On Benedict’s second day in Trostenwald, he awoke early and asked Cassie to join him on an excursion to the Ustaloch a couple of miles east of the city. Cassie agreed, though Katerina, who was also up early, refused to let her go alone when she saw Benedict and Cassie leaving. Together, the three of them traveled to the shores of the Ustaloch, where Benedict asked Cassie to search for any plants that radiated a magical energy; for Katerina, he asked her to assist in searching the rocky shoreline for any hidden messages or codes as well as pieces of red stone, similar to what they found in the Wildewind’s field. This outing was related to Benedict’s disappearance from Trostenwald the last few days. He travelled into the Verstglade, seeking some information on dark magic and was almost enthralled by the evil there, until he found this red stone, which woke him from the trance. He found other pieces of this stone, though much smaller, as he moved out of the Verstglade. He has reason to think that the magical darkness of the Verstglade is attempting to spread, but, perhaps, this stone is spreading too, and might serve as a proctective force against the darkness.

After several hours, Cassie found many examples of magically altered plant life around the shore, while Katerina only found one small red stone in that time, barely the size of her palm, and not the same vibrant red. Their discussions were cut short by the attack of a large, giant squid that pulled Cassie into the water. While rescuing her, the group found a small cave underwater, where the corpse of a mage rested, encircled around a large red crystal, pulsing with light, as if the figure died while hugging the stone. Furter investigation revealed that the corpse was much more decayed than their robes, a dark green trimmed with navy blue spirals, indicating that perhaps something caused the flesh to decay faster. The group returned to Trostenwald in a thoughtful and disturbed silence.