Ingred's Journal Entry 18: Foolishness

''The journal is speckled with sweat and sand packs the edges between each page. It appears that the entry was originally written in blueish ink, but a few lines in, the words become streaky as if the ink dried up before it even touched the paper. The writing quickly switches to graphite. There is a sketch of a young, crocodile-like creature on the first page.''

Good Lord Jonsen, it is hot here. Really hot. My feet burn and these dumb sandals do nothing to help. K’s rocking the whole “shirtless” look while the rest of us are shrinking into these cloaks that Lily provided. Even Marisol put hers on, and she never changes her outfit for anyone. She also ate a scorpion. K ate a dead lizard. It’s as if the desert’s making everyone go feral… eating odd things. We’re all terribly exhausted, terribly filthy. I want a bath…

Speaking of K; his back is rather scarred. I’m curious, but I worry he might not give me an honest answer if I were to ask about it. Then again, he’s really good at opening up to the group compared to some people. Maybe it would be worth a shot. It seems that everyone has scars in this group, but his… there’s so many of them.

The Tyvian region is really something. Although, there’s not much to look at unless you’re in one of the few cities here. It’s mostly all sand. The people here look like K; tan skinned, dark haired. They also remind me of… well, it doesn’t matter, but they don’t seem very concerned with the sun or heat. The folks in the first city we visited were extra cautious with the magic users in our party. Everyone was forced to wear these ugly sashes except K and I. Seipora’s looked god awful, like someone failed horribly at making peppermint candies. That place was a pain in the ass; I even got some gold stolen off my person. The others should probably check their supplies for missing items when they get the chance.

During our first downtime I spoke with Marisol for a bit. We’ve both agreed to having a detailed discussion once this problem with Anthos is taken care of. I would like to use it as an opportunity to get more information from her. Perhaps we could do a “trade”, or at the very least gain some common footing. I’m rather frustrated and tired of this back-and-forth we keep finding ourselves in. Maybe this will be a good thing. Maybe.

I still feel… I don’t know… uneasy when she casts magic. We secured passage alongside a caravan called “The Camel” after patching up a gentleman who’d lost an arm to a desert beast. I believe they were called hooktails? Well, anyways... I was (for lack of a better term) useless during the procedure. She had pushed me aside to stabilize him with some… dark… frightening magic… L-Logically speaking, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with it, but still it- it terrifies me. Her necromancy. At least, I-I think that’s what it was… I don’t… I know I told her otherwise, but… seeing it in person…

She was laughing at something soon after. Maybe she was laughing at me.

We were followed by a group of hooktails the following day. Since our party was given the task of protecting the caravan, we spent some time dealing with these creatures. K and Lily were trying to tame some, however it wasn’t worth their effort. I got- er- rather soiled after stopping one from running off. They were quite impressive but didn’t stand a chance. I think K was disappointed, but honestly I’m glad we don’t have another beast in our party. Kov Sirika’s difficult enough to manage as-is.

...ok, look: I know I poked fun at K and Marisol for eating unusual things earlier, but I had a point to make, damn it, and I wasn’t about to be one-upped by the cleric. K and I we… Well, he convinced me to eat- uh- a scorpion- after our hunt for poisonous ones had failed. I wasn’t going to, but I was reminded of earlier when he told me to “conquer my fears” or what have you… so… I did it. I did it, alright? It wasn’t pleasant by any means, but K seemed… I don’t know… proud? Of me? Maybe. Maybe not so much when I told him my reasons for doing so, but he said it was a step forward, nevertheless.

I needed a bit of space one night, so I decided to take a bit of a walk away from camp. I wasn’t really expecting to see much, aside from the usual sand and dead brush, but to my surprise I spotted a creature burrowing through the sand. It looked to have been playing, so I decided to leave it be. I asked Atep about it later (the man had recovered quite well) and he told me it was a juvenile sand dragon; a sign of good fortune in this region. I’m not really a believer in superstition, but I suppose we could use some fortune right about now.

