A New Companion

 She works quickly!

As we approached the very first piece of land since leaving Unitopolis, there was a storm on the horizon. We moored the ship for safety, and while we waited out the storm, I noticed a woman battling some storm elementals. Far be it from me to let an obvious invitation from Her go unanswered, I leapt to help, followed quickly by Cole-Bay and Averyn. It was a tough battle, but we eventually persevered (though my contribution was little more than drawing attacks away from the others). The storm dispersed, we were introduced to Ingrid, who goes by the moniker the Blue Lion. She and the Captain seemed aware of each other, though they had not previously met. I feel that she will be a fearsome addition to the band that the One is building for Her decree.

My Adventure Begins!

This morning was was more calm and orderly, but only when set against the pure chaos of yesterday's revelation from Her. I am still, as I was last night, terrified, excited, and a little proud to be chosen for this mission. Brother Luther and Sister Isolde will each also find passage to explore more of Zephria and learn what it is we must learn, but they are still young. I finished gathering my things together and donned the armor I haven't worn -- Goddess! -- since I was fitted for it!

When I was all packed and ready to leave, the Prelate prayed with me and then gave me some money from the temple's coffers to aid my journey. Thankfully, I used most of it to get a ring to keep me safe (or safer) on my journeys and an enchantment for my mace -- Goddess only knows what dangers may await in service. And she knew well! I had no sooner purchased my new mace than I had to bring it into use! As I stood in the market, fitting it to my belt, a FLOCK of monochrome hawks swarmed a man! Who would have thought, in the middle of Unitopolis? I ran to his aid, but arrived to late to save him. It left me and an Ipothia named Cole to dispatch the still-swarming birds. 

In a minute, we had eliminated the threat, but I've never heard of the hawks being aggressive like that. They didn't attack anyone else, so there must have been something about that man in particular. He wore the badge of Azure Co., the airship builders, but when the authorities examined the scene, they pulled a beautiful pearlescent crystal out of his backpack. Perhaps the birds sensed it somehow? It seems less far-fetched than some avian vendetta.

In any case, I noticed a ship's captain also in the market, and negotiated service aboard her vessel for passage to...wherever the winds take us, I suppose. Her name is Averyn and the ship is the Falcon's Blade, which sounds vaguely familiar, but I can't at the moment remember why. It turns out that Cole is also taking passage, and I briefly saw (if not met) her half-elven navigator.

All in all, an ominous and exciting start to my journey. Adventure before I'd even left the city! I dread (and thrill!) to think what She is preparing me for to start challenging me so early.

This IS the Path!

 We are back to ourselves, but that might make this reality even more strange for it's partial normalcy.

The people are people, mostly as I'm used to, but the world around us (though world is hardly an accurate word) is vastly different. We seemed to be on some sort of ship, but the materials are different. Instead of wood, most of it is steel. There were other materials that I can't even identify.

In any case, we awakened -- yet again -- surrounded by the teleportation glyph, this time in a small room. We were met shortly by our contact in this realm, Lady Blackbird. She said a lot of things that didn't make much sense at the time: Nightport past Haven, Uriah Flint, the Pirate King in the Remnants. We were interrupted by flashing red lights and much activity, so we hurried to the bridge. This is where the real wonder of this realm was apparent. We appeared to be sailing through a starry night, but with no water below us. Just this strange ship in the night sky. We were lit partially by a huge blue mage-light of some kind on our left. Someone called it a star, but that made no sense to me -- stars are tiny, this was possibly larger than our ship.

Apparently the red lights and commotion were about a boarding party, as one entered the bridge not too long after us. Led by a bounty hunter named Veronica, she was there to take Lady Blackbird. We were torn. Her crew looked far more capable than we did, and we still had no real information of what was going on and what we were supposed to do. We thought possibly to let them go, then pursue and stage a rescue. However, though Veronica said she would leave us all in peace, once she had Lady Blackbird in custody, it was suddenly clear to me that she was ordering her crew to kill us. This pretty much made our minds up, and battle was joined. As it turned out, they were much more show than substance, and we finished things with few injuries.

In the aftermath, we tried to figure out what was going on. We talked to the crew, but they were essentially hired hands, with some local information, but no understanding of what we were going through. We found Lady Blackbird in her room and proceeded to try to get some answers. Avery was, shall we say, very direct. He intimidated and interrogated her, and while she didn't seem particularly intimidated, she did give us some information. There was much that she was "not allowed" to tell us, and some of what she said didn't make a whole lot of sense. 

Lady Blackbird is an alias. Her real name is Natasha. According to her, the three of us volunteered to be a part of "ERPEC" or "the Corps," but as part of the training process, our memory of that volunteering was wiped. We are then sent from reality to reality (maybe into other people's bodies?), doing what we can to stop the machinations of "K," who is destroying universes. In the middle of this stream of information, she imparted that while this process is partly a way for the Corps to evaluate us as agents or operatives or whatever, it is more a journey of self-discovery.

Finally! A sure sign that this is the path Master Quoth set me on! I am doing what I should be doing.