Solo Eager Hound

[Belugnir]

Summer, 56th, Noon, A Dry Plane in the Prairie:

''Hey, Pulser, I haven't given you leave to start slacking!'', as he spoke, the apprentice sat on the edge of a nine foot wide, now four foot deep pit Einar has been digging in the dry ground of the Prairie ever since the first morning light. Meanwhile, Ein, who had just gotten out of the pit, wiped what dust he could off the sleeves of his poorly patched together shirt, proceeded to tuck his shovel away, grab the waterskin he had left within the pile of his belongings he had brought, including his armor, daggers and poleaxe, which he had left for the time being simply because they'd have hindered his shoveling labor, and bring himself into a seat opposite side of the apprentice.

''Mhm.'', the mercenary grunted, taking a greedy gulp of water. It would hardly take an observant fellow to tell that he was already on edge with this buggering bonesack, who has done absolutely nothing but whine and complain and babble on about how great and important he believes himself to be ever since they left the sodding Citadel. Now Einar had built up a certain level of patience when it came to mages, but this bugger was hardly any less of a nobody than himself, and by the gods he just wouldn't shut the fuck up. ''And I wouldn't be able to give any less of a shyke if I tried.''

''I'll have you know--'', the nuit started in an imperial tone, with a single lecturing finger raised, as if he was just waiting to start one of his holier than thou speeches.

''I'll 'ave you know that I'll shut ye hole with me boot if you don' shut it yourself.'', Ein cut him off, he honestly was past the point of caring, having been laboring for over six hours with hardly any rest while this piece of shyke just sat there and babbled commands that needed not be said.

The nuit seemed to take great offence in being interrupted, and gaped his mouth open to speak again, beginning in a fairly louder tone with a ''You--'', then he was cut off again, this time by Ein tossing the one good shovel they had between them in front of the nuit's feet.

''Yes, me, the petcher who's bee' workin' since before the sun fuckin' rose, me. Me and this still pulsin' heart of mine are takin' an everlovin' rest. And while we're at it, I'd like me ears to take a rest from you, else me brain might just spill out if it has to take in any more of the shyke you can spew. So how about you take that soddin' shovel and put in some work yourself, because by Cheva, a deaf man could tell by now that you, like so many other apprentices on this rock, have NOTHING useful to say?''

At this point, the apprentice had gotten up on his feet and started weaving his hands around in a tantrum, outright yelling at the man. ''How dare you!? I am master Azhak's Favored apprentice! I've been working with him for over a decade! One word from me and you're DONE FOR!''

Ein was in the middle of a seated stretch as this prick shoved out his threat, and at that point it was evident that whoever this bugger really was, he wasn't half as important as he believed himself to be, plainly put, folk who hold power hardly need to go about yelling to remind others of the fact. The apprentice's yelling left a long moment of silence, one that Ein went to exploit, simply staring down the nuit as he slowly got up, dusted himself some more, and presented a coy smirk. At the point where Einar crossed his arms across his chest, the apprentice was nervously fidgeting, fairly disturbed that this man didn't seem moved at all by an indirect threat of him setting one of the most famed torturers out there after him.

''Let me ask you... Shagdal, was it? Right. Do you know what sort of an apprentice a wizard sends out for a potentially dangerous monster hunt in the Prairie? I's not their most valuable asset, their best researcher or their most capably destructive student. No. They send the annoying, useless ones. Why? They send 'um hoping the monsters will tear 'em limb from limb and that they'll never have to hear from the buggers again. Tha's why you're here. Not 'cause your boss wants ye to learn somethin' new and astounding. It ain't 'cause he expects anything from you. In fact, I'm rather tempted to just cave ye skull in meself, shove you into this ditch, go back to the Citadel and relish in the sounds of a world free of Your. Endless. Babble. And Laviku petch me eyes out if anyone alive or dead would blink an eye o'er your corpse.'', Ein completed his presentation with a generous spit in Shagdal's direction. Now Ein wasn't the wisest of men, that's obvious, but when it came to his actual job on the island, the lad was rather well versed in some things at this point, and by the gods, chief among them was recognizing a disposable apprentice, and that's after spendin' half a day with the buggers, too...

[Belugnir]

Summer 55th, Early Evening, Gug Adjak, Lab 23-F:


''Ah so you've finally arrived.'', one Azhak Taldat disapprovingly greeted Einar into his laboratory. ''And might I ask what took such a fine and able lad over a week to answer my summons?''

