00;00;00;00 - 00;00;22;07 Unknown Before we begin. This episode contains references to thalassophobia, drownings, trances, family violence, pregnancy issues, self-harm, suicide mania, the deaths of children, famine, and the supernatural. Listener discretion is requested. 00;00;22;09 - 00;00;52;19 There are ten pilgrims at the mission when something goes awry. Nine pilgrims. At the mission. One lets out a cry. Eight pilgrims. At the mission, one lost their sight. Seven pilgrims at the mission. One tried with all their might. Six pilgrims at the mission. Something calls out. Five pilgrims at the mission, cursed with mortal doubt. Four pilgrims at the mission. 00;00;52;21 - 00;01;18;24 Something called your name. Three pilgrims at the mission. Escaping all but blame two pilgrims at the mission. They sang both night and day. One pilgrim at the mission arrived to go away. There are no pilgrims at the mission, and still the mission stays. 00;01;18;26 - 00;01;46;03 There is a red stone church built deep into the sandy soil at the center of the Igrula Valley. It's one of those strange structures that has a history much longer than anyone's memory. And those stories of this place have filled both scroll and tome. They offer very few consistent facts. This is a place, as are many in this realm, which does not want to be documented, but it does need to be known. 00;01;46;05 - 00;02;11;14 People in the surrounding hills have come to know that at some point when you come of age, you learn about it, about the Crimson mission and what it's done and why you do not go there even when it asks for your pilgrimage, even when it calls you by your name. Tonight's episode is a little different, as you've probably surmised. 00;02;11;16 - 00;02;37;26 Instead of presenting facts and theories about an ongoing singular investigation or cold case with suspects and motives, we here at Alchemy Investigations have delved into our archive and put together four stories about the Crimson Mission, how it may have come to be, how it came to grow, how it convinces you to stay, and how it has come to now be abandoned. 00;02;37;28 - 00;02;54;22 At the center of these stories are two questions. Dear investigator, what lives in the Crimson Mission? And what would you do when it called your name? 00;02;54;24 - 00;03;22;15 This time on Alchemy Investigations, we explore through first person accounts the hunger and the want at the heart of the abandoned crimson mission of the Igrula Valley. As we sift through unbelievable story and unreliable narrator. We will become all too familiar with this site of offering decay, absence and tragedy. As the children's rhyme reminds us, there are no pilgrims at the mission. 00;03;22;17 - 00;04;02;13 And still the mission stays. Stay tuned. Investigators. Greetings, investigators. With you again as Ichabod M. Groster, lead dispatch for Alchemy Investigations. The realm's foremost private investigatory body. And this time, we're telling stories. Stories about a seemingly abandoned church far from most settlements, deep in the humid jungles of the Igrula Valley. Heading north from the Tosley Pass. A day's journey or so into the thick foliage, one finds themselves in a clearing with several structures made out of red stone unlike anything in the surrounding biomes. 00;04;02;13 - 00;04;25;26 Sandstone and shale. According to travelers and local guides, the stones let out a pleasant sound at first it cuts through the thick air, and it's a warning to those who know it, and an invitation to those who do not. And that's where the truth becomes murky. Most accounts, those that survive, will detail the din of the red stone structure. 00;04;25;26 - 00;04;53;03 It's the prelude of the Crimson Mission, but beyond that, a concise, conclusive history is hard to find. It seems that anyone who survives that place has a vastly different story to tell. That is, if they're lucky enough to survive, and tell one at all. The stories we've selected for you, dear investigator, run a very, very long timeline. The first is so old, so profoundly ancient. 00;04;53;07 - 00;05;20;21 The valley itself did not yet exist. Instead, the area was covered by a sea which facilitated trade routes between pert but foregone cities and coastal towns. One such place, Ville De Renais, still to this day tells the story of the “Gloria Moss”, a merchant ship which set to sail, returned, but wants to say goodbye, and was later found without her crew. 00;05;20;24 - 00;05;38;10 Abandoned, dead in the water on a sea which no longer exists. This is that story. The story of the Gloria Moss. 00;05;38;12 - 00;06;01;20 Much of this tale comes from the Scribner's notes of Old Kelv, the seer. Old Kelv was a mystic and astronomer in the very early days of Ville De Renais. Hers are some of the only proto histories that have survived from that era, as she enchanted her writings into living stones which would speak back her words. Unfortunately, all these stones survived in The magic remains potent. 00;06;01;22 - 00;06;19;22 The very early languages of Ville De Renais have drifted so far from the common tongue that a great deal of transcription and translation is required. As such, I hope you will permit some interpretation on my part. Also, I should mention that while we do not have an exact date for the final sailing of the Gloria Moss, no one does. 00;06;19;24 - 00;06;41;03 It does describe a time when the Igrula Valley was covered in a saltwater sea. So you can imagine it was quite some time ago. Listen well to the sad story of the Gloria Moss. A good ship found. Though her crew now lost, their families went too, down to the sea. A voice called them home a din set them free. 00;06;41;03 - 00;07;06;02 But what of us, with so many gone without our neighbors? Off hither and yon doorways darkened a song on the tongue. No butcher, no captain, no cobbler. No one. As it would happen, the Gloria Moss was a merchant ship which moved Ville De Renais jewelry across the sea to ports along the near western coast. It returned with luxury stones and precious metals. 