[Quel33]

I have always wanted to write my own fanfic, but have made myself delay for fear of typos, and other things. I was planning on doing a fanfic way before I got into the RPG scene, and now I've finally got up enough courage to show you all one. It's not the one I had originally planned, but its in the same world. This story takes place quite a while before the one I actually have planned, and it basically what it says it is: a prelude. Enjoy, critique, anything.





Chapter 9is the newest.



______________________________________

This is for later... When the story gets complicated enough that I need a codex...

This post has been edited by Quel33: 20 November 2011 - 02:23 AM

[Quel33]

Every story usually has a hero who is tasked with saving something, or someone; and every story usually has the forces of good vs evil. This story isn't one of those...

~The Prelude, Chapter One: Herdsmanship & Zombies~

Hello all, my name is Quel. Not my birth name, but my chosen name. I can't remember my life before age twelve, so I've no idea who I am, or where I came from. This story starts like all others: somewhere, sometime. Well let's stop procrastinating, and get to it.

****

"Quelly boy!? Where are yew?" said the voice of my nightmares.
"Mmmpphhh!" said I.
"Thar yew are laddy!" said the voice.
It was then that I felt a sudden tugging, and found myself being pulled out of the waste bin I had been "investigating". Hanging upside down, I had been grabbed by my right ankle and was now looking up at the face of my rescuer.
"Hiding agin?" said the Head Baker of Castle McCully, Mrs. Renee Derminster. Mrs. Derminster was the wife of Mr. Derminster the Head Marshall of His Lordship's Stables, and both were wyverians in their second century, which was young by their standards, and huge by ours. Now you see why she's able to hold me up so easily...
"No! I, errr, thought I saw some malachite at the bottom, and then I got, err, stuck!"
"U-huh. And I suppose a shakalaka named Gaspardh shoved you in deeper?"
"Not at all... Why are we acting like I'm a kid again...?"
"Because you are avoidin' yer duties as the head shepherd of our Lord's livestock."
"I was only sparring with Gondel in the training yard, and lost track of the time."
"Your test to become a junior guardsmen will have to wait, there's been rumors of a predator bein' spotted in the Veil."
"Ah... That's a different matter."
"Aye, it is. Yew need to ge' on yer gear and go investigae' it."
I was twenty-two, almost six feet tall, I weighed almost one-hundred and fifty pounds of solid muscle, I had blue eyes, brown hair, light skin, and I was still naive by most peoples standards. This was Castle McCully, and I was the head shepherd for the Lord of the Castle, Jason McCully. I had no other shepherds to assist me, so "head shepherd" was just a title. I was all alone... My responsibilities extended all over his Lordship's lands, from the far western coasts of the Black Crags of Dunmire, to the eastern edge of the Veil, the biggest forest in this part of the continent, which was largely unexplored, to the south, where the Lordships' duchy bordered his neighbor, and rival, Lady Heran's land, and finally to the north, where it bordered the vast wasteland known simply as the Frontier. Now this may sound like a huge swath of land, but in actually it only covered about two-hundred miles of land. No I wasn't the only herder in all of the McCully lands, but I was the only one stationed at Castle McCully. The country I was in was known as Evomere, and Lord McCully was head of the northernmost duchy in Evomere. Another thing to mention before I forget to mention the big details, and just mention the little details... Castle McCully was surrounded by a big wall, and around the wall was a moat, and around the moat spread the large town of Castle Town. Unoriginal, but it fit. Outside of Castle Town there were solitary houses, and farmsteads spaced on every hilltop.
Now I'm going to take the next paragraph to tell you all the woes of my job as a shepherd of livestock. Being a shepherd isn't easy, and it isn't tough... As long as you know what to do... What do I mean by that? Well you have to have the tools of the trade for starters. Certain monsters listen to certain things, and abhor certain sounds and smells. For instance to be a good herdsman, you need a herdsman's specially crafted herding stick, a flute, a horn, a pair of climbing gloves, a strong pair of lungs, and a limitless sense of terror. Every herdsman had his own trusty mount, and one of the first tests to be a monster herder was to capture your own mount. I had captured a mount that was a little bit.. different from the usual herdsman's mount. I had my own great baggi, who I named Crash. No I didn't name him that because he crashes into things... I named him that because he crashes me into things... Now back to the present...
Walking back to my hut, I found Crash eating something that crunched entirely too much for comfort's sake.
"We have a job to do Crash. Are you ready to go out hunting something vile, dangerous, and mysterious?"
"Grarrh..." replied Crash warily.
"No you won't have to go near Old Man Derrik's guard dogs."
"Groo..." replied Crash happily.
Saddling up Crash, I gathered my flute, herdsman stick, and a carving knife. Remember that other herdsmen gear I told you about? Too expensive for me to own. I also was smart enough to pack a small lunch of some dried bread, kelbi bacon, and kelbi milk. The ride out from Castle McCully was a beautiful one, with the Veil on the far right horizon, and the heights of the Highlands to the west. It was early in the morning, so a mist still clung to the Veil, and the sun was just now rising over the horizon, making the forest look both awesome, and spooky. I was heading into that awesome, and spooky forest. After riding over many a hilltop, and waving at some folk I knew, I arrived at the proper edge of Lord McCully's territory: the edge of the Veil. After riding across the small expanse of untiled land at the edge of the forest, I found myself in another world. Where the farmlands of Lord McCully had been bright, and windy, the Veil's edge was dark, and quiet. Animals large and small made noise in the underbrush, and birds flew in the trees, crying alarms at my presence.. or was it Crash that disturbed them so? He just snorted at the smaller animals, an stared with a keen predator intelligence at the bigger animal noises. It took us about ten minutes of travel along the small animal trail we were on to reach our objective: a small pen in which we sometimes kept kelbi, or aptonoth. The pen was in ruins. Only one post still stood, and the rest was pieces of wood scattered across the clearing. Scorch marks dotted the scenery to, and of the small herd of kelbi I had placed in the pen the day before there was no sign.
Getting off of Crash, I checked the scorch marks. Hopefully they were just a kut-ku's doing. If they were of something larger than a bird wyvern, then I was in trouble... Another aspect of being a herdsmen was the ability to be a tracker as well. Not being able to read much from a simple scorch mark, I began to investigate the rest of the clearing. Crash just stood there, looking at me and the surrounding forest. The broken pen yielded no results, as nothing had left any defining markings around it. I found no tracks, or claw marks. Nothing in the way of anything told me what caused this... The fact that there was no sign of a mutilated kelbi also clued me in to what must have done this: poachers. Poachers. There isn't a word more hated, or vile as that one word to any herdsman. Occasionally a herder is killed by a poacher, but we give no quarter to them in return. Fights between poachers and herders have gotten so bloody in the past that at one time the old King of Evomere, Keillor the Wise, put a 100,000z bounty on anyone caught poaching. in fact the war between poachers and herdsman once had a famous battle. The Battle of Glover's Holdfast. Not entirely a famous battle, for it was actually fought by ten herdsman, and thirty drunken mercenaries... But it is still remembered by us herdsman... Sometimes... Though admittedly the Bard of Gloverdale does a bad job of singing the lines of "herders murder their burghers" and "mercy mercenaries, for Percy!" Yes, I was most likely dealing with poachers right now... After checking the entire clearing, and finding nothing, I began to check the perimeter of the clearing. After completing my check on nearly half of the clearing's edge, I found what I was looking for: signs of something having left the clearing. From the looks of the tracks ten men at least had passed this way, wearing boots. They had walked single file into the depths of the supposedly unexplored Veil.
"Well this is interesting..."
"Grooowaaarr..." said Crash, also apparently interested.
I was about to whistle for Crash to come over, then thought better of it as my instincts told me I wasn't alone. Crash stopped his grumblings, and bird watching, and fixated his gaze directly to his right... which was six feet, or so to my right. The bushes didn't tremble with movement, the forest animals didn't stop their singing, and the sky didn't darken; but I felt something looking at me. I raced back to Crash, jumping on him just as the brush behind me erupted with movement, and a giant beast emerged silent as death, to rush at me and Crash. We had barely gotten into a gallop, when it was almost on us. I suddenly wished I had some other kind of weapon than a knife. I had no time to look over my shoulder at it like a buffoon, so I hunched down and urged Crash to go faster. Naturally being smarter than his curious master, Crash increased his speed, and was able to widen the gap between us and the beast by a large margin.
We emerged from the forest ten feet in front of the beast, and as it emerged behind us I dared to look over my shoulder. What I saw made me take in an involuntary breath. What was chasing us was something out of a nightmare, it was a demon. The decayed corpse of a monster chased us, but it was impossible to see just what type of monster, for it had a thick black cloud surrounding its body, with only the eyes being visible on account of the fact that they glowed red! It didn't have any trouble being silent, and if it wasn't for the fact that everything it touched rotted and died you probably wouldn't see it until it saw you. So there I was, running-well "riding" for my life, with a giant undead monstrosity of monstrosities following me with clearly violent intent. I had to somehow outrun it back to the castle, but considering that Crash wasn't used to long distance racing, and the beast would probably be tireless, I was in deep $#%&. I was having a splendid day...

