Open Chronicles Hellboars on the Highlands

[Irman Harefoot]

Irman sat peacefully atop the crumbling wall of a long lost dwarven structure, the name for which he did not know. He was smoking his pipe, and trying to keep his mind off of travel. It had been seven days since he had arrived in herdschlant, a small human village which had claimed a fertile valley for itself in the middle reaches of the Spine. The hope was that another caravan would deign to go through this simple village with need for a guard to help them on the road, but none had come, and Irman's heart had started to beat with wanderlust.

"Auch" huffed Irman, with a puff of smoke "I suppose there's no helping this matter just sitting around waiting, better get myself moving before I don't have a choice in the matter." Irman took to his feet, descending the 30 foot high wall with a series of hops as he held his billhook in one hand and his pipe in the other. Once on the ground Irman started walking into town, muttering himself as he sucked on the tip of his pipe

"The best part of being a caravan guard is not having to worry about food everyday, the bad part is the noise, guess I should have weighed that last group a bit better since now I need a lot of money to buy a bunch of provisions very fast. Not sure I can survive on mountain bugs and stringy birds a second time."

The adventurers guild had a desk at the local tavern, the receptionist there was a young man who had heard the rumors that some kind of rabbit beast man had been staying at the inn the last couple days, but was still surprised to see it walk up to him and flash a gold rank adventurer pin.

"I'm looking for something quick young man," said Irman. "Do you have any requests for monster slaying, or something comparable?" The young receptionist quickly went to search through the records of active postings.

"there is one, sir, but I'm not sure its something a single gold rank adventurer can handle all that easily..."
"That certainly makes it sounds good young man, I'm quite fond of a challenge."
"ok, 'request to thin Highland Hellboar numbers'." Irman gave the young receptionist an inquisitive look.
"ah, hellboars are a monster that appear every now and again on this region of The Spine, they're firebreathing horned pigs the size of full grown bulls."
"quite an apt name in that case."
"very, a large herd of them was spotted in the highlands a couple days ago and while a call was sent to bring in expert monster hunters to deal with the main herd, local adventurers are being paid to deal with straglers that might end up wandering to a farm or settlement. The payout is relatively high since there's a lot of danger involved, but this request has been picked up by numerous guild locations throughout the region so you likely won't be the only person out there doing this."
Irman smiled, tipping his hat as he started for the door. "That sounds perfectly what I had in mind young man, thank you. I'll be heading to the highlands then and will soon be back with enough hellboar horns to make your head spin! Har Har Har!"

 

[Sigrun Flintfeet]

in the Highlands, west of Belgrath

Sigrun leant down, her blue- patterned fingers brushing lightly across cloven tracks. The size of a horse, but subtly different, clustered closer together, hinting at shorter legs. The print stamped deep into the soil of the valley woods, a mark left by a heavy creature. She picked up a clump of earth from the print, sniffing it, then rubbing it between her fingers.

Fresh. A few hours or less. The unmistakable smell of boar lingered faintly to its stamp. Though it held a hint of sulphor to it.

She rose from her kneel, reaching no higher than five feet. But it was enough to see the faint curl of smoke beyond the canopy of trees. A camp or other settlement. And the creature was headed straight towards it.

Judging by its sparse droppings and determined path, she surmised it must be driven by hunger. A hungry beast could be a dangerous one. She blew out a bit of hair from her face and flicked her braid of auburn-brown hair past her shoulder. She would need sharp axes and spears for this encounter. Perhaps even a trap, should it decide to return.

Sigrun flung down her pack. It spilled out an assortment of items: Spare throwing axes, heads covered in leather sheaths, a saw-toothed hunting trap of rusting iron tied to its side, a skinning knife, stakes, hammer, whetstone, waterskin and more. Her feet ached from hours of walking, her throat parched with thirst. She thought she had heard the gurgle of a spring nearby. Perhaps she could fill her water and sharpen her axes, maybe even lay a trap beforehand. No sense in confronting the beast tired and with dull steel. It was not likely to be going anywhere.

