Father Knows Best

First topic message reminder :

Okay, so this is a sequel to Monk's Friend. There wasn't much substance to that quest, so I'm going to take what there actually was and just run with it.

So far, basic plot:

-After returning from a pilgrimage, Father Mortimer finds out about the party that happened while he was away and puts the entire monastery under a penance of silence

And that's all I've got so far. More to come!

Ride your donkey through the woods until you reach a small trail leading somewhat out of the forest. Follow along until you reach a large wooden gate with Sardominist stars carved into it. A nearby sentry informs you that you have reached Flander's Ridge, the next of the stops on the pilgrimage! Why a simple monastery should need huge gates and an armed guard, you'll just have to guess.

Inside, the moonlight falls on what looks to be a small town, complete with streetlamps, cobbled streets, and small houses. Flander's Ridge seems to be doing better for itself than either of the other two cells, probably because of the marketplace that seems to be set up in the "center" of "town." Evidently business moved here after the Abbot's Monastery fair was...canceled.

The head monk of the town can be found in the "town hall" building located at the far end of the street. He's an old, half-blind man named Father Alastair, and he can't seem to remember anything from what day it is to where he's even standing.

W-w-who's there?

O: Pilgrims, Father. From the Abbot's Monastery.

Pilgrims, you say? Well, I think you've pilgrimed to the wrong place, my boys. This *is* the Abbot's Monastery.

O: Er...I don't think so, Father. Isn't this Flander's Ridge?

Oh, maybe that was it. This *used* to be the Abbot's Monastery, back when the Abbot was here. Yes... Back when the Abbot was here.

A: We've got a question or two for you, Father.

Oh, I'm not v-very good with questions these days, young lads, but I will try my hardest.

A: Is Father Mortimer currently staying here?

Mort..imer? It doesn't sound like my father. My father's name was *William,* you see. William with a W. Which is sort of like an M, only upside-down. Are you perhaps looking for William? He's dead, you see, so I don't think he can be of much help.

A: No, not William. Father Mortimer. He was a monk who went on a pilgrimage to here a few years ago?

Hmm...I'm not very good with remembering things that far back. Maybe? I can't quite recall much from that time. Maybe one of our younger monks could help you with that.

P: Thank you very much, Father.

Speaking to any of the other monks in Flander's Ridge reveals a strong reluctance to talk about anything that has to do with Father Mortimer. There are several references to a mysterious "Hatch" and some muttered words about a month-long penance, but that's the extent of what you'll get out of these frightened citizens. Only once you find Brother George will you get some sort of clue what's going on.

G: I remember the Father. He came a few years back...said we were all fiends of Zamorak.

O: Is he still here?

G: No...Saradomin above, no. He left after we had paid our due.

A: So he's not here anymore? That's good, I suppose.

If you try to leave Flander's Ridge after this, you'll be stopped by a worried Omad, who tells you that it would probably be best to try and find something new for the idol. As it is, you only have feathers and the idol itself, which doesn't amount to a very impressive figure. Searching around town reveals a beautiful necklace that is being held as a reward for the annual Merchant King, the winner of a bazaar contest held on a certain market day.

Asking Brother Rudolph, the head of the market, fills you three in on the rules of the contest.

1. No more than one stall may be operated by any one competitor.
2. Stalls must be open only during the allotted time.
3. Competitors may not engage in mean-spirited acts.
4. Whoever makes the most money by the end of the day wins.

These rules seem simply by all counts, but the problem lies in actually finding a stall to run! The easiest way is simply to take over an empty stall and when the real owner comes, tell Rudolph that he is engaging in a mean-spirited act by trying to throw you out. Otherwise, talking to some of the merchants and being very persuasive can garner you a new stand. Either way, once you have your property, the dawn soon arrives and everyone sets up shop!

Winning the Merchant King title is a multi-step process. First, you have to be a smarter businessman than your fellow monks and merchants. By sending Omad out to observe prices and tactics of those around the marketplace, you'll be able to raise or lower your prices in order to beat out the competition. Certain bargaining tactics can also be used, such as Intimidate, Chat Up, Wheedle, or Befriend. Depending on the mood of the crowd (which is displayed in the upper right, certain tactics will work better than others. For a happy crowd, Befriending them will certainly work better than Intimidating.

