[WaifuApple]

Normally uneventful villages in the Kysei region have begun waking up to reports of a mysterious increase in fires of any kind. Forest fires have been starting and raging out of control in several cases, before finally being trampled by a combination of local efforts and outside assistance. The harvests of some farmers have been found in smoulders, as if burned away in the dead of night.

In rare cases, buildings catch fire in the dead of night, rousing villagers from their sleep and claiming a few lives for those unfortunate enough to not make it out alive. Even rarer still are times where those houses and the people in them go up in flames in times so short that it's hard to imagine they were even there, if you didn't know them already.

Interestingly, night watches set up to figure out the mysterious cause of this rampant increase in arson, while they haven't been able to single out a culprit, have noticed something very strange indeed. Molten rock cooling not far from the scene of many of the incidents, though far from any perceived active volcanic activity. Which begs the question...

...what's going on here?

[WaifuApple]

Mysterious Embers - Investigation 1

Two adventurers arrived in one of the villages in search of information about the recent developments regarding fire and molten rock in the Kysei area. The village they arrived at itself had only seen crop fires, from what they gathered, and the villager they talked to didn't seem to have any clue what was causing it, instead likening it to an eruption without volcanic activity. Fire raining from the skies, essentially.

They also dealt with the ramblings of an old man who seemed to be completely senile, spilling stories about a being of light, angel-like in appearance, who would cause the sky to rain fire. This man seemed to have lost his marbles, however, making him a very shaky source to trust on the matter. Even less reliable were his claims that this was going to be the end of the world.

The two were offered lodgings for the night in return for their aid and the chance for others to get involved, but the sky was quickly darkening, and the two came face to face with a bolt of fire that narrowly missed them and set a house on fire, instead. Priorities shifted towards rescue of a woman trapped within, and neither of the two got a good look at the perpetrator.

The investigation concluded with the rescue of the woman via their quick thinking and skilful acts, and treatment for the injured. Their information now suggests that the villagers do not have very good communication between them, and that other villagers likely have different information that has not been properly shared.

Perhaps this can all be pieced together?

[WaifuApple]

Mysterious Embers - Investigation 2

A group of people all with their own different reasons for getting involved (if any at all) gathered together at the sight of a plume of smoke in the Kysei region - too big to be a standard campfire, and too small to be a raging forest fire or town fire. They discovered the source of the smoke to be a lone, uprooted tree set ablaze - and ran into a rogue using it as a campfire.

Talking to him, they were told that he was not the cause of this fire, and happened to be in the area at the time - dousing the ground with water to present the spread of the fire to any meaningful degree and then settling down like it was a campfire all the same. He claimed that the cause was a bright light - one like you'd see in your dreams - and that it was gone as quick as it came.

With no leads for the group to go on from this, he told them a tale of a group of people with a devotion to the Primal Fire Deity, Nairyf. He noted that this was an old story, and that they'd all since disappeared - but mentioned a temple in a cave in the hills that they built before whatever uncertain fate awaited them. He said they were supposedly peaceful, so couldn't see why it would be them - or why they'd still be alive, but nevertheless, this gave the group direction.

They marched onwards in search of this location to perform a surface level investigation of the area, traversing into the cave but deciding to take a wrong turn, where they were ambushed by constructs of fire that seemed intent on keeping them at bay, at all costs. The group took down two and fled the scene before any more problems occurred, leaving with an interesting orb in tow.

Perhaps they'll be back with more firepower, next time?