Frei's Memories: Day 6

Day 6:

Something must have happened to the dark elf; he's acting a bit strange this morning---He probably had the lucky room.  On the upside, Katja seemed in an unusually good mood.  She even enchanted most of our gear!

Keening

We passed through Katja's portal near Keening, where the big essentia mine operates.  The town is quite a bit bigger and uglier than Berlitz.  It kind of looks like a rough place, but we didn't go in so I'm not sure about that.  We did visit the mining area.  It was heavily defended.  We observed some sick people; the unrefined essentia is poisonous!  We learned a man named Herrick runs the essentia mine than dominates Keening.

On the road to Eibelstat, we encountered Nico and the elves from the game on the road to Eibelstat.  They wanted to make sure we weren't taking essentia to Eibelstat.  They acted worried that Eibelstat would use the essentia to attack Keening and take the mine for themselves.  The elves compared Eibelstat to Zerthadium and vowed to prevent the analogous history from happening.  I think they're just covering for banditry, but they seem almost crazy enough to really be freedom fighters.  They still seem to be in contact with the Elementals; we'd better remember that.  They mentioned Herrick was nasty and also not a fan of the dragon refining the essentia.  We stayed on Elves good side by selling them what little essentia we had left.  We were careful not to mention our association with Katja.

Eibelstat

We encountered some brigands. At least one of them misunderstood what "Highwayman" means---he had a shovel and a hard hat.  The other bandits didn't like him, much.  To their dismay, we were just inside Eibelstat territory and an angel appeared.  Strangely enough, the angel seemed bored so he offered to allow us to duel for money.  We beat them handily and they departed in shame.  I get the impression this has happened to them before.  I didn't catch their names but they should be easy to recognize.  A strange thing happened during the fight.  The rogue erupted a pair of insubstantial dragon wings and then so did we!  They protected us from arrows for a few seconds and then vanished.
Paradoxically, the dark elf reported feeling a little less strange afterward.

Serradus contacted us through a mirror we were carrying.  He asked us to collect some info on Eibelstat's emperor if we could.  If the Emperor is really a god-man, like Til said, I'm not surprised that the Aons are interested.

We witnessed a ceremony in the pastoral outskirts of Eibelstat.  A young man and woman were taken from their families, who were compensated.  We learned that they are not allowed to leave or communicate to the outside once they have entered the Palace Sanctum.  We had a long conversation with a local pastor and learned some things about the city and it's emperor.

The Emperor, Albrecht, has been in power for 26 years.  Before that this place was a wasteland.  Albrecht's ascension and terraforming requires LOTS of essentia.  We entered the main city and immediately a tour guide found us.  We were given room and board passes and allowed to explore the city.  Eibelstat is a nice place.  They are turning people away.  I doubt they are interested in taking over Keening.  Nonetheless, they seemed ready for war.  Also, the administration recognized us as Returned.  Vel, Albrecht's second in command said she might have jobs for us.

While eating a feast in the market, we met Silvi, a Bahamut zealot.  She was preaching from a booth. Eibelstat is awfully tolerant of this kind of thing.  Maybe Albrecht is just that confident.  She had a long conversation with our Bahamut Priest.  They had a platinum dragon party.  She's from Kitzingen in the North.  She asked us to help kill some undead there.  Naturally, the priest insisted we go to Kitzingen after our tour finished.

We looked around Eibelstat a while longer.  When the sun set, the magical streetlights turned on.  What a sight.  This place even has running water. No wonder they're turning people away.  I wonder what Til's problem with the place is.  We stayed at a fancy hotel and even received a complimentary massage!  I even got a gecko scale massage, yea!

I bet there's someone here who can help us get across the Rift and back to Zerthadium.  I don't think the team is strong enough to handle it, though, so I'll put off mentioning it for a while.