Pharast 12th, 656 AR

As expected, the majority of the village wants nothing to do with us since they found out Chiyo is not only alive but with us. There are cries of dark magic and evil animating her body. Yet if they took even a moment to look at her, they'd see so easily she is just a little girl once more.

 

 

It isn't all bad though. Some of the villagers sneak out at dusk or dawn to deliver us packets of food, blankets, and supplies. Many are grateful for what we did for them, but afraid of the consequences of disobeying the Elder. I cannot blame them but it still saddens my heart that it has come to this.

 

 

Today myself and Baoji went back to the tower where the priest Koba was staying at and took the time to search it a bit more closely. We located his journal which shed some light on what happened in a bit more detail. I'll try summarize rather than copy it word for word, as his journal is near comprehensive as my own.

• Koba was indeed a priest and healer, though his journal showed his loss of faith after he found out that Empress Pandora, our Lady, had a child (the beloved Princess). His reasoning was that if our great Lady had a child she was also prone to carnal drives and was just as mortal as the rest of us.
• It wasn't long after his loss of faith that he first met Skaetis. Skaetis and his followers were seeking a way to overthrow Pandora and free the country of Saiya Zei. They offered him a way to act on his desires and get revenge against our Lady for what he considered her falsehood and betrayal. Skaetis already had a number of other groups and mercenaries on his side to make his plans come to be.
• Skaetis engineered the tubes and transformation based on ancient giant rituals that created the sin creatures. It was methodical and precise. He used the mercenaries and allies to steal away some of the villagers and transform them into the first sinspawn. Every night, those transformed villagers attacked the town and stole away a few more of the population, starting with those liable to fight back and healers. Soon the city was reduced to women, children, and the old. it left the village helpless against the army that surged forth every evening.
• The orange and black looking sludge in the water near the priest's home was by product of the work Skaetis was doing. Koba theorized that the rage and fury that filled the sin creatures was primal...hence the transformation should be primal as well. As he was devising a plan to test his theory Chiyo arrived at his tower seeking help. He...forced her in contact with the sludge which began her transformation. It seems transforming by the sludge in the water also caused unintended side effects like regeneration. Potentially why she was alive and well when we found her.
• Unfortunately, even putting his arm in the water to hold Chiyo down partially changed him as well, explaining the state he was in when we found him. Partially transformed into a sinspawn, but not quite entirely.

It still sickens me that someone with any amount of honor like Nash or Zhen could believe this was the right way to achieve their goals. So many innocents would have been killed or changed into horrid, killing machines. What happened that could twist their logic so? I shudder at the very thought.

 

 

In any case, we've been discussing our next step. We've decided to continue onward to the lands of the Lion clan, via the road to the north-west. It will lead us to the city of Haytoma where we can catch a ship to the capital city of the Lion Clan, Wuxia. It's about five days of travel there on horseback so we'll be leaving first thing in the morning. We can't leave Chiyo here so she'll be coming with us and riding with Keisuke. He seems to have grown really attached to her. Reminds me a bit of when Aiko and me were younger.