The Hunter's Guide to Monsters

Krow had only been on a horse three times, and that included the time someone taught him to ride by tossing him onto a horse and yelling instructions while they fled.

The other two times absolutely did not endear the animals to Krow.

"You know," he grimaced at the reins that one of the riders had cheerfully tossed at him. "there was one time a horse tried to eat me."

It was a shape-shifting mudlurker, but it counted, right?

Yes it did.

The rider, a russet-maned vargvir who'd introduced himself as Bassalt, laughed as he mounted his own steed. He did a graceful twisting motion with his legs and hips and suddenly it seemed he and his horse had always been melded as one, two puzzle-pieces that made a furry centaur.

He winked at Krow. "I assure you, my friend, dearest Bangorgau has been weaned off human flesh."

The horse was named Gorgon-blood.

Nice.

Krow eyed the large animal even more warily, then narrowed his eyes at Bassalt.

Thank you, 'friend', your assurance didn't help at all.

"I imagine it was difficult to escape when you were already on its back." Einel, already sitting on a blue-grey dappled mare, waited patiently.

"It was…something like a mudlurker. A friend helped." Krow grabbed the saddle. His lips turned up at the edges briefly. "He had a spell very much like the Mouth of Hell, actually."

Exactly like the Mouth of Hell. Gazzy's Spell had eaten enough of the mudlurker's mass that it crawled back into its pit in tiny wriggly wormy pieces and likely wouldn't show itself for at least a hundred years.

He couldn't say that, though.

Krow still hadn't quite forgotten his thoughts on the AIs of Redlands logging his conversations. If someone happened to come across them, or if an NPC AI tracked his Redlands history to better craft his behavior to Krow's actions, that'd be trouble, wouldn't it?

He couldn't explain his unaccountable knowledge of Zushkenar. He'd already slipped up more than once.

If he continued, he might get flagged as a blackhat and his account banned.

That was something that couldn't happen.

Indefinitely, he'd pretend his experiences in Zushkenar were another game. Or maybe an augmented reality LARP, those were still popular.

"You were watching the caravan?" Bassalt asked, surprised. One of his ears flicked, tilted lower.

"I was nearby." Having psyched himself up, and seeing that neither of his companions could be persuaded out of getting him to ride, he slid his right foot into the stirrup, tightened his grip on the saddle, and pulled himself up, swinging his left leg over the horse. He grunted. "Even if I wasn't, it lit up the night like a beacon. Whose bright idea was that?"

They both grimaced, didn't answer.

It was rhetorical anyway.

The horse snorted but stayed quiescent as Krow adjusted himself in the saddle.

Hah. It was docile now, but a horse with a name like Bangorgau had to have a few quirks.

Krow wanted nothing to do with those quirks.

He only just started getting used to the draculkar body avatar.

And he'd learned to ride as a human.

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The designers of the races restricted themselves to purely humanoid designs in order to prevent cognitive dissonance in the players, but added just enough variation to the human base that players who chose non-human races had a longer adjustment period than human avatars.

In draculkar, according to online studies, the differences included heavier shoulder blades, larger vestigial tailbones, odd heart and lungs, subtly claw-like fingernails. Then there were the weird tendons, especially in the legs.

He skimmed, alright?

The point was, the balance that Krow-the-draculkar needed on a horse was not the same balance Scare-the-human had learned.

He tensed his knees and tugged at the reins. The horse moved.

What a relief. At least some things were the same.

"You were out at moonset?" Bassalt eyed him dubiously.

Yes, yes, he didn't look like much. His stats were in the low twenties still, you know! Of course he looked like a teenager in growth phase.

Ugh, he couldn't wait until he gained enough stats that he could bulk up his avatar body a little.

Being so slim and lean obviously got no respect.

He'd seen the sizing enchants Janggi had surreptitiously placed on his clothes.

"Scouting for a job." Krow kept his attention on the horse, trying to keep his back straight and not fall off if the horse swerved or something equally embarrassing.

They broke into a fast walk, an easy-looking pace in the other riders, to catch up with the caravan. Krow paled a little, tightening his grip on the reins.

He'd ridden flying beetle-boars, he berated himself, even one of those crazy racing podcycle inventions by the Mafmet players. This should be easy.

"You're too tense," Einel observed, studying his posture. "Not used to riding?"

"There are other mounts." Better mounts. Ones that didn't remind him of teeth grinding into his flesh.

"Shkav, I need a distraction. You want to know what happened last night? Fine."

It wasn't a secret.

He just didn't want to talk to someone who didn't introduce himself properly then started to interrogate him like he was due Krow's story. No matter how gently, it was still an interrogation.

For a fraction of a moment, Einel looked concerned. Krow launched into last night's retelling before she could draw attention to his unease.

"It was a split-second decision," he started. "The bird flew right over me, and your brother is…very small and young..."

*

It took an hour and a half for the caravan to reach Nyurajke.

It took a third of that time for Einel and Bassalt to run out of questions and start bickering. They got a little heated.

Krow tried to leave them to it, but the blasted horse preferred to pace its fellow animals.

With a barb thrown by Einel, Bassalt narrowed his eyes gleefully. He definitely was going to say something outrageous. Krow chuckled resignedly, interrupting. "You sure you want to do that?"

Bassalt smiled widely. "Oh, everything between us is like this. It's my name, see. It's why she has a rocky relationship with me."

Krow regretted immediately.

"I would prefer not having any sort of relationship with you." Einel stated.

"But I am irresistibly lith-some."

With good reason, she ignored him after that.

Bassalt leaned close to Krow. "Whenever she sees me," he thrilled in a stage whisper. "Her face becomes like stone!"

