Fentra and Felines
As the party finished talking to Korboz, he was summoned to his daughter's quarters where she had locked herself in and was not responding to anyone. The party tagged along and once inside her room, they saw a haggard looking young-adult gnomish woman hunched over her desk frantically scribbling. Her sketches flew off her desk as she finished with each and floated in a designated space within the room. Any interference with these papers agitated the young gnome, who otherwise was unresponsive.
While this was going on in Fentra's room, Rovu took this opportunity to look through a writing desk in the main living area. He snagged some letterhead and unfinished letters written in gnomish that was clearly not Korboz's, intending to translate this later.
Stuu was curious and did his best to figure out what the papers depicted. After inching around the room and looking at the drawings as a whole from several angles, his efforts were rewarded with this image:
Its jaws gaped wider than a mine entrance. The eyes were so sunken, so hollow. It drooled as it darted for her. I heard her bones snap in the resounding silence. And then… it sang again.
The room was still. The image searing itself into the minds of those present. Korboz turned to Jirna.
Jirna I need you to aid the party any way that is reasonable to deal with whatever... that thing is. That. That is the enemy.
Thorrfig took this opportunity to ask if he be allowed to cast Dispel Magic on Fentra. Korboz agreed. Immediately after the spell was cast, Fentra relaxed visibly. She opened her eyes after a long moment and shuddered at the sight of her own drawings.
What? What is this? Who did this?
What do you mean? You did this... You were drawing when we entered.
I hate it, it makes me uncomfortable.
Without a second thought she collapsed all of the papers into a neat stack tucked away in a distant corner of the room. "I... Don't remember that. Sorry papa, I am so tired, I need to sleep."
The party ducked out, concerned and confused. Deciding to take advantage of this newfound freedom, they set off to the south side of town in search of a cat.
Craven took the lead and approached a cat they found on the south side of the city. After a few tense moments, the cat was spooked by something behind Craven and bolted. Stuu managed to calm the creature and it seemed to feel safe with him.
Brownie the cat was clearly terrified of something it called "the Long One" that haunted "across the river" (North of town). It alluded to there being several, and that none of the "people" could see the creatures, "But we see them. And they see us. If you could see them, you'd be terrified as well."
The poor creature wasn't much help otherwise, and rather than terrorize it more, they let it go out the gate, as it wished. "Come with me! If you were smart, you'd leave too!"
Stuu postulated that maybe the artificers would be able to create something that would let them see the thing. Jirna thought that was a smart idea.
Probably! That's definitely a good request for the next time you get them all in the Grand Hall. We could ask ...... Wait, how do we get those meetings set up? Hmm. Well we could ask Korboz's Office to organize it. I'm sure that ..... who was that? That name is slipping on me.
Another lead the party decided to follow up on was the Opal Bizarre, which they remembered being important, but didn't remember why. After meeting a gnome who called himself Esteemed Haggler Zek, the party decided not to pursue that line of questioning just yet.
Stimied on that front, they turned their attention to some spellwork. Thorrfig cast Locate Creature seeking Inventor Vrizz while Craven used the Crystal of Locating to try and find Auri's body. With both active, the party did some power walk circuts of the town but neither spell revealed anything.
Craven followed Deppeg's advice and wrote the Harpells of Longsaddle with all the information the party does know, hoping that the researchers might turn up some useful information. We left our party scratching their heads in the midst of the central Mushroom Fields, thinking there must be something that they missed on the northern side of town.