This post has been edited by Quel33: 26 July 2011 - 04:57 AM

[Joker]

I enjoyed reading this Quel!

Descriptions were good and the setting was a little different from the other Monster Hunter stories I've read so far. My only "issue" with it is that it's a little hard on the eyes. Some formatting wouldn't hurt but that's up to you.

Example:

Quel33, on 25 July 2011 - 05:57 AM, said:

Every story usually has a hero who is tasked with saving something, or someone; and every story usually has the forces of good vs evil. This story isn't one of those...

~The Prelude, Chapter One: Herdsmanship & Zombies~

Hello all, my name is Quel. Not my birth name, but my chosen name. I can't remember my life before age twelve, so I've no idea who I am, or where I came from. This story starts like all others: somewhere, sometime. Well let's stop procrastinating, and get to it.

****

"Quelly boy!? Where are yew?" said the voice of my nightmares.
"Mmmpphhh!" said I.
"Thar yew are laddy!" said the voice.
It was then that I felt a sudden tugging, and found myself being pulled out of the waste bin I had been "investigating". Hanging upside down, I had been grabbed by my right ankle and was now looking up at the face of my rescuer.
"Hiding agin?" said the Head Baker of Castle McCully, Mrs. Renee Derminster.
Mrs. Derminster was the wife of Mr. Derminster the Head Marshall of His Lordship's Stables, and both were wyverians in their second century, which was young by their standards, and huge by ours. Now you see why she's able to hold me up so easily...
"No! I, errr, thought I saw some malachite at the bottom, and then I got, err, stuck!"
"U-huh. And I suppose a shakalaka named Gaspardh shoved you in deeper?"
"Not at all... Why are we acting like I'm a kid again...?"
"Because you are avoidin' yer duties as the head shepherd of our Lord's livestock."
"I was only sparring with Gondel in the training yard, and lost track of the time."
"Your test to become a junior guardsmen will have to wait, there's been rumors of a predator bein' spotted in the Veil."
"Ah... That's a different matter."
"Aye, it is. Yew need to ge' on yer gear and go investigae' it."

I was twenty-two, almost six feet tall, I weighed almost one-hundred and fifty pounds of solid muscle, I had blue eyes, brown hair, light skin, and I was still naive by most peoples standards. This was Castle McCully, and I was the head shepherd for the Lord of the Castle, Jason McCully. I had no other shepherds to assist me, so "head shepherd" was just a title. I was all alone... My responsibilities extended all over his Lordship's lands, from the far western coasts of the Black Crags of Dunmire, to the eastern edge of the Veil, the biggest forest in this part of the continent, which was largely unexplored, to the south, where the Lordships' duchy bordered his neighbor, and rival, Lady Heran's land, and finally to the north, where it bordered the vast wasteland known simply as the Frontier.

Now this may sound like a huge swath of land, but in actually it only covered about two-hundred miles of land. No I wasn't the only herder in all of the McCully lands, but I was the only one stationed at Castle McCully. The country I was in was known as Evomere, and Lord McCully was head of the northernmost duchy in Evomere. Another thing to mention before I forget to mention the big details, and just mention the little details... Castle McCully was surrounded by a big wall, and around the wall was a moat, and around the moat spread the large town of Castle Town. Unoriginal, but it fit. Outside of Castle Town there were solitary houses, and farmsteads spaced on every hilltop.

Now I'm going to take the next paragraph to tell you all the woes of my job as a shepherd of livestock. Being a shepherd isn't easy, and it isn't tough... As long as you know what to do... What do I mean by that? Well you have to have the tools of the trade for starters. Certain monsters listen to certain things, and abhor certain sounds and smells. For instance to be a good herdsman, you need a herdsman's specially crafted herding stick, a flute, a horn, a pair of climbing gloves, a strong pair of lungs, and a limitless sense of terror. Every herdsman had his own trusty mount, and one of the first tests to be a monster herder was to capture your own mount. I had captured a mount that was a little bit.. different from the usual herdsman's mount. I had my own great baggi, who I named Crash. No I didn't name him that because he crashes into things... I named him that because he crashes me into things... Now back to the present. Walking back to my hut, I found Crash eating something that crunched entirely too much for comfort's sake.
"We have a job to do Crash. Are you ready to go out hunting something vile, dangerous, and mysterious?"
"Grarrh..." replied Crash warily.
"No you won't have to go near Old Man Derrik's guard dogs."
"Groo..." replied Crash happily.

Saddling up Crash, I gathered my flute, herdsman stick, and a carving knife. Remember that other herdsmen gear I told you about? Too expensive for me to own. I also was smart enough to pack a small lunch of some dried bread, kelbi bacon, and kelbi milk. The ride out from Castle McCully was a beautiful one, with the Veil on the far right horizon, and the heights of the Highlands to the west. It was early in the morning, so a mist still clung to the Veil, and the sun was just now rising over the horizon, making the forest look both awesome, and spooky. I was heading into that awesome, and spooky forest.

After riding over many a hilltop, and waving at some folk I knew, I arrived at the proper edge of Lord McCully's territory: the edge of the Veil. After riding across the small expanse of untiled land at the edge of the forest, I found myself in another world. Where the farmlands of Lord McCully had been bright, and windy, the Veil's edge was dark, and quiet. Animals large and small made noise in the underbrush, and birds flew in the trees, crying alarms at my presence.. or was it Crash that disturbed them so? He just snorted at the smaller animals, an stared with a keen predator intelligence at the bigger animal noises. It took us about ten minutes of travel along the small animal trail we were on to reach our objective: a small pen in which we sometimes kept kelbi, or aptonoth. The pen was in ruins. Only one post still stood, and the rest was pieces of wood scattered across the clearing. Scorch marks dotted the scenery to, and of the small herd of kelbi I had placed in the pen the day before there was no sign.

Getting off of Crash, I checked the scorch marks. Hopefully they were just a kut-ku's doing. If they were of something larger than a bird wyvern, then I was in trouble... Another aspect of being a herdsmen was the ability to be a tracker as well. Not being able to read much from a simple scorch mark, I began to investigate the rest of the clearing. Crash just stood there, looking at me and the surrounding forest. The broken pen yielded no results, as nothing had left any defining markings around it. I found no tracks, or claw marks. Nothing in the way of anything told me what caused this. The fact that there was no sign of a mutilated kelbi also clued me in to what must have done this: poachers.

Poachers. There isn't a word more hated, or vile as that one word to any herdsman. Occasionally a herder is killed by a poacher, but we give no quarter to them in return. Fights between poachers and herders have gotten so bloody in the past that at one time the old King of Evomere, Keillor the Wise, put a 100,000z bounty on anyone caught poaching. in fact the war between poachers and herdsman once had a famous battle. The Battle of Glover's Holdfast. Not entirely a famous battle, for it was actually fought by ten herdsman, and thirty drunken mercenaries... But it is still remembered by us herdsman... Sometimes... Though admittedly the Bard of Gloverdale does a bad job of singing the lines of "herders murder their burghers" and "mercy mercenaries, for Percy!" Yes, I was most likely dealing with poachers right now...

After checking the entire clearing, and finding nothing, I began to check the perimeter of the clearing. After completing my check on nearly half of the clearing's edge, I found what I was looking for: signs of something having left the clearing. From the looks of the tracks ten men at least had passed this way, wearing boots. They had walked single file into the depths of the supposedly unexplored Veil.
"Well this is interesting..."
"Grooowaaarr..." said Crash, also apparently interested.
I was about to whistle for Crash to come over, then thought better of it as my instincts told me I wasn't alone. Crash stopped his grumblings, and bird watching, and fixated his gaze directly to his right... which was six feet, or so to my right. The bushes didn't tremble with movement, the forest animals didn't stop their singing, and the sky didn't darken; but I felt something looking at me. I raced back to Crash, jumping on him just as the brush behind me erupted with movement, and a giant beast emerged silent as death, to rush at me and Crash. We had barely gotten into a gallop, when it was almost on us. I suddenly wished I had some other kind of weapon than a knife. I had no time to look over my shoulder at it like a buffoon, so I hunched down and urged Crash to go faster. Naturally being smarter than his curious master, Crash increased his speed, and was able to widen the gap between us and the beast by a large margin.

