Thea: The Awakening, Zorya 1, Part 2

My village was cursed by the Hangedman in the Hangedman Quest. The quest proceeded like the Early Access version, unlike the alternate version I had when I was playing with Mokosh. It looked like there were two versions available for this quest, with different outcomes.

The Hangedman Quest.

A group of Orcs wanted to use the village Smithy. One presented option, involving Zorya, was to challenge the Orcs to a wrestling match.

The Orcs wanted to use the Smithy.

Fortunately, my Dwarf Smith had recently returned to the village - he had been away for a short period to gather resources for crafting. The Dwarf Smith and a Warrior participated in the tag-team wrestling match with the Orcs. With the Dwarf Smith's great Strength and the Warrior's Tactics, it was an easy win. The participants gained permanent Strength and the Dwarf Smith learned more Craft.

The Event with the Orcs awarded attributes to villagers.

I started Zorya's Divine Quest. The visit to the Grand University in the first part revealed a lot about Zorya's story.

A visit to the ruins of the university revealed Zorya's story.

Zorya was the honorable sort of goddess. That was a big clue on what to do when the time came to pronounce judgement on the scholars. Freeing the scholars would be the wrong answer where Zorya was involved. Beating them up gave Bless of Strength to everyone in the party.

There is a spelling mistake here.

In the second part, considering what I knew about Zorya, I chose to prove my people's worth through combat. The Bless of Strength from the first part were helpful here. At the start of the fight, I found out that Zorya had a serious dual-personality issue.

Zorya had a dual-personality issue.

I had to fight two avatars of Zorya, each representing her one of her personalities. With Piercing, they took out one of my villagers before the fight even started. In addition, all her minions had Piercing too.

Fortunately, I had brought along the Dwarf Smith (I had run out of resources again). He was at the end of the Tactical stack in the first round. I had equipped him with a Club that gave Blunt to take advantage of his high Strength.

Note that one of my villagers was already injured before the fight.

After the fight, I received Bless of Dexterity for everyone. Three villagers gained +4 Animal Kinship. In addition, everyone was healed of all Wounds, including any received before the fight. That last bit was a relief since I had people who were critically injured.

More of Zorya's story after the fight.

The last part of Zorya's Divine Quest involved the hunting of Simargl as Zorya was the goddess of the hunt.

Can you spot the spelling mistake?

After capturing Simargl, there was some text describing its true purpose as a divine power plant of the stars. Having completed Zorya-approved Challenges during the earlier parts of the Quest, I had an alternate option to put all that power into Zorya and make her the Supreme Goddess.

I chose to make Zorya the Supreme Goddess.

The final reward for Zorya's Divine Quest was a Goblin Beast Master.

A Goblin Beast Master joined the party.

The Goblin Beast Master did not have anything truly impressive. He had Strength, Animal Kinship and Traps. Also, he had good Will for a fighter-type. Unfortunately, he had no Magic, which was present in the characters given as rewards for many of the Divine Quests of the other deities. It was likely that I would have to play Zorya's game with little Magic.

The attributes of the Goblin Beast Master.

There were three bows in the screenshot above. I received those at various points of Zorya's Divine Quest. Perhaps it was Zorya's favorite present. Anyway, I want to note that I had completed the Divine Quest at Turn 146.

As my expedition explored the land, they came across a group of bandits who demanded a chess game. Having a Dwarf in the party provided an instant-win option.

The Dwarf won without a Challenge.

I had earlier completed the Smithy Quest where I introduced a Rusalka to a Dwarf. In that Quest, I kept the Children instead of giving them to the Rusalka (like what I did in another game). Later, I met the Orcs that gave me the Children in the Smithy Quest. Likely because of the result of that Quest, the Orcs entrusted a few sick Children into my care.

The Orcs from the Smithy Quest gave more Children.

The Baba Yaga's House had appeared for some time. Unfortunately, my people had hardly any Magic to deal with the Baba Yaga. Thus I had to solve the Quest with excessive violence.

Completed the Baba Yaga's House Quest with violence.

While some of my people gained attributes, solving the Quest in this manner cursed all my villagers everywhere, including those back in the village. All my villagers had Bless of Health from a random Event at that time and that mitigated the effect of Cursed. However, that was a temporary reprieve and I had to bring each of my people to the Dziody for a permanent fix.

Before my expedition left, they found a few Children under Baba Yaga's House.

A few Children were found.

The Children I gained brought the total number I had to 7. I hoped I would get the Cropping Event and get some-'thing' useful. However, I had not seen the Cropping Event since the Early Access Version.

I had a total of 7 Children.

While I was sending villagers to the Dziody to have their Cursed attributes removed, 4-Star baddies appeared near the village. The baddie group to the west of the village were from the second main Quest, Giants Return.

4-Star baddies appeared near the village.

The situation was tense for a little while, but I managed to deal with the 4-Star baddies and had all the Cursed attributes removed. A few people were seriously injured from the curse and the fights but no one died.

The Quest about the tragic love between an Elf and an Orc appeared for me. However, completing this Quest required Magic, which my people were short of. I would have to delay the Quest until I could find more Magic.

The start of the Elf and Orc Love Story Quest.

Interestingly, the Elf was from the Silveroak clan, which would be the name of the Elf Guardian in the Cosmic Tree Main Quest.

My people came across the skeleton of a dragon. Despite playing with Zorya, the goddesses Lada and Morena were mention in the Event.

Looting the skeleton of a Dragon.

Another Child fell gravely ill. I was curious what would happen if I selected a different option. The Child survived and everyone in the village was blessed with temporary health. I wonder if the result was random. I would need a Totem and its Magic bonus for a chance at a better outcome if I were to have this Event again.

Another Child fell gravely ill.

From past experience, I found that the game tended to get more interesting once the Divine Quest was completed. In the present game, I had a good number of villagers with equipment and abilities to handle tougher challenges. It would soon be time to attempt the Cosmic Tree Quest.

Thea: The Awakening, Zorya 1, Part 1
Thea: The Awakening, Zorya 1, Part 3
Thea: The Awakening, Zorya 1, Part 4
Thea: The Awakening, Zorya 1, Final Part

Thea: The Awakening, Contents