Manithan Vaanam

After the discovery of a new people, the party follows a swinging Anjan through the Kaalu Kaatu, retracing their steps back to the Raatchi Raasa shrine. When they arrive, they realize that the tree that the shrine is built upon now holds a foggy portal in its trunk. The group theorize, conspiring amongst themselves of what the portal is too. After a few minutes, Bhavannan and Haavani both realize that crimson fog in the trunk is different from the fog affecting the rest of the forest, which leads to another revelation for Haavani: this fog is the megham. The horror spreads over the Soodamese, as they attempt to understand how the megham is here. Shwari destroys the fog with manthiram, which works for a few minutes, the red slowly filling the void once more. Once the portal is fully made once more, two infant mirughams jump out. With the party terrified, Aadhi and Shwari immediately blast them to chars, rendering them lifeless. Seeing mirughams emerge from the fog, Haavani remembers that before she left Konga Naadu, she had healed abrasive and puncture wounds, very unique compared to the usual burns and heat exhaustions she helps with.

The party conjectures about the nature and origin of the megham, supposing that, as it is here producing mirughams, it must be some new device. Aadhi realizes that there must be a final sorcerer afoot, and Anjan goes to seek him out. While he does, the group burns the strewn bodies, including Ashitham's, Haavani conducting funeral rites for Nila's paati. Anjan finds this last mage at the source of this new megham and reports it to the group; they venture there, and Aadhi casts calm emotions to protect the party as they enter a fog-filled hut where the last sorcerer apparently resides. Shwari leaps onto him to subdue him, and the party interrogates him, learning that this new megham in the Kaalu Kaatu is an experiment devised by Khootabha, sworn enemy of Mun Mugham and apparent mastermind of the soonyam mages and mirughams. They also learn that the hut they are standing within is the death place of Bodhi, and that the rage-inducing fog is a revitalization of her anger; her bones are stirred within a boiling cauldron. After his knowledge is exhausted, Shwari kills him, and Aadhi magically blasts the hut he resided in. The fog begins to recede, its detriments slowly disappearing from the forest. The party rejoices as the evils unmasked are slowly battled against, unleashing a new hope within.