Sister2Sister Adventure #3 -- May 8, 2020

(Still) naked and afraid and partially tied up in the cart, Vashe, Hotaru, and Katyr hatched a plan. While Vashe was trying to get a better idea of their circumstances, one of the three bandits pulling the cart saw her and the plan went into action! 

Vashe stood up and spoke into his mind, pretending to reveal herself as an erinyes demon (and also used magic to make it look like she had wings) while Hotaru made the ground shake and spruce up the drama behind this "big reveal".

While the one bandit was suitably stunned, the other two were not. Katyr summer stepped out of the cart and lined herself up to use her dragonmark against all three. She killed one, but the fight was only just beginning! A few seconds later she took an arrow to the knee and went down (each girl had only 1 hit point); Vashe threw a bag from the cart into one bandit's face and knocked him out; and Hotaru tried to pew pew the third (and heartiest) bandit but to no avail. Vashe ended up grappling with him, and the two girls eventually killed him. 

Vashe found Hotaru's sacred symbol in the other bags on the cart--and had to remind Hotaru to heal Katyr before looting the rest--but there turned out to be lots of interesting loot, including a sack of 4 bottles with a note that read: "From James, to Hjord, Here's all the funds we could afford. Please get the potions from Nijah for Stephanie."

Could this note be from those dead people the girls originally saw the bandits with? Is this their carts? To find out, the three decided to interrogate the last living bandit. It took a while to find an appropriate place to hold the interrogation, but they ended up doing so after a good night's sleep in the woods frighteningly close to Barnabus' cave. Vashe's large bush illusion once again saved the day--or night in this case.

The big dude told them about Barnabus, whose cave was up the hill and which includes a fighting pit with dogs and wolves. He wears a kilt and has mutton chop sideburns. The bandit claimed to be a free agent and the three girls let him go. Hotaru gave him some parting advice to find new meaning in his life. 

The now richer and more experienced group headed on to Nijah, laden with the purpose of finding out who Stephanie is. The adventure ended--or is just beginning?--at the witch's door as she opened it to stare at them with her empty eye socket.