We emerged from the forest ten feet in front of the beast, and as it emerged behind us I dared to look over my shoulder. What I saw made me take in an involuntary breath. What was chasing us was something out of a nightmare, it was a demon. The decayed corpse of a monster chased us, but it was impossible to see just what type of monster, for it had a thick black cloud surrounding its body, with only the eyes being visible on account of the fact that they glowed red! It didn't have any trouble being silent, and if it wasn't for the fact that everything it touched rotted and died you probably wouldn't see it until it saw you. So there I was, running-well "riding" for my life, with a giant undead monstrosity of monstrosities following me with clearly violent intent. I had to somehow outrun it back to the castle, but considering that Crash wasn't used to long distance racing, and the beast would probably be tireless, I was in deep $#%&. I was having a splendid day...

[Quel33]

Which formatting hurt thy eyes? The chapter title? In that case I'll just make it in bold script and a tad bigger.

And if you think the setting is different, just wait until I get going. I might have created an entirely different world from the original MH, but I hope to create a good story for people to read. Next chapter is coming up soon btw...

I'm glad you liked it Joker, it means a lot coming from you.

This post has been edited by Quel33: 26 July 2011 - 12:33 AM

[Quel33]

~The Prelude, Chapter Two: A Lesson in Outrunning a Zombie ~

Hello again. Back for more retelling of my life's road? Then sit tight! The road's a bumpy one at times...

***

The horror chased me with uncanny intelligence. Every time I tried to lose it by having my more agile mount jump over a small chasm, or race up a hill, and then race down in a random direction, it always managed to seek out my true intentions and ambush me. Twice I almost didn't detect it in time and it got close enough for me to be able to smell it up close. In a word it reeked. It smelled like dead things, rotten things, but above all else it smelled like a corrupt heart. I don't know if you can understand me when I say something smelled like that, but that's the best way I can describe it... Crash and I had barely gone a mile from the Veil, when he started to tire. It wouldn't be long now until he was too exhausted to run, and then we'd be easy targets for that monster. This was a type of situation that was new to me, but would happen all my life: being in a situation with no hope in sight, death looming all around me, and only my instincts and brains to use to save myself. Fear for myself hasn't usually impaired my judgement, but fear for one's I love usually always makes me go into a near panicked state. Not that I loved Crash that much, I was just stricken by terror for the first time in my life. Now, I'll stop my monologue and return to the story... Crash and I had only gotten halfway back to the castle, when disaster struck. Disaster loves to strike at inopportune times... Crash and I had just come down a steep slope to reach the bottom of a dried riverbed. Large stones dotted the ground, and Crash was beginning to get wobbly. The horror was nowhere to be seen, and had disappeared about five minutes ago as we headed towards the riverbed. I had the distinct suspicion that it was heading us off, but I couldn't go back the way I had come, and I was almost to a place I knew would give Crash and me a safe hiding place from the beast. We were just coming out the other side of the riverbed when we heard a groaning sound, and I saw a dead tree falling-wait, dead tree? It was then that I had one of my instantaneous moments of cognition. The horror had somehow circled around me, and had pushed the tree, trying to blockade my path. I was lucky that I had come this way enough times to know that that tree hadn't been dead when I had last seen it, scarcely a week ago. The tree fell, and it was large enough that it blocked off the exit very neatly. Then the horror leaped down from the top of the steep hill that the tree had been standing on. Thankfully I had realized it would do this scant seconds before, and had already turned Crash around to run away. The beast arrived to find me quickly retreating. It was still deathly silent, and the only noise I had heard it make the entire time I had been around it was the impact from it landing in the riverbed.
By now Crash was on his last legs, and was barely conscious. I decided to try something desperate, so I threw my lunch at the horror's face, smacking its head with a piece of kelbi bacon. Surprisingly it slowed down from that... I threw the bread next, and it hit the horror square in the middle of its forehead, which I could guess by the glow of its eyes, remember its surrounded by a cloud as black as night. Come to think of it the cloud didn't make any noise either, but do clouds make noise? Thankfully it was at this moment that I saw what I had been looking for: the briar patch that I occasionally used to hide in as a kid. I now used it to stash supplies that I didn't want anyone else to know about. The one entrance I had created was hidden behind a small bush, but was large enough for Crash to fit through. We raced towards the briar patch, and Crash knowing what I had planned raced straight into the hole. The horror wasn't so lucky and slammed into the briar patch full force. I knew that wouldn't do it any lasting damage, but it did give me my first chance to hear its voice. It didn't scream in pain when it hit the briar patch, it didn't scream in anger from having lost me, its prey... It screamed in sorrow. The kind of sorrow of having lost something dear to it. This gave me chills. Was it crying in sadness that it had lost its chance to see my entrails? Was it crying because it had lost its chance to see my spleen? Was it crying because it had lost its chance to see Crash's spleen? Did Crash even have a spleen? Why am I thinking about this again? Oh yeah, the horror... Those were basically my thoughts back then... Well now Crash and I were safe, but the horror was still out there, stalking around the briar patch, and every now and then prodding at a section of it. I had a plan. First I got out the short sword I had stashed in the briar patch, then I got out my rope. I had fashioned a sort of passage up to the top of the briar patch, and I had covered the sharpest of the thorns with dried grass. Lots and lots and lots and lots of dried grass. Now I crawled through the passage, cutting myself on the thorns that made up the ceiling of the small passage. Gravity didn't like my idea of placing grass on the ceiling, so I could never get it to work to any great degree. I crawled all the way out of the briar patch, and now I was about thirty feet high... Just high enough to see the beast see me see it, and have it rear up, trying to get me. Fortunately its reach wasn't quite long enough to tear me off. Unfortunately it could reach up with what it called a paw, and was trying its best to tear me down with it. I quickly spun an improvised lasso over my head, all the while dodging the horror... barely, and managed to swing my lasso up into the tallest tree, catching hold of a branch. Then I tied it down to the briar patch as best I could, and began to shimmy up the rope. The horror had better ideas, and with a leap it tore the end of the rope tied to the briar patch out. I was still holding on to the rope, but as I frantically climbed up I felt the air from its paws brush me from underneath. Thankfully I made it up into the tree. Now all I had to do was jump from tree to tree, hoping the horror couldn't get me, and finally get to the river than ran to the west of me. I was hoping that river, which ran relatively close to Castle Town, would be able to get me away from the horror. Basically I was hoping it couldn't swim... I next had a few hours of jumping from tree to tree. By now it was reaching late afternoon. I had been away from the castle for a long time, was anyone worried about me?
Finally I reached the river, only to find that the nearest tree to the river was a good forty feet away from the edge of the river... I couldn't sit in that tree all night, so I had to think up a way to get by the horror, who was stalking around my current tree. Finally I came up with a desperate plan, and taking the short sword in hand I prepared myself to do something stupid, and insane. I cocked my arm back, and let fly my short sword at the horror's face. I was lucky, in that the pointy end actually impacted first, stabbing the horror on the right side of its face. By the time it reacted to the blow, letting out a truly fearsome silence, I had already landed from the tree, and was running for my life to the river. My luck wasn't as good as I hoped it would be, as this section of the river was not deep, and was easy to ford. I was halfway across the waist deep water when I heard a loud splash behind me, and then a continuous splashing indicating something big was trudging towards me in the water. Finally reaching the other side of the river I didn't need to look over my shoulder to know the beast was right behind me, and that I couldn't outrun it. I felt very doomed at that moment, and would have almost given up except for my innate sense of determination. When others give up, I just get angry. Well I was angry now, very much so. I wasn't desperate enough to turn and fight the thing, knowing I'd last all of one second, which was about as long as it would take me to start screaming. Instead of being foolish I ran on, hoping to find some way of getting away from the horror. Luckily for me I only had to go another ten steps to see salvation: an old abandoned cottage. It was high enough to allow me to get out of the horror's reach, and sturdy enough to hold out for some time. That was when the shadow loomed over my shoulders, and I remembered how quiet that blasted thing could be...

