Exiting the Cave of Terror, we see this:

I have to go Mountainside Inn to rest, stock up and pick up Talinia, my 2nd companion.

At the right corner, we saw Talinia.

When she sees you, Talinia shouts: "Captain! Er..." She looks around for a moment, then continues more quietly. "It's me, Commander Talinia! I appear to be stuck in this simulation... I'm some kind of archer or ranger." She holds up a stout wooden bow and a quiver of arrows. You notice that she's clad in simple leather armor. "The 'monsters' outside are too powerful for me to fight by myself, so I've stayed in this inn. Now that you're here, though, I should join you, and maybe we can figure out what's going on."

You say: "Sure, come on."

Talinia says: "You got it, sir."

Talinia has joined your party!

Munar says: "Welcome to the Snowy Rest Inn. My name's Munar, and I'm the owner. If you want to spend the night, it'll cost you 200 gold pieces."

You say: "We'd like to rent a room for the night."

Munar says: "That'll do fine, thanks. Your room's upstairs, on the left."
You rest for the night, and wake up refreshed and healthy.

You say: "What can you tell me about Terror Mountain?"

Munar says: "Well, don't let the name fool you, but Terror Mountain used to be quite the skiing resort. That is, until all the monsters started infesting the place. We did great business until then... and now, everyone who's staying here is stuck here until it's safe to go back down the mountain."

You say: "The chias in the village at the bottom of the mountain said that the Snowager is missing."

Munar says: "Oh! That makes sense. I always used to get woken up at dawn by the Snowager's roaring, but ever since then I've been oversleeping. I'd use an alarm clock, but I never needed one because the Snowager woke me up, and now I can't even leave the inn to go get one."

Evyas says: "I can't believe this. We finally get away for a skiing trip, and what happens? Some bizarre magical creature disappears, and now we're stuck here! I never should have left Neopia Central..."

Faria says: "Don't be so grouchy, Evyas. At least we get to be up in the nice, fresh mountain air. What with all the sewage problems Neopia Central's been having lately, I don't think I'd want to be there now, anyway!"

Borhal says: "What do you want? Oh, I'm sorry, where are my manners? I'm Borhal, the cook here at the inn. Normally we're completely full up, so I'm extremely busy, but since the Snowager disappeared, things slowed down a little. Obviously. Anyway, in my spare time I cook up potions, which I can sell to you, if you need them."

Orsing says: "Well, even though we're stuck here in this inn, at least we've got a nice, toasty fire to keep us warm. Why don't you have a seat and we can chat awhile?"

You say: "How long have you been here?"

Orsing says: "Oh, a few weeks, ever since the Snowager stopped roaring in the mornings. Like everyone else, it's too dangerous for me to leave. Why, I used to be an adventurer like you, but now I'm too old to go fight monsters. And I've seen some vicious, fierce monsters out the windows since I've been stuck here, let me tell you."

You say: "What kinds of monsters?"

Orsing says: "Well, the biggest one I saw was an enormous, furry spyder. There are lots of other snow spyders scuttling about, but this one was easily three times as large! It didn't come very close to the inn, but it was so big, I could see it clearly from far away."

You say: "Do you know anything about the chias at the bottom of the mountain?"

Orsing says: "Ah, the chias... Yes, I visited there the first day after I arrived at the inn. The Chias were very polite... I think. I couldn't understand anything they were saying, though, but they were all smiles and friendliness. Come to think of it, that was the day before the Snowager disappeared."

You say: "The chias use a magical wordstone so that outsiders can understand them. I recovered it for them."

Orsing says: "Ah, did you now? I'll have to go back and visit them, now that I'll be able to understand what they're saying."

Eridin is writing something as you introduce yourself. He says: "Excuse me for a moment..." and finishes writing a few words. Then he turns to look at you. "Well, hello, there. My name's Eridin, and I'm a writer, as you may have guessed."

You say: "What are you writing?"

Eridin says: "A story of my travels. Someday I hope to have a full journal of my entire journeys."

You say: "How much have you written so far?"

Eridin says: "Ah... see this paper?" He holds up the sheet he was just writing on. "This is about it so far. I've just started my travels, really, and I got stuck here when the Snowager vanished. Nothing has really happened since then. So, there's not really anything to write about. Depressing, isn't it?"

You say: "Yes, a bit, I suppose."

Eridin sighs and nods. "Ah well. I guess I should get back to my writing. If I don't get out of here, I may have to start making things up!"

Hjala says: "Eh, what? Sorry, I was sleeping. Not much else to do around here, since we're all stuck indoors. I know I didn't pay for a vacation in order to spend the whole time sleeping. I could have done that at home!" With that, she flops her head back down on the pillow and goes back to sleep.

Illun says: "Why, a fellow adventurer! And here I was thinking we were the only ones on the mountain."

You say: "You're adventurers?"

Illun smiles and says: "Yes indeed. We've slain many a fiendish foe, including some of the monsters up here on the mountain. Normally there's not much call for adventurers, these days... but now that we've found these monsters, we're certain to receive the acclaim and glory we deserve!"

You say: "So if you're here to kill monsters, why aren't you outside?"

Illun say: "Ah, er... heh... well... you see, uh... we're taking a break, yes, that's it. We've been slaying monsters all morning! Even heroic adventurers need a break every once in a while." While she's saying this, she manages to look everywhere around the room except at you.

or

You say: "Wow, that's very... heroic. Good luck to you."

Illun says: "Yes, it is, isn't it? And thank you very much. Once we finish resting up a little, we'll surely see you out in the wilderness. Ta!"

Wunarka says: "Don't fret about Illun, there... she's a bit of a braggart. We are, technically, adventurers, but not by choice. More by necessity. We arrived on the mountain only a couple of days ago, and we didn't know about the Snowager or the monsters. Illun insisted on taking what she called a 'shortcut.'"

You say: "I'm guessing it wasn't really a shortcut?"

Wunarka chuckles: "You know the saying, 'The shortest distance between two points is a straight line'? Well, the longest distance between two points is a shortcut. Anyway, the main roads up to the mountain all have Neopian police on them, warning people to turn back. The shortcut missed them, so when we were nearly here, we got attacked by some ferocious lupes!"

You say: "What happened?"

Wunarka says: "Well, it was scary, but lately I've been learning martial arts -- neo-fu, specifically. I was able to defeat one of the lupes, and the other one ran off. We saw a few more monsters on the way here, including some giant spyders and a shaggy, angry-looking uni!"

You say: "That sure does sound scary."

Wunarka says: "Yes... but we survived, and now we're here. Unfortunately, once we recovered from the shock, Illun decided that she had been the heroic one. Oh well."