RE: The Fatal Conflict (GBS2G7) (Round 4: The Huntsman's Garden)
10-05-2020, 02:44 AM
Making his careful way through the underbrush, several weeks past since his first arrival in this place, Kaja had a sense of assuredness to his movements. Though he had tried his best to keep himself looking more or less respectable, his time spent in this wild place had taken a very visible toll upon him.
His hair was long, thick and matted, in some places chopped abruptly short. His beard was in much the same state, though he’d made more of an effort to keep it trimmed short he’d lacked the appropriate tools. The only shaving implement he had was Zaire’s crimson blade and though he had become more comfortable wielding it, he still did not like to bring it too close to his throat. He was a mess, his contraption scuffed and marked with clumps of mud, his clothing stained a dour rainbow of colours from the various reagents he had been experimenting with, his shoes just missing lost somewhere in this forest.
He moved slowly, keeping one hand on Zaire’s blade which he kept sheathed through his belt at his waist. His eyes darted around as he made careful progress through what was by this point very well worn ground. Occasionally he would spot a track left in the earth and squat down to scrutinize it closer. Kaja had no formal knowledge in the art of tracking, just what he had been forced to learn over the past few weeks. He had become reasonably adept in identifying the different tracks of the various different beasts that roamed the Huntsman’s Garden. Over the course of an hour or so he identified the paths of a pair of battering tortoises, one particularly meandering trail left by a crystal knife wolf and finally at long last the tracks of a warpbird.
Warpbirds were huge ostrich-like birds, replete with vibrantly coloured plumage and razor sharp beaks. The most noticeable thing about them was their capacity to teleport short distances in order to close in on their prey, or hapless alchemists who might be lingering nearby in certain circumstances. Following his initial painful encounter with a warpbird Kaja had been trying to work out some way to utilize their teleportation capabilities. A couple of weeks ago he had managed to get hold of a warpbird corpse and had spent some time ascertaining that no part of their anatomy acted as an alchemical reagent for teleportation. Last week he had made a number of attempts to capture one of the murderous bastards alive in the hope that domestication might be possible. While he had eventually been successful, he was later forced to conclude that Niji had at some point lost their teleportation abilities.
Kaja had one hypothesis left; there was something in the environment that was giving the warpbirds their teleportation abilities. Niji, isolated from this power source, had lost their powers and reverted to being just an ordinary bird… albeit an enormous and murderous ordinary bird. The trail of a warpbird was a tough one to follow, if anything after having spotted the initial track Kaja only slowed down as he painstakingly searched each subsequent one, which could be close by or, if the warpbird was doing as its name suggested and warping, could be several meters away. It would have been so much easier to follow Niji to this teleportation power source, indeed Kaja had tried and the bird had led him in circles for an entire day. The search he was currently undertaking was one borne of desperation. This entire endeavour was built on the unfounded hope that if he was to finally get his hands on the source of this teleportation he would be able to use it to brew up some potion to get them out of this place and home again; an astronomically large supposition. Regardless of the odds of success he forced himself to try, it was the only hope that he had for the moment.
He made progress painstakingly slowly, but eventually the trail of the warpbird led through a dense thicket of trees and out into a small clearing. Kaja froze at the edge of the treeline, just concealed enough to not be immediately noticed by the throng of warpbirds gathered in the centre. They were gathered around a massive white-barked tree. From just a glance it was clear to see how fragile the bark was, there were places where the neon-blue sap inside the tree had oozed out of the cracked bark and formed enormous hanging polyps. The warpbirds were each scratching around the base of the tree, wetting their beaks on the shining blue sap within. This had to be it, Kaja reasoned. Now all he needed were some samples of the sap and then… he wasn’t sure how to even begin conceptualize the process of learning how to teleport effectively enough to escape from the battle entirely, the actual steps that doing so would take. Those considerations could wait until he safely had the sample back at his makeshift lab, for now he had to focus.
Kaja’s hand tightened around the handle of Zaire’s crimson sword as he focused on the group of warpbirds surrounding the tree. The effect would not be immediately obvious to anyone who wasn’t already listening for it; slowly something that had been background noise so quiet as to be almost imperceptible grew louder and louder. It was the sound of violins, tranquil, perhaps melancholic with only occasional notes of discord. Simphonia flowed from out of the trees behind Kaja, a shapeless cloud of musical notation and blood red runes moving in unison.
Three out of five of the warpbirds had turned and vanished out of the clearing as Simphonia broke through the treeline. The other two planted their feet and honked menacingly at the intruder. Simphonia hesitated at the treeline, as if having to be prompted to move any further. Behind her Kaja was stood stock still, both hands gripping Zaire’s crimson blade. In a moment Simphonia’s song grew more discordant; with her hesitation quelled she advanced upon the warpbirds.