While you and Omad are busy running the show, Androe can be sent around to other stalls to cause...a fuss. Seeing as he's not a true competitor, he is able to engage in as many mean-spirited acts as he sees fit. Every five minutes or so, you'll be able to send Androe out to either Delay a merchant by talking to him for a while, Sabotage a merchant, by accidentally falling into his stall, or Create a Display of Such Extravagance that All the Other Customers Stop to Watch. This last effectively removes all business from the other stalls while the display is going on. If, at the end of the day, your total is less than one of the other stalls, Rudolph declares some form of cheating and says that a new competition will be held tomorrow. This continues until you manage to make the most money, at which point the Merchant King necklace is yours!

Return to the donkey cart and make your way to St. Portly's, the next stop on your journey! Unfortunately, things won't go so hot on this portion of your trek; if you still have your donkey, prepare for a rude awakening. A gang of bandits leaps out of the woods, accosts you, and makes off with your trusty steed, leaving you to deal with the few thugs left behind! It's not a tough scrap, but the departure of your vehicle means you have to deal with similar encounters for the remainder of the pilgrimage.

After what feels like days, you finally see towering before you the steepled clock tower of St. Portly's. This veritable cathedral is hidden in the middle of the woods, the only beacon of truth and order in a frenzied forest of chaos. Or so they would tell the outside world. There is little to be seen here other than the cathedral, as most of the monks either live inside or on the ground around the cathedral. There might once have been houses, given the scraps of wood lying around, but they have since been torn down.

Inside the cathedral, Father Edward is praying. Talking to him produces no visible effect, and shaking him is just as inconsequential. Only after continued pestering does he deign to take a piece of paper and scribble upon it some short answers.

O: Did Father Mortimer come through here?

E: Yes

O: Is he still here?

E: No

O: When did he leave?

E: A year ago perhaps

O: What happened here?

E: Penance

A: Hey, I stayed here before I went to the Abbot's Monastery! Weren't there houses here before?

E: Yes

A: Where'd they all go?

E: ...

A: Where'd they go?

E: Penance

O: Well, maybe you can help with something else. Do you have anything that could go on this idol of ours? We've been called by Father Mortimer for our own penance, but we hope this idol might calm him down a bit.

E: ...May Saradomin have mercy on your souls

O: What? Why?

E: There is some paint. In the storage room.

O: Oh, for the idol? That'll be a big help, thanks!

The paint is easily found in the storage room and applied to the idol. Now, you have a gawdy monstrosity that looks like it could fit right in with Father Mortimer's study. In the chapel, all the monks present are now praying. None of them respond to questions, nudges, or attempts to figure out why on earth they're praying at such an odd hour. Now, it's a simple matter of walking to St. Ive's to confront Father Mortimer, for that is surely where he must be.

CHANGE IN NARRATIVE STYLE ALERT: I figure that the next bits of the quest are best given in a different format. All the necessary quest steps will be given after each respective section.


The approach to St. Ive's was dark and rainy, as I should have guessed it would have been. My sandpaper cloak clung to my skin and slowed my every movement. The path underneath me had long since turned to muck, and it was all I could do not to lose my boots in it with every step. Omad and Androe, bless their souls, were carrying on as best they could, Omad with the idol strapped to his back. Every few seconds, there might have been a brief rest in the stinging of the gale, but it returned almost immediately, slapping hard against my windburned skin.

It was long past dusk by the time the walls of St. Ive's came into view. They were tall and imposing, befitting a citadel rather than a cathedral. I guessed that there must have been a large complex surrounding the church to warrant such a protection. Barns, smiths, storage rooms, and coffers, all must be contained within these ecclesiastic walls. The large gates remained closed to us, and I could see no sentries on the wall ready to hail us or let us in. All was dark. The walls stretched into the dense forest, giving me no hint as to their length. They could stretched forever, and I would be none the wiser.

"St. Ive's," muttered Omad. "This is where Father Mortimer should be. Let's see if there's anyone at home." He took the lead up to the gate and pounded on it with his fist. The pitiful sound was lost to the thundering rain.

