The Red Inquisitor had seemingly intercepted Sandon’s warp spell to spit The Rectifiers out into the ruins of the old Mataran capital of Ristum, rather than Amanta. After a moment of getting their bearings in the snow-covered, ruined city, a red portal appeared through which came the ever-solidifying specter of The Red Inquisitor. He was still mostly red specter except his forearms, chest, and lower abdomen. He now held a spectral cane in his hand as well. He spoke with a voice growing much smoother than his original chaotic tone. He told the group he brought them here to investigate strange occurrences in the ruins. Apparently, magic forces that should never mingle were combining to create something terrible, as pointed out by the strange wailing of women in the distance. He told them these wraiths were longing for something, but to be wary about giving each the wrong thing. He imparted gifts, allowed his patrons to shop, and sent them on their way to resolve this snowy horrorscape.
The Rectifiers found three clear paths to sources of wailing to the north, southeast, and southwest. In each section of the ruined town, they found the bodies of women impaled through the heart on spikes of magical ice. Their hearts were beating with dark corruption. Traces of doom crystal also littered the icy shards. In the north, they found a woman with flour covering her clothes as well as some ruined buildings. In what was once a bakery, bank, and barracks, the group found a gray hat with a blue feather, a coin purse with an “H” stitched upon it, a coin with heads on both sides, and a stuffed wolf. They left the items they spotted in the bakery and investigated a different section of town before offering anything to the flour-covered woman.
In the southwest, they found a young girl impaled on the ice. She had pale blue noble’s boots on. In the surrounding pottery shop, apothecary, and painter shop, they found a broken statuette of a nude woman, a potter’s tool made with a blue metal, a mortar and pestle painted by a child, a purple hairpin, and a gold-accented paintbrush near an impaled corpse. The corpse had a blade through her gut. As they investigated, they heard footsteps outside. In the snow, the group spotted a few sets of footprints, but they seemingly began and ended quite suddenly. Wary of who or what lurked nearby, the group continued to the third section of town.
In the southeast, The Rectifiers found an extremely saddened woman impaled on the ice. She seemed to be reaching out with palms injured by blade wounds. There were no standing buildings near this woman, only rubble. Unsure how to proceed with this wraith, the group instead returned to the young girl. They decided to offer the stuffed wolf, which caused the girl to spring to life and swat the offer away in anger. She leapt from the ice shard, summoned forth other wraiths, and attacked the party. During the battle, the girl would vanish, attack with both ice and darkness, and attempted to strangle out weakened members. Despite this, The Rectifiers came out victorious, vanquishing the wraith to dust, which also caused the hat with the blue feather to disintegrate. The ice shard receded into the ground, the dark mist dissipated, and the temperature seemed to warm a touch in this section of town. With the southwest resolved, they returned to the flour-covered woman.
The Rectifiers discussed what to give the flour-covered woman for some time, as they were quite wary of triggering another attack. Finally, they decided to retrieve the single-handed wooden roller from the bakery and offer it to the woman. The woman took the roller and seemed relieved, vanishing into the wind. The ice and darkness receded in this area as well. Duma Van also heard movement in the bank, so he moved in to investigate. Inside, he found more footprints as well as three bullets. He offered the bullets to Gale, who tried to load them. Upon loading one of the bullets, it sparked with purple electricity and fell from the gun. Wary of them now, Gale pocketed the bullets separately from her normal stock. The group continued to the final, frozen wraith.
The group was quite unsure what to offer the saddened woman. They had used the Blade of Marka Corvux to hear whispers from the stabbed corpse in the painter shop and heard, “I hope I was able to save her…”. Using this information, they began to think perhaps the woman wanted the paintbrush found near the corpse, but decided that the blade wounds on her palm meant something else. They decided to offer the blade that had killed the painter to the wraith. The wraith moved, and The Rectifiers waited in suspense for what fate awaited them with this final wraith… The Red Inquisitor