It now seems like Limgrave, Stormhill, and the Weeping Peninsula have been thoroughly explored by our good friend Shaw. All the catacombs have been cleansed of evil, the tunnels ripped of their resources, the sites of grace activated, and a veritable who’s who of NPC well wishers have been encountered.
Since last we left Shaw, so like yesterday, she ran into the Sorceress Sellen, a rather condescending lady with a stone head who sells crystal magic; she also met a fellow named Bernahl, who claimed to be a Tarnished, and sells ashes of war.
From the former, she purchased a glintstone spell, and from the later, a no skill ash of war.
Speaking of ashes of war, Shaw only learned, realized, and/or remembered that she needed to two-hand her weapon in order to use an ash of war. The one she had equipped, she assumed, was like an ongoing effect. Equipped with this new knowledge, she was now able to 2-shot lesser mad pumpkinheads and regular bears. Had Shaw just found an easy mode?
She decided to test this theory on something called a Crucible Knight at the Stormhill Evergaol, and nope, this was not a shortcut to success, or at least this ash of war wasn’t, or not for this particular boss. Sigh.
In any case, Shaw felt ready to face the dragon Agheel. She got incinerated again, rather quickly, but then, a thought occurred, what if she simply avoided the flames? On her second attempt, she just rode away any time a hint of a flame started to glow from Agheel’s gullet, and a few minutes later, he was slayed. She also got help from Alistair the Jellyfish.
Now, the logical thing to do would have been to rest at a site of grace, but Shaw was fired up (no pun intended) so she explored the nearby ruins, which led her to a treasure chest, which then teleported her to a place called the Sellia Crystal Tunnel. This is where she lost all the runes gained from slaying the dragon. As an additional bonus, being underground, it was not possible to teleport out, so she would have to fight her way out.
Either because of blind luck or supernatural foresight, the spell she had only just purchased could easily kill the miners, but they weren’t the real problem. For some reason, this mine was also filled with humanoid centipede slashy spike-shooting ****ers. Her sword was less than effective, but another stroke of luck, her throwable (and craftable) fiery pots could almost instantly kill those damn things. Long story short, Shaw made it to the site of grace, and the exit, in one piece, but several thousand runes poorer.
Having nothing left to lose, Shaw set out to explore this dreadful place, mounted of course, Sir Mix-a-Lot’s companionship being the only thing preventing her from collapsing in terror. Caelid seems like a truly awful place. Imagine exploring a bleeding festering wound filled with evil and that should give you some sense of the place. I cannot imagine they have much of a tourism industry.
Nevertheless, riding her trusty steed, she followed the road and found 5 sites of grace and one merchant. She was unlikely to return to this place any time soon, just thinking about it was raising the hairs on the back of her neck. Still she was proud to have explored so much. What follows is the path she took.
