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To Reap What They Sow
Arrival At Kremston

Arrival At Kremston

An armored man stood atop a wooden palisade, shielding his face as he was guarding the gate toward sunrise. "Always stuck guarding the east side in the mornings or the west side at sundown. I swear, it's like the Captain takes pleasure in making sure I'm stuck staring into the brightest light he can find..." The fellow muttered under his breath, slouching forward against the sawn ends of the logs making up the wall surrounding Kremston. Across from him, posted on the opposite side of the huge wooden gateway that allowed entry, his compatriot released an amused snort, "Well, you're the one who got caught sleeping the one time he put you on night watch." "It was one time, and I had to cover double shifts that day because somebody caught sick!" "One time too many. You're lucky you get guard duty on the wall at all. At least here we can sit around and relax. He could have put you on patrol in market square."

The pair bickered and chatted the morning away, the burning ball of fire steadily rising to crest the horizon fully and shed light across the modest frontier town that Kremston was. The town had an air of a military outpost more than a home, with almost half of the town dedicated to the 'market area', a bustling, noisy place that never seemed to sleep. Even in the depths of the night, torches burned, taverns had fights, smithies hammered metal. Kremston was the last stop on this side of the Valdweald, and so everyone from merchants and mercenaries to lords and ladies made a stop in the town for a last taste of civilization. Still, this place was far enough off the beaten path that it didn't justify more than a wooden palisade for defense, which was more than enough to keep the beasts of the forests and flatlands nearby at bay. The natural barrier of the Valdweald meant that the area hadn't seen an army in over a hundred years, and the way things were going it was likely to be a hundred more.

The pair of guards were facing one of the two sides facing the Valdweald, as the vast forest crept around the east side of the town and around along the north besides, the town having been built in the crook of space on the inside of the turn to facilitate travel across the wildland in either direction. "Hey, some'at's on the road over there, headed this way. What idiot's coming back this early in the morning? Must have been out all night!" "Brave, or a fool." "Or both." "Probably both." The pair chatted between them unconcernedly until the figure got closer, noting the bow he was carrying and the large avian corpse he had slung over his shoulder like a sack of grain. "Hail the mighty hunter." One of the guards called out, the tone of amused mockery was clear, as even though the bird looked like a fairly big specimen it didn't look anything impressive. Even at a distance, the ruffled feathers and the blood over the hunter's leathers made it seem like it had put up a fight.

"Piss off and open the gate, I've got important news and I left my friend rotting back there to bring it!" The tired, beleaguered figure that was Tam shouted up the wall with a rising temper. The guards always acted so high and mighty around everyone else but the nobles, like simply being given a job and some armor by the town meant they were made of better stuff than the rest of them. "Shame for your loss." The second guard remarked, with a more moderate tone. Losing someone in the Valdweald wasn't new, though, so at most he would express his sympathy. "Can't open the gate until the sun finishes getting over the horizon." Sighing, Tam unslung the bird over his shoulder and waved it at the wall as if it was going to support his argument. "There's monsters out in the fringes. New ones, and damned dangerous ones. This bird's got a mouth with more blades in it than a militia armory! I need to report it before anyone else manages to get themselves killed not knowing what they're up against."

"Well, ain't nobody going out to be at risk before the gate opens, now is there? Sit on the roadside and catch your breath for a few minutes or something. You look like you crawled your way out of those woods more than anything else, and while the blood on you might make the guild take the threat more seriously, I doubt anyone's going to want to be downwind of you on the way in." The guard wasn't moved by the persuasion, and his companion had long stopped paying attention to the hunter below. Tam shook his head, berating the rules, the fool that made them, and the guard that seemed to be so rigid he'd expect to find a steel rod rammed up his ass. After a few more minutes passed and the sun had risen just a bit further, the massive wooden girder that barricaded the backside of the gate was heaved aside and the gate was pushed open to permit travel. Tam made an obscene gesture at the guards' backs as he went inside, before spitting on the cobblestones of the path and heading inward. Aside from a single caravan headed out as he came in, who he spoke briefly to and warned of the bird as best he could, there wasn't much in the way of travel. Anyone who set out to go in this direction set out early and fast, to cover as much ground in one day of travel in the forest as they could manage. If it hadn't been for this outgoing caravan, the guards might have not even bothered to open this gate and made him march around to the northern or southern gates instead.

There were a fair few folk out and about even at the morning hours. Hawkers roamed the streets trying to interest passerby in a breakfast of pastries stuffed with meat of an undisclosed variety. Sometimes you got something decent, but more often than not you wound up with something borderline-palatable hidden in a crispy shell. Horse, or rat, or even monster meat. It was a gamble that Tam wasn't going to make, even with his stomach growling at him in protest after the night's forced travel without making camp. Instead he managed to get a loaf of coarse brown bread almost the moment it came out of the oven, juggling the burning loaf from hand to hand while trying to scoff large bites on his way to the adventurer's guild. A creature like this bypassed the hunter's guild completely, as they were mainly responsible for the hunting of mundane creatures. While he hadn't seen anything magical about this particular bird, it's complete lack of survival instincts during the fight nudged him on the side of monster rather than simple animal. It was a killing machine, plain and simple, and he could only hope the guild knew what it was.