00;07;06;04 - 00;07;30;22 At the time of its disappearance, the ship was captained by Lord Byron Attuck and owned by the Ville De Renais merchant consortium. By all tangential accounts, the ship was in good stead before the loss of its crew and others. More on that in a bit. Every 16 days it would make a round trip, offloading forged gems, jewelry and trinkets in far ports and coming back with raw stones and materials for the Ville De Renais Artisan Guild. 00;07;30;29 - 00;07;55;05 Given the somewhat valuable nature of the cargo to sail aboard, the Gloria Moss meant quite a bit of trust. Captain Attuck, it was said, was discerning, clandestine and prized security above most other virtues, which made what happened to the Moss all the more confusing. Nothing about the Gloria Moss' final voyage seemed out of the ordinary. It initially left port with no fanfare. 00;07;55;05 - 00;08;20;23 The winds were strong and orderly, and it would have gone unnoticed, save for what happened four days later when the Gloria Moss returned to the Ville De Renais port, making an unscheduled and nearly two weeks early arrival. But that was not the only irregularity. The Moss, which usually anchored out in the bay, relying on smaller tender vessels to load and unload it for security reasons, sailed right up to the port. 00;08;21;00 - 00;08;44;10 Captain Attuck must have requested that the ship come to rest right off one of the piers in the main dock, just floating right next to the shore, dropping anchor but not lowering the gangplank. The Gloria Moss set the port all day and all night. No lights or cooking smoke, no hail or greetings or flags to communicate. Nobody, not a soul coming nor going. 00;08;44;10 - 00;09;18;24 It just sat there silently. And according to old Kelv's record, the entire crew was seen standing on the deck facing the town, baking in the setting sun. They said not a word they made. Not a move. They just stood at attention silently. A whole ship of watchers waiting. The story goes that just before dawn, the gangplank was lowered and silently the crew crept off the ship and into the sleeping town. 00;09;18;26 - 00;09;40;06 They went to their homes and woke their families. Old Kelv does not elaborate on what the crew members said to their sleeping households. Assumedly, it was quite convincing because family by family still in their nightclothes, the relatives and close friends of the crew walked the streets of Ville De Renais down to the docks and boarded the Gloria Moss. 00;09;40;08 - 00;10;04;10 They packed the ship to the gills. Only then, in the cold morning light, could cheers be heard coming from the deck, and the hold. The Gloria Moss was filled and happy, and it set sail once more without a word. Leaving the dock and the bay. 00;10;04;13 - 00;10;30;26 While Captain Attuck’s command was beyond reproach, this unscheduled and unsanctioned departure and equally unscheduled arrival was apparently too much for the harbormaster, who chased the Gloria Moss in a pursuit sloop. She wasn't able to catch the Moss. as the seas had become inexplicably choppy and hard to traverse, but before the chase was relinquished, the harbormaster would attest that she heard a song on the wind coming from the deck of the ship. 00;10;30;28 - 00;10;52;29 She said it sounded like the chime of a church bell. Now would be a good moment to speak about Captain Attuck himself after what is about to happen happens. A great deal of inquest went into Captain Attuck’s history and solvency as a leader. The short story here, according to Old Kelv and several supplementary artifacts, is that he was a naval man who left the service. 00;10;52;29 - 00;11;15;04 He married his sweetheart and fathered three daughters, and he sailed the Gloria Moss from port to port over the Igrula Sea every 16th day for almost ten years. Although the numbering system is somewhat inconsistent, it may have been 13. There's some debate about this. He was awarded medals. He was held in some of the highest esteem that Ville De Renais could offer. 00;11;15;06 - 00;11;40;27 He never deviated. He was almost never late, according to memory, and by all accounts, he was the paragon of what we think about when we think about a grizzled but genuine captain. Descriptions of a portrait of him by Old Kelv later indicate that he even had a salt and pepper mustache. Textbook, just textbook. But the Moss never made it to its first port. 00;11;41;00 - 00;12;04;10 Almost immediately after the ship left Ville De Renais Bay for the second time, craft were commissioned to give chase and find the rogue vessel. At very least, Lord Captain Byron Attuck had to explain what was going on and why the ship had, without any warning or permission, nearly quadrupled its crew complement with families, relatives and friends. The Moss wasn't found on its trade route. 00;12;04;10 - 00;12;28;19 It had clearly departed from that as well, and for a time the Gloria Moss was nowhere. That is, until word came into Ville De Renais that the ship had been found by a traveling sea caravan, drifting far from any known landmark in open water, as was reported in the Arcane Communication. Please send your fastest to this place and hurry. 