All the gold I took from the mint was already gone - I bought every spell that Rudyom in Cove had to offer (half the spells I could learn in total) and ran out of gold before purchasing the final spell (the eighth circle spell, Swordstrike).
We had a couple of options at this point - go to Minoc to follow up what the Britannian Mining Company is doing to Lock Lake and deliver Batlin's package to Elynor, or travel to Yew to investigate Nastassia's father's death. I decided to go to Yew first - because I had traveled that way already to hunt deer and to pick up the flying carpet.
Yew was the city of Justice but is now mostly forest with a few scattered houses. The only inhabitants are rangers who explore and hunt in the woods. Beyond Yew is the Empath Abbey where the monks make great wine.
We took our time exploring the woods on the way and fought spiders, wolves, and bridge trolls. We met a few rangers before stumbling upon Iolo's house. It was in a right mess:
There was a letter from his wife Gwenno who has apparently traveled to some mythical place called the Serpent Isle (which we learn about in Ultima VII part 2!). As I always do when I play this game... I cleaned the place up and made it my own. I use it to store magic weapons and armour that I no longer need or may need in the future. I already had a Firedoom Staff and a glass sword to put on display, and a great dagger I no longer needed:
Next to Iolo's house is a barn with a talking horse named Smith. Smith talks a lot and is quite irritating, and if you talk for long enough he gives you a clue. Unfortunately the clue relates to the previous game, Ultima VI: The False Prophet.
Something actually useful is the woodsman Tseramed who decided to join our party. Tseramed becomes the penultimate member of our party.
Tseramed had a lot to say about The Fellowship. Someone dear to him, Lady M, died due to Abraham not letting her see a healer (The Fellowship have a distrust of healers and mages). Tseramed hunts Abraham across the land for vengeance. He joined our party and we headed north. We had not learnt anything about Nastassia's father before we reached the Empath Abbey.
The Abbey itself houses several monks. There is also a prison, a healer, a cemetery, and the great mage Nicodemus. Nicodemus' house is locked with a magical lock which means I cannot enter until I obtain the Unlock Magic spell. In the meantime I admired his enormous chess set:
I met some of the monks first - Aimi, Kreg, Perrin, and Taylor. Kreg asked me to obtain a potion of invisibility for him.
At the prison the guard Goth was a blunt and corrupt person. He sold me keys to the prison and gave me inside information in exchange for gold. The log book at the prison mentions Sullivan the trickster again, specifically mentioning that he has been dressing as the Avatar. The same log book mentions Hook who is a known and dangerous killer (must be the hooked man who killed Christopher in Trinsic). New information is that Hook travels with a wingless gargoyle named Forskis. That must be the gargoyle that Spark saw flee the stables. Also in the log was Kellin who is a thief who has used the alias Kreg before... looks like Kreg the monk is not what he seems!
In the prison was a troll and a pirate. After giving the troll some food he told me a secret - a voice talks to the trolls (in their head) and warns them of danger. It could be the same voice that occasionally speaks to me - it could even be linked to the "inner voice" that the Fellowship talks about.
We confronted Kreg about being a thief... he confessed and attacked me with a poisoned dagger. I had to slay him right on the roof of the Abbey.
I was trying to find the monk Taylor to ask him what he knows, and stumbled upon Bee Cave. The cave is full of giant bees. They didn't seem to attack me so I delved deeper inside the cave...
Inside the cave were... naked people.
They seemed completely unaware of the outside world. They claim to eat mice and take honey when the bees are sleeping, but their language was broken at best. Spark's jaw dropped at the naked woman, and Iolo had to close it for him. As we delved deep into the bee infested cave Iolo noted he was "too old for this" which made me chuckle.
At the end of the cave was honey. Now, I am pretty sure if I take that honey every bee in the cave is going to attack me on sight. I felt like I needed some way to distract them or the entire cave of bees was going to descend on me... but I took a chance, grabbed some honey, and RAN! Several bees chased me all the way outside but we survived and got the honey.
I finally found Taylor when he returned to the Abbey. We finally got a lead on Nastassia's father Julius. Taylor remembers someone with that name who was brought to the cemetery to be buried.
With that, I felt I had learnt as much as I could from the citizens of the Empath Abbey. Before heading to the next location I went for an adventure deep into the forests of Yew to find anything else I could relating to Julius.
I found a strange abandoned building filled with Wisps (balls of living energy). I was unable to communicate with them.
And then I found an area filled with Silverleaf trees (the roots are a delicacy). Among the trees lived a tribe of small humanoids named Emps. Lucky I had the honey on me because one of the Emps, Trellek, came and talked to me in order to get it.
Trellek knew all about Julius. He was a friend of the Emps, and saved many of them from a fire years ago. He died of smoke inhalation. I talked with their leader, an older female named Salamon who said I needed to talk to Trellek about a job. Humans are cutting down the Silverleaf forest that they have built their homes in and we need to stop the deforestation. I am piecing together what they're saying but bottom line - if I can convince some woodcutters to leave the Silverleaf trees along then Trellek may join my party. I've heard Emps can talk to Wisps - it could be useful.
Before going to find the woodcutter, I explored the forests of Yew some more. I came across a cave but needed an Unlock Magic spell to explore it properly. I fought endless waves of wolves, and I even came across the Shrine of Justice.
We then used the Help spell to return to Britain and purchase a few spells from Nystal (including Unlock Magic), before travelling back to Yew to find this woodcutter.
I found him, using the flying carpet to speed up the search, and relay the story of the Emps and what cutting down Silverleaf trees is doing. He signs Salamon's contract, and it looks like we have a deal. I left the flying carpet at Iolo's house and headed back to the Emps.
Salamon was pleased with the signed contract and gave me permission to take Trellek with me for a while. But... his wife changed her mind and decided she will not let Trellek come with me. She asks why I want him to come with me... and at this point I can see I have yet to unlock something. The connection between the Wisps and Emps is not yet clear, and I have no clear motive to need to talk to the Emps. I will need to come back to the Emps later.
Here is our party at the end of this session:
Jaana is wearing our first magic chest plate.
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