"Try harder. I don't think they heard you," remarked Androe. "My baby could wail louder than that!"

"Shut your mouth," snapped Omad, turning to his fellow brother. "It's your baby that's got you here in the first place, I expect. So keep quiet in case Father Mortimer is listening."

I kept my own mouth shut for fear of the very same. The encounters we had had along the way got more and more frightening with each new cell. Father Mortimer's idea of penance had gone from silence to something so terrifying that the inhabitants of the cells refused to even acknowledge it anymore. It was all I could do not to run back down the path, don my armor again, and venture on my merry way. But Omad had requested my aid, and I would see him through to the end.

"Hello? Is anybody up there?" Omad's desperate shout barely reached my own ears, let alone those of anyone standing guard at the top of the wall. I was about to suggest that maybe we come back in the morning when a slight figure appeared just over the crest of the gate. He was holding a torch, but it did little to illuminate his features, hidden as they were by a monk's hood.

"Ah, hello! Excuse me, could you be so kind as to let us in? We're looking for-"

"Sinners!"

The cry cut through the downpour like a hot poker, striking us all to the depths of our stomachs.

"Wh-what was that?" Omad's question was lost amid a clap of thunder, but it mattered not.

"Sinners! Despoilers! Foul, foul beasts of chaos and disorder!"

The figure above the gate waved the torch to and fro in time with his condemnations, sending sparks flittering away from him with every pass. He, however, remained in shadow.

"Father Mortimer, is that you?" ventured Androe, hoping to somehow becalm the man. "We're here for our penance."

"Your penance..." boomed the man atop the walls. "Your penance shall befall each and every one of you. Fornicators and revelers, all. 'Should ye gaze upon the eyes of Saradomin and find naught but blackness, know that it is not the eyes of Order you look upon.'"

"Father, what do you mean?" cried Omad. "Look, we have brought you an idol as an offering of peace! Perhaps our devotion to Saradomin could be enough to remove any need for penance?"

"'And so shall they grovel before their own eyes, not knowing what it is they do.'"

"Father?"

"Penance must be paid."

The scene unfolded itself before my eyes. The crossbow bolt emerged from the rain, dripping with water and venom, and embedded itself deep in Omad's chest. His hands scrabbled at it, trying to remove it from the depths of his flesh.

"F....father!" It had started as a whisper, but rose to a groveling shriek as the reality of the bolt came to Omad. "Father!" His voice rose and broke, becoming nothing more than the incoherent raving of a young girl, upset over some trivial affair.

The second bolt knocked Omad to his knees. He no longer gripped the bolts; a faint scrabble at the feathers was all he could muster. Not a word escaped his lips. Only in his face could you see the torture that he bore. Here was a holy man, seeking only to accept his penance for breaking the code of his religion. And instead, he was met with this.

The third bolt came swiftly, burying itself in the stomach. Omad's body keeled over backwards and came to rest with the back of the head nearly touching the muddy ground. The idol had never even been shown.

"Saradomin is pleased with your suffering!" Father Mortimer bellowed from the wall. "He accepts your penance and welcomes the Order you bring."

Here, a long quote from a holy book began, and I edged over to Androe, who stood rooted to the spot, unable to tear his eyes away from Omad's corpse.

"He shot him...we were here for penance and he shot him dead. As penance....."

I was in no way lacking in feeling for my fallen friend, but I knew that as soon as the scripture ended, we would land right next to him. I pushed Androe towards the gate, hoping to jog him into action. The sudden start seemed to do the trick, and he made a mad dash parallel to the wall.

"You seek to avoid your due? Come, I shall guide your lost souls!" Father Mortimer unleashed a hail of bolts upon as we sprinted alongside the walls of St. Ive's, hoping perhaps to catch us before we rounded the corner. It was no use, though, and we were safely on the other side before anything could reach us.

(Basically, this part plays out exactly as read. The dialogue is the same, and it's pretty much just a big cutscene. Oh, and Omad's body doesn't disappear. When Father Mortimer starts firing willy-nilly, the spots where the arrows land will be completely random, so it's essential to sprint out of there as quick as you can.)

