L stood in front of the Hunter’s Den, frustrated, sweating, and quite pissed.
It took until sun dusk for him to find a wooden house that was nearly identical to the 60 other houses adjacent to it. Those roasting guards made any type of communication between him and the town’s people consist of grunts, spits, and scorns, and only sometimes the use of intelligent word utterance. The only reason why L was able to find this house in the first place was through the threats of placing a curse upon some religious fanatic that attempted to use exorcism on L's accursed body. The threats did not work. What did work was that while L was chasing the man yelling out gibberish and evil sounding words and making the impression summoning a storm of darkness and misery, the man had informed him that the young brunette was called Tel, and that she cleans the stables and was the daughter of the local hunter, Thrawl.
The chase ended when L had heard a dog's vicious barking. He had stopped then, remembering that a hunter generally had a dog to assist him in catching prey, and knowing what his race is like roughly, L reckoned that perceptive animals did not favor his grim touch. At the very least, he had a very good indication of whether animals are around.
L knocked on the door, waited for less than a heartbeat, and then knocked with slightly more force. A middle-aged man came out, an anxious look on his face.
“Where is your daughter?” L asked, ignoring the barking of the dog. It was a husky with light and dark fur.
Thrawl took a few clumsy moments to hold the dog back. He glanced impatiently at L. “Probably around the village somewhere. You smell awful, who the fuck are you and what do you want?
“I’m that guy that the guards warned every idiot about. Your daughter stole my dignity, and I’m here to take it back,” L said plainly.
Thrawl hesitated for a bit, and then he looked L up and down.
Like Father Like Daughter, L thought, becoming oddly tired of having his skin being studied so meticulously.
L continued. “Kullburd gave her my clothes to wash, about three days ago. Today I saw her, and instead of giving me back my clothes, the girl ran off.” L wisely chose not to mention his lack of clothing at that time, and had retained that complaint to a future time with a rather more appropriate partner.
The man’s ginger beard sunk down. “When did you last see her?” Thrawl asked carefully.
“Less than an hour? The sun was just about to set last time I saw her, when she was cleaning the stables or something.”
“For fucks sakes!” Thrawl bellowed, thick muscle bulging against his white cotton shirt, one rough hand held the side of his head. “That foolish girl neglected to do her chores again, and is probably doing it now.”
“Ahem...and-”
“You’re going to be helping be find her, because you set her off on this.” Thrawl said, pointing accusingly at L. He stomped back into the house, his adult husky springing out of the way quietly.
“It’s not like I said anything to her though” L whispered to himself. From where he was awkwardly standing, he could see Thrawl retrieving a short bow, his quiver, and a short-sword. “If You’re gonna make me leave the village when Darkness is impending, can you at least give me something to defend myself with?” L called out.
Thrawl’s answer came in the form of a spinning hunting knife that impaled itself two inches deep into the wooden door “...that I can actually defend myself with?” L clarified.
Thrawl grunted and rummaged some more. Finally, he pushed an aged short-bow and a half-filled quiver onto L’s chest. There were about 11 arrows in it.
“Let's go,” He said, jogging ahead. The husky gave L a suspicious look, a low growl, then followed after her master.
Quest started!
The Forgetful Damsel
The girl had procrastinated on her chores, and alas, she has become reckless in her pursuit to avoid trouble. Save this silly damsel! Be the dark prince! Do something!
Difficulty: F
Reward: Your dignity
A bit of experience.
Would you fuck off Null? I know this isn’t how the quest screen looks or acts.
Just trying to help <3
How about you help your miserable personality we are in a life or death situation! What if something happens to precious Tel?!
Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author's preferred platform and support their work!
As L and Thrawl jogged through the town the sun’s orange light was steadily reduced to naught but a tinny glimmer.
“What comes out at night?” L asked Thrawl. It was always important to find out as more information as possible.
“Dangerous things!” Thrawl said impatiently and broke into a faster sprint.
L let a sharp breath escape his lungs. Such shrewd knowledge!
Thrawl ran out of the gates without heeding the guard's nervous yelling and astute observation regarding the sun’s departure. L followed suit, but dropped a quick ‘off to save my first maiden lady’ as sufficient explanation as he attempted to keep pace with Thrawl.
Thrawl had his bow and quiver strapped to his back, as did L. L’s lack of clothing made strapping the hunter’s knife to any part of his body extremely difficult. Instead, he settled for carrying the naked foot long blade with him.
As high as L’s raw stats currently were, it seemed that it was no match to Thrawl’s trained proficiencies, for once they dived into the forest L became no longer able to keep up Thrawl within hearing distance.
“I’ll go upstream, you go downstream. You’ll hit the river at the North-East!” Thrawl called out.
Before L could nod, Thrawl had disappeared under the heavy cover of the forest maze.
L wanted to feel his heart-beating at such a novel scenario, but it was all too obvious attempt by the AI to provide game-play elements for L. Realizing he was being guided by the AI made L feel dispirited. It was a bit difficult to dismiss this unlikely event as a lucky coincidence, but L pushed on nevertheless.
The environment, at the very least, was quite adequate. Giant trees sprung from the hard earth in abundance, their roots and branches allowing for creative parkouring.
Surely enough, after a short while, L found the river flowing gently. It snakes in the forest, wide enough for a good fifty yards or so. Instead of going into the open, however, L trod in the cover of the trees and growing darkness. L had found the girl not too far off, finishing up a decently sized basked of clothing alongside the shallow ends of the river, where it was crossable. It was a good spot, L reckoned, as it was deep enough for the clothing to be stomped to have the filth beaten out of them, but not too deep that the skirts of the woman would be constantly drenched and damaged.