00;12;28;21 - 00;13;04;24 A great tragedy has befallen the Glory Moss. And a great tragedy it was. Nearly 14 days after the Moss's initial departure and ten days after it re embarked with so many on board, the Ville De Renais merchant marine sailed into view of the derelict craft, and what they found cemented the Gloria Moss in our memory from that day in near pre-history to this moment, as I relay it to you, one of the boarding crew deck cadet Aubrey Alestari, wrote a surviving memoir. 00;13;04;25 - 00;13;29;21 Later in life, she would hold political office and Ville De Renais, ushering in a golden age for the city state. And this story starts off her autobiography. It's a prologue to her character and connection to the merchant community of the city that she would eventually grow to prominence. She was one of the first aboard the Gloria Moss and reports the following. 00;13;29;24 - 00;13;56;23 She was empty. No crew, no animals, no cargo, her sails not pulled up, but torn down and missing. Not violently, not ripped like a surgeon or a doctor with a clean blade. There was no signs of combat, no struggle. Not a drop of blood spilled. The Moss must have drifted for days. But before they must have wanted to stay and must have wanted to hold position. 00;13;56;26 - 00;14;25;00 I'm sure they would have dropped anchor if the seafloor permitted. The “Viewmont” tracked back against the current to find where the Moss was meant to perch, and eventually found a trail of abandoned cargo, which became a trail of clothing and personal effects, which became something so troubling. I won't bear to mention it here. Blessings be to the sad tragedy of the Gloria Moss and her crew and passengers. 00;14;25;03 - 00;14;48;18 May the gods keep them. It would seem that they all entered the water with no struggle, as if they wanted it like babes would be baptized. While the Viewmont sailed north, we stayed aboard the Moss, checking each room and preparing the ship to sail back to homeport. Not too long after, the boatswain and one of the wee mates found Captain Attuck’s quarters locked. 00;14;48;20 - 00;15;15;24 After some work, they broke down the door, but the fates could not have prepared us for what we saw, Oolia Attuck, the middle daughter of the Attuck family, not 14 years upon her father's cot, a small wreath of seaweed upon her head, and her hands clasped as if in prayer, her poor heart beating no longer. This would prove to be more troubling than initially thought. 00;15;15;26 - 00;15;54;09 Oolia's body showed no sign of violence, which meant that she either died peacefully in a repose fit for a painting, or someone laid her there after she passed, locking the door behind them. This brings us to the part of the story that most people know, the part that you tell around campfires, the dark joke shared between sailors when they call each other little Rose during a squall. On the port side in the main hold, Deck Cadet Alestari found several sheets of parchment tucked into a seam, which seemed to be written by Oolia Attuck documenting the final voyage of the Gloria Moss. 00;15;54;11 - 00;16;04;17 As the Deck Cadet’s memoirs have been translated and maintained over time, so to have these final words. 00;16;04;19 - 00;16;37;15 Papa woke us up. Sisters, mater, and I rushed. Papa whispered something in mater's ears which made her smile wide. We were to march down to the ship together quickly. Papa had come back for us. I've never been on a ship before, and I was so excited. The whole town seemed to be aboard. The crew had come and gathered their husbands and wives and parents and children and so many others. 00;16;37;17 - 00;17;07;12 Rumors spread. One family said that this was a vacation for good work done. Someone said that the crew had found a Paradise island and they wanted to share it with those they loved, though many said nothing at all, instead singing hymns like the ones we'd sing in the temple. But oh... something is wrong. Everyone stopped speaking. By the night 00;17;07;12 - 00;17;35;10 On the first day, everyone just sang. Sang at the top of their lungs. A song I do not know. My sisters are singing. Even the littlest who can barely speak. Where did they learn these words? And why don't I know them? The ship has stopped, but the singing is loud and thrilling. Even through a hoarse voice. They sing. 00;17;35;10 - 00;18;00;28 They sang as they ripped out the sails. They sang as they tossed boxes and crates, barrels overboard. They sang as the first of them dove into the water. I begged mater to stop. I grabbed her frock, but she, with the littlest in her arms, sang for the louder. I couldn't stop it. 00;18;01;00 - 00;18;18;19 I ran down to the hold where I write this now, and I hear splash after splash and the sound of singing has grown quieter and quieter. Forgive me. 00;18;18;21 - 00;18;56;27 I am alone now. It's quiet and I do not know how to sail this ship. There are no rafts, no tenders, and now there are no songs and no singers. I summoned the courage to look overboard just once. And I saw Eli, the butcher's son. He was surrounded by so many others, I looked away, I could not bear to see mater or my sisters, and I have tried in vain to remember that song, to sing it myself, to hear what they heard. 00;18;56;29 - 00;19;02;26 But I just can't sing it right. 00;19;02;29 - 00;19;30;05 Finally, there is this last entry. It seems to be written down at some point after the purported mass drowning, and I cannot say for sure how long Oolia remained about the ship. And this should be, of course, taken with some skepticism. Clearly, the young girl had gone through an incredibly traumatic event, but the words that Alestari found were these Papa's alive, he's alive. 