But as she opened the cork to her waterskin, her nose caught the faint whiff of something else. A single crow flew off from the trees in the south. Intuition told her someone else - or something - was approaching.

Sigrun didn't hide. Instead, she unhooked a pair of throwing axes, one from her back and one from her belt, holding them in an easy, loose grip, dangling by her side. Her dark-olive eyes scanned the woods, waiting.

She cut a strange figure in the woods. Dwarfed by taller shrubs and moss-covered rocks, surrounded by scattered pillars of golden light, yet standing tall, chin raised, arms lowered. She held the short and broad form of dwarves, though she didn't carry the same excess weight of most of her kin, her stance balanced and relaxed, ready to draw upon a squat nimbleness. The exposed parts of her fair skin danced with sky-blue patterns like a bold welcome. It was the only colour to stand out from her brown hair and leathers that otherwise melted with the undergrowth.

 

[Irman Harefoot]

A faint scent of smoke had led Irman east to a damp and wooded corner of the Valley. A shaky lead to follow but one that seemed to be paying off as he found a suspicious amount of ash clinging to leaves and resting amongst the underbrush.

the woods were eerily tranquil as Irman cautiously advanced. His long ears un-hatted and listening closely for anything near or far of interest. For a while there was nothing, and then a mighty whoosh that gave way to a wide array of sizzles and crackles.

Irman bounded with incredible speed, hurrying towards the sound as tried to best consider a battle plan, should the monster notice him before he could strike it unawares. When Irman arrived he saw a short and painted woman standing next to a length of burned underbrush and singed tree bark. Standing across from her was what could only be described as a hellboar. It resembled a boar in many ways though hulking, with black patterned fur that faded to grey across its belly. Its face was long and boney with deep red eyes caged by a twisted briar patch of horns and tusks.

The boar and the woman were engaged at a range. Irman watched as the boar held its mouth shut before breathing forth a tremendous torrent of fire, which quickly changed direction from towards the woman to straight at Irman.

Irman leapt to the side, flames nipping at his toes as he narrowly dodged the attack.

 

[Sigrun Flintfeet]

Spoiler: Music

Sigrun had dived for cover behind a rock, now anticipating its fire. The damned creature was full of surprises!

And surprises were plenty a-coming. It suddenly changed its trajectory of flame, and a bipedal beast of fur leapt out from the trees in a blur of movement. For a split second, Sigrun mistook it for another monster - but the chime of her Noct Yaegir pendant stayed her throwing axe.

Another Yaegir. The thought hit her like stray cinders. Her face dropped from a battle grimace to surprise, before her brows knitted again in dismay, her mouth twisting into a drooping scowl. Bloody competition, then. She would rather have taken another hellboar.

She pulled another throwing axe free from her belt. Kills were split between hunters. Perhaps he would run yet.

Dogged resolve, and the timely distraction of her fellow Yaegir, sharpened her focus. She held low on the hilt, axe-head dipped down, trailing the creature with her aim. It halted, fiery eyes turning back in her direction. There.

The axe whirled, flung with all the violent force she could muster. It hit the top of a foreleg - not quite the head she'd aimed for, but close enough. The beast grunted, the axe-head sunk deep into its shoulder, oozing blood. But it hardly seemed to care, preparing to gore her.

Before its charge, Sigrun managed to bellow:

"First come, first served, Yaegir!"

Irman Harefoot

 

[Irman Harefoot]

“Yaegir?” Irman thought. The term sounded familiar, till he recalled an old man who had attacked him one time in the sewers of some sea side city. A case of mistaken identity as the two were hunting monster for the city in the dingy depths. The old man had given Irman a small insignia to hang on to after the fact, saying Irman would need it with “that mug of his”.