''Us wardens don't always get to chose how we spend our time. And unlike most folk dwelling on this island, I happen to need a bit of food and rest from time to time. I did come o'er to you first chance I got though., by now, and especially aided by his recent experience with the Sullins fellow, Ein had learned to keep his vulgarities and his cynical tone to a minimum when talking to a sorcerer... especially a renowned torturer who's been alive for five and some hundred years... or so a couple apprentices he heard over in the library muttered.

''Indeed, sometimes I forget the... inconvenient inefficiencies of you Pulsers.''

A brief silence ensued, at which point Einar merely shrugged and gave the sorcerer an odd look, seeing as the Nuit apparently wanted him to ask... ''I don't remember petchin' up anything of yours... So why am I here?''

With a light shade of laughter in his shallow breath, Azhak replied after a moment. ''You see, I might have a job for you.'' Another silence.

''Why me and not one of your apprentices or a more capable warden?'', realizing partially where this conversation was going, Ein decided to play along, albeit a bit irritated because the sorcerer wouldn't just get to the point.

''It does include one of my apprentices you see. And I don't need someone capable so much as reliable.''

''Me? Reliable?'', Ein snorted a laugh, remembering all the times he petched up a job or stabbed an employer in the back to add a couple more coins to his pouch. ''Mean no offense, but how'd you come up with that?''

''I know that not too long ago you had dealings with one Clyde Sullins. Now while I don't exactly know what you did for him... well, you're still alive and very much sane so I'll assume that you did your job well.''

Ein merely gave the sorcerer a daunted look, he thought that enchanter petcher was trying to keep his projects a secret or some shite like that.

''You look surprised, boy. I was too when I began to learn just how many unaccounted for eyes and ears there are on this island.'', another pause ensued.

''So what's this job of yours?''

''See, I've had a certain specimen escape from a minor facility I had running in the Prairie. Occasionally, we kept creatures of certain... tolerance there. For experiments.''

''Kept?''

''Indeed. This one proved more trouble than it's worth. It destroyed the encampment and cost me an apprentice and some valuable tools when it made its escape.''

''So what does that specimen of yours look like?''

''It's a large beast, bears an appearance much belike that of a boar.''

''And what makes you think it's still in the Prairie?''

''We placed it there because it was the most similar environment to the one it was originally captured in, boy. It's not likely to skulk about the Forest of Thorns, and if it had any instinct it'd stay away from the Heartland and the Bloodhills.''

''So you want me to capture your beast back?''

''Possibly. I won't really weep over it's corpse after all the trouble it's caused.''

''If you want to kill it, why not just do it yourself. I mean no offense, man, but you'd probably have a better shot at it than me.''

''You ought to clear your ears, Pulser. I kept the creature only because it was able to survive my sorcery. It is one thing when the beast is caged and restrained and another when it charges after me baring long tusks. Thus my predicament. I've said this already. If I was in the mood to risk my own life for the sake of killing that thing I wouldn't be talking to you right now.'', annoyance was evident in Azhak's voice.

''Right. Pardon me. And I'm to go after this beast alone?'', Einar hardly knew what reimancy was and what being resilient to it incorporated.

''Not quite. This is also something I already spoke of. I've an apprentice who'll be accompanying you.''

[Belugnir]

Azhak clapped his hands, and within the moment a figure appeared behind Ein in the door frame. ''This is Shagdal. He'll help you track down the beast.''

It seemed as if Shagdal opened his mouth to speak, yet Azhak's lips moved sooner. ''You two will have more than enough time to sort things out on the road. And I trust you had some scrolls to bring me, Shagdal.'', the apprentice, visibly displeased, nodded.

''Indeed, master.'', and with that the door closed yet again, followed by an echo of steps that went down the stone hallway.

Einar gave the sorcerer a puzzled look. ''Again, I don't mean to off... Nay, petch it. How on this green world do you think that scrawny sack of bones would provide any help to anyone out in the Prairie?''

Azhak gave Ein a sudden, sharp glare. Silent. The sorcerer closed in several paces and hunched an ounce toward the lad. Only then did Einar realize the bugger wasn't looking at him, but at the door behind him. It looked as if he were listenin' out for something too, after a brief moment, the wizard nodded to himself.

''You see, Pulser, I would like to pose the same question for the whereabouts of my laboratory. I've had to deal with that imbecile for the better part of a decade now.'', he closed in again, at this point standing but a few feet away from the young warden. ''Let us simply state that none would mourn over it if Shagdal didn't return from this errand.'' Frankly, Einar was stunned at first, not yet understanding the reasoning behind Azhak's want to be rid of his apprentice.

''Again... why don't you just incinerate the prick yourself or somethin'?'', he finally spoke.