We ran around the corner of the wall, searching desperately for a door to let us inside and find some sanctuary. I doubted the monks of St. Ive's knew of Father Mortimer's murder, and I wanted to be the first to assure them of his true mad fervor. There were no doors in the wall that we could see, nothing that would invite us in and give us shelter. All was blank and slick with the rain.

Suddenly, a door flew open ahead of us.

"Help!" cried Androe, heedless of any possible danger. He sprinted on ahead of me and peeked his head around the door. At once, he gave a shout of fear and tried to return to me, but a gnarled hand reached around the door and shoved a knife in the poor monk's back. Androe grunted in pain and tried to keep walking, but the hand gripped his cloak and pulled him back through the doorway. The door slammed shut again, and all was quiet.

I waited for several moments before deciding to venture through the door. I could not be sure whether Father Mortimer would be there waiting for me, but I figured I would have a better chance of fighting him head-on than waiting for him to impale me on a crossbow bolt. I counted to three, slowly, and tried the handle of the door.

It opened easily at my touch, and I entered the wall to find a river of blood at my feet. Androe had fallen here, I was sure, but the blood trail led further down the hall. I used my knowledge of blood splatters to track the trail through several rooms and finally out into the courtyard of St. Ive's. Here, the trail became harder to make out, the rain having washed much of it away already. But I picked up the faintest outlines of a body being dragged and made my way across the abandoned yard to the door of the cathedral. Here, the trail ended.

I tried opening the massive doors of the cathedral but to no avail. The doors were sealed shut from the inside, likely by Father Mortimer himself. I could see light coming from underneath, however, and a flickering in the stained glass windows high above let me know that there was someone inside able to keep the fires going. Here is where Brother Androe had been taken, but it was up to me to find a way in and rescue him. It being night, the rest of the monks were probably asleep, but I thought there must have been sentries posted *somewhere* around the complex. It was a large area, and it would only have made sense for there to be at least one guard, if only to make sure no thieves came in the middle of the night.

(Follow Androe around the walls, he gets stabbed, taken inside. Use Hunting knowledge to track the bloodstains.)

I knocked on several doors around the complex, but all were locked. And nobody heard me knocking. I began to suspect something more than just a heavy sleep. But for now, I needed shelter from the rain, a hot meal to eat, and some water to drink. To catch ill now would be the death of me.

AT ST. IVE'S

1. Approach the gates of the cell. Father Mortimer will appear up top and start screaming about how the three of you deserve penance for your actions against Saradomin. Omad tries to calm him down with the idol, but Father Mortimer shoots him in the chest with a crossbow, sending his body flying backwards. (NOTE: The body doesn't disappear.) You and Androe have to run alongside the wall now in order to avoid the crossbow bolts now hurling themselves from atop the gate.

2. Look for an entrance inside, where maybe you can find sanctuary from the madman sitting up top. Androe thinks he might have found a door, but when he approaches, Mortimer flings it open, stabs him in the stomach, and draws him back inside. You're left alone in the rain. After a short while, open the door again to find a huge pool of blood and a minute trail leading off along a corridor. Use your Hunter skills to follow this out into the courtyard. Once there, track the blood up to the doors of the cathedral, the doors of which seem to be locked from the inside.

3. Now you must turn your attention to survival. Food, water, fire, and shelter are your four biggest concerns of the moment. A quick search of the surrounding houses reveals nothing that could be of any help (most of the roofs of the houses are destroyed, which would be useless against the rain.) Only one building at the bottom of a hill seems to be of any help. It seems to have once been the kitchen for the cell, and it would likely have a stove for heat and plenty of victuals in the stores. The only problem is that the door is locked and the windows are all too small to fit through!

4. A cart filled with stones at the top of the hill could be a good way to break down the door, but only if it's put into the proper position. Using your enormous strength, you can push and pull the cart into the right position only after manipulating the environment to suit your needs. The cart can only be pushed straight due to a faulty wheel, so certain objects with curves will need to be placed in front of it in order to turn the cart around. Once it's positioned on the hill in front of the door, a simple push is all that's needed to send it rocketing downhill!

