They're back in Krin's lair! Looking for more notes, more notes, more notesss. She hums to herself as she pokes around his desk, searching once again for another secret compartment to expand her collection. Ideally not bloody, this time!

No, actually, they're here to find some more amethyst, or another phial, enough to grow and hunt what they need to make it through the winter. Searching for secret compartments is the way though; she's poking around the long-since-raided chests again, seeing if they reveal any new secrets, searching for loose floorboards in the rough and uneven ground, and is working herself up for the climb down the ladder to the ritual room.

Ooh score, she pushed the desk and it caught on a plank and it wiggled a little and she saw a button, she loves buttons. Rasha doesn't love buttons though, she'll have to wait till she's going down to test it.

Okay. She can do this. Nothing new's gonna be down there. She opens the trapdoor, makes eye contact with Lorelei and nods, and then starts descending into the space below.

Button time! She stomps on it sharply. Ooh that's a satisfying click. Now, what's this one going to do?

"Lorelei what was that noise. Lorelei." Even as she's saying it she's scrambling back up the ladder. Oh gods, she can hear a circle charging up in the walls, chzn, chzn, chzn, what did Lorelei do—

She tried to pry up the boards so she could see the patterns of the circle the button triggered, but she was too slow! Oh well. With a final chzn-pop, they both vanish in a flash and re-appear Somewhere Else.

If this new location were embodied somehow and asked to pick the three words that best describe it, it might choose: snow, charming, and screaming.

They land in a deep drift of powdery snow where it has mounded up against the side of a cozy-looking log cabin. In the distance, a repeated, rubbery sort of thwacking is occasionally audible over the panicked screams.

Ooh, a new place. For it to be snowing they must have been sent a long way, there were no mountains anywhere near that might have snow this time of year.

What. She has a chunk of purple crystal wrapped in gold wires in her hand immediately, other hand touching a tangle of string around a purple blob on her belt. But this is enough new, shocking information that it takes her a couple seconds to do more than whisper "Lor get your artifact out."

...Panicked screams? Oh gods, people. She starts bolting towards the noises.

She blinks twice before starting to run behind Rasha, crystal wrapped in gold wire in her hand as well.

There are other buildings visible through the trees, making a small village. The screams are coming from only a little ways away, where a group of ragged people are fighting off a giant black tendril, armed with farming implements. The tendril is as thick around as a tree, and clearly almost as durable, because it has smashed a whole clearing in the forest. It leads away, back into the snowy forest, before vanishing out of sight.

The snow has been stained red, but none of the people seem injured — never mind, that man was just smacked into a tree by the tendril and is now lying there insensate. A child, sitting on the roof of one of the buildings behind the fighting, shoots him with the sniper-rifle version of a water pistol.

Sniper rifle version of a what now?

Damn, projectile isn't going to work here. She slides her right hand along her belt to a different knot of string and then the gem in her hand pulses with light and an explosion of pure force detonates at the base of the tendril, on the side opposite Rasha and the villagers.

(How does it react to the equivalent of 6kg of TNT detonating against its skin?)

It writhes in panic. Not because it is injured — the wound closes about as fast as it opens — but because it is still painful. The probable-villagers take advantage of its distraction to harass it. They can't do lasting injury to it either, but the tendril is at least more cautious in its motions, now.

The man who was hit against the tree stands back up and joins the fray again, apparently no worse for wear.

That did less than expected. Two more loud booms ring out as she repeats the casting in quick succession.

It did do less than expected. That man standing up again is also surprising. What might a solution to this puzzle look like... She unhooks her staff from her pack and starts tracing patterns in the air quickly, hands steady and sure. What looks like glowing thread follows the tip of her staff as she traces each one, and once a pattern is done its thread separates from the staff, revolving slowly around her body and writhing.

Mind's, Compass', Mind's, Alidade's, Scout's—

There is now an iota representing this particular tendril on top of her stack. It is presumably coming from somewhere, but as far as her magic is concerned this tendril is its own thing. It wraps around one of the villagers, who beats at it with a pitchfork.

Good, this would be much more work if the tendril and the body were one entity. Trapping it is the obvious thing to try, going to need a large mass to hold it down given the smashed trees.

— Gemini Decomposition, Introspection, Compass' II, Mind's, Alidade's, Five, hmm no let's go bigger, Evanition, Ten, Multiplicative Dstl., Prospector's, Prospector's, Additive Dstl., Rotation Gambit II, Subtractive Dstl., Gaia's Reflection, Ten, —

Shit, need to free that guy. Clip the artifact back on her belt, unhook her staff and touch a different knot. Scribe's Reflection, Hermes' Gambit, and he's on her stack. Is he looking more-up-than-down, yes he is, okay what does she need. She pauses for a second, then carefully traces more glowing white runes into the air, which join the two spinning around her already. Gemini Decomposition to get another one on the stack, this pattern to get a ten, wait I need to not drop him let's Introspection so we do it all at once and Blink so he gets out then 100, Blue Sun's Nadir to not drop him sort out catching him later Retrospection, does that look good, yes it does, okay Hermes' Gambit.

With a ringing clang the patterns spiralling around her vanish, and the trapped villager teleports forward in the direction he's looking ten metres, then starts slowly levitating higher into the air.

Um. This was not a particularly expected outcome. He was expecting to just get decapitated and have someone grab his head, but this probably works too?

The kid with the squirt gun hits him with a stream of water, and his ribs stop being crushed. He can't really do anything about the fight from up here, though, so he just kind of floats.

The tendril seems pretty confused to no longer be holding anything. It gropes around blindly and one of the other villagers takes the opportunity to stab it with a pitchfork, not that this does much in the long run.

Okay! We'll do the accounting on how much that cost later.

... What's Lorelei doing, haven't seen anything from her yet.

— Multiplicative Dstl., Additive Dstl., Aether's Reflection, 15, Multiplicative Dstl., —