Irman could hear the insignia chiming from inside his pack. “Guess I should thank that old man if I ever see him again.”

Trees cracked and splintered as the hellboar swung its club like head around with reckless abandon. The monster was intent on killing the painted dwarf as quickly as possible to better its odds of surviving.

Irman eyed the boars legs, easy targets for a crippling strike. But that would cost him the prize, priming his “fellow hunter” for a killing blow far before he could position anything fatal. Irman couldn’t help but smirk.

“so then, what’s a man to do but try for something crazy?” The colorfully dressed rabbit broke into a dash, rapidly catching up to the charging and thrashing Boar. The Hellboar’s squeals shot pain through Irman’s sensitive ears, but he was undeterred as he leapt strait onto the Hellboar’s back.

Footing was solid, enough to ready a downward swing with the armor piercing tip on the back billhook’s bladed head poised to strike. Irman caught a glimpse of the painted dwarf down below and almost felt bad for undermining all the hard work she seemed to be putting in.

“Sorry Ms. blue paint, but I really need the money.”

Irman swung the billhook down, firmly slamming the spike into the Junction that connected the base of the Hellboar’s skull to its spine.

 

[Sigrun Flintfeet]

Sigrun froze, an axe in either hand.

Perhaps the mushrooms she had eaten earlier today had had some hallucinatory after-effect, since her brain refused to accept what her eyes were telling her.

In the span of a moment, an upstanding, garishly clothed hare jumped on top of the hellboar and skewered its spine with a hefty billhook. The creature crumbled, the strength of its limbs severed along with its spine. It collapsed in a heap of scattered undergrowth, and the humanoid hare jumped off it lightly, pulling out the brutish weapon from its neck as casually as retrieving a shovel.

"Krugg's bloth," she swore, the dwarven curse leaving her in a breath of astonishment. Despite having the black eyes of a critter, her fellow hunter moved with the easy balance of a warrior. Perhaps what offended her understanding the most was the flash of green and red making up his doublet and hoses, spilling out into clawed, furry arms and bowed-back hind legs. He dressed like some knight half-way through a joust, or those cocksure human merchants fancying themselves swordsmen she had seen entering and leaving Beglrath.

With her surprise abating, practicality set in. She needed her axe back, first. Sigrun sheathed her two other axes and stepped towards the dead boar, eyeing the hare Yaegir all the while with a suspicious side-eye.

"Here I thought the boar the biggest surprise of the day," she said, scoffing and yanking free the axe from its stubborn flesh. She shook the worst blood off the axe-head, then pulled a dirty cloth from her belt, wiping the rest off, while sizing up Imran. Then she tipped up her chin at him, halfway between a challenge and a greeting. "You often be snatchin' another's prey, eh?"

Her Common tongue grated like rocks dragged over gravel, accent and inflection of a dwarven hearth, without the pretense of attempting to soften it for unaccustomed ears.

 

[Irman Harefoot]

Irman glanced at the painted dwarf, trying to not be as painfully obvious that he was sizing her up as she was doing with him. The light blue markings that adorned her were clearly tattoos and not simple war paint. A symbol of some cultural or personal significance to which Irman was utterly foreign to. What he wasn’t foreign to however were the numerous scars he could spot across her uncovered skin, fresh and old and numbering at least a dozen. The best that had seemed to have come from the boar though were shallow scrapes, unlikely to leave even a scab. Impressive, given the ferociousness of the Hellboar’s desperate assault.

"You often be snatchin' another's prey, eh?"

“ah, the lovely tones of a rescued maiden.” Irman mused. “If only the beast beside me had not left a ringing in my ears.” The colorfully dressed hare took back out his green baggy hat and and tucked his ears carefully inside as he fitted the hat to his head. Irman’s posture was relaxed, his expression a cordial smile, as his gaze did not er from the hunter beside him for even an instant.
“I joke, of course. Let it never be said that Irman Harefoot is a thief. We divide the spoils fairly.”

