"...which suggests it's the latter, right? Anyway, fine, I'll cover your teleport in case it's not worthwhile but I think it will be."

"Alright, fine."

"Atta girl, let's go."

Payon, the Mountain Village, earned its moniker from the fact that it's situated at the foot of a mountain (though people from the Republic of Schwarzwald would argue that it's more of a hill), which distinguishes it from most other settlements in the Kingdom of Rune-Midgard. That's far from its most notable feature, though: you can barely see the mountain, as the village is embedded sufficiently deep within a forest the trees and the canopy block its view, and the Archers' Guild is located there, too. The more relevant feature for Annika and Taharqi, though, is the cave.

Directly north of the village is a seemingly-natural cave that leads underground, but not into the mountain, and in recent times—the past two or three hundred years—this cave has been used by locals to bury their dead. Over time, they've had to go deeper and deeper, and eventually they found... a city. Or the ruins of one, an earlier version of Payon that got somehow buried underground and forgotten after centuries. And even before magic resurfaced in the world a hundred years ago, there were spirits and demons there, if only a few. 

Magic resurfaced in the world, and now there are more than only a few.

"The seals are sufficient most of the time," the old priestess says, gesturing at the lip of the cave, which has a couple of pieces of paper attached to it with runes on them, as well as several more remnants of what were probably other pieces of paper that got burnt to ashes. "They get worn out, over time, and have to be put back up, but we have strapling adventurers coming over to train against the zombies all the time, and it's usually not a problem and they can hold the zombies back."

"And when you say 'most of the time'...?"

She sighs. "It's been... worse, recently. More zombies, reforming more quickly, being stronger. We've had to replace the seals three times over the last week, when it used to be once every month or two. The adventurers aren't enough to stem the tide, anymore. And we don't know what changed."

"So you would like us to figure out what changed and maybe deal with it?"

"It... could be very dangerous. Even learning of the origin of the disturbance would be good enough, for us."

"Why didn't you put up a public bounty? If it's a problem."

"It's... a delicate matter. Adventurers are not..." She is talking directly to two of them and should not be disparaging. "Most adventurers are not respectful of the dead, and we fear what they'd do, if they came in higher numbers for more than just training against some undead." Even that is disrespectful, in her opinion, "training". The point of it is to help those souls find rest, not becoming stronger. But she's too practical-minded to complain, and they don't have enough hands to deal with the problem without adventurers to help. "We want a lighter touch, and discretion and care." Which she doesn't know if these two can offer, but, well, it's probably still better than anyone who happened to see a bounty ad, that these two came well-recommended.

"We understand. And I believe we can do this, Mother Ga-in. I am very used to matters that require discretion," what with how he's a rogue, "and my partymate is from the St. Capitolina Abbey and will be careful and respectful."

Oh. That... actually is pretty reassuring. Especially the second thing. "In that case... I will have someone guide you to the lower levels of the cave. Was there anything else you would like to know before I do that?"

"Actually, yes. Do you happen to have a map, even if not totally accurate, of your best reckoning of what the cave is like? And may I have a look at your seals, as well as, if possible, a record of the rates of their decay over time and how many undead have been emerging? Also..."

"This is about as far as I can go," says the person Mother Ga-in got to serve as their guide. According to the map, every other path in this cave leads to a dead end, and this corridor is the only one that'll take them further down. And rather than just a few paper seals taped to the walls, a proper wooden fence and door were built there, with multiple seals hanging from ropes attached to the ceiling and walls.

All but three of the seals are completely burnt off.

Taharqi whistles, low and long. "Something's gone down here, huh? I suppose we'll have to find out what."

"Good luck, and may the light of the Goddess guide your path," he says, before bowing and turning back the way they came.

"Did you hear that capital-G Goddess there?" Taharqi says in an undertone to Annika when their guide is gone. "'Cause I heard it. I did not expect this place to be Feyjan."

She shrugs and turns back around to examine the door and the remaining seals. The undead they've dealt with so far have not been particularly dangerous, and while unlike some monks she is not particularly specced for Life- and Light-elemental attacks she can modify her stuff on the fly to include it and that makes her punches hit the zombies quite a lot harder than they otherwise would, which was already pretty hard.

They were really very numerous, though, and she can hear the vague echoing of their collective shuffling in the distance.

"These seals are more powerful than the ones outside."

"That's probably why they've held this long, yeah. Seems like they've been under assault for a while."

Annika nods then closes her eyes and concentrates for a second... and a ball of blue flame bursts into existence in front of her and starts orbiting in circles around her, slowly.

"What's the duration?"

"Indefinite."

"—really?"

She tsks. "Thirty seconds, but I can renew it indefinitely."