The larger of the two sprung forward, jabbing at the cloud of music with its beak. Simphonia’s razor sharp notes scratched and tore at the bird as she continued to flow forward regardless of the creature. The warpbird vanished with an alarmed honk, reappearing somewhere in the trees to Kaja’s right, whereupon it immediately turned tail and fled. The remaining warpbird honked again at the implacable wall of notes, when this failed to produce the desired result the bird vanished and reappeared behind her. Immediately it pounced, attacking with its sharp beak, and suffering the same injuries as the warpbird before it, before it too teleported to safety and fled in the same direction.
With the clearing emptied Kaja allowed himself to relax, removing one hand from the grip he maintained on Zaire’s blade. Simphonia’s discordant noise calmed until it had resumed the melancholic refrain from earlier, while her physical form reshaped itself into the vague human silhouette she favoured. “My apologies Simphonia. You know I hate to inflict that abhorrant state upon you once again, but I assure you that it was towards a noble end.” Simphonia’s tone remained the same, perhaps indicating an unease with his methods or maybe more likely simply unconcerned with anything that he had to say. It was seldom clear how invested in the world around her surroundings she was.
Kaja had found Simphonia a couple of days after their arrival in this place. She had been furiously tearing apart a grove of ironvine trees, though perhaps not furiously as it infers a certain amount of intent usually absent from Simphonia even at her most violently discordant. Kaja had considered the eventuality that he might encounter her, and the outside possibility that Zaire’s crimson blade might yet hold some connection to the blood red runes within her. Hidden from sight he had gripped the blade tight and focused on calming those runes and it had worked, to a certain degree. As long as he held the blade he could keep the runes under control, giving her back control of herself, but if he let go she would revert back to that uncontrolled violent state immediately, and so he had maintained that physical contact continuously almost unbroken ever since.
Over the weeks he had gotten used to Simphonia’s company. It was difficult to have a conversation with her, but every now and again she would reply with a change in tempo or refrain that made him feel as though perhaps there was some kind of understanding between the two of them. He really did hate to use Simphonia as a weapon as he had done, he would rationalize it away. This place was dangerous, with fearsome predators and he was simply doing what he had to to survive. It was ultimately to Simphonia’s benefit, if he was to die then she would be back to her violent discordant form, a form which he was fairly sure was unpleasant for her to exist as.
Kaja stepped up close to the tree, to the spot where the bark had been broke open and the warpbirds had been drinking their fill. With his free hand he reached to his alchemic apparatus behind him and pulled free a small glass vial. “Now with this remarkable sap we will be one fairly significant step closer to making our escape from this wretched confront-” Suddenly the vial he was holding shattered in his hand. Startled, Kaja spun around, almost letting go of Zaire’s blade in the momentary panic. “Oh for fuck’s sake Derek!”
Standing in the clearing behind where Kaja and Simphonia had entered was a familiar red cube holding a futuristic looking hunting rifle. IT’S THE END OF THE LINE FLESH BEING. YOU’RE NOT GOING TO WORM YOU WAY OUT OF IT THIS TIME.
“Seriously Derek, we are so very close to working out a solution to extricating ourselves from this damnable place. Then we’re out of your hair permanently and without unnecessary bloodshed.” Kaja sounded exasperated.
I FEEL LIKE I’VE BEEN MORE THAN REASONABLE FLESH BEING. YOU HAVE HAD PLENTIFUL PLANETARY ROTATIONS TO LEAVE THIS UNIVERSE AND YET HERE YOU ARE.
“I know you’re not a bad person. You don’t want to hunt and kill sentient beings. You don’t need to do this Derek.”
YOU DON’T KNOW ME. YOU DON’T KNOW WHAT I’M ABOUT. YOU CAN’T GET MY NAME RIGHT. IT’S DH’£R**3K.
“What about… what about… umm… Zaire. Remember how we talked about how he would be far more fitting prey than I would?” Kaja kept his gaze focused on the cube being and tightened his grip upon Zaire’s sword.
AT THIS POINT I’M NOT CONVINCED THERE IS ANY “ZAIRE”. I’M STARTING TO THINK I PROBABLY SHOULD HAVE JUST KILLED YOU THE FIRST TIME THAT I SAW YOU FLESH BEING. Slowly the downbeat background music underscoring this standoff became more and more discordant. DH’£R**3K didn’t seem to notice as the form of Simphonia gathered behind him. ANY LAST WORDS FLESH BEING?
