...She doesn't like those odds.

She doesn't like the idea of a noncombatant going into a hostile situation alone even less.

She doesn't like that she suddenly started classifying herself as a combatant given that as of yet she has unearthed precisely no relevant skills.  Besides basic fox instincts.

Unless she has skills for some reason, which would be...

Magic can do some absurd things.  And while it doesn't seem right to her, who knows what lurks in what she hasn't yet unearthed?

...Still, that's surely not something to stake her life on.

She...

"...If anyone should go in there alone it's me.  I've got less power to take notice of, and you're the one that can empower the backup if I - don't come out."

...Megi pauses and sits on the forest floor, facing her.

"I respectfully disagree. I heard two points- You're less likely to cause problems, and I'm more valuable. On the first, you are wrong. I have lived experience as to what kind of things cause trouble, and how to soothe it back if I cause a few ripples, beyond 'don't touch literally any things at all even the ground'. The second I give partial credit- However, I am more valuable both in and out. I know what I'm looking at and it will better help me plan containment measures. If it's something really very serious as opposed to merely quite bad, I have a better chance of recognizing it."

"...yeah.  Yeah, okay.  ...Right.  Honestly I'm not entirely sure what came over me."

...Is there anywhere she can at least get a better view of the area?

"I'm sure you'll be great at fighting back the darkness when you're ready~"

The center of the nasty energy appears to be... A cliffy, rocky hill just beyond the wetlands area. There's only one narrow way up. The structures at the top look like they once were a moderately sized complex- Two and three story stone buildings, built more like a hotel or a school or a base or something than a house. It's hard to tell who built them given the advanced state of decay, but it doesn't quite look like crumbling concrete. No rebar. 

Megi hops up rubble and rocks adroitly, sniffing around carefully. She peers into one long-glassless window... Then shakes her head and makes her way around the side.

She's gone for a good twenty minutes.

And then she's hopping back down the rocks and making her way over to Alicia.

"So... Bad news, the evil in there is threatening to wake up. That's why it's so noticeable now. I bet signs of human activity nearby are waking them up- Woodsmoke, or stuff in the water? It's hard to tell. Good news, it's actually a pretty weak signature. Just some curses, a dozen or two lesser, maybe one mid-tier. And those basic curses are really dumb. There's no complex schemes, not even real animal cunning- Just hatred, nice and straightforward. They're going to wake up sooner or later, probably within the year, and then there's a moderate monster problem. I'm thinking I lay some very basic seals, some tripwires, and... Go see if the local baron wants to do a purge. After the purge, someone will have to set up a proper shrine and purify the place properly for a while, probably not me."

"...Well, I'm glad it's not particularly serious.  ...How were those buildings made, do you know?  They look - familiar, but not quite."

"I'm afraid I don't know. They're recognizably Tirran. I think this place was military... But there's no stench of death. Just abandonment and resentment."

"Huh.  ...So actually, I should ask, because it distinguishes things - did the Tirran Empire still have spaceflight or other high technology?  As much as the idea of 'high technology' is kind of fake and really it should be 'highly industrialized production' because that's what gets you the fancy things...  But I digress."

"There are relics. I'll project a little illusion..."

And there is a suit of power armor, shiny and chrome.

"This weird thing, property of the City of Silk and trotted out for the big threats, like Cryptids. It's Tirran. Say, mind giving me a quick nuzzle to change back and start on those wards?"

She can do that!

"Oh that's definitely space-age technology alright.  Damn.  I wonder what I could learn from something like that."

Megi blooms back into humanoid form after the nuzzle, clothes and backpack and all, and scritches Alicia affectionately.

"There are only a few dozen relics in circulation, maybe a hundred or two total worldwide? We don't really understand them and people think they're partially divine fiat, not however they worked originally. Very mysterious. In terms of technology, things are getting better- The Book Otherworlder gave people back the printing press, and the Steel Otherworlder gave us, well, steel making. A couple hundred years ago, each. There were more otherworlders but those two are the ones I remember. I think... The Doctor, the Stargazer, the Sailor?"

Then she starts unpacking things from her bag, humming.

'The Doctor' gets a startled laugh from her.  "Sorry, sorry, that just associated incredibly wildly.  ...Hm.  I do wonder if there's anything...

"...I'm probably not going to have much to contribute, I never did know that much about manufacturing, but, like...  Where are some big - bottlenecks?  I guess?  Things that the world needs but doesn't have much of?  I have approximate knowledge of many things, as the saying goes."

"Mmm... I don't really know, I'm not a big scholar or economist... All I know is that the Steelmaking Otherworlder's ideas about production lines didn't work. There just wasn't enough- Anything, everything, to support it."

