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[Devastator]

Easy, just kill everyone in the way. Blood for the blood god.

Sessha says no, there's already one group of people out to fight you.  It's not the kind of thing where you should go for the high score.

Go in and talk first.  Maybe you can make a deal.

The three of you reluctantly, and cautiously, head towards the mansion.  It's looks pretty ordinary, all brown stone and pine trees.  There is a statue to Hilde here, the famous ancestor who supposedly found your statue all those years ago.  She was a lancer, and is posed dressed for war, mounted on her famous steed, Candlelight.  All is peaceful, and the door is opened at your knock.

Inside are two people, and six guards.  You clutch your weapons, and look at the fighters, while Sessha begins the talking.  She starts off hard, demanding to know what happened to uncle, and what on earth was worth kidnapping him for.

The two nobles start talking.  One of them is holding a white rod, and talks about how this item is proof of life for Uncle.  It'll turn black if he's dead, and the two of them can communicate through it to each other.  Sessha takes it, and talks to Uncle, finding out that he's more amused than angry, because they locked him in with Hilde's journals and plenty of paper for notes.  The other noble says that what they want for those papers is not something that can be given.

What they want, you see, is the temple at Alton Massif.  It's a famous place in her mythology, an old temple to the White Wolf where she supposedly had her lance blessed and blah blah blah.  It sounds like a cool place, all icicles and waterfalls, and white stone and with a beautiful crystal statue.

..but nobody knows exactly where it is.  The location is described well in her journals, but it's a place where she went alone, and the mountains are in the middle of hundreds of miles of barren waste, so empty there aren't even many monsters.  And so remote.  What they want is for you to take another item, some slab of some kind, and rededicate the site to their family, as it'll supposedly bring them another two centuries of good luck.

There's some fancy magic talk at this point, but you kind of stop paying close attention, looking at the rest of the building.  The house seems rich and a bit too clean, too perfect to really be lived in.  The guards look tough and well equipped, they've got fine steel armour that's a couple of grades better than yours, and they've been good at standing still and looking tough.  There are lots of decorations, and this seems like a pretty wealthy family overall.  You begin wondering where the kitchens are, and where you can get some food, and a servant comes in with drinks for the three of you.

Sessha waves hers off, and Willis's, but lets you drink one.  Score!  It tastes like peaches and there's some extra flavors.

Things eventually start wrapping up, and Sessha asks the two for another day to decide to take the job or not, and it's time to leave.  And to decide.

Do you take the job?  or..
Do you get Uncle back another way?

[ZBridges]

Take the job.

[IronyOwl]

Take the job.

+1

Uncle's happy, we like trekking through barren wastes looking for ancient temples, this sounds win-win all around.

[King Zultan]

Take the job.

+1

[NJW2000]

Take the job.

+1

Uncle's happy, we like trekking through barren wastes looking for ancient temples, this sounds win-win all around.

+1, this seems fine

[Naturegirl1999]

Take the job.

+1

Uncle's happy, we like trekking through barren wastes looking for ancient temples, this sounds win-win all around.

+1

[Devastator]

You do say, you're getting sent off in style, inside a big carriage headed west to Fort Alton, last stop for explorers and adventurers before a thousand miles of snowy mountains, all the way to the Icy Sea up north and the strange, pink coloured land, which your uncle's maps don't have labelled.

You ask Uncle about that, through the white rod.  He says it's stuffed full with all sorts of strong monsters, and he hasn't been there himself.  Nor does he know anyone who has.

Sounds cool!  You'll have to go there sometime.  Talking about strong monsters, Willis asks Sessha what the strongest monster she's ever seen was.  She gives two answers, not one.  The strongest monster she's ever heard of was the four-armed sword demon who was killed in the last human-monster war.  It supposedly could call down some kind of black lightning from the heavens, which could make people.. and buildings, sometimes, explode.  The strongest monster she's ever killed was probably a group of Turtle Knights, which she was called in specially to help deal with them after a serious adventure group couldn't damage them enough.  They were basically solid masses of bipedal steel, with literal sword and shield arms.  Her poisons had to whittle them down over time.

It takes a few days before you get to the fort, which is surrounded by wooden walls and at the entrance to a mountain pass.  You, Willis, and Sessha are overlooking a huge mess of still snow-covered mountains, with various creeks, streams, and lakes every which way through the forested wildnerness below, looking for one small mountain temple.

Sessha has Uncle's Thaumulator, which has been tuned for it, but it'll only help you find it.  You still need a strategy.. as is, you might be looking for the place for months.  You're going to gear up expecting a long journey, but there's still room to decide where to look first.  The big trouble is that you don't have Uncle, and can't simply modify his device to get a direct read on the temple itself.

In any case, you're going to pick up supplies and gear for the trek, but you still have to decide how you're going to look for the temple.

The descriptions of the temple entrance describe unusually thick icicles and a couple of waterfalls, which are above the treeline.  You should circle around the top of the treeline looking for the Thaumulator to indicate a particular valley first.  This means you'll make good progress each day, not being stuck in the woods, but you might end up going well out of your way creeping around the bulk of the mountains, and as such won't go very far in a straight line.

Those waterfalls have to lead to a lake, and you know there's a creek that runs through the temple itself.  This should mean some of the power of the temple ends up in the water, and the Thaumulator will pick it up.  Once you've got a lead, you can then backtrack on the correct creek uphill to the temple.  You'll be tromping through the forest most of the time, crossing creeks and checking lakes, and then using a pass to get to the next small valley.  It'll be harder to walk through the forest, and you might go a while without getting any lead to the temple, too, if you get unlucky.  The upside is that you'll be able to eliminate the map more completely, so if you get really unlucky this will be the fastest way to find it anyway.