[Joker]

Great second chapter!

Regarding the formatting, if you just break up the paragraphs like I did in the example above, it makes it easier to read.

[IamEpicFailure]

@ Quel : What Joker is trying to say is, fix the wall of text.

Otherwise, amazing story! OwO

[Quel33]

Liiiightbuuullb! Break up the paragraphs! Why didn't I think of that?

[Quel33]

When I get too many chapters I'll have to compile either their links in one post, or put them in spoilers in one post...




~The Prelude, Chapter Three: Worthless Cottage is Worthless~

Your still reading this!? I guess I'm doing something right then... The hypno wheel in the background might be doing it...

****

There I was, resting on top of the abandoned cottage. I had just had an adrenaline rush that had made me go hyper, and thankfully survived as well... The horror had managed to sneak up on me, and had hit me with its paw, flinging me into the air, and twenty feet forwards. My small satchel that I had kept my meager lunch in had taken the full force of the punch, and I felt my kelbi milk bottle break. When I landed I found my adrenaline rush and got back on my feet, running to the cottage. I barely made it up before the horror got to me, and swiped at my back again. It missed and I was safe at last. It was then that I smelled something odd, and examining my satchel, I found it had rotted away to nothing, and the glass shards had spilled out. Now I knew why the horror had missed me as I climbed up onto the cottage's roof: the glass shards had gotten in its eyes. Not that the shards seemed to bother it much, it had just lost sight of me when they hit, or so I assumed... Now what? I couldn't run away, I was trapped now. The nearest tree was a long way away, at least five hundred feet. The horror would probably be able to get up on top of this cottage soon. The roof slanted down low enough that it could probably jump up if it really tried. I was halfway to the castle now, and I was in the middle of the farm community, but I was in an abandoned area. The soil hadn't been that good the past few years in this area, so the farmers were leaving it to replenish itself, they did this to every plot of land in a scheduled pattern. All I could do was wait, or do a suicide run and probably make it ten feet before I was overtaken.

Hours passed, and I dozed off for small increments during the night. Then, at around midnight, I had a brilliant, and insane idea: I was going to set the cottage on fire. I jumped down into the cottage by going through a small hole in the roof. I gathered up the tools for my insanity: dried wood pieces, an old can of cooking oil, and a few sticks. Then I got on the roof, in the direct center, and piled the wood pieces, then poured the old and congealed can of oil over them. Finally I poked a hole in one of the sticks with my carving knife, and then I put the other stick in the hole, and began to rub it like mad. I don't know what your thinking about, but I just want to make fire. I remembered I had forgotten to put dried grass in the hole, jumped into the cottage again, and found some on an exposed portion of the floorboards that had mother nature encroaching. Finally, again, I spun the stick with the dried grass at its base. After doing this long enough to make my wrists start to hurt, I still don't know what your thinking about, I finally got a spark. Then everything else started to catch fire, and thankfully I remembered in time I had forgotten to pour oil on the cottage itself, so I poured some sludge around the mini blaze as well. Than I stood back and watched as it caught fire. Now the tricky part, I had nowhere to go, so all I could do was hide in the cottage. The fire was like a beacon in the night, so I was hoping people would come to investigate. Now my mind started to wonder where this thing had come from, and what created it... The fire soon spread, and I was now trapped in a burning building. Great Quel, you wont die from being killed by that thing, but your going to burn yourself to death.... Thankfully the smoke wasn't going into the cottage yet, and the fire was just on the roof at the moment... That was when I heard the voices... Multiple people were outside, and they weren't screaming in terror, so the horror must have left... I hoped. I quickly ran to the door, and pounded on it. It sounded like they heard me, and I quickly backed away as an ax pounded on the wall, making a hole. After a few minutes of hacking, the hole was finally big enough for me to get out, and a well muscled arm poked through the hole, hand reaching for me. I grabbed my savior lumberjack's arm, and was pulled to safety.

Outside the burning cottage I found two families, sons stood next to their fathers, and all were armed with makeshift weapons; pitchforks, rusty swords, and clubs. Apparently they knew this was arson...
"You started this fire?" asked my savior, he had a beard...
"Where's the monster?" said I
"Don't play games with us kid!"
"I'm not! I was chased by something from the Veil, so I set fire to the cottage to get someone's attention! Look's like it worked."

That was when some kindhearted farmer hit me over the head, and everything faded to black. I awoke to the feel of cold stone on my back, and the incessant sound of dripping all around me. No I wasn't in a dungeon, I was in a farmers cellar.

"Louts..." I grumbled.
"Well you might be in here because of me actually." said a voice.

Turning to look, I see a man in his late twenties, his hands and feet are bound, so he is stuck lying on his side. His five o'clock shadow is more of a one am shadow now, and his clothes are all torn up. He has a black eye, and a split lip to boot.

"What do you mean?" I asked.
"I've set multiple fires recently in those puffed up farmers barns, so they think your my accomplice."
"WHAT!?"

That was when a door at the top of the stairs opened, and a familiar face stepped into view.

"Quel!? What're you doing here?" said Gillian, Captain of Castle McCully's Second Squad.
"Being charged as an accomplice in a string of arson fires..."
"Your the one who set fire to the cottage?!"
"Yes, and I did it to get help! I was being chased by something in the Veil!"
"Something?"
"I didn't get a good look at it, but it was a type of monster I've never seen before."

Now my story wasn't entirely outrageous. New monsters were discovered every few years or so, with them inevitably eating someone, or attacking a town. Now the villages on the outer edges of the Guild's territory, they saw more unclassified monsters than they cared to report, which was a constant annoyance to the Guild Overseers, who liked to be informed about any threat.

"A new type of monster you say?"
"Yes, and I barely got away. I set fire to the cottage because I was trapped, and it was only a matter of time before it got me."
"Well... Your not one to cause disturbances lightly... Even if you do neglect your duties as a herder too much. Alright then, you'll just pay a fine for the destroyed cottage and we'll be off."
"Fine?"
"Oh don't worry you'll just have to pay off the debt you owe the owner of the cottage."
"K-kay."

Well at least I was alive... Alive and six feet under in debt... Just like everybody else.

[Quel33]

~The Prelude, Chapter Four: And so it Begins...~

Four score and seven years ago... I don't actually remember 47 years in the past, as I wasn't born yet.

***

Time passed, and it wasn't until eight days after my encounter with the horror that I was able to go back to the Veil. I found the broken pen still broken, and the tracks of the poachers almost too old to follow, but being curious by nature, I was more than willing to follow them. The poacher's path led me deep into the forest, I crossed two small creeks on my journey, had to detour around fallen logs many times, and once lost the trail when it went into some undergrowth. Eventually I gave up on the chase, as it was going increasingly more northwards than I liked. This was territory outside of the Guild's power, and I wanted nothing to do with it. I gave up the chase. Returning home I found Crash still asleep in the shadow of my small hut. I had my herding duties to attend to, so I guess I should share with you just what a monster herder does... I still had half the day after my hike in the forest, so I saddled up Crash, and took off to investigate the grazing area of my Lord's aptonoth. I found them all sedately grazing on a hilltop overlooking Castle Town, and I preceded to check every grazing area, checking up on the shepherd's on duty. I had been doing this for a couple hours when I got a report that some rhenoplos had gotten loose across town, and were wreaking havoc in old Mrs. Parson's garden. She had a big garden, the biggest in town, so I knew it would be hard to capture them. When I arrived I found it was five rhenoplos that had escaped. Now rhenoplos are more stubborn than any creature you will come across, darn things will charge a diablos if they see it. There was a trick we herders knew to calm a rhenoplos; they responded to a herdsman's specially crafted herding stick. The herding stick is basically a piece of wood, with a propeller in a small cage on the tip. Now all of this wasn't special at all, but the propeller had small bells that had small akishi seeds in them. Akishi seeds were very rare, in fact only we herders knew how to find them. These seeds created a type of high pitched ringing that would affect any monster smaller than a bird wyvern, and lull it into a sleepy stupor. Now successfully made harmless all one needed to do was get behind the rhenoplos and herd it to a pen. Easy, right? Wrong. If you didn't get that stick down fast enough you would get run over by a rhenoplos before you could say wyverian.

