Thorin comes barging into the pub where the rest of you have been holing up. He comes up to the table where you are currently sitting, and slams someone down on top of it. 

"Found THIS outside. His cronies took Miss Ruby, and caught me off guard. I suppose we can have a little fun with him before it's all said and done, and find out where they are taking her." 

Thorin looks this way and that, making sure you and he are alone. (10 raw roll). He doesn't seem to have seen anyone around.

"I think we should take THIS, and go upstairs to one of our rooms, wait for him to wake up, and..." He clicks his tongue knowingly, "...ask some questions."

Immediately Mutiger roughly grabs the man Thorin slammed on the table, and grins ominously. He then starts to leave the tavern through the front door.

If he's left alone, he walks down to the river, takes a quick look around, and turns the guy upside down, putting his face into the river. Then pulling him back out until he sputters awake... then he tosses him on the ground, pulls his face close and growls… "Where is she?"

The cloaked man shakes the water out of his eyes and winces as you pull him close to your menacing face. "Wha...who...what you talkin' 'bout? 'She?' No idea what you're sayin'." He tries to struggle free.

Mutiger pulls him back and slams him back on the ground. "You're friends took her." Slams him a second time, "Tell me where she is!"

"Oof!! Ugh!! Hraaargh!!" the man cries out with each slam. "I haven't the slightest as to--OUCH--what you're talking about!"

Mutiger drags him to the river dunks his head in then yanks it back out. His voice seething with rage, "You don't have long to live if you can't tell me, you and your friends attacked her. My friend her brought you back so you could tell us where she is. If you can't, then you aren't useful. If you aren't useful we have no reason to keep you alive." He dunks his head in a second time and pulls it back out.

"PBLBLPLLLBLLPPLBLBLBL!!!" *GAAAAAAAAAASPS* "PPLLLLLBBBLBLBLBLLPPPLLBLBL!!!"

The second time Mutiger pulls his head out, he comes up laughing aloud. "Whaddaya tryin' ta do? Take me for a swim?"

Mutiger pulls him up to his face, grins nastily and shoves him back under. When he resurfaces he says, "That's up to you."

Hikaru shambles up to the river... In kitsune form. Lightning crackles up and down his body, in a blood red form. Different from before Balgor. His mouth grins darkly and a baleful look fills his eyes. (22 intimidate)

Mutiger moves the guy so he can clearly see Hikaru. He pulls him back to his face, "Tell me what I want to know, or you deal with him."

Hikaru pads right up to Mutiger and the poor tortured soul. A growl gurgles in his throat, deep and sinister. He raises his hackles, getting so close their faces almost touch.

Mutiger continues, "If you don't want him to eat you, I suggest you talk."

The kitsune speaks in a distorted growly voice, "You might as well. I can track her without you. But this will go easier if you give in." His eyes almost spiral with rage.

The devilish cultist visibly pees himself. "I have no...." He stares into those baleful eyes, his heart skipping a beat. "Y-you have n-no idea who you're messing with! The Cult of the Order of the Red will dominate e-everything! Y-you'll see!" He gulps visibly, the liquid dripping from his soiled britches. 

"Mephistopheles will reign supreme over dis p-puny earth!" He looks between you and Mutiger, and licks his lips. "As for 'her,' sh-she's g-gone away n-now! N-no one c-can track her!"

Mutiger glares down, takes a step back... then his grip slackens and he falls unconscious.

Hikaru grasps the man's collar almost gingerly, his hot, rank breath washing over the man, and rattles him around. Then he places him back down. "Are you sure about that devil-lover? I have the power of a god on my side. Your puny weakling is nothing to him."

Rhys steps out of the shadows, looking at the cultist. "You shouldn't have mentioned that name... do you know who I am?"

"I DON'T G-GIVE A RAT'S @$$ ABOUT WHO ANY OF YOU ARE!!!"

Rhys begins drawing shadows toward him, ripping them from his surroundings and tearing them from their home. Light quivers as it is forced to move against its nature. The shadows form a large wingspan behind Rhys, enveloping him in a black cloak of darkness. A golden pair of eyes pierce the black form. (Almost looks like Nerezza to someone who doesn't know the difference.)