The third method is triangulation.  You'll climb to the mountain peaks, and camp there for several days to get a bearing on the temple itself.  You'll then march over to the next mountain, and take another bearing.  This will give you a relatively small region in which to look for the temple.  This will be a fairly quick way to find the temple, but it'll mean you have to climb to the mountain peaks, which can be dangerous and difficult.  There's also some chance you won't be able to get a fix, in which case you've climbed a mountain for nothing.  Still, if it works it'll be the fastest way.

[syvarris]

Follow the water.  Spending more time on this doesn't seem like an issue; Uncle gets to study those notes more, and we get more practice fighting monsters and such.

Hahaha, no, no, we do actually have a time issue!  Bandits!  Nevermind, triangulation all the way!

[ZBridges]

Follow the water.  Spending more time on this doesn't seem like an issue; Uncle gets to study those notes more, and we get more practice fighting monsters and such.

+1

Unless the bandits are pursuing us and we're in a race against time, I guess.

[syvarris]

...I completely forgot about the bandits!  Whooops!

[IronyOwl]

Hm, the bandits can probably track our general area, but it'll be real hard to follow us all the way out here.

...unless they steal Uncle from the nobles who stole him first. Damn!

Triangulation. Exercise is good for you, and "it'll be great... IF it works" is the whole idea behind being an adventurer.

[ZBridges]

Triangulation.

[NJW2000]

Triangulation

[King Zultan]

Triangulation time!

[Devastator]

The three of you get kitted out with cold weather gear.  Sessha reluctantly gives up her fancy stealth boots.. apparently you can only have two acessories at once.

Spoiler: Status (click to show/hide)

Trence
HP 31/31
MP 24/24

Steel Glaive
Steel Chain
Cold Weather Gear
Empty!

Willis
HP 25/25
MP 8/8

Fighter's Bow
Steel Chain
Cold Weather Gear
Empty!

Sessha
HP 184/184
MP 58/58

Mithril Hawkeye Daggers
Storm Shadow Leather
Ring of Elemental Armor
Cold weather gear

The new clothing is really comfy!  It's warm, and it's nice being all bundled up like this.  It is getting chilly up here in the mountains, and the extra warmth is welcome.  Sessha also says it'll help a little with ice attacks.

..These mountains are high.  And wide.  And steep.  It takes quite some time to find your way up the first mountain, as there's a glacier in the middle of the slope you were following up, which means you have to march your way halfway around the mountain to get up another face.

Still, the view is spectacular.  It already was, but up here it's even better!  You can look down on some low-lying clouds, and can see like all the primeval forest, and the many mountains in the distance.  And there isn't a soul anywhere.  It really seems like all this could be yours, if you want.

You just sit and watch the sunset tonight.  This place is lovely, and you're here with your best friends.  Travelling is the best.  You spend a calm evening making up stories about the shapes of the clouds and the amazing things that happened in this valley.

The next day it's time to summit.. but you won't do so uninterrupted.

Encounter Start!

Icebird A, Icebird B, Icebird C.  One group of four Lesser Icebirds.

"Icebirds are really annoying.  They've got big fluffy feathers, so a lot of times you'll think you got a good hit off and all you end up hitting are feathers.  Willis shouldn't have that problem with his bow.  They're also somewhat tougher than you might expect, and they can cry out to summon more Icebirds and Lesser Icebirds.  At least they're not very dangerous, as they don't hurt much.

What we really need to worry about is this dragging out long enough until a Greater Icebird shows up.  They have cold-based magic and can really mess us up.. but if one does show up, and we kill it, the others will run away."

Trence Colunstin
31/31 HP
24/24 MP

Fight
-> Slash!  Attack one creature.
Damage +++
-> Power Slash! Attack one creature harder.  Tiring.
Damage ++++

Skills
-> Counter!  Counterattack any creature that attacks Trence.  Tiring.
Damage +++

Magic

Item

Willis Naver
25/25 HP
8/8 MP

Fight
-> Shoot! Attacks one creature with arrows.
Damage +++
-> Rapid Fire!  Attacks all creatures in a group with arrows.  Tiring.
Damage +

Skills

Magic
-> Meteor Strike!  Massive fire damage that hits a whole group of enemies.  Costs 28 MP

Item

Sessha Naver
184/184 HP
58/58 MP

Fight
-> Dagger Throw.  Attacks one creature with thrown knives.
Damage +++
-> Flurry of Darts+.  Attacks all creatures in a group with thrown knives.
Damage +
-> Trick shot.  Critically attacks one creature with a thrown knife.  Tiring.
Damage +++  Increased chance of critical

Skills
->Backstab.  Charges for a turn to do massive damage to a target next turn.  Tiring.
Damage ++++++

Magic
-> Heal, cost 6 MP  Heals a little.
-> Healmore, cost 18 MP  Heals a lot
-> Group Heal, cost 20 MP  Heals all party members for a little.
-> Vertigo, cost 5 MP. Reduces target's attack and defense.
-> Armor All, cost 12 MP. Increases defense for the full party.
-> Sonic Stun, cost 11 MP.  Target may miss next turn.

Item

Spoiler: Inventory (click to show/hide)

10 potions
6 antidote herbs
2 smelling salts
1 restore potion