“As hunters, you are clearly greater. By tracking this beast and drawing first blood its flesh and hide are by all rights yours. As heroes, you again are clearly greater. Exhibiting courage and skill as I scrambled around the sidelines.”

“But as killers…” Irman paused for a moment, “my spear struck the monster dead, cowardly as it might have been surely you’d agree I have a claim to take a cowards sum? The bounty, of course, offered by the adventurers guild for *slaying* Hellboars. So howsabouts, miss blue paint. You take the story, the glory, and the boar, and whatever value those three things might come to carry; and I get a simple bag of coins to help me on the road.”

 

[Sigrun Flintfeet]

Sigrun eyed him quizzically and finished cleaning her axe. It was strange to hear herself addressed as a maiden in the common tongue. It translated somewhat to her status in her clan, though it carried different connotations, and in this case, it sounded decidedly more . . . harmless. Innocent, even. Quickly dismissed as a joke, it still galled her - much like Common galled her in general.

She tucked the axe back into its iron ring on her belt, while he spoke with that faint superiority laced with courtesy often found among human aristocrats. She still struggled to reconcile the mouth of an upstanding hare with these pompous words. It was as if the woods themselves was having a prank at her expense, mixing the mannerisms of an errant knight with the hares she knew so well. Shy and gentle creatures that easily spooked and took much skill to snare, now turned into some swashbuckling orator.

Would need a big snare for this one, she thought, amusing herself with the stray thought.

“I joke, of course. Let it never be said that Irman Harefoot is a thief. We divide the spoils fairly.”

Barely had he finished mentioning spoils and fairly before Sigrun set to work, brusquely turning away from him. No sense in wasting time or precious meat. Let this Irman Harefoot waste his breath if he wished.

Drawing her skinning knife, she set about tackling the massive carcass, kneeling down and cutting gashes in strategic areas. Its blood was still warm against her fingers. His words glided over her ears like snow peppering a mountain-top. Damned true she had tracked it.

“But as killers…” Irman paused for a moment, “my spear struck the monster dead, cowardly as it might have been surely you’d agree I have a claim to take a cowards sum? The bounty, of course, offered by the adventurers guild for *slaying* Hellboars. So howsabouts, miss blue paint. You take the story, the glory, and the boar, and whatever value those three things might come to carry; and I get a simple bag of coins to help me on the road.”

Barely had she cut the beast before she felt her skin prickle again with irritation. She might not be versed in the finer points of Common speech, but she thought she still caught the hidden boast, the faux self-deprecation and the implication that he was the superior killer in that pregnant pause. She would have preferred a straight boast, something she could directly taunt or challenge, rather than these tall-folk games.

"A hare's gibbering at me, now I've heard it all," she muttered to herself in Dwarvish.

Her doubt erased at his designation of her as 'Ms. Blue Paint,' a gentle mockery of the traditions of her clan. Clearly, his scorn betrayed his seeming humility.

The knife cut down to the hellboar's knee imperfectably. Her tempers flared, much as she had attempted to ignore him. Her fingers uncoiled from the blade's hilt, letting it stick there, like a jutting flag on her prize.

Gold for skin and name. That was his bargain. She knew of this bounty, of course, having perused the same posters, seeking the same prey.

But the mercantile nature of the Flintfeets gripped her rock-heart. Her great-great-grandfather had been a master haggler, after all, so surely some of that merchant's blood might have rubbed off of on her, despite what her family might think.

"You realise," Sigrun said, fanning out her hand at the dead hellboar, its eyes now closed, as if sleeping to avoid this inevitable confrontation, "that the bounty on these creatures is each worth two-hundred and thirty pieces of gold?" The air quivered at her pause, her anger mounting. This deal was insulting. It was enough to make her teeth gnash to think that she would even consider this offer, nevermind agree to its ludicrous justification. She planted a boot on its snout, stabbing her own palm with a finger, a gesture equivalent to rudely rolling a finger at the temple for humans. The dwarf was now wildly animated when it came to questions on coin.