I put down three herding sticks, and got behind a bush for a few seconds, then I got out and began to herd each rhenoplos until I had them all back up in the pen they had escaped from-it was right across the street from Mrs. Parson's garden. By now it was approaching dinner time, so I headed for home on Crash, dodging any low branches that he "didn't see". I ate a small supper with Crash making horrible noises in the background, and got out a good book to read. Yes I could read, most people who can afford to learn can read, and I had just finished my last year in school eight years ago. I read the book, and dozed off. Now this was how my life had been going for the past five years, and it was only interrupted every once in a while when there was a herd of aptonoth that got lost and they needed every herder they could find to track them down, or when a predator appeared, and they needed herders to calm and shelter the animals until the hunters had slain the monster. In short I was bored a lot of the time. I wanted to have this kind of life in my forties and fifties, not now when I had an urge to explore beyond every hill in sight. Destiny has a funny way of showing us our course in life, and I was contemplating my boredom one day when a friend of mine knocked on my door.
"Quel, are you there?!" said a voice outside my hut.
"Coming! Oh! It's you Aegrid, what can I do for you?" replied I.
Aegrid was an old friend of mine. He was the Mr. Derminster's second in command in the Castle McCully stables.
"Well ye see there's this urgent package that must be delivered to the Sorcerer's in Castoq, but the messenger's mount has broken a leg. So..." said Aegrid.
"They need Crash, because everyone around here knows he is the fastest, and hardiest mount for three leagues." I guessed.
"Aye."
"Don't have a choice, do I?"
"No..."
"Eh, as long as the messenger takes care of Crash, I'm fine with it."
"Grraahh." said Crash in dismay.

The rider showed up not too long after, ans with him came two knights from the castle. Two knights I knew from reputation as being bastards; not literally, but figuratively.
"This is the beast I shall be riding?" asked the messenger, in a voice filled with scorn.
"Yup." said I, deadpan.
"Well I suppose he'll do. There aren't any large monsters in this area after all."
My mind flashed back to the horror chasing me and Crash. I snapped out of it to watch as the two knights helped the messenger to mount, apparently it was urgent business. As soon as he sat in the saddle Crash got a queer look in his eyes that I knew all to well, and bucked like a mad bronco, sending the messenger flying on his third leap. The messenger landed in a rose bush off to the side of my hut. His curses were most eloquent as he rose out of that bush, covered in mini thorn wounds.
"I'll have its head!" he said.
"This is the only mount in the whole area for leagues who can possibly deliver the message in time!" replied one of the bastard knights. "You can't kill it!"
"But he can't even ride it." replied the other knight to his friend's side.
"Well if I can't then who can?" asked the messenger.

Every eye turned to look at me.
"Oh no! No, no, no! I'm not doing it, you can't make me! I've got other duties to attend to here at the castle!"

Ten minutes later I was sitting on Crash with a hastily packed meal, a suspicious package in my saddlebag, and a two day ride to Castoq.

[Quel33]

~The Prelude, Chapter Five: A Chance Meeting~

No comment actually....

****

Castoq wasn't what I expected after two days of hard riding, in which I had a lot of time to wonder what a city renowned for its sorcerers would look like. Instead of a city built entirely out of giant towers with sorcerers firing arcane spells out of the windows every few minutes, I saw before me a city old and filled with many normal people. No I actually didn't expect to find a city like I imagined, but still... There were only four towers in the city. Each was dedicated to one of the elements: fire, water, ice, and lightning. Even though dragon was still an elements it didn't have a tower dedicated to it, study of it was forbidden apparently. Anyway, back to the present, where I'm clueless, for at that time I didn't know any of what I just said...

I was riding down the main street when two things happened: I saw three guys riding dosfurogi's race towards me with cold expressions on their faces, and I heard someone shout "Look out!" I turned to look up just in time to take a flying girl full in the face. Her collision with me probably saved my life, though I have no certain way to tell even now... I landed on the ground, Crash began to cavort around me and the girl like a mad jester, and the girl was laughing at it all.
"Hey! Who are you, and why did you tackle me!" I shouted.
"I was falling you idiot!"
"You jumped!"
"Then gravity had me fall on you, idiot!"

By now I had realized that she had been carrying a saddlebag as well, and it had gotten tangled with mine. The three dosfurogi thugs arrived at that moment, cut away what I thought was my saddlebag, and rode of towards the center of the city.
"HEY! That's my saddlebag you a$$^&*#@!" I shouted.
"Tough luck buddy." said the girl as she peeked in and saw that she was holding my saddlebag.
"HEY! That's my saddlebag you a$$^&*#@!" she shouted.
"Instant karma." I said with a smile, right before she hit me in the face with my saddlebag.

When I got the saddlebag off my face she was gone, and so were the three fools who didn't look at what they were stealing. And after that nothing much happened until I got to the place I was seeking: the water tower of sorcery.
"Hello!? I have a delivery from Lord Jason McCully!"
I was shouting at a large reinforced door, and as the echoes of my shout died a plate at eye level slid open and I saw two luminous eyes appraising me. I held open the saddlebag, showing the eyes the contents of my saddlebag. They gazed it it for a few seconds, then the plate slid shut and the whole door began to revolve outwards. I stepped back and saw that the eyes belonged to a skinny, yet muscular man in his early thirties. He gestured for me to enter, and I took my first tentative steps into my first sorcerer's tower. It wouldn't be my last, nor my favorite.

I was guided by the skinny man down many corridors decked out with blue carpets, shinning marble walls, ceilings, and floors. Everything was decorated with water motifs, and lanterns with blue glass covers shaped like sea shells dotted the walls at even intervals. I was in a world of blue. After what seemed like a hundred corridors I found myself standing outside a door impossibly large. To say it reached the heavens wasn't that far from the truth, it disappeared at the rafters, and hugged the walls, which was astounding considering the corridors were a good twenty feet wide. My guide rapped lightly on it with his knuckles, and another small plate, this one seamlessly disguised with the door, slid open, revealing another pair of eyes. These stared out at us with a blind kind of boredom. After looking at us both the eyes blinked, and disappeared as the plate slid back into place. I expected the doors to start to ponderously open, creating shock waves in the floor, but another seamless opening appeared, this one was a smaller door, more people sized. I stepped through alone, my guide turned back the way we had come. When I stepped through I found myself in an entirely different world from where I had just come. Where that world had been shiny, blue, and pristine, this world was dark, suffocating, and grim. Tapestries as dark as night flowed along all the walls, and some even hung in the middle of the room, the ones in the middle seemed to be around something, but I'll be getting to that in a bit... There were no torches, small statues of children carried the only illumination: lanterns with dark purple coverings. The floor was black marble, or was that obsidian? It seemed to suck up all light, and now back to the tapestries in the middle of the room... They were hiding a giant chair, more of a throne, and on this throne sat an elderly woman. She was holding nothing in her hands, and yet I could have sworn she had something in them... A knife, a book, a doll, a globe of crystal, an eye? I couldn't tell, it was blurry... She was gazing at me with eyes that well, filled me with terror, and terror.
"You have what I desire?"
Suddenly she seemed to be both young and old, so I was a bit flustered. Just what was she...?
"Y-yes!" I stammered.
"Show me..."
I quickly got out the package that I had been tasked to deliver, and held it up for her to see.
"Good, now place it on the ground in front of my curtain and leave."
I complied. Took one step back, and fell through a trap door down, down down, into complete darkness. And as I fell I heard the woman behind the curtain laughing, she was very amused

This post has been edited by Quel33: 17 August 2011 - 05:52 AM

[Quel33]

I'm not abruptly ending this fanfic, I'm just focusing my attention elsewhere atm. Anyone still care though...?

[IamEpicFailure]

^ I'm always watching OwO
Will wait for your next update...

[Quel33]

~The Prelude, Chapter 6: The Nose Knows ~

In retrospect I could have not written about what happened in the past five chapters, but I wanted to show you readers what led up to this chapter: my awakening.