A voice echoes from the dark figure, different from Rhys's. Darker, deeper, and more guttural. Almost as if Balgor had somehow learned to harness shadows...

"I am The Night Stalker. The Dark One. The Soul Thief. I am the one who is tasked with ripping your master's worthless soul from his corpse. You WILL tell me where she is, or I will drag you to a realm of pain you cannot even fathom!"

Hikaru jeers, "Two gods. One devil. He's already outnumbered.”

Suddenly, the cultist starts to laugh quietly. Then it grows to a chortle. Then a hardy laugh. Then a maddened cackle. Dropping all pretense, his eyes glow red, and the symbol on the back of his ochre cloak equally glows red. 

Rhys drops all illusions of being Nerezza and instead turns all the shadow he had manipulated into a large sword, heaving it end over end at the cultist.

The man’s maniacal laughter reaches a pitch almost inhuman, and he suddenly...

...disappears with a crack and a pop.

Rhys’ sword passes through the now thin air.

Hikaru writhes like a mad dog howling and cackling like a fox and rips a tree out of the ground and tosses it. Storm clouds appear overhead and lightning crackles, striking his tails.

Hikaru shifts back into humanoid form and punches the ground SEVERAL times, bloodying his knuckles. Then he goes up Mutiger and shakes him. He uses his new power to try to sense the location of the crystal that Ruby was carrying. 

(You have an overwhelming suspicion that you need to head west...like really west. Toward the Korosvye Helots west.)

Hikaru feels the surge. "It’s this way, Rhys. We need to get the others and go west. To Korosvye Helots."

(Chantry: Rodrick's bracelet, which can call Firelord to his location, also has a communicator. Through it, he can give Firelord, (and the automatons with voice recognition in the vicinity) orders)

The airship is now definitely on its way, but it is not here yet.
"We need to get to the others Rhys." He looks back at Mutiger and growls.

"I. WILL. NOT. LET DELILAH. DIE."

"Quite. Hikaru, do you think they would be comfortable using the shadow realm? It isn't inherently safe... as you know... but travel there is faster. We could get to the airship by morning instead of waiting for it."

"Let's ask them."

"Let's. Mutiger, up my friend. Come now!" Rhys kneels down and begins trying to aid the tiefling into a sitting position. Mutiger stays unconscious.

Rhys sighs. "I quite hate doing this to my friends..."

Rhys concentrates, pushing his consciousness outward. It brushes Hikaru's mind before finding Mutiger's. "Awake, warrior! You are needed! Ruby needs you!"

(Mutiger, your mind is being spoken to directly! Changeling mind trick, can pierce even the deepest of slumbers!)

(You are able to successfully go into Mutiger's...and someone else's mind...You can't tell who this being is, but it is very powerful, and is somehow connected to Mutiger in an integral way!)

(Does it feel familiar at all? Does it feel..... similar to a certain.... demon lord... with whom Rhys has spent time with? Lol)

(No. It is utterly foreign to you.)

While still connected to the pair of minds, Rhys would attempt to isolate the mind he knows to be Mutiger's and ask, “Are you aware of another's presence in your mind? Besides my own?" (Also 14 raw roll to block that communication from the other mind)

(The bond is inseperable between Mutiger and the other being.)

Rhys still asks Mutiger even though he can't isolate the message to just Mutiger.

Almost as soon as you touch the inner mind of Mutiger, the other presence that is there disappears in a fleeting of an instant. You could not grasp, nor could you hold any ties to this being. It is gone before you could gain anything from it. 

Mutiger wakes up. He looks at you all for a second, then says, "Let's go."

Rhys shrugs, tabling it for another time. He looks at Hikaru, and gestures away from the river. "As our friend said, let's go."

***

Later the next day...

A body lies dead in the middle of the red line district of Trenfield, a bloody knife sticking out of the poor soul's neck. The police are already trying to clean up the scene, but it is too late; the message has been sent.

Blood is scrawled in three languages on the wall, saying the self-same thing:

"Malice has come home."