View source for This Heat, An Evil Heat

{{Infobox expedition log
| title = This Heat, An Evil Heat
| date = 05/04/25
| storyteller = Tire
| tier_of_play = Legendary
| player_characters = [[Zeal]], [[Melfyra]], [[Shadefrost]]
| rewards = 350 xp, 62085 gp, Staff of Fire (major), Symbol of Conflict (major), Warcaller's Chime of Dread, Book of Lingering Blaze, Aeon Stone (Olivine Pendolesque), Wand of Teeming Ghosts (rank 6), Corpse Compass, Nightmare Rune, Grasping Snare Formula, Snagging Hook Formula, Stunning Snare Formula, 4x Gorum's Tear, Taper of Sanctification
| result = Success
| author = Melfyra
| downtime_days = 16
}}

With the lerritans dealt with, all that's left for us to do is figure out where the portal they were coming from is and close it. To do that, we head to the village that Samara, Petals, Hogo, Evalynne, and Sanguine investigated and first saw the cavalcade approaching from. When we get there, there's a few burning corpses littered around the place. I heard that the remaining survivors stayed behind after the last job, so that's worrying to see. I find some bootprints. From the looks of how the wearer was moving, they weren't on fire. Judging from the fact that shadefrost found the body of the mayor strung up in a snare, it looks like we might have some company. We follow the prints and find signs of people struggling while being dragged to a nearby cave, which looked like it was dug out by a magma worm. There's a series of tunnels down there, and we find a bed. Clearly, people live/lived in here. There's not much time to think about it, as Lictor Zeal triggers a tripwire, causing an alarm to go off. We find a gang of humanoids split up through the cave, with someone who's flying around rambling on about bathing the world in cleansing fire near a big statue in a river of lava. Looks like some sort of cult? Anyways, these cultists were strong enough to put up a decent fight against us, with their leader (I think she was their leader?) casting sunburst on herself multiple times like a maniac. I'm gonna be feeling those tomorrow. Lictor Zeal points out a creature in the central chamber of the tunnels - some sort of four-legged spider with a human face, four eyes, and leonine features. We later find out that this was an Agradaemon. It gives us a really hard time, leaving us on the back foot for most of the fight. It was breathing out smoke that was so thick that I couldn't say incantations for my spells because I would've passed out otherwise. It takes a while, with us getting split up a lot, but eventually Lictor Zeal is able to take the fiend down. We investigate the rest of the ruins and find a runed obelisk that was causing creatures that go through portals to go berserk. Lictor Zeal destroys it, as well as the statue of Hastrikhal that we saw earlier in the tunnels. With the bodies of the innocents that they slew (possibly sacrificed?) recovered to be given proper burial rites, we take all the equipment we can off the cultists, cut the head of the Agradaemon, and headed home. Lictor Zeal also commissioned me to stuff the head, it'll make a fine trophy.