****

So there I was, unconscious in a dark pit, but I didn't know that yet. At that point in time I was in another time and space. It was time I woke up to who I was. I had handled myself exceptionally well with the horror, not panicking, and not falling to its fangs. I had survived where I was pretty sure not many could have. Now you will find out why, and I will find out just what I was...
"Quel...Qeuuulll...Qeeuuullll...QUEL!"yelled a voice.
"AHHHHI What!? Who's there?" replied I.
"I have need of your help young warrior."
"Where am I...? Where are you?"
"We are in between everything. This is the Vast, a place where the collective unconscious lies. I have come to you here as you lie near death-"
"WHAT!?"
"LISTEN! You have an immense power that is both a gift and a price that you must accept."
"Oookaaay."
"Do not sass me! Listen well, for I will not tell you twice!"
"Yes ma'am!"
"I am from a lost tribe of multidimensional beings. We have taken on the forms of white wolves, and we are one tribe of many. We came to this planet of monsters and hunters ages ago. Now we must fight a war to protect this place we have come to call home. Other tribes, darker and more base than us, have come behind us. Some of them are allies of us, and some of them are enemies of us, but all share our talents and abilities."
"What does this have to do with me?" I asked in a small voice.
"Your soul resonates with our tribes idol. You are one of us, and we have come to absorb you into our tribe."
"My soul, huh? Does my soul resonate with any of these other "tribes"? Will they come seeking me to if I don't join you?"
"Perhaps..."
That's a yes I thought... "What choice do I really have? I do feel no darkness from you, so I'll at least investigate your tribe before I change my mind."
Even though I couldn't see this voice I knew two things: one it was a woman's voice, and two she was definitely smiling right now as she said: "Good, you will know which direction to go. Seek the red moon, and go to the lonely sentinel. It will guide you to our den."
"Right."
"There is one last thing I must do before our link fades, I will awaken your inner wolf."
"Inner wolf...? I don't know-"
"Too late."
"HEY!"
By then I was already feeling myself waking up...

I awoke in a place that was damp, musty, and filled with shadows. I was in some sort of catacombs underneath the water tower. I needed to pay back that infernal idiot up above me behind her precious curtain, but I also needed to get out of here. Catacombs usually are the home to mummy's, or worse things best left alone. I needed to get out of here, and fast! I started by checking to see if I was injured. I found out that I was, and badly. I had a severe cut on my left shoulder, which was bleeding a little too much for safety's sake. I had a broken rib, or two, or three(!) on my left side. It hurt to breath, and I had a long way to go to freedom and safety. I started by first getting up and walking very slowly over to the right. I quickly bumped into a slimy wall, and after fumbling along it to my right for a long undefined period of time I arrived at a dark tunnel. I could tell it was a tunnel by the feel of the air around me, and the fact that a different smell was emanating from it. Wait. A different smell? Since when did I use my nose that well?

I could smell dirt and other earthy aromas coming from down the tunnel, and it seemed to me that I shouldn't go that way, so I didn't I walked a complete circle along the wall of this room, and found it was roughly a rectangle. I had fallen through the trap door to land in the center of it. There were two exits: the dark tunnel I was leery of, and another, even smaller tunnel, that seemed to go almost directly downwards. The smells coming from this smaller tunnel smelled more inviting, in fact I could smell water in this direction... I decided that this was the only way that I could go logically. After a few twists and turns the small tunnel opened up, and I had some light from a few patches of lichen growing on the ceiling. After another few twists and turns, and going up a few inclines, and down a few slopes, I arrived at a small cavern. The path I was taking continued on, but there was a pool of water to my immediate right. This water didn't smell like any old pool, it smelled like it was deep. What I mean by it smelled like it was deep was the fact that its moisture was overpowering the small cavern, and a small pool wouldn't be that strong. I dove in it without much second though, and found it was much has I suspected: extremely deep. Only the difference from what I had sensed up above was the fact that it was like a labyrinth underwater, heck it WAS a labyrinth. Being underwater my nose was useless, so I followed the currents and swam like hell.

My lungs began to burn after a while, and I was just reaching the limit of my endurance when I breached the surface and immediately gasped in air for a few minutes. After regaining my senses I saw I was in a large cave, with an underwater lake dominating the scenery. I saw a ledge and swam towards it. When I got closer I saw the ledge was man made, and that was when I realized where I was. On my way into Castoq I had heard of a large underground lake that was used as a place to wash laundry by the locals. Sure enough as I was getting out I saw a mom and her two daughters walk down a carved staircase at the other end of the ledge and regard me with amusement.

"You shouldn't bathe in that water boy, it's filled with all sorts of bodily fluids that could make you come down with sickness." said the mother. Her two daughters, twins it looked like, just giggled. I sheepishly made my way past them and out of the tunnel, and it wasn't until I had gone a few steps up the staircase that I realized two things: I could smell those women keenly. I knew how healthy they were, I knew what their emotional state was. Apparently I could now get a vague sense of a person's intentions with my improved nose. I could also apparently detect sickness in people to... I was a regular spook now. I was quite unnerved by all this, it was still new to me... The second thing I realized was that Crash was back at the water witch's abode...

[Quel33]

I edited chapter five. I didn't catch the stupid typo/paradox I created with the saddlebags, but I did now. Sheesh!!!

[Quel33]

~The Prelude, Chapter Seven: A Snoring Great Baggi is of Little Comfort~

Ah love, such a fleeting and powerful emotion.

***

I was in a state of panic as I traced my way back to that witch's tower. Fate had much in store for me that night... I was coming around a corner when someone ran into me at a full run. We both went down in a tangle of limbs, and I came face to face with that rowdy girl from earlier who had her saddlebag taken.

"You!" she said.
"You!" I said.

It was then that I heard running feet and saw the same three dosfurogi thugs running up to us. We disentangled ourselves and stood together to confront them. I'm not one to leave a lady in a perilous predicament...

"I see your accomplice has come to die with you!" said the guy on the left.
"I'm not-" I tried to say.
"Yes he has. Now it's a fair fight you wankers!" yelled the girl.
"WHAT?!" I yelled.
"Not much to look at is he." said Left.
"He'll do." she said.
This wasn't what I wanted, but I couldn't see any alternative out of this, so I stayed by the rowdy girl's side. That was when two of the dosfurogi thugs drew out knives and stalked towards us... The girl tossed her saddlebag at them, and leaped into the air, landing two simultaneous kicks to both of their heads. They fell like sacks of potatoes, and the third guy ran off screaming: "We'll remember this! Lord Jasco isn't one to take kindly to those who cross him!"
"What in blazes have you gotten me into?!" I asked politely.
"None of your business, now let's forget we ever saw each other."
And with that, she vanished down a shadowy alley. I shrugged my shoulders and continued on towards the water tower. Halfway there I found Crash wandering around the city. Apparently they hadn't caught him and roasted him for supper. When I said as much to him he kindly bit my right hand.
"That's a rude way to say hello." I said.
"GroaarrQuelllrrrrr." he said.
I froze in my tracks...
"Crash... Did you just say my name..."
"Graaarrrk." he said happily.
"Apparently not. Phew! I thought I was hearing things for a second..."

******

Days later we arrived back home, and I found everything the way it was before. No one was talking about any monster attacks, so I figured that horror hadn't reappeared... That or there were just no monsters in the area. I went about my herdsman duties, and pretended to forget what I had seen. I had just bee hallucinating, none of what happened in the cave had been real. And so what If my sense of smell, hearing, and sight were now levels above what they and been before. Poppycock! It was normal for boys my age, right? Right?! I was fooling myself, and hiding what I had become from even myself. But when a stormy day arrived and tough choices had to be made I finally fully accepted my path in life.

******

"What's happened!?" yelled Faben, a local farmer.
"A hunter has come into town severely wounded. He says it was some kind of dark beast that attacked him! He barely got away!" yelled Adela the local crofter's wife.
I was busy looking after some of Lord McCully's kelbis at pasture when I heard all of this occur behind me. The kelbis were safe enough where they were, so I followed the tide of people in our small community that were gathering around the castle's main gate. We all saw nothing of course, but Lord McCully usually addressed his subjects personally when there was something amiss. This time was different, as Lord McCully, Havik Fairoaks, the Captain of his household guard, and twenty odd men came barreling out across the drawbridge. Everyone scattered, and watched as this impressive host went racing off to the east... Towards the Veil...

No I didn't saddle up Crash and follow them. I went back to my duties, and watched as a storm built up off the coast to the west. Later that night, though... When it was nearing midnight and the storm raged across the land. I braved the many thunderclaps, and lightning flashes; the powerful gusts of wind, and the pouring ferocity of the rain to see what was happening. I had heard the host return scant minutes before, and donning my meager rain gear I left my hut and went to see what was happening. What I saw wasn't good... It wasn't good at all... In fact it was horrible. When I got to the edge of the drawbridge, I could see all the way into the main courtyard of the castle thanks to my improved eyes. Havik Fairoaks was nowhere to be seen, and Lord McCully was draped across his mount, clearly dead. He had been torn apart by something, and the few remaining men that had returned-who numbered less than ten I might add- were shambling around the Lord's body, waiting for something. Just then the castle's main door opened and Lady McCully came out, saw her husband, and fainted. I lost sight of what was happening then as the returned men rushed to her aid along with her personal handmaid. I had seen enough, and I thought it was time to go to bed to have nightmares. I stealthily made my way back to my hut, barred myself in, and went to sleep listening to Crash snore.