00;19;30;05 - 00;19;49;21 He's knocking outside on the hull. And a voice I hear it calling out, little rose, little rose, little rose, that's Papa. I'm saved. And surely he'll sail us home. 00;19;49;24 - 00;20;14;25 The ghost ship of the Gloria Moss was towed back to Ville De Renais, and immediately a cleric was brought in to revive Oolia. As her testimony would prove invaluable. But apparently she could not be awakened by supernatural talent. As the cleric reported to the merchant consortium who paid for the revival, if a soul is unwilling, it cannot always be retrieved. 00;20;14;27 - 00;20;37;01 The Gloria Moss' crew found something in that water that was so important, so sacred, that they retrieved everyone who mattered to them in the whole world and sailed back, back to the middle of the salt sea, back to the middle of nowhere, with just a hymn on their tongues that they may have well learned from the water itself. 00;20;37;04 - 00;20;44;05 Why little Oolia couldn't join them in their song. I will never know. 00;20;44;08 - 00;21;21;01 What we do know our threefold truths one. The makeshift journal, Oolia's Journal, was found in the hold of the Gloria Moss that's below deck, and Oolia was found above deck, dead in the captain's quarters, behind a door that needed to be locked from the outside with the key. Two -- Old Kelv was a noted astronomer, a scholar of the skies, and one month before the Gloria Moss lost its way, she wrote of fire in the sky streaking down to the sea. 00;21;21;04 - 00;21;50;29 She called it a terrible omen. And three deck cadet Aubrey Alestari was the first daughter of a mapmaker. She kept excellent notes, and if he were to use them to backtrack the Gloria Moss from the spot where it was found, to the spot where it meant to stop, where those converts made the plunge into the frigid water that spot when time passed and the Igrula Sea dried up, becoming the Igrula Valley, lush and Verdant. 00;21;51;02 - 00;22;26;05 That spot in the sea floor would be a day's ride from the Tosley Pass, a place where now pilgrims come to pray in the red light of the Crimson Mission, hungry in the jungle as it was on the sea. What, dear investigators called out from beneath that ebb and flow. We'll explore that further after our break. This particularly spooky episode of Alchemy Investigations is brought to you by Countess Otto's anti-aging serum. 00;22;26;08 - 00;22;50;00 Don't like those unsightly lines? Want to keep your hair looking bright and youthful? Contact Countess Otto's Forever Young consortium for your free consultation. Side effects may include day sweats, temporary loss of appetite, light to moderate vampirism and dry mouth. Remember, we can't beat Mother Time, but we can elude her under the cover of night. 00;22;50;02 - 00;23;12;18 Our second story, tonight, comes by way of the notes from an art history lecture offered by the famed bardic historian, Doctor Gossimer Mox. Doctor Mox specializes in methods of cultural preservation, and he published a paper nine years ago entitled Painted Folklore The Hidden Occult Tragedy of Maerbell of Igrula as depicted in Starsi Jophenda’s ‘The Crimson Lady of the Valley’ -- a mouthful for sure. 00;23;12;18 - 00;23;32;01 As many academic titles are. For our purposes, it's going to be useful to break down this title into its parts so that we may become oriented. A very long time ago, probably when your great great grandmothers were just children. A woman at the end of her own life named Starsi Jophenda, painted a landscape painting called The Crimson Lady of the Valley. 00;23;32;01 - 00;24;02;29 This image, painted on a cedar board, depicts the lowest part of the Igrula Valley in dark reds and blacks. At the center of this image is the outline of a reclining woman in ceremonial religious dress. This woman is meant to be Maerbelll of Igrula, a former nun who took up residence in the Igrula Valley. She is said to have built the Crimson Mission's first structures, relaying via letters her thoughts and intentions to her niece, a small girl who would grow up to become the famed artist Starsi Jophenda. 00;24;03;01 - 00;24;23;23 So in the timeline, long after the Gloria Moss was lost and found in the sea, levels fell, revealing the valley below. A nun named Maerbell came to the land and built what would become the Crimson Mission, detailing the process to her young niece, who would later paint her understanding of the scene in the now famous The Crimson Lady of the Valley painting. 00;24;24;00 - 00;24;44;16 Much, much later, Doctor Mox would do a great deal of research to contextualize this effort in his scholarly work. Doctor Mox writes, before we can fully appreciate the artistry of The Crimson Lady, we must do the work to learn about how the eponymous subject came to the Igrula Valley in the first place. Several hundreds of years ago, 00;24;44;16 - 00;25;11;04 Though accounts here can be challenging to verify as the area is remote and confirmable record keeping is not the local priority. There was a great famine to the west of the Igrula Valley, and it displaced vast swaths of people who moved into parts of the region to stake claims and attempt to rebuild their lives. Settlements like Tosley and Corveray were founded around this time, largely from immigrant populations escaping the famine and the political instability which inevitably followed. 