“Just…” Kaja trailed off. “Just fuck off Derek.” With that Simphonia’s form crashed down onto the humanoid red cube and several things happened very quickly. Simphonia’s razor sharp notes shredded through DH’£R**3K’s hunting outfit, and through the translucent red energy cloud that was his body. He cried out in wordless psychic pain and fired wildly in Kaja’s direction. Kaja meanwhile had flung himself to the floor the moment he told the multiversal hunter to fuck off. He landed heavily on his stomach, the weight of his alchemical apparatus knocking the wind out of him. DH’£R**3K’s shots whizzed over Kaja’s prone body and slammed into the huge white tree, splintering the fragile bark and causing the glowing blue sap to splash out across the clearing. The tree shook, shuddered, creaked loudly and then vanished entirely leaving nothing but an empty space in the centre of the clearing.
DH’£R**3K had spun around and was firing shots wildly at the engulfing cloud of music. FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK he cried out as Simphonia’s whirling notes tore at the cube at the heart of his being. DH’£R**3K threw down the rifle and tried just to bat Simphonia away with his insubstantial hands. OKAY FINE FUCK THIS he screamed and then made like a tree and completely disappeared.
-------
In a distant world of rolling sands an entity lay perfectly still atop the dunes. A humanoid being, with strange featureless skin that changed its colour to match whatever was around it. They were wearing camouflage gear significantly less effective than their own skin and clutched in their hands an enormous gun crackling with energy. Their eye pressed up to the scope, their finger tensed upon the trigger, just waiting for the right-
*ding*
They jerked up at the exact moment their finger pulled the trigger sending a streak of golden energy across the sky. Grumbling they put the gun to one side and pulled out their phone. Another negative review for universe EQ48… They opened the review and skimmed it. Lots of invective and complaints about sentient flesh beings ruining the atmosphere, and something about a very loud and very sharp cloud that very nearly caused permanent damage.
The Huntsman was thoughtful. They’d received a couple of complaints like this recently, but there was always someone ready to complain about something. Perhaps it was time to handle this matter personally?
His hair was long, thick and matted, in some places chopped abruptly short. His beard was in much the same state, though he’d made more of an effort to keep it trimmed short he’d lacked the appropriate tools. The only shaving implement he had was Zaire’s crimson blade and though he had become more comfortable wielding it, he still did not like to bring it too close to his throat. He was a mess, his contraption scuffed and marked with clumps of mud, his clothing stained a dour rainbow of colours from the various reagents he had been experimenting with, his shoes just missing lost somewhere in this forest.
He moved slowly, keeping one hand on Zaire’s blade which he kept sheathed through his belt at his waist. His eyes darted around as he made careful progress through what was by this point very well worn ground. Occasionally he would spot a track left in the earth and squat down to scrutinize it closer. Kaja had no formal knowledge in the art of tracking, just what he had been forced to learn over the past few weeks. He had become reasonably adept in identifying the different tracks of the various different beasts that roamed the Huntsman’s Garden. Over the course of an hour or so he identified the paths of a pair of battering tortoises, one particularly meandering trail left by a crystal knife wolf and finally at long last the tracks of a warpbird.
Warpbirds were huge ostrich-like birds, replete with vibrantly coloured plumage and razor sharp beaks. The most noticeable thing about them was their capacity to teleport short distances in order to close in on their prey, or hapless alchemists who might be lingering nearby in certain circumstances. Following his initial painful encounter with a warpbird Kaja had been trying to work out some way to utilize their teleportation capabilities. A couple of weeks ago he had managed to get hold of a warpbird corpse and had spent some time ascertaining that no part of their anatomy acted as an alchemical reagent for teleportation. Last week he had made a number of attempts to capture one of the murderous bastards alive in the hope that domestication might be possible. While he had eventually been successful, he was later forced to conclude that Niji had at some point lost their teleportation abilities.
Kaja had one hypothesis left; there was something in the environment that was giving the warpbirds their teleportation abilities. Niji, isolated from this power source, had lost their powers and reverted to being just an ordinary bird… albeit an enormous and murderous ordinary bird. The trail of a warpbird was a tough one to follow, if anything after having spotted the initial track Kaja only slowed down as he painstakingly searched each subsequent one, which could be close by or, if the warpbird was doing as its name suggested and warping, could be several meters away. It would have been so much easier to follow Niji to this teleportation power source, indeed Kaja had tried and the bird had led him in circles for an entire day. The search he was currently undertaking was one borne of desperation. This entire endeavour was built on the unfounded hope that if he was to finally get his hands on the source of this teleportation he would be able to use it to brew up some potion to get them out of this place and home again; an astronomically large supposition. Regardless of the odds of success he forced himself to try, it was the only hope that he had for the moment.
