The Scarlet Dawn arrived at the Sunset Continent about twenty minutes later than scheduled.
It wasn't that anything had gone wrong with the ship itself. Murphy had changed their route partway through. They should have entered the planet's orbit from Transia, then approached Feathered Serpent Fortress along the most direct route, with the starship oriented for forward travel. But to get a clear picture of the situation on the new continent, Murphy had specifically asked First Officer Solma to reenter the atmosphere before they reached it.
Traveling through the atmosphere was certainly slower than flying through the vacuum of space. This time, the Scarlet Dawn had flown almost all the way across the Holy Spirit Plains, from the northern tip of the continent, before finally reaching the area around Feathered Serpent Fortress.
For the players aboard, the trip had been worth every minute!
They'd gotten to experience the wonder of "space travel" firsthand. The stretch in orbit, especially, had been incredible, with its weightless conditions. If they hadn't been pressed for time, the players would have planned a few "spacewalks" and recited the classic line, "People back home, don't worry!"
But once they entered the Sunset Continent, the novelty of the journey was quickly overwhelmed by the terrible state of the place.
"I thought it was just the Dusk's lackeys here. Turns out I was oversimplifying the situation on the new continent. This proves that occasionally peeking at places thousands of miles away through the world-monitoring program from the comfort of Transia doesn't let us fully understand what's going on there.
"Hell, it's a complete madhouse here."
In the captain's quarters, Murphy stared gravely at the various readings sent back by the starship's radar. The bizarre "mutants" displayed on the screen had killed his appetite for dinner. They were clearly