00;25;11;06 - 00;25;36;26 But our concern is a singular pilgrim, one who fled the famine and at some point on the road east to Tosley, broke off from her traveling companions and walked, seemingly by herself, into the deep and wild jungle. This woman, who we will come to know as sister, soon to be mother Maerbell, was Starsi Jophenda’s paternal aunt, and I posit that her writings had a profound impact on our artist. 00;25;36;28 - 00;25;59;26 Studying this relationship will give us a more huned insight into Jophenda’s work and her final painting in particular. Famously, Doctor Ivan Rist intoned that Jophenda spent her whole life with what happened to her aunt at the back of her mind, only releasing it into the world when her own health began to fail. She could no longer contain such an enormous truth. 00;25;59;29 - 00;26;23;00 So for a time, Sister Maerbell seemed to settle in a remote part of the Igrula valley, living alone in the dense jungle, notably having no formal survival training, having spent the preceding decades in a convent but thriving in Igrula nonetheless. And then the letters began. It is unclear to me how these notes found their way to Little Starsi, living just southwest of the capital. 00;26;23;06 - 00;26;52;18 Perhaps Maerbell tracked back to Tosley and sent them by post there, but the sheer fact that she was able to send them at all really does speak to the preternatural tenacity of this former nun. Many who study the Crimson Mission hold Maerbell and a very important light. Lady Bester of the Oprex Academy, who runs an archive concerning evil aligned martyrs, once wrote that Sister Maerbell may be a poor fit for her collection, as it is unclear if the mission made her wicked or if quite the opposite. 00;26;52;20 - 00;27;04;19 Regardless, her letters to her niece are informative to our project here. And so Maerbell wrote. 00;27;04;21 - 00;27;29;24 Dearest Starsi, I have been tested, I am safe, but I have been tested and I have starved and I have run, and I have slept while waking so that I might run some more. But do not pity me this, nor have your father pity me. But do light three candles at the temple, one for me, one for you, and one for the light which guides us. 00;27;29;26 - 00;27;49;05 I could not stay with the others. They have been crushed under doubt and pain, and I need to follow what I know to be truth. The wilderness here is filled with life, and I hear it in every bird song and insect call. I have made my home deep in the thick of it. The light has called me to a clearing where no trees can grow. 00;27;49;07 - 00;28;14;22 The light has called me through the darkened canopy to be protected in its glory. And I am safe here. Three candles, little star. No more, no less. Please. Ichabod here, Dr. Mox will, from here on out, do a fair bit of quotation from Maerbell's letters to her niece. As a fellow academic, I respect the commitment to finding and including these letters as they are relevant artifacts. 00;28;14;22 - 00;28;34;21 But as with many scholarly products, it can get a little wordy. To better prepare you, I would like to describe the Crimson Lady of the Valley, the painting in question. Unfortunately, ours is an ear based medium and the original painting is in the private collection of one Dame Xaxxon Miswit, though I have very little information beyond that. In memory, 00;28;34;21 - 00;29;01;29 The painting is large, nearly two of my arms lengths wide by one and hide the edges of the image are a pure black, the sort which almost seems enchanted to shift and displace as you move your eyes across it, like the paint is still flowing, despite having been dry for centuries. As we draw our gaze closer to the center of the piece, the dark sections become broken up by what looks like foliage, creating layers of ambient shadow and depth. 00;29;02;02 - 00;29;33;29 That's where the figures start. Behind the trees appear all manner of person short, tall, old, all with their backs turned to the viewer, barely discernible against the dark background, save for a sliver of light red cresting over the shoulders and tops of heads. Imagine hidden in the dense jungle, droves of people standing at attention like worshipers at a sermon, each individual but none distinguishable, backlit by sharp crimson light. 00;29;34;02 - 00;30;09;20 As we move ever closer to the center, the tree line ends, and so too does the Onlooking congregation. Now it's just an open clearing. The odd section of dirt inside, broken up by what looks like lumps of stone. But close inspection shows that these are depictions of people who have come to lay still, face down in the dirt, as if they were walking out of the trees into the clearing and were crushed by some large weight or wind, the bones of the odd arm or leg sticking up into the night sky. 00;30;09;23 - 00;31;10;28 And at the center of the painting is the church, which Maerbell herself built, with steps leading down into the crystalline terrain. The eponymous crimson mission and at the base of this church, emanating radiant rose colored light, there is a woman rendered in a classically figurative way, such that the painter wanted us to see her sallow face and her sunken eyes, her face agape and distorted, her body clothed in opulent Orthodox regalia so near death either the moments right before or the moment held just after the woman in the painting is being caressed and cradled by a shape, an intentionally ugly shape, contrasting with the finesse of the figurative work on the woman, Maerbell. 00;31;11;01 - 00;31;36;13 The shape, which seems as if Jophenda spilled a pot of ink to achieve the effect, is holding Maerbell in a delicate repose, like a holy mother over a child. The importance of the shadow has given relief from the enervated form of the broken Maerbell. Before it became privately owned, people would claim to see objects in the shadows of the trees. 