He made progress painstakingly slowly, but eventually the trail of the warpbird led through a dense thicket of trees and out into a small clearing. Kaja froze at the edge of the treeline, just concealed enough to not be immediately noticed by the throng of warpbirds gathered in the centre. They were gathered around a massive white-barked tree. From just a glance it was clear to see how fragile the bark was, there were places where the neon-blue sap inside the tree had oozed out of the cracked bark and formed enormous hanging polyps. The warpbirds were each scratching around the base of the tree, wetting their beaks on the shining blue sap within. This had to be it, Kaja reasoned. Now all he needed were some samples of the sap and then… he wasn’t sure how to even begin conceptualize the process of learning how to teleport effectively enough to escape from the battle entirely, the actual steps that doing so would take. Those considerations could wait until he safely had the sample back at his makeshift lab, for now he had to focus.
Kaja’s hand tightened around the handle of Zaire’s crimson sword as he focused on the group of warpbirds surrounding the tree. The effect would not be immediately obvious to anyone who wasn’t already listening for it; slowly something that had been background noise so quiet as to be almost imperceptible grew louder and louder. It was the sound of violins, tranquil, perhaps melancholic with only occasional notes of discord. Simphonia flowed from out of the trees behind Kaja, a shapeless cloud of musical notation and blood red runes moving in unison.
Three out of five of the warpbirds had turned and vanished out of the clearing as Simphonia broke through the treeline. The other two planted their feet and honked menacingly at the intruder. Simphonia hesitated at the treeline, as if having to be prompted to move any further. Behind her Kaja was stood stock still, both hands gripping Zaire’s crimson blade. In a moment Simphonia’s song grew more discordant; with her hesitation quelled she advanced upon the warpbirds.
The larger of the two sprung forward, jabbing at the cloud of music with its beak. Simphonia’s razor sharp notes scratched and tore at the bird as she continued to flow forward regardless of the creature. The warpbird vanished with an alarmed honk, reappearing somewhere in the trees to Kaja’s right, whereupon it immediately turned tail and fled. The remaining warpbird honked again at the implacable wall of notes, when this failed to produce the desired result the bird vanished and reappeared behind her. Immediately it pounced, attacking with its sharp beak, and suffering the same injuries as the warpbird before it, before it too teleported to safety and fled in the same direction.
With the clearing emptied Kaja allowed himself to relax, removing one hand from the grip he maintained on Zaire’s blade. Simphonia’s discordant noise calmed until it had resumed the melancholic refrain from earlier, while her physical form reshaped itself into the vague human silhouette she favoured. “My apologies Simphonia. You know I hate to inflict that abhorrant state upon you once again, but I assure you that it was towards a noble end.” Simphonia’s tone remained the same, perhaps indicating an unease with his methods or maybe more likely simply unconcerned with anything that he had to say. It was seldom clear how invested in the world around her surroundings she was.
Kaja had found Simphonia a couple of days after their arrival in this place. She had been furiously tearing apart a grove of ironvine trees, though perhaps not furiously as it infers a certain amount of intent usually absent from Simphonia even at her most violently discordant. Kaja had considered the eventuality that he might encounter her, and the outside possibility that Zaire’s crimson blade might yet hold some connection to the blood red runes within her. Hidden from sight he had gripped the blade tight and focused on calming those runes and it had worked, to a certain degree. As long as he held the blade he could keep the runes under control, giving her back control of herself, but if he let go she would revert back to that uncontrolled violent state immediately, and so he had maintained that physical contact continuously almost unbroken ever since.
Over the weeks he had gotten used to Simphonia’s company. It was difficult to have a conversation with her, but every now and again she would reply with a change in tempo or refrain that made him feel as though perhaps there was some kind of understanding between the two of them. He really did hate to use Simphonia as a weapon as he had done, he would rationalize it away. This place was dangerous, with fearsome predators and he was simply doing what he had to to survive. It was ultimately to Simphonia’s benefit, if he was to die then she would be back to her violent discordant form, a form which he was fairly sure was unpleasant for her to exist as.
Kaja stepped up close to the tree, to the spot where the bark had been broke open and the warpbirds had been drinking their fill. With his free hand he reached to his alchemic apparatus behind him and pulled free a small glass vial. “Now with this remarkable sap we will be one fairly significant step closer to making our escape from this wretched confront-” Suddenly the vial he was holding shattered in his hand. Startled, Kaja spun around, almost letting go of Zaire’s blade in the momentary panic. “Oh for fuck’s sake Derek!”
