Who Deserves Help at Ragefort

Ragefort's captain made the situation sound simple.

Thunderlungs had escaped. Thunderlungs needed to be returned. Dangerous Witchborn belonged back where dangerous Witchborn were kept.

Then Thunderlungs answered with enough force to make everyone feel the problem in their bones. A sonic shout blasted one of the frog-like war mages nearly to death, and the ground itself seemed to remember the sound. Reverberations rolled through the area, thunder damage spreading through anyone too close to the conflict.

Jonah healed the fallen war mage.

That act kept the party from sliding into an easy side. Thunderlungs was dangerous. The people trying to capture him could be hurt, killed, and frightened too. But the more Thunderlungs spoke, the less Ragefort sounded like protection. He said they kept him chained up until he felt like he would explode, unable to release the pressure building inside him safely.

The question changed.

Not: can Thunderlungs hurt people?

Yes. Obviously.

The question became whether Ragefort's answer to danger had made him more desperate, more unstable, and more alone. The party stood between an institution claiming custody and a person claiming abuse, with sonic power shaking the road under both stories.

The choice point was not clean.

That was why it mattered.