(So i'm kind of an idiot...)

Wulfa opens the door, the poor human looking like he has gotten very little sleep. He blinks for a moment and brushes his hair back with his hand. "Oh, hello Zack. I take it this is your group then? Come in, come in. I heard that you all engaged the culprits."

He eagerly waves the group in as he swiftly grabs chairs for everyone from various places in between his bookshelves, arranging them around the desk Zack had seen last time he was here just the day prior.

"So uh... for everyone else, I'm Wulfa. Elandar's husband and the closest thing to a wizard this village has." He laughs slightly.

'Ah, so you're the local magic man?' Kalgren smiled while entering Wulfa's abode. The sight of many books haphazardly packed into the room made Kalgren feel a bit more amicable towards the man, as the pursuit and hoarding of knowledge was something he could relate to. Kalgren's eyes wandered across the titles, trying to pick up just what it was Wulfa was most interested in.

OOC: trying to read the (most visible) titles on the books Kalgren can spot 'cause you can learn a lot about someone from the kind of literature they leave lying around.

Kalgren sees plenty of books, namely of folklore from across the kingdom, local stories, medical textbooks, and more. He also has a few books penned by archmages. Seems he's a pretty smart guy, if a little socially awkward.

"Yes, something like that. I can't cast any spells myself, but I like to know the academics behind it."

"If you have any spells Wulfa, I would love the opportunity to look them over and perhaps copy them into my own books," Zack perks up at the mention of spells. "We have these remains for you to look at. The captain of your town guard suggested that you might like to look at them. If you could give us any insights, we would very much appreciate it."

Almost on cue with Zack’s comment, Vigil slumps the bag off of his shoulder and onto the floor, causing the sound of a wet thud from the back, and a grunt of effort from the tiefling.

"Never seen anything quite like it. When we took it down, it looked like the thing that animated it was gone, disolved like ice cubes under the sun."

Grell, not taking much notice to the books and other things, looks to the creature's remains within the bag and invisibly shudders.

"It also swallowed me. Grell did not enjoy this experience..."

The Dragonborn averts his eyes from the bag as the thought of the creature's insides flashes over his mind's eye.

Wulfa's eyes seem to glint a little as he opens the bag and slowly shuffles the body out of it onto his desk. In vast contrast to the captain, he seems intrigued and excited at the prospect of something new! He pokes at the body, checks the talon, looks over the beak. "...hm. I'll have to do more studies on it, clearly, but it seems that upon death, the muscle tension that gave it form gave way, hence why it looks like a literal sack of organs now, instead of what clearly must have been an impressive physique." He nods. "I'll gladly take over researching it while you gentlemen go out exploring. I take it you have a direction to look?"

After a moment, he pauses. "...Swallows, huh...? Need a drink, friend?" He gives a sympathetic smile, as if he knows how it is to feel haunted.

Grell shakes his head.

"No more drink, last night was enough..." he says, as he slowly walks out of the door, back into the fresh air outdoors. The experience did indeed leave it's mark, but the Dragonborn had been through much worse. All he wanted now was to hunt these things down and put a stop to their evil...

"Well, we suspected they may be coming from the north of the village, but no evidence to specifically point in that direction. They appeared to come from the river last night, however, and upon enquiring with the captain he didn't know of any burrows along the waters. However, he did point us in the direction of Oriander at the Essentials store who apparently spends much time by the river."  Zack refers to the notes he's taken so far as he recalls this to Wulfa.

Quote from TrojanWiz >>

Grell shakes his head.

"No more drink, last night was enough..." he says, as he slowly walks out of the door, back into the fresh air outdoors. The experience did indeed leave it's mark, but the Dragonborn had been through much worse. All he wanted now was to hunt these things down and put a stop to their evil...

'Big guy like you can't hold his liquor?' Kalgren smiled at Grenn, though the smile he gave him was a warm one. After all, the dragonborn was swallowed whole by the creature and that is not something Kalgren would wish on anyone, let alone someone he was feeling a budding sympathy for. Lesser men would have drowned themselves in alcohol trying to scrub that memory from their mind.

Kalgren walked over to one of the bookshelves and picked out the book on local stories. 'I wouldn't mind a drink. Hot tea, if you would be so kind.' He replied to Wulfa's offer as he turned a page.

OOC: Thumbing through the book of local stories, Kalgren will keep an eye out for anything that even remotely resembles what they know and have experienced so far.

"Tea it is!" Wulfa looks down at the body of the creature before managing to wrestle it back into the bag. He motions for the others to follow him upstairs, while Grell stands outside in the cool and refreshing mountain air. Various fairy tales and cautionary stories, occasional goliath tales (which if Zach were to see, he would recognize one of them as being from the human perspective of the story he previously translated in the book he has).

Vigil felt slightly disapointed that the creature’s corpse didn’t produce the same effect on Wulfa as it had on the guard captain. Commoner’s reaction to the uncanny had a way of amusing him. Moving past it, he sighed and brushed back his hair. "Don’t want to be rude, but we need to make use of the time we have. Those things, though they look primal, are definitely intelligent. They’ll be back, and we don’t know if they’ll be more of them." He then waits by the door for Zack and Kalgren to finish with Wulfa.

"Agreed Vigil," Zack nods to his fellow sleuth. He turns back to Wulfa, "If you'll excuse me, I might pass on the tea and instead go in search of Oriander with Vigil. If that suits everyone else?" He looks around at the others.

Standing outside while he waited for the others, Grell breathes deeply the cool air, his mind recovered from his ordeal the previous night, his stomach still swirling from the many beverages that followed. The tall Dragonborn looks out into the town, looking around to see what was about.

(ooc: what's it like in the town outside? Is it obvious where the Essentials store is? Unsure if we have directions exactly? If not, Grell will flag down a passerby and ask :P)

Kalgren lifted a a hot cup of tea and took a sip. 'You can't rush tea, my friend.' He replied to Zack with a pensive glance and smile. 'I'll catch up when I'm done, if that's all right.' He took another sip. 'I'll even bring the corpse along as well if you want.'

He turned his attention back to Wulfa. 'Why the interest in stories, mister town's wizard?'

Zack nods to Kalgren. As he walks outside, Zack pats the struggling Grell on the shoulder, "Shall we get you out of this light? We'll try to find the Essentials store. Hopefully they'll have something to help with your swirling head." He chuckles, and turns to Vigil and gives a questioning tilt of the head, Shall we go?

Accompanied by the wizard and the dragonborn, Vigil stepped out of Wulfa’s home and began looking for the Essentials store, the final stop before picking up where they left the trail, assuming it was still fresh enough.

As the rest of the group leaves, they will see that the town is a bit livelier compared to the day before. It seems that with word of their victory over the creatures spread, the townsfolk were at least a bit more confident! From where you stand, it is quite obvious where the essentials store is... if only because it has a bright green sign with a fancy hand-made mountain on it.

Kalgren, meanwhile, would find himself sitting across from Wulfa again. "Well, I find that stories often tell tales of magic that offer interesting insights into the mages of the time. Goliath shamanistic tradition is a good example of such things. Druidic magic, basically... but occasionally Nature Clerics, with Spiritual Weapons." The man laughs a bit. "Plus, it uh... helps intersperse the nitty-gritty of arcane theory and eases the headache."

Zack points across at the green sign, "Shall we go speak to the proprietor?"

With a simple affirmative grunt, Vigil begins walking towards the store. Once inside, he’ll start looking around for an employee.