[Quel33]

After a hiatus, I have seen MH 3G, and I have a new drive to write again!


I had no idea what to do with this fanfic, but now I know I will complete it! And start my long thought out MH fanfic epic!


That will bore you all to tears, cuz I doubt anyone reads this stuff.


I'm still going to write it.

[Quel33]

~The Prelude, Chapter Eight: Choices ~

I awoke the next morning not sure of what I'd discover, and to cut the suspense short it wasn't good. Gossip had leaked out what the survivors of the raiding party had reported: a dark beast with a horrible aura was what had killed most of them and our lord. Sounds familiar, right? I knew it was that thing that had chased me all the way out of the forest. Of course they hadn't listened to me, isn't that always how these stories go...? That was when my body tingled, and I instinctively knew something was different. Looking up I saw my answer: a blood red moon.
"The path is open..." I unconsciously said.
Snapping out of my semi-trance I wondered at myself for saying something like that. I remembered the female voice's words well. If my hunch was correct that moon would lead me towards something called a sentinel... Correction the lonely sentinel... This red moon was giving me an uncontrollable urge to follow it. Something deep inside me was terrified of losing this chance to follow it, so I made a choice. I gave up everything I had been living for in this tiny city on the northern frontier. Saddling up Crash I packed a large amount of supplies, and left a note saying goodbye to everyone on my kitchen table. They'd think me craven for leaving the city during this crisis, but I suddenly didn't care. I was at peace, and unattached with the world around me...This was a first for me. When I was finished with all my preparations and had finally gotten everything I was taking onto Crash it was early morning. The sun was just peeking over the horizon, for all of ten minutes, until it started to disappear above the dark cloud bank. Unfortunately for any sun gazers, and fortunately for me it was still raining hard. This was one of the worst rainstorms in years, and it was serving to help me escape unnoticed. The moon was fading, but I knew in which direction it was. That was when my journey started, and my life took a turn for the better, and worse.


***

Five days later I was still following the moon, and I was now only traveling at night. I stayed at any cheap inn I came upon, but I mostly slept in the wild. I knew from hearing stories of this area that the path the moon was guiding me on was going steadily towards the Fury Mountains, home of the famous Pokke village and other snowy hunting havens. My supplies weren't running out, but they were depleted...

***

Ten days after leaving my home I arrived at the foot of the Fury Mountains. The northern lights were out in force, and the sky was lit up in rainbow hues. Brilliantly colored, chillingly frosty, the Fury Mountains beckoned to me. The Red Moon was in its waning phase, halfway through it in fact. I got a red Cheshire Cat smile as I trekked up the mountains. With this as a herald of my arrival in the Fury Mountains, I climbed ever higher and went ever deeper into the frozen peaks of that range of mountains.

***

Three days later I had blisters on my blisters. While Crash was somewhat sullen, he was also overjoyed to be in his native environs: the bone chillingly, bathe-if-you-have-a-death-wish, nostril icicle region some call the Glacier. From fables, and myths I knew the Hero of Pokke had killed an Ukanlos in this area, but all was frightfully still, or desultorily still, for such a famous region. My heart was pumping faster as time went by, and I wasn't as cold as I thought I should've been. My instincts were telling me I was getting closer to my goal... Two days after realizing this, I found the Lonely Sentinel...

***

A frozen lake, more like a mini ocean, was in an area of this Glacial region I was sure had never been explored. The snow banks were hundreds of feet high, the slightest sound echoed a thousand times over, and the wind barely blew... This was a Sacred Land, sure to have a monster as ancient as the world itself and just as powerful, slumbering within... At the center of it I saw a mini spear of ice sticking straight up... I knew this was what I sought... At first I was worried the lake's protective covering of ice would break under the combined weight of Crash and myself, but I soon realized it had been frozen for hundreds of years, nothing would short of ten gravios' shooting fully powered fire beams concentrated on one spot would have a chance to break through to the water. That, or a really powerful earthquake...I stopped worrying about it. When I was halfway to that lonely spear of ice, I realized it was much bigger than a small hill... And when I got up close to it I understood how peculiar its existence was. It was a giant stalactite of ice, shooting up to two-hundred feet high, and five-hundred feet wide all around. I stood in front of Crash, holding his reins, gape jawed. I was a mere ant next to this thing... And at its base, directly in front of me, there was a crack, thirty feet high, and about seven feet wide at the base and narrowing as it traveled upwards. I knew what I had to do, so I gave Crash a meal, tied his reins to a long rope, and stacked it into the ground... I didn't put all of my power into stacking him, for if I didn't make it back I wanted him to be able to get free. Then, starring at the welcoming darkness of that ice cavern, I lit my torch and walked in...

***

It wasn't too spooky in there and after going down into an ever widening cave. My torch's light reflected off of the wet surfaces of the ice, casting my reflection farther ahead of me than I liked. My heart knew something was coming for me... This was to be a Trial of Strength. The cave got more and more wild as I went down it, with me now climbing and jumping down and over jagged ledges, and squeezing through narrow cracks. Then I reached the end... A cavern larger than any you have ever seen loomed in front of me. The caver had been narrowing for some time, and had opened up into a small alcove like area, and right on the other side of this, through a small crack in the wall, loomed this gigantic cave. It was pitch dark. With only the occasional dripping noise to greet me as I stepped out, and stood on the shore of a vast underground lake, unfrozen and untouched by time. I felt the hairs on my neck stand up. All was peaceful, but I felt malevolence, rage, a dark glee, blood lust, pleasure, and more dark emotions laying underneath this quiet. Something was watching me, knowing I felt it, and taking a savage pleasure from that fact. It sensed something in me I barely perceived, but knew of like a long lost friend, or a mirage of a lost paradise... And above all of this I felt...

The Call to the Hunt.

A bared my teeth, feeling them change. I hunched over, feeling my skin, hair and feet change. I opened my eyes and felt them change. I had somehow dropped the torch during this little interval, and it bounced and rolled until it was quenched in the lake, hissing, smoking, and spluttering. It went out in the blink of an eye, and I was overwhelmed by an odd feeling, dazed. That was when I knew "it" was right on top of me, scant inches away. How had it gotten so close!? I leaped away, and felt the air scream next to me as something vile slammed into the ground where I had been standing a second before. Upheaval, everything around me was roaring. Darkness thicker than the eye can pierce, it was screaming hysterically. I felt the ground shake throughout all of this, falling away where I had been standing, caving in from the force of whatever had happened. All of this happened withing the span of only a few seconds, and as I regained my footing I felt "it" lunge at me. If I had been a "normal" human I'd have died right then and there...But I wasn't what you would call normal, and instinct took over again. I leaped forwards, and up, kicking off from something meaty, bony, and for an instant it shrieked in surprise. I flew through the air, blind, and crouched in midair. I landed with a profound splash in the underground lake, and had all warmth along with my breath leave my body. Now drowning, I oriented myself to my surroundings. When my eyes adjusted, I saw a faint, but large glow emanating from the far bottom of the lake... I swam for it without thinking, and was nearly halfway to it when I heard a dim sound from behind me: a giant splash.