As he neared the adventurer's guild, the doors propped open wide to let the steady swarm of folk mass inward for missions and assignments then back out to do their tasks for the way, Tam had to all but shoulder his way through to the administration desk for visitors. He drew a few swears for his haste at going forward, and a few more once people saw the large avian corpse he was hauling around, but managed to reach his destination rather quickly. A tired receptionist lifted her head from the stack of paperwork arrayed on the desk before her, sighing at the interruption. "How can I assist you today?" She chirped with a forced politeness and a small, professional smile. That expression stiffened as a corpse was hefted upward and waved about in her view, "I- We-... There was an attack by some new bird-creature, and I came 'ta report it." Tam stammered over his words, trying to make himself sound as proper as he could manage, intent on being taken seriously. "It flew in like a blur an' took down a grown man inna breath, and put up a decent struggle against me afterward a'fore I managed to kill it. I don't even know what it is, but if'n there's a flock of these out there, they could pick a caravan clean in a matter of minutes, without any hope of bein' able to outrun it."

Stolen story; please report.

With a skeptical stare that shifted between the body and the man, the receptionist took out a sheaf of paper from a new stack, starting to scribble atop it in neat, precise lettering. After a short time, she handed the paperwork to the hunter and made a gesture at another desk. "Take this... bird... over to acquisitions, and keep the second paper. If anything of value comes up from your warning, you may be eligible for a monetary reward, but for the time being all we can do is take the corpse and attempt to compare it to the bestiary records in our library. Please check back tomorrow, or in a few days at the latest, in case we have any more questions for you." It sounded like they were dealing with the issue, but Tam had the distinct feeling that this was just being added to a backlog of problems to be dealt with later. At least they couldn't put off some initial examination for too long, else the bird would begin to rot. Following the instructions, he was paid a few silver coins in exchange for the corpse itself, which was more than he had expected given the unknown nature of the creature. Tam didn't see silver unless he brought down a good-sized deer or something similar. Still, considering the cost of bringing the creature back, the coins felt awful light in his grip. "I'll give all of it to Vern's missus. I hope they pay out a reward... her and the brat ain't making it through next winter on a fistful of silvers..." Now he just had to steel himself enough to go over and deliver the news.

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"Fascinating. Completely fascinating. Look here, the teeth aren't carnivorous in design. These teeth aren't designed to tear meat for ease of consumption. It's as if the teeth were maliciously and intentionally created to cause the most damage in a single bite. I can't even break off a tooth with an iron dagger! It took good dwarven steel to finally break one of them off to examine closer. And let's not even get into the issue of why a bird has teeth at all, let alone teeth like this." A high-pitched voice chattered on incessantly, barely pausing to breathe or to allow a pause between sentences, as if they had to get their thoughts out as quickly as possible. A figure that was barely taller than the bird, which was sprawled out and pinned to the table like an insect on a cork board, leaned over the avian and poked and prodded at it. The chest of the bird was cut open from neck to the base of the belly, the skin pinned down to either side to allow for easier examination of the organs. Or, concerningly, the lack thereof. There was no heart, no lungs, no liver, and only the most rudimentary example of a stomach. Skeletal structure and musculature was present as expected, but everything else about this bird was very, very unnatural.

Brushing bright, noxiously vibrant red hair out of their face, a female gnome stood atop a stool to be at a height to examine the creature on the table. About three and a half feet tall, she was almost mistakable for a human child at first glance, her figure clad in a leather butcher's apron, thick leather gloves, and dark grey clothing that served to hide bloodstains. "Aside from telling you it's a dungeon-spawn, I can't even begin to speculate on its behavior. The report we have indicates a form of ambush predator, but that could be a matter of circumstance rather than a habit of the creature as a whole." A coarse, gruff voice reverberated across the room in reply, speaking in a tone accustomed to authority. "All I asked was if this was a species we had a record on already. A simple 'no' would have sufficed, Mimzi." With a sigh of exasperation, the gnome threw up her hands, leveling a frustrated stare at the Guildmaster, a serious-looking dwarf. Just barely taller than the gnome herself, at about four-foot in height, he looked like a grizzled veteran delegated to managerial work by age. His heavily-tanned skin indicated he did more than remain behind a desk these days, but his shaggy hair and glorious, braided beard were a pure sheen of white without a dapple of their original color or even greying remaining in them due to his advanced age. The beard fell almost clear to his waist, and the dwarf stroked it repeatedly as he thought, his hazel eyes scrunched into an expression of annoyance as he swapped his stare from the corpse to the gnome. "Fine. No. Happy Erk?" "Not particularly. And don't call me that." The dwarf's full name was Erkandirin, but those who could get away with it liked to shorten it to "Erk" to, well, irk him. It was part of the reason he usually preferred to go by 'Guildmaster'.

"Do we have anything else to add to the report before I send it off? I'm going to have one of the mages connect through to one of the larger cities, to see if there's anything similar in their libraries. If we're lucky, this is just a stray dungeon-spawn that managed to traverse through the Valdweald. Salt and stone, there's enough space out there we don't have any information on that a dungeon springing up wouldn't be that unlikely. The issue is if a new dungeon decides to cause trouble on the roads, we've got few enough that'll get across the wilds safely as it is. Still, I want scouts out with eyes in the sky looking for these new birds. I want anything that even looks approximately right size and coloring reported, and compiled onto a map. We'll narrow down our area of search based on the sightings, and if it seems like it's in the deep Valdweald, we'll just write off the whole area as 'more dangerous' on the maps and call it a day." Mimzi laughed, a shrill, grating sound to the dwarf's ears, and rolled her eyes at his optimism. "Oh, sure, just write it off and hope it stays to itself. How many times has trying to starve out a new dungeon actually worked, and how often has some adventurous team of morons given it a quick boost and got it addicted to killing?" Erkandirin sighed, and rubbed at his temples with both hands, knowing full well that the young and stupid were both plentiful and ambitious. "I know, Mimzi, I know. But it's worth a try. Let's just find the thing, first. Hopefully, before anyone else does."