00;31;36;16 - 00;32;04;18 And given what we know about the area, I am not the least bit surprised to hear that one of the most cited objects hidden in the visual noise of the near negative space is what looks like the anchor of a great sailing ship, out of place among the landlocked jungle. But to try to understand how all of this came to be, we need to return to Doctor Mox and the Lady of the Valley’s 00;32;04;18 - 00;32;31;07 Letters to her niece. Dearest Starsi, three more candles when you can. Today. The light is a light of purpose. I see it, yes, but I also hear it overtaking my eyes and my ears. I feel it in my body like a kick, like a voice which cheers you and makes great works possible. You can see it, can you? 00;32;31;07 - 00;32;55;23 Not? In the eyes of your heart. A sanctuary in the clearing, a holy place amidst the noise and darkness of the jungle. It needs me. It needs me to do what I must do. I was first called to the convent. Now again, much louder. I know what I have been called here to do, little star. And one day you will know what you have been called to do. 00;32;55;25 - 00;33;20;04 I just know it. I know that if I have to carve it out of the stone with the bones of my fingers, I will. I will dig into the rocks and stones until they be altars and steeples. I shall grow this place of purpose and light. And someday little star, you will come see it for yourself. With your eyes, you and your father. 00;33;20;06 - 00;33;57;11 And every one we know. Three candles at the temple, dear. Don't forget, from here Doctor Mox goes on in his lecture. It goes without saying that these letters take on a very unsettling demeanor very quickly. Whether we would attribute that to an infirm mind or to the trauma of the famine and subsequent displacement, I am unsure. Maerbell, of Igrula, had been living alone in the wilderness for several months at this point, which makes the following letter and its revelation ever the more complicated. 00;33;57;14 - 00;34;05;03 Keep in mind, too, that at the time, Starsi Jophenda would have been no older than 12. 00;34;05;05 - 00;34;31;03 Dearest Starsi, I write to bear a miracle unto you. Miracles are gifts that we can give by telling, by calling a name in the wilderness. And no sooner had I begun to dig in the land beneath me, no sooner had I removed the first bright red stone did I feel it. I certainly thought that it was impossible. Grown from my soul into my body. 00;34;31;05 - 00;35;07;23 It is confirmation of purpose. I will build in this place, this site of work and worship, so that I may thrive, so that I may bring into this place new life. Please, little star, light four candles, one for yourself and one for the light, but do spare two for us. The two pilgrims in the mission now. 00;35;07;25 - 00;35;31;10 So Maerbell would carry a child. How this child came to be is very unclear. Beyond magical and spiritual abilities to create life in this way, false pregnancies have also been commonplace in times of trauma and unrest. So to say, one way or another with certainty is not possible. But I also believe that Ms. Jophenda was deeply affected by these letters. 00;35;31;10 - 00;36;08;07 And this letter in particular, as I was able to view these messages in the Jophenda Ephemera collection in Malort, I could see how she stored them when she was alive. It was in a small metal box with a lock. She carried that box with these letters in it from place to place. From childhood to old age. And the more I read through her journals and notes on the subject, the less I believe the lock was to keep prying eyes out, and much more to keep the letters, or simply their intent sealed away. 00;36;08;09 - 00;36;21;28 At very least to make it more difficult to open the box should Starsi desire to reread them, allowing her a moment to reconsider as she fumbled with the key. 00;36;22;01 - 00;36;46;21 As you well know, Starsi Jophenda became the court artist for Tsarina Cosgru of Malort. And her style, while figurative, was used to make the royals of the court look beautiful and wonderful. Her work is often cited as the preeminent leader in the new luminescence movement, privileging bright colors, muted contrasts, and cohesive depictions of subjects smiling with rosy cheeks and bright big eyes. 00;36;46;23 - 00;37;09;16 This is not at all surprising, as few leaders want dour portraits of them and their families. Few intentionally wish to appear unwell or ill at ease. But despite the cheery nature of her work, Ms. Jophenda would often take to bouts of inconsolable sadness in her adult life. She would often toil into the night on these uplifting works of color and vibrance, and then sleep much of the day. 00;37;09;19 - 00;37;34;12 She rarely gave lectures nor lessons, and would on occasion disappear for weeks at a time. After the death of her father, who would have been Maerbells's brother, Starsi Jophenda, left the court and in fact left public society altogether as it would happen. The last time she was seen was two days after her father's burial at the Temple of Light in the Malort City capital. 00;37;34;14 - 00;38;02;27 She gave confession to the cleric, and it would seem she vanished until her death four years later, when she was found, along with the recently completed The Crimson Lady of the Valley, painting in her apartments near the Fife's Elder section of Malort City. She was found without note or letter. No will nor testament. She just passed on, laying in her bed chamber the paintings set up before her so she might regard it from her final repose. 