"...Well of fucking course it didn't, you need industrial-scale metallurgy before you can get there and that goes through industrial-scale mining operations and I'm guessing y'all still mine and forge relatively 'by hand'?  But, no, I'm not -

"I couldn't tell you how industrial steelmaking works with any confidence even if I tried, I'm pretty sure I had family who were involved somehow but that was way before my time.  What I'm thinking about is -

"There's bound to be low-hanging fruit at the intersection of 'things this world already needs for what it does' and 'things Earth knows'.  ...My brain is insistently reminding me that if this was Dungeons and Dragons I would be able to do a lot for their diamond requirements, even if I can't do anywhere near as much for other costly material components.  ...I must really have spent a lot of time thinking about that situation to so specifically remember it now, because the only other bit of gemology that comes to mind is rubies being a subtype of the general crystal-with-inclusions called corundum, and like hell if I know what that's made of at all - but 'diamonds are just fancy carbon' is etched into my brain."

"Diamonds are magically useful. Who knows, if we keep pushing back the cursed lands maybe someone will find a proper big diamond mine."

She is unpacking papers and packets of incense-y powder from her backpack. 

"...You don't need a diamond mine, you just need to make the conditions under which diamonds happen naturally - and I think magic has an edge on technology for this one, because I bet it does forces pretty easily so it's just a matter of power and spell design, not figuring out how the hell you make pressure vessels of sufficient resilience...  ...You just need - carbon - coal, charcoal, I forget if coke's the same stuff - it's the building block of life in full generality besides water - and a fuckton of heat and pressure, precisely how much I couldn't possibly establish because I don't have the tools to build the tools to figure out the invariants from which the measurements were defined, let alone know what the heck those tools are - but... probably the weight of a mile of rock or more, and the temperature of magma.  ...Well.  Motion is heat is force when it's small enough, I kept pulling that out for wizards...  So just.  Enough pressure.  ...Anyway.  There's fancier ways, probably, but gemstones don't just spontaneously manifest under nonmagical conditions.  So if you replicate the right conditions, you will perforce replicate the resulting gemstones.  And thusly, boom, we've synthesized diamonds."

"I'll take your word for it, Ms. Wizard-to-be... Hmm... There, that should be everything. I need to go stand near the entrance to perform this ritual. Some seals, a little incense and holy water, and red string- And a connection to the gods. If you approach with me, let's be quiet?"

She nods.  "I'll stay over here.  Even with this being a tiny baby cursed land, I don't want to poke it without much more ability to defend myself."

"You did good to warn people, and show me. I'll be back soon. Everything will turn out fine."

And with one more ear-scritch, Megi walks up the hill towards the sour place, tail a-swish. She lingers up there for twenty minutes- Doing a little dance, burning something, chanting prayers in what seems like a structured way (calling for sleep, peace, and boundaries), and then putting paper seals all over the outer wall (which has just enough of a ledge around it to make it possible if somewhat hair-raising to skirt along the outside).

And then she heads back, looking a bit morose and thoughtful.

"Well. That's that. I sort of want to go nap in your warren now... Blessings make me sleepy."

"...We could absolutely do that, if you wanted to.  Are you...  Are you alright?  You seem..."

...She's just gonna do her best to be therapy-cat-shaped to Megi, in lieu of finishing that sentence.  You know, applying 'human' contact, purring...

"...I'm sure there's time enough for you to take a moment for yourself."

"You've done what you needed to do, you know?"

Pet, pet, pet.

"...I try to remain willfully ignorant of the worst things out there, when I'm not dealing with them. Let's go nap."

Good girl That would be entirely inappropriate.

"Yes, let's."

She can lead the way to the warren, if that's what's happening now.  (She thinks it is?  Probably?)

And a lovely, snuggly nap is had.

When they wake up the faint aura of ickbad is definitely waning. It feels more like a lingering stain than a spreading stench, now.

"Thank you for putting up with my moodiness..."

...Yeah, no, she's going to get licked, because she is being silly by saying something like that.

"You just had your face rubbed in the echoes of an apocalypse; you get to be sad about that, and if someone tries to tell you otherwise I'll bite them."

"Oh, but being sad and sulking is one of my personal indulgences! It's like chocolate or fancy accessories. Hihihi."

She doesn't know what amused fox noises sound like, but she sure is producing a good sample thereof.

"...damn, now I want chocolate, except I should set a good example for other foxes and not have any while I'm shaped like this.  How dare you do this to me," she deadpans.

"...If there's anything left in those ruins, incidentally, is it, like, finders keepers?  Or, like..."

"...okay, actually, I know next to nothing about the government here at all, and I probably should know things about the government around here if I'm going to keep living here, which...  I don't even know where anywhere else is, you know?  Where am I?"