"Don't bring me into this," Krow sighed.

Bassalt smirked, but obliged. "Have you heard of the gunsmiths of Themlef? I hear their trade is reviving, after centuries of decline."

"Are they any good?"

The rest of the way to Nyurajke was made less of an ordeal by Bassalt telling stories of places and people the caravan met on the road.

A throwaway comment confirmed that their branch of the Garvan Clan had signed the Trade Covenants.

Hm. That gave him an idea.

Then something caught his eye.

In the distance, a flight of windmills crested tall towers, wings curling around a center in a globe-like style, different from the pinwheel windmills on Earth.

The sight took his attention away from an avid discussion on the types of monsters that commonly surfaced in different parts of Marfall.

Einel followed his fascinated gaze. "We're a quarter-hour away."

Krow stopped his horse, slid off and started stretching happily. "Great, I'm walking."

Bassalt snickered, and a couple of the nearer riders made sounds of amusement. No doubt his horse-riding prowess had been dismal. Even Einel smirked.

It felt dismal, anyway. His torso and thighs ached.

But then both of them dismounted too.

The caravan started slowing down.

Eh?

Einel cleared his silent confusion. "There's a clearing near. Too much trouble to use the town caravanserai."

They weren't stopping long, was the implication.

Ahead, half the riders converged on Harnalt, following some unseen signal. A cart was quickly assembled from various detachable parts of the wagons and hitched to one of the spare oxen.

It took less than five minutes before the cart was moving.

Impressive.

"One hour!" Harnalt's call rumbled through the whole of the caravan.

There were cheers from the older children, before they quickly scattered to get ready.

"That reminds me, you're on child minding duty today."

"Ah," Bassalt noted in dismay. "Are you sure it wasn't kitchen duty?"

Einel's expression didn't change. "Very sure."

Bassalt looke like he wanted to argue, but instead turned to sling an arm around Krow. "My friend, this is the sorrowful moment when we part ways. I shall commend your safety to the Watchers on the Roads, and hope for the sweetness of future reunion!"

"…sure. Safe travels to you too."

"Agh," Bassalt staggered back, wilting against his horse, "the soul of a draculkar lacks poetry."

"The hundreds of critically acclaimed songs about dragons deny your claims," Krow stated.

Because even a hermit living under a rock could sing about draculkar and their dragon obsession.

Bassalt shook his head, the picture of mourning. "Corrupted, dragon-mad, unknowing…" He leaped onto the saddle. "Farewell! My dear Einel, I shall see you later."

"No."

He rode away calling back. "Fortune favors the bolder!"

Krow chuckled.

Sein leaned out the middle wagon, sighed, then slumped down on the retracting steps.

Krow neared. "Not joining them?"

"I'm to stay here," he said glumly. Then snorted. "Who wants to see the town-under-pass anyway? We've seen it many times before."

"And you'll see it many more times after." Krow tried not to smile at the childish pique.

Sein nodded, kept his firm expression for a long moment, then gave up. He leaned his shoulder into Krow's arm. "I want to see it now, though."

"You're old enough to know now," Krow patted his shoulder, unsympathetic. "Being grown up means not always getting what you want."

The kid ran out on the open road with condorowls prowling. He was barely being punished. Probably his guardians thought the scare of the adventure was enough.

Sein wrinkled his nose.

"You see this horse? I didn't want to ride this horse. But the other option was walk, which was slower. Did I want to walk? Not when there was another option. I rode the horse."

"You could've sat in the valdau with us!"

"I don't like confined spaces," he shrugged. Also, his sister wanted him away from the caravan living spaces – Krow hadn't been unaware of that. The girl was dangerously protective of her family. "Besides, I got to hear the story about the secret dance of rosefur bears in the Rombe forests."

That finally got a small smile from Sein. "I like that story."

"I like that story too."

It told him there were, in fact, rosefur bears in the Rombe forests. Rosefur bear hide was great armor material.

Sein was quiet. "We're never seeing each other again, are we?"

Krow nudged his shoulder. "Do you really believe that? I don't. When it comes down to it, the world is a small place."

"No it isn't. Marfall is, as reported by the sages of the Varrualan Observatory, around thirty million square kilometers large."

…the Clans didn't stint on their children's studies, huh?

Was it really that big?

It didn't feel like it.

He mussed up Sein's hair. "You'll know what I mean. Just know it means we'll meet again. So don't forget me, hm?"

"I won't! I wanted to give you something, so you can't forget me too!" He pulled Krow's hand up and dropped a small object in it.

It was a slug pearl, graded C- Rare. One of the only two Rare pearls in Sein's haul.

"You know this is worth at least half the value of all the Uncommon ones put together, right?"

"It's a leaving gift." Sein said stoutly. "You can't refuse it."

Krow was touched.

Leaving gifts were given to those who left the caravan, but were still part of it.

"Do you think you can be allowed to accompany me to a temple?" Krow wondered. "Your scary sister can come with us."

"Einel's not scary! And she's my cousin."

"Why?" Einel glanced at them from where she'd been combing her horse, not even hiding her eavesdropping.

"His gift needs a spirit-binding." Krow turned to Sein. "An early thirteenth year present. You can't refuse either."

Sein beamed.

"Does it have to be a spirit-bind?"

Krow nodded. "I have to do one as well. I'll go first?"

Einel inclined her head. "I'll tell father."

She tossed the currycomb into a box on the wagon and walked away.

Hopefully Krow remembered the Chant correctly.. He was going to be watched as closely as a mouse being stalked by a hungry hawk.