00;38;02;29 - 00;38;24;12 Despite the sad end of Starsi Jophenda, I do want to remind us all of the light and beauty she offered to this world, how she could cultivate a smile out of the young and old. And as the Cosgru families said at her funeral service, we only wish that we could live up to the joy that Madame Jophenda painted behind our eyes. 00;38;24;15 - 00;38;56;13 I am unclear how many letters were sent to Starsi when she was a child. The ones I can verify are months and sometimes years apart. It would seem that Maerbell, while apparently pregnant, hand-built several structures into the open grove in the Igrula Valley. Depicted in some of these letters are a main building, which Maerbell called the sanctuary, a long boarding structure which she called the host, and a tower which she called the steeple. 00;38;56;15 - 00;39;21;27 Additionally, there are a few references to smaller outbuildings and a burial cairn where she would presumably lay believers to rest, though aside from her and perhaps her unborn child, I do not know how these tombs would come to be filled. Now. I am not a structural engineer nor a gifted artificer, and there are plenty of magics in the world which might shape these ruby like stones into the aforementioned buildings. 00;39;22;00 - 00;39;41;17 To my knowledge and research, Maerbell did not possess such arcane talents, though it would seem she was able to build these masonry edifices by hand while with child alone in the jungle, my own mother would often say that no magic can stand between a mother and a better life for her child. And I suppose that sentiment is true. 00;39;41;17 - 00;40;05;25 And if so, Mother Maerbell would certainly be its patron saint. But most Perplexingly and I must stress that the time frame here is hard to verify. But given the time between letters and placed using dates in Ms. Jophenda’s personal journal, Maerbell did not give birth for two and a half years after the first mention of her child. 00;40;05;28 - 00;40;31;08 She just carried it while building the Crimson Mission, seemingly by hand in her final letter to her little star, or at least the last letter that Starsi Jophenda kept in her collection. Maerbell of Igrula shared the following, closing out her message -- I can feel the urgency now as I place the finishing stones in the narthex, I. 00;40;31;11 - 00;41;01;11 I didn't know I'd be making a bassinet to welcome your cousin, your little cousin. We have a bed for you too, little star, as I will need you to witness. Because what good is a story that we can't tell? We'll keep watch for you, please do light four candles again, my dear. And please don't keep the light waiting. 00;41;01;14 - 00;41;25;07 To my knowledge, Starsi did not visit her aunt when she was invited. She did. I propose visit much, much later. As part of my research for this publication and presentation, I was able to secure a grant and visit the Igurla Valley, taking a trip of my own to the Crimson Mission to verify some of the depictions in Ms. Jophenda’s work. 00;41;25;10 - 00;41;51;09 It is an odd place, made all the more odd by my understanding of how it came to be. Travel made, of course, all the more complicated by much more recent events, which are not the purview of this academic study. When arriving at the mission, one sees the structures mentioned by Mother Maerbell. There is indeed a church or temple at the center, with a cellar that is very much in disrepair. 00;41;51;12 - 00;42;12;01 It would seem that Maerbell used the crystal and stones to construct the load bearing elements of the mission, and utilized wood or some other, less permanent material for many of the walls as those have fallen off. The boarding structure only consists of incomplete redstone pillars, and the steeple is much more of a spire now, like the crow's nest of a ship. 00;42;12;03 - 00;42;48;16 Of course, the burial site and the cairns have been enchanted and I was not permitted in there. Not at all a surprise given Vosgarith’s and the Ornamental Order’s mass suicide five years ago. The locals are still very sensitive to that, and I, being a good visitor, observed these limits as well. Walking around the space, I couldn't help but imagine the maniacal, wide eyed Mother Maerbell, summoning an impossible strength to terraform this place, to raise the stone like a thousand polished rubies, constructing a radiant church in its own infancy. 00;42;48;21 - 00;43;13;11 It must have been a truly impressive and incredible sight. I was standing inside the sanctuary with its now sucking ceiling, and something came over me. I asked one of the guides from Tosley to steady me, and he walked me out into the sun and let me sit a spell away from the mission. When I felt more myself, I turned around and realized something. 00;43;13;14 - 00;43;44;07 The view from where I happened to be standing was familiar. Not abstractly familiar, actually familiar. It was the exact view of the church from Starsi Jophenda. This painting, the exact perspective. I have studied that painting for three decades, and I know it as well as I know my reflection. And I know that at some point before her last days, Starsi Johpenda had come here and stood where I was standing. 00;43;44;09 - 00;44;10;05 It was a realization for me as an art historian. We often think of artworks as sites of memory, but we are not often in a position to use an artwork to uncover a truth once buried, a truth once locked away. Jophenda came here to this place to take up her aunt's invitation. However late and at the end of her life, she painted this view. 00;44;10;08 - 00;44;34;01 I must have had a terrible look on my face, because the guide insisted on turning back to Tosley. He said that if we did not leave soon, we would be caught in this place at night, and that was not a good idea. He said that we had to return to Tosley before the last bell stopped ringing. I had been at the mission for hours and I had not heard a single bell, but he clearly had, and that worried me greatly. 