''I am not about to discuss every potential complication and inconvenience of my predicament with some street rat spawn of Sunberth!'', Azhak visibly struggled to keep his voice just beneath the echoing volume of a yell. ''Now, I trust you understand what it means to have an individual such as myself in your debt. So? Are you up to the task?''

Ein didn't ponder for long, hastened greatly by Azhak's gaze that seemed to tell silent volumes of the fact that making a pesky, loose-tongue warden initiate into a pile of ashes wouldn't be half as inconvenient. And gods help him if he actually wanted anything to do with this Azhak prick...

''Aye, wizard. You've yourself a deal.''

[Belugnir]

Summer, 56th, Noon, A Dry Plane in the Prairie:

Shagdal was at a loss of words. Staring at the pulser with his maw gaping like a cavern. A long silence ensued. Believing the cat to be out of the bag, the young warden used the silence to paint the messy image of a candle burning in a dark void, blurred by colors of anger. He forced a flicker of Djed into his forearms. Sure, he was spent from digging for the better part of the morning, but it really wouldn't take one much effort to leap forward and shove the skinny nuit's head clean off if the apprentice had the guts to try anything funny. Problem was, Ein couldn't be sure if this bastard actually had any potentially lethal magic at his disposal.

''Pick that shovel up and start usin' it, lest I'll shove the daft thing so far up your arse, you'll taste the dirt on it.'', Einar finally spoke after feeling the tension loosen. Though his voice promised trouble a plenty.

Blinking repeatedly, with an outline to his jaw that Ein was certain was made by quietly gritting teeth, Shagdal reached down for the shovel, lowered himself into the pit, and began to tear away the dry soil chunk by chunk. Honestly, for all the prattle you parade about with, all you sodding errand boys and sorcerer wannabes really are worth a cow's sour shite at best. Then again, those foolhardy apprentices do serve under some of the most indifferent and infamous bastards this side of the continent, and if that ain't a remedy for one's overconfidence, hell knows what is. Either way, after the brief, quiet power struggle, Einar stood more than confident that Shagdal wouldn't try the daftest thing against him, for all the hate he might keep pent up that a Pulser was bossing him around.

And so the day went on and the pit deepened, though ever so slightly, as Shagdal justified his master's desire to be done with him time and time again by proving his laboring efforts to be even less worthwhile than his word. And while the Nuit made his piss poor progress on the digging part of the job, Einar went and robbed several Acacia trees of a fair portion of their lower branches, as thick as his poleaxe would've allowed him to hew off, gods forbid he brought a hatchet. Then, with all the speed and quality that old Domagoy's crooked dagger would allow him, he started to fashion the wood into thick pikes, anywhere between three and five feet long. The sun was perhaps two bells away from meeting the horizon, and Einar had made multiple shifts between digging and sorting out the spikes pointing upwards from the pit's floor, for while Shagdal did prove that he can just barely get something done, Ein'd sooner had bitten his own prick off than entrust the whining nuit with making sure that the trap they were making for their boar monster was put together well enough.

[Belugnir]

If only he could've worked thrice as fast as he was able to...

Just as Einar was setting up perhaps the thirteenth pike into the pit that was now as deep as your proper grave and about twice as wide across, and awing at the fact that they hadn't yet gotten assailed by every creeping buggery that crawls around the Prairie, he heard Shagdal yelling from above, with anxiousness witlessly obvious in his tone.

''Warden! Warden!

Huh. When'd we get from 'Pulser' to 'Warden'?, It was odd to hear the nuit say a damn thing without a sadly self defeating imperative voice.

Get up here, quick! There it is!''

Einar made his way out of the death trap he was making as fast as was possible for a man who's been working their arse off for the better part of the day, although when he laid eyes upon the frame of the creature that was charging their way, roughly from the direction in which the Forest of Thorns laid, most of Einar's exhaustion gave way in favor of panic. Azhak you rotten prick!, truth be told, he cursed himself more for accepting the job now than the wizard for sending him here. Their boar was perhaps two hundred yards away from them, though every daft idiot could already have told it was perhaps twice or more the size of your everyday boar. The thing was headed straight for them, if zig-zagging somewhat in it's frenzied charge.

Get the petch out of here you daft bastard!, Einar sneered at himself, only to find that he was grasping his poleaxe, pointing it outward to the beast and bracing in a low stance. What the hell are you doing!? His wit couldn't tell him what his instinct knew, that he couldn't outrun this thing, not in a hundred years, maybe with the distance advantage he had right now, he could get half a mile away and that'd be it. He knew no help would come either, this was Sahova for crying out loud. No. Either him or this heap of meat were going to be dead soon.