"You think . . ." - her voice lowered, rising dangerously - "some skin, meat and a few tusks would match that? That you can fop me off with some boar-hide, huh? I could buy a caravan of mules for that sort of coin! Probably a small farm too! You think this piece of hide will match that?! Pah!"

Nevermind that she didn't know how much she could sell this for. With the right buyer and the right market, perhaps she could even match the bounty. But there was no reason to let him know that.

"Half," she snarled, through gritted teeth, lifting three fingers in a Belgrathian gesture to indicate as such. "As Yaegir, we split fairly. I say fair is half. Half the meat, half the skin, half the bone and half the coin. Besides, I'm nay certain I can lug all this around." She barked a brutish sort of laughter, more fit for a bandit than a rescued maiden. "You certainly won't be able to, that's for dead certain."

Irman Harefoot

 

[Irman Harefoot]

“Fine, fine” Irman huffed in a defeated tone. If he knew this “Yaegir” group had a generous policy on splitting rewards in the name of “fairness”, then he wouldn’t have gone so hard for a killing blow to better his bargaining strength. At least his initial probing had given him some insight as to who this dwarf even was.

Of course there was hardly any grounds for Irman to claim a third of the bounty let along half. He wasn’t needed and he wasn’t a Yaegir. But, if the dwarf had made up her mind, why ‘correct’ her? After all, “I suppose you can’t get much fairer than tradition”

There was hardly much to do as the dwarf went about skinning the hulking boar so the two of them could begin divvying the carcass. Irman’s attention drifted to the forest around them. None of the Hellboar’s burning breaths had left anything more than scorch marks, likely due to how moist the plant life all was. A strange fact in itself as not once since Irman arrived in this valley, had he seen it rain.

Irman took a piece of cloth and wiped some bark on a nearby tree dry, as soon as he was done, the bark began to remoisten right before his eyes.

Water droplets were now forming on the surface of the bark, Irman stepped back as suddenly a shiver shot through his entire body.

Fur stood up on end as Irman’s blood felt cold within his veins. Irman had his polearm at the ready, his eyes glistening green as his feigned swindler’s attitude dropped in an instant.

“Hey, did you feel that too?” Irman called to the dwarf, but before she could respond a squealing sounded through the wood, sounding just like the Hellboar at first before deteriorating into something otherworldly.

 

[Sigrun Flintfeet]

Sigrun blinked. She hadn't expected the argument to die before it had even started. It tended to stir a fire in her blood with a vigorous haggle - the only good thing about returning to the city, she found. That and the rewards.

Very well, she thought, thinking she might have judged this Irman wrongly. With a shrug, she resumed her skinning work.

“Hey, did you feel that too?” Irman called to the dwarf, but before she could respond a squealing sounded through the wood, sounding just like the Hellboar at first before deteriorating into something otherworldly.

More than anything, it was the alarm in his voice that raised her guard. At this unnatural squeal, she jerked to her feet, keeping her skinning knife in an inverted grip, her most immediate weapon.

Sigrun frowned, exchanging a look with Irman.

"More of them," she muttered.

Stalking through the trees, she approached the strange noise. Carefully, keeping low. That was when she too noted the curious moistness of the trees and plants. Her hand clenched tighter around her knife. She didn't like any of this.

She didn't expect or ask Irman to follow. The sensible choice would probably be to leave. Take what could be reaped from the dead boar and make it home with at least one bounty.

But she found herself curious. Or perhaps more accurately, worried. These woods were home to her. The sound of something like this felt like an invasion, an unknown corruption to the environment she thought she knew so well.

More gigantic hog noises emerged, splurging with something wet and fleshy. It reminded her of a diseased throat. It slammed violently into trees yonder, splintering bark.

Irman Harefoot