5. Pick your way through the ruined doorway to find yourself in the monastery's kitchens, a small series of connected buildings including the storerooms, the iceroom, the kitchens themselves, and the cellar. It's not long before you hear a quiet sort of moaning permeating your hasty search of the premises. Following the voice, you reveal a small boy hiding behind several sacks of potatoes! He seems badly shaken and is nearly incoherent. It's clear that you'll need to calm him down. From what you can gather from his few broken words, you'll need to find him something strong to drink and something hot to eat.

6. The drink can be easily found by going downstairs into the cellar and searching through the racks of bottles of different types of drinks. Select one at random and bring it up to the boy. Unfortunately, he might not be a fan of the drink at first, and he'll tell you that. Each drink has four aspects to it: Sweet, Bitter, Dry, and Thick. In each of these four categories, there are several different options that a drink can have (Sweet contains Very Sweet, Sweet, Not Very Sweet, and Watery, for instance.) Only one combination of those four aspects will satisfy the boy's thirst, and it's pretty much a game of Mastermind figuring out what he likes. He'll tell you if there's one, two, three, or four things about the drink he doesn't like, but it's up to you to figure out which ones they are.

7. The second step to calming the boy down is getting him something hot to eat. This should be easy, since you're in the kitchens, but the stove is completely ruined and the stores of food are completely rotted. Fixing the stove is a simple matter of cleaning it out, putting more wood in, and lighting it with a tinderbox, but finding food will be more of a challenge. Talking to the boy reveals that some of the last remaining good food was taken by some monks up to the barn so they wouldn't be hurt by....something.

8. The barn can be reached by going out the door in the back of the kitchen. This puts you directly adjacent to the barn, towering above all but the cathedral of St. Ive itself. The door to the barn is locked, but that shouldn't be a problem for too much longer. On a nearby barrel, a slender knife sits, which can be used to pick the lock on the door! The knife can also be equipped as a weapon, leaving you no longer unarmed. Inside the barn, you can see that people are clearly not meant to reach the upper levels.

9. What was once a simple elevator system of ropes and wooden platforms is now a convoluted mess of knots, ladders, stairs, pulleys, and everything else that would make it impossible to find a way up top. Whereas before, it would have been a mere matter of standing on the platform and pulling a rope to elevate yourself, now the ropes go every which way, attach to different things, attach to *nothing,* and tie each other up in knots so horrible that neither one can be pulled to any great effect.

10. In order to get up, you must do a series of actions that involve lifting yourself up on platforms, cutting ropes with your knife, climbing up ladders to cut other ropes or reach other platforms, travel along seeming dead ends simply to connect a rope to a pulley, and many other things that are too twisted to mention here. If at any point, you should wish to reset the barn, simply go out through the door you came in and the puzzle will reset. Once you've figured out the rope puzzle, however, you can ascend to the upper levels of the barn where the food is supposedly being stored.

11. At the top, two Deranged Monks sit huddled in the corner, gnawing on yellowing bones. When they see you, they leap to their feet and start shouting about how they aren't gluttonous and can't go to the cathedral. If you try to get closer, one of them dives over the edge of the second floor and falls until the ground floor breaks his fall. The second one cries out that you'll never bring him to Penance Hall, and pulls out a shard of broken glass as a weapon. The monk has no level, but seems like he should be easy to beat, but your pathetic knife just doesn't hit the agile monk as he dances around you. After many small hits and several bloody pools appearing, the monk finally collapses to the ground, dead.

12. You're able to take your pick of the food, or what little there is left. Two potatoes are all you can salvage from the pile of eaten or rotted food. Make your way back down in the elevator and back to the kitchens. Searching the storerooms reveals a tinderbox, but all the wood is consumed by water or insects. You'll need to find a source of dry wood for the stove before you can heat anything up. Fortunately, your new knife allows you to enter any previously locked doors, so you can search around for dry wood!

