The adventure

As they crossed the wooden bridge into a forested area, Vi echoed the sentiments they'd heard many times already:
"There are two things you need to know about Trynton. One: they've some of the best magic on the planet, and two: they'll take anything that's not nailed down."
Even before they got off the bridge they were met by a welcoming committee of forest mites. The tired and tattered friends avoided some more animated plants, identified as iron weeds, and headed for a large tree where they saw some Trynnies standing. In the base of the tree they met Chief Gari, who initially thought that they were Rapax spies. He, like other trynnies, seemed as if if he didn't quite have all his marbles. Once he'd calmed down out of his fervour about the rapax, he asked if they'd be willing to help with an infestation he had.
Of course they all said they'd be delighted, and he explained that they had rats in one of the boughs of their tree-city, and they needed exterminating. As he put it:
"Giant rats, and I mean giant: they're bigger... well, um, maybe as big as you are." his voice trailing off as he sized up Vi and Salva.
With Chief Gari's blessing, they entered Trynton. There were a lot of ladders and small chambers on their way up: they met 3 vile roaches, which Quentin magically webbed, some crawling creepers, a slow but powerful type of animated plant (Quentin wondered if they were the ancestors of the faster crimson poppies and iron weeds that they'd seen), 5 wolf spiders and a big dung beetle. None of the creatures was much of a challenge, but the first crawling creeper they met was a surprise and grabbed Shu Ting as she reached the top of a ladder. She died soon after they had killed the offending plant, which had managed to inject her with a cartload of poison. Quentin mourned their dear-departed friend with a tear or two before re-animating her with a dusting of another third of the magical powder they had found at the monastery. Death is enough to test the lack of faith of any atheist, but she remained wary of exploring her magical abilities further.
They did finally reach the open walkways and rope rails of Trynton, and waiting for them was a fountain of beautiful clear water, a drink of which washed away their wounds. They splashed the stuff around before moving on. In a little dwelling carved into a lesser tree trunk they found a chest trapped with daggers, which Salva managed to trip twice in quick succession. The daggers were amazingly sharp and well-aimed for an inanimate object, and the friends staggered back to the fountain, Margreet with a dagger in her neck and through a lung. The fountain did not disappoint, regenerating their gaping wounds quickly and painlessly.
On the third try, and with much apology, he did get the thing open, but they found a few measly coins inside. This section of Trynton was not large, but they found a rickety lift on a winch that could lift them higher yet.
The first thing that met them in the Upper Branches was another fountain. After their experiences with the previous one, they were keen to have a drink. As they sipped from cupped hands and, in Salva's case, a glass jar that he'd picked up somewhere, a voice spoke to each of them, asking a riddle. An astonishingly easy riddle, they thought, and Quentin voiced the answer, just in case anyone thought that he might not know. As they each thought the word, the voice whispered "Yes, I am"
There was no magical healing, but they all felt strangely empowered, and Quentin and Margreet enjoyed a sudden rush of understanding as they both realised that they could not only weave magic into shapes with words, but partly also with their minds.

They turned right at the T-junction where the fountain sprang, and walked into a wooden hut with a mossy sign over the entranceway saying 'Fuzzfas' Potion Palace'. Fuzzfas was in the middle of an experiment, and banging and crashing met them as they walked in. They found glass on the floor and some unpleasant goo on his desk, but Fuzzfas apologised for the mess, explaining that he must have missed "a step or two, or five", and welcomed them in.
Margreet and Quentin got very excited as they once again spent the group's cash on his lesser potions. Quentin mixed them discreetly in a corner, with Vi shielding him, while Margreet kept him talking. He was much more intelligent than the other Trynnies that they'd met, and conversed happily about Trynton; he recommended that they see the Shaman, which would require zuzu petals and his mystery potion, he was excited to hear from He'Li, and gave them an armful of potions to take to her, and he explained more about the history of Dominus, from his limited (he readily admitted) perspective. He must not have recognised Vi, because when he was talking about Phoonzang, the Cosmic Lord who was the god that the Higardi and trynnies worshipped, he shared a rumour that a Higardi called Vitalia Domina was the granddaughter of the chap.
In the corner, Quentin chuckled to her when they overheard that.
"That must make you a demi-god. You could start you own religion. Not 'the body of Christ', but 'the body of Vi'. Sounds better to me."
Vi ruffled her eyebrows and smiled hesitatingly.
"What positions would there be in your Church? I'd like to try the missionary position, if you'll have me." he continued.
Vi continued smiling, dismissing Fuzzfas' rumour as just that; a silly idea of a superstitious people. "It's probably only because I survived being with the Dark Savant, and they don't know how someone could have managed it" she replied. Karen just gave Quentin a dirty glare, but wasn't willing to distract Margreet and Fuzzfas by telling him off. Quentin smiled serenely as he and Vi continued to chat quietly; he explained the significance of 'the body of Christ'.
Eventually Margreet had finished pumping Fuzzfas, and they sold half his stock back to him, and kept the rest. Margreet had some ideas about further potion-mixing they could try. They tried it outside by the fountain of intelligence, which seemed to have nothing more to give them (except fresh water). It worked, in that she and Quentin could sense more potent magic in the resulting mixture, but they couldn't work out what it might do.
They passed a little temple with some flying sprites inside, wary of offending the Trynnies or the magical creatures inside.
Inside a larger house they met two more crawling creepers, on which Shu Ting extracted her revenge for her earlier experience (or deprivation of it). Salvador almost died from the lashing tendrils and Karen gagged helplessly from the evil stench they emitted. As they were about to leave the building they met four leaf sprites in a corridor. The little sprites were easy to chop up, since they couldn't fly out of reach or use their magic from long range, but they worried about encountering such creatures in the open.
They finished off a giant Vile Spider that was attacking a Trynnie patrol and walked past a small zoo hung between three trees. It had crocodiles, sprites and a bull-like beast called a Hogar which even had a name: Bobo! They walked on, past a junction to a spiral walkway that led up to a large room with a giant telescope in it. Here they met Madras, another senior Trynnie official, who introduced them to 'operation extermination'. He gave them a couple of firebombs and shared some interesting rumours with them. As Burz had hinted a few days ago, and Madras confirmed now, the Mook have some sort of device similar to the fabled Destinae Dominus, and are looking for an alliance with the Umpani or T'Rang ('thing-rangs, as he called them). His take on it was "You can get a look at the device because they're hoping for an alliance offer, if you don't mind using people... I don't." Margreet warmed to him immediately, even though the others pointed out to her that he had no boat at all. The giant telescope seemed to be sufficient for her.
Madras was helpful about the Destinae Dominus too. Rather than the story they'd heard many times already, about Marten stealing it and taking it to Marten's bluff, he said
"I don't know know where it is, but I do know who does know... It's Crock!" His moment of revelation was spoilt by the blank look on their faces. He explained that Crock lived in a shack in the swamp, but might need persuading to share his information. They decided that they liked Madras and set up camp for a rest in the downstairs section of his observatory. Salva scrounged a giant magnet from some of the abandoned equipment sitting there. Madras and he chatted a while about engineering: Salva explained some complex physics to Madras, whose mind seemed capable of grasping it despite his child-like take on other things (like many of the other trynnies), and Madras explained some basic principles about using magic in engineering.