The meal had not turned out too badly. Guided by instinct, hidden memories or maybe just by plain luck, which one Chance was not too certain, he had set up a thin stone over the fire to cook the fish upon, wrapped in bark and seasons with herbs and mushrooms. They hadn’t been too burned, and only partially uncooked in parts. They came apart fairly easily into pieces as well when unwrapped.
Skill unlocked:
Cooking, basic.
It was a start at least. As long as he could find food he could prepare it and so survive, for a time. Together the two of them had picked at the cooked fish, pulling off parts and eating them. Yrip had been greatly hesitant at first, but after seeing Chance eat some had soon showed delighted enthusiasm, finishing off two of the fish himself despite his small stature. After his initial reluctance, he looked disappointed when the last of the fish were gone, leaving only bones behind.
Chance smiled at him, watching the kobold trying to pick the last scraps from the bones. “We’ll have some more tomorrow, Yrip. It doesn’t look like there was a shortage in the pool.”
Yrip beamed at the thought of it. “Yrip could never have imagined such tastes, master. Iyari have no skills for this cooking.”
“Tell me, Yrip,” Chance started to say, not really wishing to broach the subject but knowing that he had to, “You are of the Halfscale tribe aren’t you?
Yrip nodded rapidly. “Yes, master. Halfscales are strong. We serve you well.”
“I shall have to pay them a visit.”
“The Halfscales will be honoured, master.”
Maybe, Chance thought, Maybe not. I still can’t tell him what I’m meant to be doing to them.
“Do you also know of the Grimfangs and Brokentooth?”
Yrip spat on the ground. “Stinky, smelly,” he replied with some conviction; there was no love lost there by his reaction. “You do not need them, master. The Halfscales are all that you need.”
“I am still going to have to meet with them as well, Yrip,” Chance told the kobold. “I have a quest to remove them from the Azval Stalvaq region.”
“Good,” Yrip replied firmly. “The Halfscales will help. Halfscales will prove to you that you don’t need stinky or smelly.”
“I’m sure I won’t if all the Halfscales are as helpful as you.”
Yrip beamed again. “You will see, master. Halfscales can help you in many ways.”
“That will need to wait,” Chance said, using a length of wood to move the cooking stone off the fire, exposing the glowing coals beneath. He added a few more twigs and larger pieces of wood, coaxing the flames back into life. When the fire was burning again, he looked upwards, at the darkening sky and the first stars that were making an appearance. He was not much of a stargazer back home but felt that they were different stars, different constellations overhead. The thick band of stars that he was used to that marked the Milky Way was not there for a start. “It is getting late, and we should get some sleep before we try anything.” He sniffed at the air, though he did not know why he did so at first, not until the message spoke into his mind.
Skill unlocked:
Weathersense, basic
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Affinity; Nature
“No rain tonight,” he announced, “And it will remain warm as well.” He didn’t know how he knew all of that exactly, just that he did, part of that mysterious other part of him that kept on intruding. “Keep the fire going and we should be fine tonight.”
“You don’t think that the stinkies or smellies will try anything, do you master?” Yrip asked, a little anxious.
“I shouldn't think so. Who would attack one they thought was a dragon?”
Yrip nodded rapidly. “Yes, yes. Even the stinkies and smellies know better than to do that.”
Chance doubted that they actually thought that he was, but he was still in the tutorial zone after all, and that made it unlikely they would attack; Yrip might not understand that and nor did he think that he could adequately explain the concept to the kobold either.
Unconcerned while in the presence of the one he though of as his master, Yrip found a spot on the grass nearby to the fire and curled himself up in a ball. It did not take long for a razor-edged snoring to be coming from the little kobold.
Chance sat for a while, simply staring into the flames. His mind was a whirl of thoughts and of nothing at all. It had all been to much, and while he knew that he should try and get some sleep, he was not sure that he could. Now that he had a moment by himself to stop and think, his mind raced, trying to make any sense of what was going on. Taking up a stick, he poked at the fire, letting sparks drift upwards as he disturbed it.
It had been a long and very weird day. He was only meant to be having a check up, not an uncommon occurrence given his record, and next he knew he was here, wherever here was, with no knowledge, no clues and only a slight mad and overly eagre kobold for company, and that last he considered a bonus, all things considered. It was the kind of thing you’d get in a bad dream. He hoped that it was one, that he would soon wake and it would all be over.
Deep down though he knew that it wasn’t. Sure he felt disconnected, disoriented, not totally in control, but at the same time it felt far too real for it to be a dream or nightmare. They tended not to stick to one thing, but to meander all over the shop, with random bits of strangeness thrown in for good measure.
Here was filled with random nonsense, but it all fitted together, it was all one thing that made sense given the context. And that, more than anything, convinced him that, yes, this was real, even if it made no sense as to how it could be so. Somehow he was going to have to muddle through it all, to try and figure something, anything, out. Tomorrow though.
He lay down near the fire, facing towards it, trying to find a comfortable position. The new body didn’t lay down the way he was used to and the ground was a lot harder than his comfortable bed back home. And there was no pillow either, forcing him to use his arm. Grumbling, he shifted about, trying to find some way to at least minimise the discomfort. First thing in the morning, he promised himself, they would prioritise getting decent bedding. Everything else could wait. Well, nearly everything.
He had just found a spot that he thought might work, envying the ease in which Yrip had settled in, and closed his eyes, when he became aware of a presence. It wasn’t so much heard, and certainly not seen, but more felt.
He rolled over and sat up abruptly, staring off away from the fire, towards the forest. He couldn’t see anything but was certain that something was lurking out there. He could feel it, a sense that wouldn’t go away and so he stared at a particular spot of the forest. Despite the dark he could see reasonably well, even if the colours were lacking, a washed out mix of greys and blacks. Dwarves could see quite well in the dark and night he realised. He’d had a hint of it earlier on the cave but at the time he had been in far too much of a state of shock to properly take things in.
There was something out there. A set of eyes glowed back at him, and a grey shape of some type of animal could just be made out, half obscured by bushes. Whatever it was, it was also quite large. For a moment Chance considered shaking Yrip awake, then rejected it. The little kobold would be of little use against a creature that large.
It emerged from out of the bushes and started to pad towards him, a large, shaggy dog. No, not a dog he realised; a wolf. The wolf that he had heard earlier no doubt. It was coming towards him at a slow, methodical pace, silent, golden eyes studying him. It was big too; he hadn’t realised that wolves could grow so large. He had always pictured them as large dogs, not the monster that he now saw, a grey killer on four legs. The Counsellor had said he wasn’t meant to be killing wolves; he half wondered if that was because he wouldn’t have had a chance against something as fearsome as the wolf before him. The thing would devour him without missing a beat.
It came nearby, but not too close to the flames and then stopped, half sitting, appearing as if it was waiting, expectant. There were no fish remaining, otherwise Chance would have thrown one to the wolf in an effort to distract, or bribe, it.
The wolf’s vision moved, from Chance down to the kobold, and then back up to him. Steely, hushed words came to his mind, spoken into it, in a manner of the messages that kept plaguing him, but these words were alive.
Strange company you keep.