13. While you don't find any dry wood in any of the houses, you *do* find an axe in the groundskeeper's shack, which you can use on any piece of furniture (tables, chairs, etc) to break it up into burnable shards. Once you've hacked apart five different things, you'll have enough to keep the stove going for a good length of time. Return to the kitchen, light the stove up, and put the potatoes in. Once they're done, give one of them to the boy in the other room. After a few minutes, he'll calm down and be able to talk to you normally.

14. He tells of how Father Mortimer arrived at the cell not more than a year ago, and how he was driven by some sort of force to make sure that no sinners would remain in the service of Saradomin. He set to work almost immediately enforcing penance, taking over the job of the head of the monastery. As time went on, the monks still refused to accept Father Mortimer's rules, and the penance continued. Soon, people began disappearing. At first, it was suspected that the wolves in the forest were responsible for it, or else the monks simply left in the middle of the night to escape Father Mortimer and the strict new regime. But soon, monks in high positions began disappearing as well. The cathedral doors were found locked after this started happening, and Father Mortimer no longer appeared at meals or prayers (which now had to happen outdoors.) The boy, Brother Charlie, had suspected that Father Mortimer was conducting some sort of penance ritual inside the cathedral, but he wanted none of it. As more and more people disappeared, he fled to the kitchens where he could stay with the large monk in charge of cooking the meals. If anywhere could be safe, it was with the Meal Monk. But one night, Charlie heard screaming coming from the cellar as he was sleeping. In the morning, the Meal Monk was gone. After that, Charlie barricaded the door and hid behind the sacks of potatoes during the day, only emerging at night to salvage what little non-rotten food there was. For the past few nights, he had done nothing of the sort and remained hidden, becoming more and more paranoid.

15. Charlie is sure that Androe has been taken to Penance Hall, but he has no idea how to get in. Upon hearing that the three of you had brought an idol, he says that it would be a good idea to reclaim that and use it either as a calming gift or else as a way to frighten Father Mortimer out of the cathedral and into a more easily accessible place. Unfortunately, the idol is still strapped to the back of Omad, who is currently lying dead in front of the gates. There's nothing for it, however, but to make a run for it and try to bring the body back inside.

16. Getting outside is a simple enough matter, as is getting to the body. Once you and Charlie reach it, however, Father Mortimer discovers what you're doing and appears once more atop the gates, shouting about defilers of bodies and Saradomin's will. He'll invoke a powerful prayer before the two of you can do anything, and soon you'll find yourself in the midst of a small meteor shower, sent by the god of order himself! Untying the idol from his back would spell certain death, so you'll have to pull Omad's body back inside without it getting too roughed up by the meteors (or whatever they are.) Once the shower starts, Charlie sprints back to the wall while you grab Omad's body. You are able to drag him one square at a time to wherever you like. Everything else in the world moves one square at a time also. You can tell where meteors are about to fall by the size of the shadow on the square below. A large faint shadow means it'll fall in 3 turns (movements), a smaller, darker shadows means it'll fall in 2, and a pitch black dot means it'll fall on the next turn. A direct meteor hit means instant death for anybody underneath, whether it's you or Omad's body. If you're killed, a "force" resurrects you back with Omad's body in front of the gate. If Omad's body is obliterated, the same thing happens (since the idol is destroyed along with him.) Splash damage is taken if you're one square away from a falling meteor. Three hits from that and you're out.

17. Eventually, you stagger back inside the wall with Omad's body, beaten and bruised, but in one piece. Untie the idol from his back and head over to where Charlie is sitting against a broken table. He tugs his robe down weakly to show you a large chunk of rock wedged in his chest. It's not immediately fatal, but without the proper care, it could easily be a mortal wound. Charlie tells you that in order to cleanse the wound properly, you'll need a special herbal water from the monks' stores as well as a root that has some sort of healing property. The water, called Holy Cordial, could always be found in the cupboards of Brother Wendell, the healer of the cell. The root, known as Bloodsbane, grew only in a small grove behind the cell itself. Brother Wendell tended to it, but he never told anyone where exactly the grove was. Charlie imparts this information to you and then leans back against the wall to wait for the medicine.