Standing in the clearing behind where Kaja and Simphonia had entered was a familiar red cube holding a futuristic looking hunting rifle. IT’S THE END OF THE LINE FLESH BEING. YOU’RE NOT GOING TO WORM YOU WAY OUT OF IT THIS TIME.
“Seriously Derek, we are so very close to working out a solution to extricating ourselves from this damnable place. Then we’re out of your hair permanently and without unnecessary bloodshed.” Kaja sounded exasperated.
I FEEL LIKE I’VE BEEN MORE THAN REASONABLE FLESH BEING. YOU HAVE HAD PLENTIFUL PLANETARY ROTATIONS TO LEAVE THIS UNIVERSE AND YET HERE YOU ARE.
“I know you’re not a bad person. You don’t want to hunt and kill sentient beings. You don’t need to do this Derek.”
YOU DON’T KNOW ME. YOU DON’T KNOW WHAT I’M ABOUT. YOU CAN’T GET MY NAME RIGHT. IT’S DH’£R**3K.
“What about… what about… umm… Zaire. Remember how we talked about how he would be far more fitting prey than I would?” Kaja kept his gaze focused on the cube being and tightened his grip upon Zaire’s sword.
AT THIS POINT I’M NOT CONVINCED THERE IS ANY “ZAIRE”. I’M STARTING TO THINK I PROBABLY SHOULD HAVE JUST KILLED YOU THE FIRST TIME THAT I SAW YOU FLESH BEING. Slowly the downbeat background music underscoring this standoff became more and more discordant. DH’£R**3K didn’t seem to notice as the form of Simphonia gathered behind him. ANY LAST WORDS FLESH BEING?
“Just…” Kaja trailed off. “Just fuck off Derek.” With that Simphonia’s form crashed down onto the humanoid red cube and several things happened very quickly. Simphonia’s razor sharp notes shredded through DH’£R**3K’s hunting outfit, and through the translucent red energy cloud that was his body. He cried out in wordless psychic pain and fired wildly in Kaja’s direction. Kaja meanwhile had flung himself to the floor the moment he told the multiversal hunter to fuck off. He landed heavily on his stomach, the weight of his alchemical apparatus knocking the wind out of him. DH’£R**3K’s shots whizzed over Kaja’s prone body and slammed into the huge white tree, splintering the fragile bark and causing the glowing blue sap to splash out across the clearing. The tree shook, shuddered, creaked loudly and then vanished entirely leaving nothing but an empty space in the centre of the clearing.
DH’£R**3K had spun around and was firing shots wildly at the engulfing cloud of music. FUCK FUCK FUCK FUCK he cried out as Simphonia’s whirling notes tore at the cube at the heart of his being. DH’£R**3K threw down the rifle and tried just to bat Simphonia away with his insubstantial hands. OKAY FINE FUCK THIS he screamed and then made like a tree and completely disappeared.
-------
In a distant world of rolling sands an entity lay perfectly still atop the dunes. A humanoid being, with strange featureless skin that changed its colour to match whatever was around it. They were wearing camouflage gear significantly less effective than their own skin and clutched in their hands an enormous gun crackling with energy. Their eye pressed up to the scope, their finger tensed upon the trigger, just waiting for the right-
*ding*
They jerked up at the exact moment their finger pulled the trigger sending a streak of golden energy across the sky. Grumbling they put the gun to one side and pulled out their phone. Another negative review for universe EQ48… They opened the review and skimmed it. Lots of invective and complaints about sentient flesh beings ruining the atmosphere, and something about a very loud and very sharp cloud that very nearly caused permanent damage.
The Huntsman was thoughtful. They’d received a couple of complaints like this recently, but there was always someone ready to complain about something. Perhaps it was time to handle this matter personally?
Heaven Help Us | Make Room!!!! | I'm Not Okay (I Promise)
Hang 'Em High | The Only Hope For Me Is You | Zero Percent | Early Sunsets Over Monroeville | DESTROYA | Demolition Lovers | To The End
Surrender The Night | Disenchanted | The Ghost Of You | Party Poison | Vampires Will Never Hurt You | The Jetset Life Is Gonna Kill You
Hang 'Em High | The Only Hope For Me Is You | Zero Percent | Early Sunsets Over Monroeville | DESTROYA | Demolition Lovers | To The End
Surrender The Night | Disenchanted | The Ghost Of You | Party Poison | Vampires Will Never Hurt You | The Jetset Life Is Gonna Kill You