Dragon Age 2 — Story Playthrough — Part Nine.

All Lyria had to do now, before heading off the Bartrand with the money to help fund the deep roads expedition, was to find out just what that Chantry sister wanted in Lowtown in the middle of the night, and to discover why templar-recruits were disappearing after visiting the brothel.

Both jobs seemed straight-forward enough and then they could get on to the proper business of being wealthy deep roads treasure hunters!

While on their way to find the Chantry sister, they noticed a strange mage just wandering about the foundry district of Lowtown and Lyria thought they'd best investigate... after all, didn't that templar investigating the disappearance of several women say that his investigation ended at the foundries?

Maybe this mage had something to do with it!

The mage was spooked when he noticed they were there and ran away, leaving a trail of demons in his wake to attack them.

They swiftly took care of the demons and then tried to find the mage, but it was as though he had vanished into thin air. On the ground it appeared the mage had dropped something in his haste to escape. A bag with bones in it and a small ring that looked like an Orlesian wedding ring — perhaps Ninette's?

She would deal with this new information tomorrow, for now she still had a Chantry sister to speak with.

It turned out that the "work" the sister — Sister Petrice — wanted done involved a qunari mage, leashed and bound perhaps worse than any non-qunari mage, and she wanted him escorted from the city and to freedom.

After further investigation this freedom was not out of the goodness of her heart. Petrice wanted people to see the brutes that are the qunari and for the political parties in Kirkwall to stop trying to appease them and realise the challenge they represented.

Lyria wanted no part in this ploy but felt that she had no choice. She agreed to take the qunari and lead him out of the city.

Petrice insisted that they escorted the qunari through the undercity so that no one would see them until after they emerged into the safety of the outside world.

The undercity was full of giant spiders and dangerous traps laid perhaps to capture unwary passersby, but they soon made it past. The qunari didn't speak, only grunted, and he did nothing to help as they fought through the numerous spiders.

Suddenly, they came across a group of men who were ready to grab Lyria and her people and try to ransom them. After they killed Lyria's "qunari pet."

Finally the qunari responded and with a growl set forth a wave of magic that killed the leader of the group and sent the others flying to the floor.

After that display, the qunari decided to do no more as Lyria and her group fought the remainder of the men. When the men all lay dead, Lyria tried speaking with the qunari but, once more, could get nothing out of the creature other than grunts.

Aveline pondered however Petrice had deciphered this qunari's wishes considering all she had to work with were grunts and twitches. There was no way of knowing what this qunari actually wanted.

As they followed the tunnel out of the undercity and out into the countryside, bathed bright beneath the moonlight, they walked straight into a group of qunari.

These qunari had been following a trail of dead qunari — a trail that had led directly to Lyria and the qunari-mage she was escorting. It had been a set up, but for what purpose, Lyria couldn't quite grasp.

She refused to relinquish the mage to the qunari and since they wouldn't see reason — like, working out the more important picture of why they had been set up — the qunari decided to attack.

After the fight, the qunari-mage gestured to a strange device and Lyria picked it up. Once she had a hold of it, it jerked in her hand and then suddenly the mage was able to speak.

No longer releasing a series of grunts and snarls, the qunari-mage thanked Lyria for her help, despite her help being wrong. He had wanted to live and die by the Qun and since the qunari could no longer take him, he wished to do things his own way.

The qunari set himself on fire, and burned until he died.

That had been most unexpected. Lyria didn't quite know what to think but she felt that Sister Petrice certainly had a hand in a lot of what had just happened.

Racing back to the city and to Lowtown, they barged into the sister's safehouse and demanded answers. When they had barged in, Petrice had been giving orders to her templar to clean the place up and make it look like no one had been there. It was very suspicious. AND there had been a trail of bodies that had led the qunari straight to Lyria and her qunari-mage. Just what had this all been about?

Petrice outwardly admitted that she was hoping the qunari would kill Lyria and the qunari-mage to further prove her point that these creatures could not be appeased. More needed to be done about them and the chantry and the politicians were sitting on their thumbs, doing nothing. She wanted action to take place. She wanted them all to hate the qunari and make them leave!