For a short while, as the boar approached, Einar fought with plain fear to try patching together the shade of a strategy for taking this monster down, the young warden completely threw Shagdal out of his thoughts, and couldn't rightly give a damn about him if he hadn't. Thus he failed to see that the nuit had began to run for the hills at the very moment when Einar took his weapon and pointed it toward the monster.

[Belugnir]

Cold sweat was well and truly beginning to pour into the sides of Ein's eyes as the monster got to about thirty yards away, with the boar's grotesque form now well visible to him. The thing was gargantuan, bloated with some ungodly infection, it's sides charred, with several entrails hanging from it's belly, trapped in a state of steady decay. Good gods, what did they do to this thing... Then a moment came in which he found himself inpossibly conflicted between hurling his poleaxe at the creature and bolting and standing his ground.

Yet he never had to decide. For the boar's charge changed direction at about halfway of the remaining distance to Einar. Lad could only gape at the frenzied heap of meat that was now bolting after the fleeing nuit, darkened blood sparsely splattering in the wounded creature's wake. He didn't yell out to the apprentice, he had no reason to, and no wits for it either in his current state, and if he did, it's unlikely that the nuit would've heard him. Ein merely stood and watched as the boar closed in, reared it's head, and sent Shagdal's body airborne like a rag doll. When he hit the ground, he was already a ruined mass of pulverized flesh and torn limbs.

Though Einar didn't exactly get much time to watch Shagdal's shattered corpse spread across the ground, as the beast that killed him now set its attention back to the warden, after but one frenzied sniff to the air around it, changing directions and beginning to charge straight for the lad again, the boar was blind, and it followed first the strongest scent reminiscent of its torturers, and Einar happened to smell of death almost as much as any proper nuit, having spent the better part of a year among them. Ein merely paced backwards slowly, never taking his eyes off the boar, never really coming back to his senses from the initial shock of just seeing the gargantuan abomination either. Instinct and reason still fought in him, should he fight or flee...?

[Belugnir]

Then came the crashing sound of a giant's body slamming into the ground, of wood breaking and bones shattering. Such was the Einar's conflict with himself that he almost completely took the pit he's been working on for the better part of the day out of his mind. In contrast to his usual rotten luck, however, the boar had paid its death trap even less of a mind. All that drove the beast's blinded frenzy were the blurred sight of a humanoid shape, and the vague scent that lingered upon the man, that of the undead, its tormentors.

In it's charge of painful wrath, while the boar's direction didn't take it straight into the pit, its left foreleg slipped into the shallow chasm, and that was everything that the pit needed to claim its gruesome prize. Within the moment the gargantuan, thrown off balance in its momentum, fell sideways across the wooden pikes, and as its already ruined body was impaled, the creature let out a shriek of despair and anger at which all the servants of Uldr would have shuddered.

The boar never stopped, even as it lay, awkwardly crashed and with six wooden pikes stuck in its gut, its left legs broken under its own weight, the beast still tried to move forward, scratching away at the dirt with the limbs that still served it, it managed to just barely move forward in several desperate lunges, which only served to widen and make worse the wounds that incapacitated it, and only called forth more ungodly wails, each one weaker than the last. For all the unearthly strength that the boar's waning muscles and painful madness could provide, at this point there was simply no way for it to cause any further harm... Unless one'd be mad enough to hurl themselves into the beast's desperately clipping jaws, filled with teeth so numerous and sharp that they had no business being in a boar's maw.

As the tormented creature displayed its final defiant acts, Einar breathed a shallow relief. Shallow, for while he knew that he won't have to properly fight this monstrosity now or risk his skin further, he was more than certain that the boar's image will haunt his nightmares for at least a full month.

[Belugnir]

Ein had no way of knowing what this creature was through, what brought it to this sorry state it was in. A great boar, captured ways off northward, in the forests between Ravok and Nyka and brought along other specimens, not without great expense, to the wizards of Sahova to be experimented upon. Unspeakable things were done to the creature by Azhak and his colleagues at his facility, dreadful things that regular men wouldn't wish unto their worst enemies, experiments and torture that crooked its tusks and bloated the boar to the point where it became almost twice it's original size and where the skin of its belly started bursting to let its entrails drag upon the ground, keeping it in a constant state of pain and driving it into the bloodied frenzy that the warden met it in. But Einar couldn't possibly guess at any of it, and frankly, he didn't care.