She quickly attempted to finish the last of clothing, realizing the amount of peril she was in.
L did not move in to help her. Instead, he hid in a thick cover of bushes a safe 10 yards off and had begun to weave darkness into his spot, further decreasing his visibility. There was no doubt some type of related skill L would be able to learn through this.
Um...aren’t you going to go get her?
L did not answer, and instead concentrated on blending in. He attempted to also enhance his body, but his skills were too low at this point. It would be something that L would have to improve at a later time.
A few quiet moments passed as the girl dried and tucked in the last shirt into the basket.
A strong wind blew then, rustling the giant forest trunks and thick bushes.
It was then that L noticed an oddity. One bush in particular, on the other side of the river, swayed oddly in an unlike motion its sisters and brothers fluttered in. Focusing his senses on it, L was able to spot movement inside it, as well as little features of limbs. Brown limbs, purple limbs.
Monster limbs.
A notched bow gently pushed aside the embrace of the bush. A giant brown claw held it, aimed directly at Tel.
L watched as the arrows escaped the fingers of the concealed humanoid figure. The loosened arrow parted the wind and then soft flesh. The arrow had pierced Tel below her collarbone, the sharp tip puncturing through her shoulder blade.
She screeched and fell to the water, splashing and wiggling her limbs in horror and confusion.
Two smaller creatures sprinted out of the bushes right then. Three feet tall with disproportionately bigger heads and two enormous yellow eyes sprinted across the shallow waters, one holding a club and the other a small dagger. They were thin and childlike with sleek purple skin.
Tel crawled out of the river and attempted to run, but with each movement the arrow sent ruptures of paralyzing pain, reducing the effectiveness of her clumsy movement. The first creature reached her not too late after, and smacked his club against the back of her knees, sending her tumbling forward against the hard stone. Her forehead bounced once off the ground, dazing her screams.
Still, L watched as the creature swung again, this time cracking her skull against the ground, finally silencing her cries. They then each took a limb and began to drag the face down Tel across the hard stone, and back across the river. Her cheeks bounced off against each stone, leaving droplets of blood behind her.
While she was being pulled across the river, her ankle-length skirt became increasingly wet. It got stuck under her, and as she was being dragged, her skirt slide up her legs, all the way to her hips. Her underwear became bare, as the bottom half of her skirt was now pulled over the back of her head.
The bow-wilder, a six-foot humanoid creature, poked out of the bushes with hisses and snarls. It resembled a Bugbear, with hairy brown fur across the head and a hunched spine. Wedge-shaped ears extended from the sides of their heads, and carnivorous teeth stuck out of its mouth and drool seeped out in anticipation of soft flesh.
It took a bit for the small creatures to drag Tel across the river. Instead of helping, the Bugbear wisely chose to cover the retreat of his minions, sticking to the cover of the trees with his short-bow, a thing that no doubt was salvaged in similar ways to this.
A barking was heard, followed by the maddened cry of the hunter a short distance away. The haggard figure of Thrawl came into view a short while moment later, his hunter’s high precipitation no doubt allowing him to see the monsters drag his limp daughter into the forest.
The irony of the hunter was not lost on L.
By the time Thrawl jumped into the shallow end of the river, the purple creatures had fully dragged Tel into the thick bushes.
All was not lost. Thrawl was a Hunter, a decent one at that, and would no doubt be able to track the creatures and get back his daughter--the fact regarding the state of her caved in skull registered little with Thrawl. All he wanted was to get his daughter back.
It was then that the Bugbear high intellect came into place. Any other creature would have retreated in fear and would have then been tracked and murdered. The Bugbear, on the other hand, had chosen to fight, even if instinctively it knew that the Hunter was a much higher level than it. Thrawl was half-way through the river when the Bugbear released an arrow through the bushes.
The arrow whiffed by Thrawl as he twisted out of the arrow's path, dodged narrowly by ludicrously high reaction skills. Even on bad terrain, and at a distance of 25 yards Thrawl was able to avoid an arrow.
Thrawl kneeled, unhooked, notched, and loosened an arrow at the trajectory of the previous arrow before the Bugbear had even notched his second arrow. The arrow went into the bushes, and though Thrawl could not see it sink it, a pained howl confirmed a hit. It pierced through the Bugbear thick thigh muscles, becoming entrenched besides the bone.
The husky had dashed ahead of Thrawl and was now circling in and out of the two purple creature’s range, who kept it outside of the forest.
Another arrow came out of the bushes, but this time Thrawl was too close to be able to maneuver out of it. Though it missed, it had still managed to go through one of his arm biceps, taking flesh off and bouncing against the water behind him.
It was then that both L and Thrawl saw an opportunity, as both notched their arrows and loosened them.
Both missed.
Thrawl had attempted to take down one of the purple creatures, but their tiny size, agility, and the cover of the trees made the shot tricky. The arrow bounced off a tree’s branch.
L’s arrow, on the other hand, flew right near Thrawl’s skull. It impaled itself on a tree’s trunk.
Thrawl snapped his head around, and upon sighting L, and had instantly pinned his daughter’s tragic demise upon him, which usually have only gone as far to show a simple human-defensive mechanism in being averse to responsibility, but in this one case of prejudice and rush to judgment, Thrawl was entirely too right.
“Watch that aim you scum!” He bellowed back as he sprinted forward, attempting to cut the distance.
“My bad! This bow is not tuned well!” L said, loading another arrow. He took careful aim.
This time, L did not miss.