The group shelters beneath broken hoist beams while rain whispers over the abandoned sorting yard. Tavia keeps the oilcloth-wrapped records dry, and Renn watches the dark between leaning sheds.
Sella Vane
The physicians can preserve the king only if they learn what the working consumes. Pell’s notes mention vitality, memory, and warmth, but never name the source openly.
Sella Vane
My contact saw the king’s symptoms worsen whenever the lower conduits were fed. The physicians need a warning that distinguishes poison from the working’s drain, or they may treat the wrong sickness.
Sella unfolds a damp scrap bearing terse medical observations: salt-thin blood, recurring fever, fading pulse, and brief improvement after sunlight exposure. Her fragments align uneasily with the poison’s ingredients.
Tavia Reed
The records prove Pell’s shipments, but they do not tell the physicians how to keep the king alive. Can your contact carry a remedy safely?
Sella Vane
A remedy, perhaps not. A warning, certainly. If the blood salts bind the sunstone’s residue, ordinary purging could hasten the working. They must stop feeding it and shield the king from further exposure.
The ledgers, Sella’s medical fragments, and Medica’s concealed poison knowledge now occupy the same narrow space beneath the beams. A remedy or warning can be prepared before the group chooses its next road.
✓ Quest Accepted
Prepare a treatment warning for the king’s physicians
“Fear not, you are in the presence of a great alchemist! Using my legendary level medicine skill, I carefully analyze the notes, combine that with what I learned from distilling the poison, and create a counter-poison”
SUCCESS (Legendary Medicine, rolled +1)
Medica Valkyrie
Fear not, you are in the presence of a great alchemist!
Medica spreads Sella’s medical scrap beside the copied shipment figures and the distilled poison notes. Rain taps the hoist beams as her lenses isolate the binding pattern between blood salts and sunstone residue.
Medica Valkyrie
The blood salts bind the sunstone residue; ordinary purging would strengthen the working.
She selects a neutralizing tincture, measured ghostmint, and a minute sunstone counter-reagent, then tempers them through three glass vessels. The mixture settles into a clear amber draught with a faint silver sheen.
Sella Vane
You made it from the poison itself. Will it break the binding without feeding Pell’s working?
Medica tests the draught against a preserved trace of the poison. The residue clouds, separates, and falls inert, leaving the tincture stable. Her counter-poison is complete, with a careful dose marked for the king.
Tavia Reed
Then we can give the physicians both answers: stop the exposure, and use this only as directed. I will guard the formula and the records.
Bring the treatment warning to the king’s physicians
Quest Complete
Prepare a treatment warning for the king’s physicians
+ New Item Acquired
Counter-poison draught