I swam faster and faster, lungs burning, mind reeling. I wasn't going to make it, but I did. I reached the glow, passed through it, and fell into the lovely embrace of oxygen. What the deuce is right!! How was there oxygen at the bottom of this giant subterranean lake? Looking around my answer was revealed... The lake had a large, 20 feet by 60 feet long, bubble sticking to the bottom of it. Against all logic a bubble of this size had formed... My first thought was if it had formed naturally, or had some weird alien race lived in this area millennia ago? Then I got my oxygen starved brain out of the clouds, and focused on my current problems. The bubble had oxygen, the bubble glowed, it was sturdy enough to allow me to pass through it. That meant the "it" could pass through easily as well... I needed a battle plan, and I got an unexpected one. I felt a breeze. Snapping my head around, and cinching my neck in the process painfully, I saw a tunnel yawning at the other end of the bubble. I ran to this tunnel, and passed through it easily, which meant the "it" could as well. Casting one last glance over my shoulder as I entered the tunnel, I saw a huge dark shape approaching the bubble from the direction I had come. I increase my speed, and only realized I had no torch when I was engulfed by darkness again...A loud shriek behind me confirmed the chase was still on, so I ran blindly in the dark, stumbling every once in a while. One of the most terrifying feelings is running at high speeds in the dark. Your body will be shot full of adrenaline, waiting to run into something every millisecond. I of course ran into lots of somethings... On my mad dash in that cold hell, being chased by "it" I ran into the wall, and nearly fell a bunch of times, I finally ran full boar into a solid wall of ice, and slid down it a few inches before recovering enough to stand up. Regaining my footing, I heard "it" coming on fast behind me. I didn't know ho far I had been running, but I did know I saw a blueish glow coming from my left, through the ice... I saw the tunnel continue on down that way, and started running down that way. The "it" was catching up, I ran faster. When I got to the end of the small darkened tunnel, which was more like a gap between two giant glaciers than a proper tunnel, I found another vast cave, only smaller than that giant pitch black one.

This cave had a large hill in the middle of it, and seemed to open up onto a large plain, only that was an illusion, What I at first thought was a plain was a crystal clear wall of thing ice. It stretched from the floor to the ceiling, smooth as a mirror. All three other walls were made out of jagged, thick dark blue ice and rock. I was about sixty feet up on one wall, my tunnel had narrowly opened up on a long, thin ledge. The world exploded in a storm of snow and ice as the "it" broke through the narrow tunnel behind me, taking the surrounding wall with it. I was sent flying with it, tumbling down to a sixty foot end below.

***

I was awake, and yet asleep. Dead, and yet alive. I was in between, limitless.

"You should not be here Quel." said the by now familiar female voice, calmly.
"This is a different place from before." I replied.
"This is where those who still have a choice go."
"Huh, well what's my choice?" I asked.
"To live, or to die."
"Not much of a choice"
"You must choose. If you live you will suffer uncounted, and forever unknown torments...But if you die you will go to a better place."
"Still not much of a choice. You say torment, I say living. I'll take my chances back there where I was, thank you very much."
"You may regret this."
"You're the one asking me for help! Stop being a hypocrite and send me back already!"
"You're infuriating!"
"Same to you lady!"

And with a noise that can only be described as a Cosmic Slap, I awoke...To pain.

***

Blurry, unfocused I lay there. Not remembering anything but how to breath... Then my senses rushed into my head like a tsunami, and I knew my peril. The "it" lay next to me, also dazed, but rapidly-far more than I-getting up. Choices.

[Quel33]

~Chapter Nine: Change~

It was do-or-die, and I was at a disadvantage from the start. This thing was unlike any monster I'd ever heard of: it was so pale it was translucent, it had two yellow cat-like eyes on its smooth ball shaped head, a black hole for a mouth with teeth in its throat, a long khezu-like neck, with spikes all along its length, a classic wyvern body with two tails with suction cups on them; and its organs shone through its skin, in various shades of pink, yellow and red. It was still when I awoke, barely moving...But when I started to try and get up, it started to thrash around in anger, smelling me I guessed. Then its glowing yellow eyes pierced me with their intensity, stunning me momentarily. It used that time to get up completely, turn and face me and roar. Its roar was like a bat's shriek combined with a jho roar. My head swam and nausea hit me in waves from the sound of its voice and it lunged at me, too fast! I threw myself away from it as it crashed into the ground where I had been standing an instant before. I skidded on the icy ground and managed to stop myself after sliding around behind it, that was when its left tail hit me in the chest, sending me flying through the air. When I landed, I forced myself to run up the hill in the middle of this chamber on instinct. I began to plow through debris from something. Looking closer I saw I was amid the decayed bones, rusted armor, and worn away weapons of some climactic battle. There were hundreds of warriors here, and with a start I realized they were dressed in archaic versions of the current hunting gear. I saw a 500 year old cephalos armor suit, a long forgotten long sword type, and plenty of bones and leering, broken skulls. I was then hit by an overriding instinct: I didn't belong here, my very presence desecrated this place. That was when I nearly died. I had forgotten about the monster chasing me, and it managed to grab me around the waist in its mouth. I screamed in pain as it tore into me, breaking my ribs with sickeningly loud cracks. That was when something miraculous happened. I was limp inside this monster's mouth as it shook me back and forth, tearing me apart, when the temperature dropped even lower--far past what I thought possible--and a rain of snowflakes unlike any I'd ever seen began to cascade down from the heavens. They were black snowflakes, shining with a foreign light. A voice spoke to me:
"Do you desire power?"
"Y...yes" I coughed, blood was trickling down my chin.
"So shall it be, but for a price...Do you accept our price child of man?"
"I ac-cce-ep-t..."
"So Be It!"cried the voice, forever altering my destiny.
Then, something even more miraculous happened: ice formed around me and the monster's head, making it cry out in pain and fear. It renewed its shaking attempts, this time more frantically, and I came loose from its mouth and flew through the air, landing near the top of the hill. Though my consciousness was fading to black, I glimpsed a figure clad in armor at the top of the hill; standing right next to a long sword embedded in the earth. It was a warrior in ancient hunting armor, clasping the hilt of the embedded sword with his ghostly hand. He was see-through, pale blue, and his gaze was fierce. He nodded his head at me once, eyes without pity, but conveying a tumult of feelings that formed an indescribable emotion inside of me: strength, honor, duty, understanding, love, sadness, transformation; all of these I felt in his gaze, passing along the line of our eye contact. His armor was what struck me most: it was like a wolf's, but not like kamu, or nono orugaron. I can't describe it accurately: it was older, fiercer and filled with more majesty than the orugaron wolves. The specter stared at me a moment longer, then vanished without a second's warning... My vision faded to black. Now you might think I was a goner for sure, I did at that time. I awoke to a different world. The monster that had been hellbent on eating me was gone, it had left a trail of blood as it limped off into the deep regions of this subterranean ice cavern. All was silent. In front of me was a sword old as time itself. Rusted beyond recognition, frail looking and casting a small shadow on the hill, this sword called to me wordlessly to wield it. It made no sound, made no plea. The ground around it thrummed like it was a snoring giant. It was a mini earthquake, rumbling internally. Hungrily. I answered the call, walking up to stand next to it, right hand posed to touch it. The thrumming stops, the ground ceases its tormented quivering. Stillness reigns. I grab the relic of the past by its scarred hilt, pulling it out of the ground like a knife from a block of butter. Bits of snow detach from the tip and fall earthwards, a ringing fills my ears, coursing through my body. Something has clicked, time has shifted, nothing is clear to me and yet it all is now wide open to my inner eye.

I stood their in a daze for quite some time...Then, all of a sudden, I came back to myself and realized my wounds were mostly healed... What the deuce?! was of course my first thought. My ribs were tender, but whole again, my deep bite marks from that monster had closed, already scabbing over. What should have killed me, or nearly so with medical attention, had simply healed as I slept...What was going on? I hadn't been bitten by anything, and it certainly wasn't a full moon...What was I? It didn't take me long to retrace my steps out of that Lonely Sentinel. I now had a rusted piece of junk for a sword....Now what?


****


Standing at the top of the slope, I surveyed the battlefield. My side was winning underneath this blood red sunset. It had been fifty-six years since that fateful day in the cavern and I hadn't much. My life's span had lengthened immeasurably and I had been adventuring and causing havoc for decades. War was my main mission in life currently. The four great nations of this continent had started a colossal war upon each other. The Empire of Evomere, the Republic of Lysander, the Kingdom of Xylan and the Kingdom of Catori. This war was unlike any that had been waged before it, for monsters had been tamed by the wizards, with varying levels of success, to be used as mounts. Now hunters rode on the backs of dragons and fought in the skies. The scope of this war was unimaginable...And what was more there was something grim hidden in the events leading up to its genesis. The true cause of this war was unknown. Times had changed.


~To Be Continued~

[Quel33]

I had originally intended to do another fanfic, which I have some chapters already long since written, but I have decided to do another fanfic instead. So I am putting this fanfic about MH on hiatus for a while... A LONG while... :/

It was called, and if yo uwant to read the first few chapters of it PLEASE say so(I'll post them in the blink of an eye)...Right...

It was called...

The Threshold of the Chosen