A sandstorm hit us in the morning. We had experienced one before, but not to this magnitude. There were rocks being thrown about, hooktails getting obliterated in the fray, sand finding its way into all kinds of undesirable places… despite taking refuge in some bed rolls with Seipora, the two of us got hit pretty hard. We all did. Some of us got struck by cactus, including me. It passed eventually, and no one got lost, thank gods! However Seipora was blinded, and once again I found myself in a situation where my aid wasn’t enough. Once again, Marisol used her dark magic. Once again, I was frightened…

She wasn’t the only one frightening me on this journey, though. Anthos, whom I’m still genuinely terrified of, thought it would be a good idea to prank me for the… what is it now… 6th time? Of course he had to make me believe he was already exploding. He scared the daylights out of me. I swear I saw my life flash before my eyes and I hated every second of it. Well, not every second… Honestly, I had just mustered up the courage to speak to him since he might be dying or whatever! He doesn’t even seem all that phased! He keeps joking about wanting to die and I simply cannot understand his reasoning.

Maybe actually exploding has changed his mind. Goodness, was it intense. The man couldn’t even stand up on his own afterwards. Or talk coherently, although he did muster up a terrible attempt at an apology and casted some weird and unwanted magic on me before practically fainting. What a fool. An utter imbecile. I can’t believe I’m afraid of this absolute moron… Anyhow, he seemed to be under the effects of some sort of heat exhaustion. Which… you know- makes sense regarding his experience, but it should have been much worse. Most likely would have killed any normal person if they were in his predicament.

At this point I had almost run out of medical supplies and needed to restock. We had just entered the port city and after speaking with some local hoodlums I was directed to the nearest apothecary, the “Serene Flower”. What a bunch of bastards. There was nothing serene about this place. The first thing I saw as I entered the building was a goat-like man snorting some powdered drug off the countertop. The freak was so intoxicated that I was able to talk him into giving me some “free samples” before getting kicked out by his furry companion. I wasn’t able to get any real medical supplies (I doubt these potions are actually health-related), but Seipora was able to find me a more professional apothecary to make my purchases. She’s really good at convincing others to give her discounts. I was skeptical of her capabilities after she led me on a goose chase around town, but I suppose things went well in the end. Plus Seipora and Lily lent me some money so I can’t complain.

That afternoon we waited at the docks for a ship that would be willing to give us transportation. Anthos slept, Lily fetched us lunch, and we all rested until it got busy. There was a goblin at the main booth. I wanted to talk to him, but I had a feeling it would have been awkward. The people here seem to respect him. He reminds me of you.

K got rather curious about my background after a discussion regarding his birthplace. He questioned me a lot, but most of them were mundane things so I didn’t mind all that much. Marisol was making me unnerved by how intensely she was staring at me, especially when my education was brought up. It’s like she knows something. Creepy. Why did she have to laugh at me for wanting to be a dancer as a child? I’m already upset about it, she doesn’t need to make it worse...

The ship we acquired was a crabbing vessel. Anthos and Sirika were sent below deck while the rest of us were assigned tasks. Mine was both terribly boring and terribly busy. I got rope burns the second day in. Lily is quite a good cook, I’ll admit I wasn’t expecting that from her. Well, with a family as big as hers maybe it shouldn’t be surprising.

Even though I was still frustrated with Anthos I helped him eat some supper. He seems a lot smaller without his armor. Still bigger than me of course, just not so intimidating. He may be scary, but seeing him in that state eased my nerves a bit. After talking to him I was able to make more sense out of that Tarlie symbol he put on my palm. He uh… he may have a heart in there somewhere, but it’s a foolish one. I don’t think he’ll be pulling any more pranks on me, at least not for a while.

We made it to the island safely. The party had to use magic to get to the shore, much to my distaste. It was embarrassing being carried across, but there’s no way in Jonsen’s green grass that I’d go anywhere without touching something solid. The island didn’t give us too much grief aside from a pack of giant raiders. Lily has apparently learned a new trick. I think it’s similar to Hyacinth’s, if not the same. I’m not sure what she’s been doing during our free time, but whatever it is, she’s been putting a lot of effort into it. As much as I don’t like magic, well… It's different with her for some reason. I’m tired of the others forcing magic onto me, or using my ignorance to take advantage of things. At least she doesn’t make fun of me for it…

The landmark was easy enough to find as well. Now we are waiting to access the laboratory. The researchers here are cold but they’re only doing their jobs. I don’t blame them for their distrust. While Marisol’s stunt was amusing, it didn’t exactly get us anywhere. I just wish they would at least let us into the building, seeing as we’re the ones who got them here in the first place. The party made a lot of progress digging, but I have a bad feeling we won’t make it inside without convincing the others. We’ll see how things go in the morning. I just hope we all make it out alive once this is over.