8-24/25 The Compound Report

General Summary

While going up the mountain, they are stopped by Mercury/Legato who leads Serenade and the others off up the mountain. There Serenade makes a deal with Legato that if they have a chance at the end he will stand aside, but if the end is inevietable she will join him. Zulex enters Mercury's mind and finds a shape coalescing in the Deep. He helps it form to find a less corrupted Mercury at the center of "a concept." He opens his eyes before being flooded with Ephemera. The Mercury shade looks confused before dissapearing.    Sneak into and explore the cult compound. The cult is being refilled due to the loss of higher members recently. To the east of the village is a hidden mountain cell. Find Kagrin under house arrest in the mountain cell home.   "I have ruminated much on the possibilities of how we may stop the Deep, one of the three primordial gods. The other two were only killed when Alios who sacrificed themself to weaken Balimor who was then later bound completely to a mortal host to be defeated. That will not be possible. The Deep has already spread too far for that to work. From my studies based on that history a god, primordial or not, can sensibly be defeated with a power equal and opposite to it. Due to the unique nature of the deep as a neutral power, it has no opposite. But we have seen creatures of the deep be weak to Erebus. Now Erebus is not perfect ephemera, but nor has its minions been. I believe the Deep’s weakness has to be itself. If nothing can stop it, then we must use nothing. So we must find a sufficient source of the deep’s power, and the only sufficient sources are its hosts. The only one that is still technically vulnerable, not fully beyond the veil, is Athrun. And there are only a few ways to defeat a full fledged god or bend them to your will. One is through binding them in the Asmodean pact, but Athrun and the Deep exist outside of it, and so that option is off the table. Another would be through a powerful flood of pure godly energy, but the amount needed for that would have been a nearly impossible feat even at the height of your power. It was only found at The Well, which is gone now. The last is through removing their godhood.   You see, the Deep choosing its champion as a god paradoxically creates a weakness for us to exploit. Were Athrun just a mortal whom the deep chose, we would have to kill him to stem the tide, but then would be left with no weapon to fight back with. But because the Deep flows through him and his godhood, were we to take and contain it, it would also contain an aspect of the Deep itself that we may be able to use against it. I know you may be tempted to try and turn him to our cause instead, but Athrun, being an aspect of the Deep, no matter how he tries, is unable to use his power to stop it entirely. But if we were to fully separate it from any host, it would be free to use. Now as far as how, and in what way would we be able to use it? I have no idea. I tried convincing Athrun that he is going down the wrong path, but he was hardly moved. I chose not to bring up the idea of taking his godhood away and using it as a weapon as I did not want to tip him off to the last possible plan, but I can say confidently that he wouldn’t throw away eternity for himself and the legacy of his cult for a slim unknown chance to save others.   There is a man who has become the recordkeeper for the cult to keep his head down, but he is a friend of the cause. He should have a book that instructed them on how to perform the ritual. If it has the instructions, it can be used to figure out a way to undo the ritual."   The cell is connected in some way to the Temple. Forced to mingle at dinner? Jarlaxle/Maddox and the rest of the cult eat at the mess hall. The gifts are given to the cult. Maddox is antagonizing. Revan shows up and gives a hint to find Salah.