Solo A Letter from Home (Solo)

[Iosha]

Once the spiderweb fell, Iosha walked through the opening and kept her eyes on the canopy. She knew the tree tops were crawling with the eight legged killers since she could hear the sounds of them moving through the tree tops. The konti started to quicken her pace and did her best to avoid the silky tendrils hanging from the ceiling. The trip through the forest was slow, and often she needed to change direction to avoid the underbrush. Suddenly, Iosha spotted floating red lights in the distance, and she remembered Curgan's warning about the tiny bright red lights. The konti set down her backpack and fished out her white cloak. He took off her white blouse and tied it over her mouth and nose. She didn't want to take any chances of breathing in any of the spores into her body. When she wrapped her exposed body in her cloak, she continued her journey further into the forest with the right lights floating in the stale air. Iosha couldn't help herself from thinking the tiny red lights added a sense of dread to the Underground Forest, and she could feel her heart start to race in her chest. The konti could see the red spores easily in the air, so she tried to avoid the large clusters of them floating in the air like red clouds by the treeline. After about fifteenth chimes of traveling, Iosha saw a horrible sight laying at the bottom of a tree. She walked closer and saw the corpses were human, but the chest cavity seemed to ruptured open by the amount crimson mushrooms inside. The rest of the bodies were at different stages with on body of another male didn't have his chest blown open; however, the neck of the man was bloated and the man's mouth was open with a mushroom growing out of it. The last person was mostly a big glob of mushroom except of a single mostly decayed hand sticking out of the top. Iosha felt her stomach start to churn, and she quickly turned away from the fungus victims before she threw-upped on the ground. Iosha could feel her heart beat even faster now, and she start to panic. The konti tried to calm down by closing her eyes and started to think about her goddess' comforting presence in her life, and the fear seemed to fade away. Soon after encountering the bodies, Iosha made it to the glade. It would be a peaceful glade, but the beauty was marred by the presence of the horrifying crimson mushroom that replaced the bright green moss of the rest of the forest. Iosha put a hand on her sword hilt and looked up into the canopy. She saw interweaving spider webs everywhere in the tree tops, and to make matters worse, the dangling strands of the threads were everywhere in the glade. Feeling the heat and humidity starting to grow around her, Iosha looked around and saw a underground stream meandering it's way through the glade. However, even the water seemed odd here because the rushing water was steaming as it flowed through the petrified forest. She immediately thought the volcano could be heating the water at it's source, but it didn't matter because the red satchel was right in the middle of the glade. Iosha moved quickly the satchel trying to avoid the silky tendrils hanging from the ceiling. When she got the leather bag, Iosha noticed a dried up corpse wrapped up and hanging from the web above her. Suddenly, she heard a couple of loud tweets and whistles of the nari language coming from three different sources. She stood up and unsheathed her longsword when she saw the roguish looking Deks walking towards her with short swords in their hands. Iosha got into her fighting stance when they started pointing their short swords at her. She put her left foot forward and her right back. She had her sword hit up to her cheek waiting for them to attack. For a tick, Iosha looked at the bag of mushrooms, and she knew if she retrieved it for Rosethorn. He would deliver the letter to her grandmother in Lhavit, and she would be one step closer to finding the whereabouts to her daughter. She knew if they attacked her. She would have to kill them even though she didn't want too. The largest dek smiled at her and motioned the other two deks to flank her. It was sound strategy, and she knew the odds were against her. The leader tweeted at her and motioned her to put down her sword down, but Iosha violet eyes just stared at him and shook her head slowly, no. The konti's violet eyes flickered around the room, and she noticed the tendrils hanging from the ceiling. She quickly moved forward and hit three of the tendrils with the side of her sword. The Deks started to laugh at her and the leader pointed his sword at the shorter dek on the her left and tweeted loudly. Iosha watched as the dek blindly charge her and swung his sword in a large arch at her trying to catch her in the side. She quickly stepped back letting the sword breeze by her. The konti quickly stepped forward bringing her sword down and across his chest. She misjudged his skill as he jumped back letting her sword completely miss him. Iosha was out of position, and he quickly swung across his body trying to slice the top of her leg. Iosha feebly tried to block his sword by swinging her blade at his blade, but she missed his sword and his blade caught her across the leg. She stumbled back and clenching her teeth trying to ignore the pain, but she could feel the warm and sticky liquid oozing onto her leg. Suddenly, Iosha heard two loud screams coming from the two other deks, and she glanced over there for a tick and saw the other two deks were being ambushed by the large spiders. Their bodies seemed to be frozen for some reason. She turned her attention back to the dek and saw the dek rushing her with his sword pointing at her chest. The konti stepped to her right and holding the sword in her left hand now; She swung her sword left to deflect his thrust away from her. Iosha smiled to herself when the deflection worked and caused the dek to be out of position. She quickly stepped forward with her right leg adding each momentum to her clenched fist as it was aimed at the face of the dek.