18. It's impossible to tell from the outside which house of the dozens in St. Ive's is Brother Wendell's. Only by going inside each one can you find the one house that looks like it belonged once to a healer. Once you find the one with bloody tables, cabinets full of strange herbs and vials, and a large, painful-looking rack of metal implements, you'll know you've found the place. Scour the cabinets to find the Holy Cordial among the dozens of bottles all labeled in minute handwriting. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be a single bottle of the sort. There *is,* however, a small recipe card tucked away in one of the drawers below the cabinets that tells the reader exactly how to make Holy Cordial. This card was evidently only meant to be read by Brother Wendell, since it makes ample use of things only the writer could know. Several of the herbs used are referred to by such names as "That thing Brother Jeremy can't stop sniffing" and "What I found in the swamp a few years ago." They're also measured in such amounts as "2 gulps" and "1 tongueful." Seeing as none of the herbs are labeled and you have no idea how much a gulp is, you'll have to do some serious digging inside the room to find out conversions.

19. Inside Brother Wendell's room are several books, one of which is a journal of his life. By reading it very thoroughly, you'll be able to find detailed descriptions of some of the different herbs found in his cabinet. Others can be found in the book "Strange Herbs of Gielinor." With these two books combined, you should be able to identify every herb except one (which would be the only name not yet used, then.) There is a third book of importance that can be found: Wendell's Medical Diary. This is a list of every patient he's had as far back as he's been keeping track of that sort of thing. Hidden within the pages is a list of handy conversions that he's been using instead of legitimate means of measuring because "it takes too damn long."

20. The recipe is random for everyone, but it averages about four different herbs that have to be put into a bottle of water. Examining the cabinet brings up a screen where you can pick from a selection of herbs. Clicking on an herb allows you to choose what type of "measurement" you want and how much of it. Once you've chosen your herbs and mixed them up, you'll get the Holy Cordial if you did it properly! Now, you just have to find the Bloodsbane. Luckily, if you did this step first, you'll have the right book to find out where it's growing! Wendell created a helpful list of exactly which trails to take to get to his special growing site and placed it in his journal once he thought of it. It's just a series of three words: Left, Right, and Straight. This obviously is a set of instruction on which way to go when you get to a crossroads on a trail. The hard part, however, is yet to come.

21. After you find this and head out around the back of St. Ive's (stopping by Charlie to see how he's doing) you'll come across a trail leading into the woods. Going down this leads you to the first of several crossroads on the way to the Bloodsbane grove (each crossroad is its own instance.) While the steps left by Wendell seem straight-forward enough, the problem is in figuring out whether you are supposed to go left, right, or straight based on the direction your character is facing or based on the direction relative to the path you've come out of. For instance, you could come out of the northernmost trail (with the camera appropriate positioned) and be told to go left. It could mean either the right-hand trail (your character's left) or the left-hand trail (the camera's left.) Figuring this out early on is incredibly helpful so you don't get lost. If you *do* get lost, there is no easy return button. You have to find your way back.

22. Once you find the Bloodsbane grove, you have to fight the level 60 Guard Dog with nothing but your knife or your axe (depending on which you prefer.) It's not a hard fight, but it's a necessary one to get to the root. Once the dog is dead, it's easy enough to pluck the root. Then, it's a simple matter of following the instructions in reverse to get back to St. Ive's. Once back, give the two things to Charlie. He'll pour the water on the wound and eat the root (which is evidently quite bitter.) Then, he'll say that the last thing you have to do is pull the root out. To do that, you'll need to go back to Brother Wendell's and get a specific tool designed just for that purpose. Go back to the house, search the rack for any sort of grasping tool, and take it.

23. When you return to Charlie, he seems to be asleep. Shaking him doesn't wake him up, so you decide to pull the meteor shard out anyway and hope that his sleep keeps him from feeling it too much. Once you pull the shard out, the accompanying rush of blood drenches the front of Charlie's robes. He falls to the side, limp and pale. He is dead.

24. The only thing left to do is try and take the idol to Father Mortimer, sitting high in his Penance Hall. Take the idol from Omad's dead body and carry it into the courtyard (the idol takes the place of your weapon and shield slot since it's so big.) Though Father Mortimer is nowhere in sight, the cathedral doors creak and open wide to admit you, beckoning you in for your penance. You, the last of the monks.