00;44;34;04 - 00;44;56;05 We left immediately and said nothing. On the long trek out of the jungle. Thank you for coming to this lecture. I hope it has been illuminating for you. And I offered this in closing the letters sent to young Starsi Jophenda clearly burdened her with a great psychic weight, one which had a profoundly stressful effect during her lifetime. 00;44;56;05 - 00;45;22;12 While simultaneously providing the backbone of a prolific and culturally important career. Despite the value and knowing this complex connection to the Crimson Mission and Maerbell of Igrula, I would encourage you to meditate on the power that extremes may create. As Vass of Herackla reminds us, each feast was once a living beast, and each tear shed creates room in the eye to see beauty. 00;45;22;14 - 00;45;38;19 It would seem the Starsi Jophenda that gave all her joy to the world through her art, and saved one last bit to memorialize her dear aunt. Lost to the jungle Igrula, for better or worse. 00;45;38;21 - 00;46;15;20 Doctor Mox is famous for his academic performances, and while I do think that he will oftentimes forgo the rigors of scholarship for a good story in this case, I'm glad he did. Well, there are other stories about Maerbell. Many fall into the misogynistic and misguided, quote unquote evil woman in the woods trope, which I think undersells both the incredible architectural work she was able to accomplish and the profoundly complex correspondence she shared with her niece, as it stands now, after the Gloria Moss was lost in the Igrula Sea and the sea itself dried up. 00;46;15;23 - 00;46;42;07 A crimson mission called out to Maerbell, a lost soul in need of purpose, and convinced her to build a place of congregation and fellowship. In time, this site would become the focus for disappearances, hauntings, murder, and a very notable ritualistic mass suicide. Whatever is at the center of the mission, it clearly needs company, preferring those who cannot leave. 00;46;42;09 - 00;47;02;23 Fortunately for us, we can, as that is in fact where we will have to leave it for today to properly tell the story of the Crimson Mission in the modern era. From the diary of a thief who would pilfer one of the red stones to the now infamous ornamental order mass suicide, we will require the time and space of another full episode. 00;47;02;23 - 00;47;24;16 But don't worry, by the end of this two parter, you should feel confident enough to walk into the Igrula Valley, and conduct a productive investigation. Regardless of what you might hear on the wind. Thank you for listening to tonight's episode. Part one of a two part edition. In this first half, we have looked at the origins of the Crimson Mission of the Igrula Valley. 00;47;24;16 - 00;47;49;28 We have recounted the tale of the Gloria Moss, who lost its crew in the sea above, where the mission would come to be built. And we have explored the supernatural underpinnings of Starsi Jophenda’s depiction of her aunt as she built the mission's first structures. Looking ahead, we will hope to answer the questions what causes the strange events near the Crimson Mission, and how can we learn more while not succumbing to its thrall? 00;47;50;01 - 00;48;04;15 This has been Ichabod M. Groster for Alchemy Investigations. Farewell. Until next time. Investigators, and beware. 00;48;04;18 - 00;48;30;03 Alchemy Investigations is produced at Else Break Labs and is hosted by Ichabod M Groster. This episode and its related materials are released with absolutely no warranty nor support, and are distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution noncommercial share alike 4.0 international license. If you are interested in learning more about tonight's mystery or want to explore others, please click the link in the description or visit us at our website. 00;48;30;06 - 00;48;57;02 alchemyinvestigations.com. There, Ichabod will explain the resolution of this particular scenario and offer tips on how it might be run as a tabletop role playing game One-Shot, or as part of a larger campaign in your next game night. Tonight’s story all names, characters, and incidents. They’re in our works of fiction. No identification with actual persons, living or deceased places, structures, ideals and or products is intended, nor should be inferred. 00;48;57;04 - 00;49;23;15 Alchemy Investigations is supremely thankful to our wide network of correspondence correspondents like the illustrious Dr. Gossimer Mox, who allowed us access to his lectures and footnotes, but not in notes which we understand and respect. We would also like to extend a sincere thanks to Mr. Ganymede -- the docent at Dame Xaxxon Miswit’s private collection. We appreciate your help despite not being able to visit the gallery itself. 00;49;23;17 - 00;49;31;13 And of course, thanks to you, dear investigators. Stay well and stay curious. This transcript may contain small inconsistencies. If you encounter one and would like to report it to be corrected in subsequent updates, please contact us at ichabodmgroster@gmail.com Alchemy Investigation and its related materials are offered with absolutely no warranty nor support and are distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution - NonCommercial - ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0).