[Iosha]

The konti's white fist connected with the face of the dek, and he went down clutching his face. Iosha walked over to him, picked up the short sword, and threw it away from him. She picked pointed the sword at face, and she decided not to kill him. However, she needed to have him not to follow her, so she lifted her leg and brought down her heel of her boot into the stomach of the dek. She heard him growl in pain, and he was writhing in pain holding his stomach now. She stumbled to red satchel, opened it, and saw about two dozen crimson mushrooms in it. She heard another scream, and she looked back and saw the last dek being pounced on by another spider. She frowned to herself not wanting to inadvertently kill anyone, but in the end, it was her who caused the death of those men even if she didn't swing her sword at them. Iosha picked up the satchel and moved slowly through the forest until she made it out of the area with the red spores. She went immediately to a tree, sat down, and leaned her head against it. She knew her adrenaline was the only thing that got her out of the glade. Iosha opened the cut in her pants slightly and saw a shallow gash across the leg. She knew it would need stitches, but she decided to clean the wound with her gnosis and stop the bleeding for now. Iosha put both hands on the top of her leg, and she prayed to her goddess for assistance. The blue light was faint, but her wound was cleanses and the bleeding stopped. She unwrapped her blouse from her face and started to tie the bandage her leg wound. The pain was immense and almost blinding, but she eventually got the bandage tied to her leg. She waited for the pain to subside before she continued her trek back to Curgan. When Iosha made it to Curgan, she slow fell from from the log when she hit the ground, the pain in her leg caused her to crumble to the ground. Curgan jumped to his feet, and he said to her in common, “By Eywaat's tail feathers, you made it out of there alive!” He looked at her holding her leg, and she said to her, “I take your wound is a sword wound isn't it?” Iosha could only nod to him through her clenched teeth. After a few chimes, she stood up, looked at him, and said softly, “I don't want to venture into this forest for a long time, Curgan. I will need your assistance to get out of here.” The trip back to the market place was most uneventful accept for a few sightings of giant bats along the way. Iosha was pleasantly surprised at the strength of the deformed man as he lead her out of the underground forest to the market place. It was about four bells past noon, but the time, she spent in the forest seemed like eternity to her. Iosha stumbled through the crowds not sure what she wanted to say to merchant when she saw him. Eventually she made it back to his tent, and the Spider named Nafarus Rosethorn was loading product into crates. She walked up to him with no emotion on her beautiful face. The Symenestra opened his long arms out to her in welcome, and said with a smile, “Ah you retrieved my red sachel. Why don't you hand it here, girl.” Iosha was to angry with him to show him any pleasantries, so she hobbled over to him and shoved the bag into his stomach. The merchant let out a deep breath when the bag hit him. He stumbled back by the blow, but he seemed not phased by her reaction towards him. He looked at Curgan and said with a smile, “I see you helped her too, Curgan, so how is your son?” The Dek stared at him, growled to himself, and turned his back to the Symenestra trader. Iosha pulled the letter from her backpack and handed it to him. The Spider took it and said with a smile, “I promise you, Iosha that my hand will pass this letter to your grandmother personally.” Iosha stared at him with hatred in her heart and said softy with a venomous smile on her face, “I promise you Spider if you stray from your delivery... I will find you one day even if you decide to hide in Kalinor.” Iosha whirled around not wanting to see him again, and she patted the dek on his shoulder and lead him out of the tent. She stopped outside the tent and fished out twenty pinions from her backpack and handed it to the dek. The deformed hand took it with a slight smile on his face, and he asked her softly, “Do you think you can trust him Princess?” Iosha looked back into the tent, and she shook her head, no, and said with no emotion, “I will know when my grandmother arrives next Fall, but if she doesn't, I will honor my word and find him.” Curgan pocketed the money and said with a smile, “Your daughter is a lucky girl to have a mother like you. I am sure you will get her back eventually...” Iosha wiped a tear from her eyes and hugged the deformed man. She pulled back and said with a smile, “Please don't be a stranger, Curgan.” When the Dek walked away back towards the warrens, Iosha made her way to the Infirmary to get treated before going home to sleep.

[Stardust]

Character Name

Skill	XP Earned
Observation	4
Socialization	1
Interrogation	2
Persuasion	2
Negotiation	2
Weapon: Long Sword	3
Weapon: Daggar	1
Weapon: Short Bow	2
Unarmed Combat	1

•	Lores Earned
•	A Letter From Mura
•	Grandmother's Request
•	A Deal With Nafarus Rosethorn
•	Braving the Underground Forest
•	Nafarus Rosethorn: Drug Dealer
•	Everything Has a Price
•	A Deal With Curgan
•	Stay Quiet!
•	The Underground Bats
•	Curgan: A Caring Dek
•	The Story Of Curgan's Son
•	Corpses and Mushrooms

Dream On

What a read! That was exciting, yet very suspenseful! Poor Iosha! I hope her grandmother gets the letter! Very nice solo!

If you have any questions or concerns regarding your grade, please send me a PM and we can figure it out.