Emit didn't want to travel with the group but was concerned so he followed. When the group was in trouble he waded in trying to cut the villager but failed. After some more scuffling Reggie's desperate attack gave them key information. They were some kind of automatons different from Aetherforged, more mechanical than magical. Forgecrafter William finds them fascinating and has not seen them before.

The group has a hard time trying to corral the villagers but does so. They hear metal on metal and Emit goes to investigate, he sees Five Horse/ Dog creatures with cages for torsos, villagers connected by tubes. They do their best to prepare for an ambush.

Rohan unleashes his chain and decimates four of the five horse creatures. Rohan was ensorcelled and stepped in front of Reggie taking the brunt of the damage but he uses the chains to protect himself. The creature ignores the group attacking it and spews some gas on the unconscious villagers who begin to change into four new horses who begin tubing the villagers.

They scuffle, Alan runs away from the fray, Emit attempts to cut the tubing and it seems severing the connection was a good way. The horse turned back into the villager and the villager lost the horn (button) on their back. Birds in the sky began plummeting, they continue to scuffle and they feel corruption around trying to take hold. They manage to dispatch the horse and have to try to transport the villagers. It's a difficult journey but they manage to make it back to Bastion.

Met with Mr. Griffin of the Luminaries, some were stamped as official helpers tasked with finding the scavenger for him. The group split up to investigate, Emit checked with contacts that he knew but the situation was too hot for most people to be involved in. They regrouped and shared that the scavenger fled to an area of Bastion that still has Bloom.

Emit ran into a person he did a job with ten years ago that didn't quite go as planned who informed them that the Forgemasters are also interested in the relic. They continued on and ran into some Lightkeepers "fixing" a pylon and Alan tried to get in with them which didn't go well. Delaney ran into Gina, a person she knew in her youth who told her to be on their way. Strider was curious about the pylon and wanted to look into it but the group all wanted to move on and convinced them otherwise.

The group was able to locate the scavenger thanks to Delany talking to an older tree who sensed the changes caused by the relic. Strider approached the Kelpie (a horse, fish hybrid creature), it looks at the group giving them a sense of dread.

While that was happening Emit moved to try to retrieve the relic (a sextant) which was in the scavenger's hand clearly draining him. The bag he used to try to protect himself disappeared when he touched the relic and suddenly he was holding it and feeling as if he was being drained.

Alan tried to go to Emit to help in and the Kelpie (Nightmare) came to them and licked their face, drawing on their most recent nightmare which was of the demonic bear that he encountered with the Verdant. Emit tried to figure out and deactivate the relic with Delaney's help which they were not able to do and they possibly made it worse. 

Serpent tried to use electricity to hurt the relic but instead it went through the water harming everyone. Alan teleported in and is working to understand the relic. Emit tried to redo his amazing strike to knockout the bear and did so but the fact this is a dream made the act not go as it did before. Strider and Alan began to try to just destroy the relic, in the chaos Delany changed into a wolf which helped bolster the group. Emit took the relic from the air and was able to smash it, ending the magic. 

Alan took a few pieces of the sextant for themself. Delaney and Emit returned the destroyed sextant to Mr. Griffin, they both were cold in their conversations and he was not pleased with the relic being destroyed. With the relic destroyed Strider returned to studying in the Two Silver.

The group went out to investigate the mystery of the goods going to the disappearing keep, and after a bit of time found the site of the Night Keep. They began doing what they could to investigate as quietly as they could. Emit was able to sneak close to one of the containers finding that they had been moving plant seeds. Each member investigated what they could before things escalated. The leader mentioned a mana forge, a powerful device which is used to refine raw aetherite. Rohan tried to stop whatever magical device they were using with a caged grizzly bear and did until the bear itself knocked the two materials together.In the resulting confusion Emit was able to take the demonic bear out with a well placed strike with knock out poison.

From there they all fought to help each other escape while battling against the Verdant forces. Thanks to some well placed uses of magic and outright deception they were able to fight them off until the keep disappeared leaving them with just the few stragglers and the Verdant who went after the loose horses. A standoff occurred that was tipped in the group's favor thanks to the demonic bear waking up and being directed through some obscuring magic by Alan to attack the Verdant.

It took longer to get back to Bastion since their prisoner refused to speak and tried to escape any chance she got. Led by Clarrissa they shared their stories and got a better picture of all that happened and what threats these people will possibly pose in the future.