Lyria glared the sister down and told her that she would never deal with the likes of her again. Petrice and her templar then stormed out of the safehouse declaring that the next time they wanted help, they wouldn't bother with such thugs.

Irritated with that entire job and doubly-irritated with templars and the chantry — more reason to despise the fools — Lyria grabbed her group and took them to the brothel.

As much as she wanted this visit to be for pleasure and not business, it was unfortunately the other way around and she got straight to work asking the ladies there about the missing templar recruits.

A lady at the front-of-house looked through the guest book and discovered that Keran and Wilmod had been there quite often, and was she sure they even had time to be templars?

They had both seen a woman named Idunna, and they could find her upstairs if they wanted to chat.

Lyria hurried upstairs straight away and tried to engage Idunna in conversation... Idunna didn't want conversation though.

Allowing a seductive aura to manifest around her, it encased Lyria and her group and they found themselves powerless in the face of the woman before them. Varric wanted to have some fun with the woman, and try as Lyria might, she wanted answers to questions but instead she found herself answering the woman's insted.

Idunna wanted to know who had told them about her and after Lyria had answered, Idunna demanded that Lyria grab a knife and kindly slice it across her own throat.

Luckily, Lyria's willpower took over and she was able to break free from Idunna's spell.

Now that the woman held no power over her, she was finally able to ask her questions. Idunna was a blood mage and she was sending templars to another named Tarohne, down in the undercity. They were going to make the templars powerless, and mages would rule over the city once more. It would be like the Tevinter Imperium! Wouldn't it be glorious?

Lyria didn't agree. She thanked Idunna for her information then killed her, leaving her body on the brothel floor.

They now had to visit this Tarohne and find out what was what.

As they entered the area Idunna had spoken of, Anders warned Lyria... if so many blood mages were down here, it was likely there were a lot of protections in place.

He had been correct. Those protections soon rose up in the form of demons, everywhere, attacking them and trying to thwart their progress.

After dispatching waves upon waves of demons, Lyria at last stumbled across the ones who had summoned them. Tarohne and her followers. And a man's body hovered in mid-air, petrified.

Tarohne spoke of putting demons inside of templars and causing chaos throughout the chantry and templar ranks; of making the knight-commander go crazy! And of mages ruling akin to how the Tevinters had, hand in hand with the demons as pets.

Anders sighed and asked them why it was always about the demons?

Instead of answering, Tarohne demanded her mages and their demons attack! But not to destroy these new bodies; they could be useful.

No one was taking her body! Lyria and her group fought and fought until all the mages and their demons were dead.

As Tarohne died, the petrified man fell from mid-air and landed on the floor, then awoke. He was Keran. To make sure he hadn't already been implanted with a demon, Lyria bade Anders do a test to see if the man was safe.

Anders shot a lightning bolt at him and since no demon emerged to automatically protect itself, he deemed Keran to be safe.

Lyria told him to go, his sister was worried and looking for him.

When they emerged from Tarohne's hideout, morning had rose.

Lyria and her group went to the Gallows to inform Knight-Captain Cullen that he no longer had to worry about recruits going missing; however, he might need to keep an eye on any who had returned have a significant disappearance. It's possible they had demons in them.

Cullen was horrified and then turned on Keran, but Lyria convinced him that he had no demon in him, they had already tested him.

Cullen allowed Keran to stay in the order, but they would be keeping an eye on him for ten years before he could be made a full member of the order. Just to make sure.

While they were at the Gallows, they found the templar who had been investigating the missing women and filled him in on what they had found.

Lyria mentioned that they had seen someone flee the scene, but didn't know where they had gone. But it was definitely suspicious. The templar thanked her for continuing the investigation, and maybe now there was enough evidence for the city guard to finally do something about this.

Everything seemed finalised around the city. Lyria had plenty of coin in her pocket and the word of Varric by her side. It was time to at last approach Bartrand and offer herself as a partner for this expedition to the deep roads.

Hopefully this conversation would go well. Surely he could not refuse?

 

Until next time! 😊🐲⚔️

 

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_{All screenshots in this post are courtesy of me, @kaelci and are from the game: Dragon Age 2.}