement magics probably help too.
Connected: Being the daughter of Kasha is not a terribly rare accomplishment, but it's a point in your favor nonetheless. Being a devoted and successful assistant to her clergy, and by extension the people, is considerably more valuable. Also being the spawn of Black Chrysanthemum probably doesn't help a lot with anyone but hags, but you'll take what you can get.
Complementary: Much like his father, your nephew is good at running headlong into trouble and dragging others along with him. Neither's so great at cleaning up the mess afterwards, which is where you come in. When protection isn't enough, determination can bypass the problem, but healing actually fixes it.

Spoiler: The Body of the Shield (click to show/hide)

They bring the crest out first, cradled in a simple but soft fur, wanting to know who you want it delivered to.

Tee'il arrives a little later, apologizing for the delay but explaining that she wanted to pay her respects to the God of the Dead. She's just as you last left her, looking much like a lean, snake-eyed goatwoman with an orange stripe on her forehead. Her graceful sword is a rare bronze artifact by your people's standards, though you understand the people of other worlds might dismiss it as common.

Tee'il
6 Str
Circle of Swords: +2 Str for actions involving your sword. It is very difficult to move past you when you so desire.
Loyal: The Body of the Shield is a truly heroic man, one you have no doubt will continue to bring light to the darkness in the future. You wish to serve and assist this light in any way possible, and in doing so make the world a better place.
Complementary: The Body of the Shield is an adept fighter, but he is a warding fire. Sometimes a bone cage can block or trap what he cannot.

The spidery thing looks over its caravan and speaks to its little doppelgangers.
You three are just perfect! When the time comes you will each be needed so stay safe! This Underworld, it worries me... so don't go wandering off, I doubt the locals will be much fun anyway.
Looking around at the caravans, seeing the desiccating landscape, the food stores seem to pale and shrink before the size of the task... Lumbering after the somewhat intimidating angels as they departed from their deliveries...
I, uh, apologise for the lateness of this request, but I seem to have some favours remaining, could I trouble you for some few last supplies?

5 mourn mundane favours: rations
1 mourn mundane favour: basic material

They nod and return a short while later with a sample cart and your material. The rations are mostly smoked meats, with some vegetable matter for variety and nutrients. They ask which caravan you'd like them delivered to.

The material appears to be some kind of mammoth tusk. Further inspection reveals a faint green glow; you think you've heard of moss mammoths or something.

Mammoth Tusk: +2 Str to a crafting attempt. Affinity for life.