He felt a need for this thing to die. Not driven by hatred nor spite... the thing was simply better off dead, for its own and the sake of every other breathing creature on this forsaken rock. So as the creature still twitched and pitched it's roars of pain, Einar lowered himself into the pit, only so as far as he needed, and quickly buried the pike of his poleaxe through the creature's right eye. The shriek that ensued had Ein's stomach wrench to the point where he thought his insides were turned upside down. The plunge of his weapon couldn't reach deep enough. In a rush of panic, as the creature began to kick its legs in a desperate, hopeless attempt to rear its head and strike the man with one of its great tusks, Einar pulled the pike out and began to jab at the creature's forehead with it. It took six stabs of the poleaxe with all the strength that Ein could muster in his tired state to pierce the boar's thick skull, all the while he remained deafened by the monster's dying screeches. And only when the beast was finally still, Einar realized that the corners of his eyes had teared up. It wasn't out of fear or remorse, but of horror. And when he climbed out of the pit, the man turned for another look at the bloated mess of flesh and entrails... his urge to belch almost overcame him when he heard the wet, thudding sound of an organ freshly leaking its way out of the boar's belly.

Azhak, for fuck's sake, what did you do to this thing...?

[Belugnir]

It took him a couple chimes to collect himself, as he sat by the pit and stared at the limp carcass. Now that it was no longer shrieking, and maddeningly struggling for life that was long since lost to it, the boar's visage wasn't nowhere near as ghastly. It was but another corpse. And upon a moment's ponder, Einar could recall worse sights. His gaze rose from the boar's carcass to the place where Shagdal laid on the ground, torn into bits. Even from the distance that there was between them one could see the nuit's torso was torn in two, both his legs and a single arm detached. And good riddance., a horrible end, yes, but not that Ein cared an ounce about the rotten bastard... and speaking of rotten bastards, Ein now began to wonder just how sure he can be that Azhak will indeed act as if he owed the lad a favor when he walks back into the citadel and informs the sorcerer of his... astounding success in the tasks he was given. His best bet will be to just tell the wizard what happened and sod right off afterwards, maybe the bugger pays him a fee, maybe not, but he'll cut his own prick off before trying to argue or insist upon anything with a widely feared sorcerer... which brought the glaring issue of a possibility that Ein will walk out of all of this shite empty handed.

With about a bell and a half of sunlight left, Einar lowered himself into the pit again.

It was a world of difference between dressing a hare and quite literally carving off the hide of a monster like this from its back with a crude dagger. Ein would bring the Boar's pelt to Azhak, both as proof of having finished the job and as a trophy to keep for himself afterward. Sure as hell he wasn't going away empty handed. He ran the blade under the monster's cheeks, rending its skin just under where the upper jaw overlapped with the lower. The stench was something fierce, but now with a level head, Ein could bear it. He had spent the better part of a year skulking around living corpses and cleaning up their mess on quite the few occasions. This was medicore. It would take the better part of half a bell, but eventually he'd separated the hide from the boar's face, and several square feet of its thick skin from the creature's back, where its fore legs connected. The hide seemed a decent bit sturdier and was considerably less charred and ruined than upon the monster's sides, and he could at the very least fashion a reasonable cloak out of it at some point to come.

Taking a brief while to rest from today's ordeals, Einar would collect his belongings, leave Shagdal and the beast to rot in the evening, and make way back to the citadel as hastily as he could with nightfall creeping up after him. There he would report his... astounding success to Azhak and take his leave with a snort of gratitude from the wizard and a promise to come back and cash in a favor with the rotten bastard at some point in the future. For he did essentially complete everything requested of him, and on a level of personal satisfaction, he knew that Azhak was pleased he'll never have to hear Shagdal's ramblings again.

Truth be told, after some pondering, he concluded he'd probably spent his share of luck for the whole year by surviving this bloody ordeal.

[Madeira Dusk]

Grades Awarded!

Don't forget to edit/delete your grade request!

Belgnir

Skills

• Intimidation: 2xp
• Observation: 4xp
• Logic: 2xp
• Socialization: 2xp
• Investigation: 2xp
• Flux: 1xp
• Meditation: 1xp
• Construction: 1xp
• Trapping: 2xp
• Tactics: 1xp
• Weapon- Poleaxe: 1xp
• Butchering: 1xp

Lores

• Intimidation: idle threats
• Observation: identifying a disposable apprentice
• Socialization: keep snarkiness to a minimum with mages
• Investigation: gathering details
• Trapping: drop pit
• Lore of the grotesque lab boar
• Butchering: skinning a kill

Awards & Retribution
+Grotesque Boar Pelt: the raw pelt of a Sahova lab experiment.

Notes
Huh, I didn't know Belgnir had sensitive side! Even if his version of sensitive is mercy killing instead of straight-up killing. Also your description of the boar was excellent. Repulsive, but excellent. A+ thread overall. I hope to see more of your snarky bastard in the future!