Krond learning stuff.

[Krond Thuliaga]

Krond finds a quite place in the forest to sit down and relax. The previous night's battle had left him exhausted; and he decides to kick back and relax a bit. He removes Fanghir from it's sheath, places Gram next a tree beside him, and begins the lengthy process of sharpening them both. As he sharpens he begins to think to himself; back to the events of the last month. The Elemental Lords have told us about the tether points that need to be connected and how a tracker was required to even find out where they were. There was also the whole Pocket incident where he tried to find the weapons that were stashed. While happy that he was able to help a little bit in both cases; Krond knows that his current skill at tracking leaves much to be desired. If he is to get any better at it, he'll need someone to show him a few more things.

"But, who else do I know here that can track?" Krond says to himself. He thinks about it for a second and has a sudden realization. "Gryzzleback!" He yells out loud. He quickly finishes up sharpening the edges of his swords, sheaths them, and makes his way towards the bunkhouse.

When he gets there, he notices the patch of dirt dug out under the bunkhouse where he usually sleeps. He kneels down at it's entrance and says, "Oi! Gryz! Are you there? I've got a small favour to ask you!"

Krond remains silent for a moment, anticipating a response . . .

[Gryzzleback Chanteloup]

As he slumbers in his makeshift den under the Holdfast bunkhouse, Gryzzleback get woken up from a good snooze by the sound of that annoying barbarian Krond yelling at the entrance. He opens one eye and glowers at the large man outside his little den. Sighing, he slowly crawls out, grabbing his hammer as he goes. He blinks and stretches as he gets out into the sunshine.

"Ah was sleepin' ye clang tailed divit. Wha ye daein' yellin' at me loch 'at? Ah hae half a min' tae feed ye mah hammer inch by inch."

The Arluru glowers at Krond and waits for a reply, though he's already beginning to think about getting something to eat. Maybe he can steal some more food from that little hairy man again.

[Krond Thuliaga]

Krond looks up at the Arluru that is towering over him with a scowl on his face. He retorts by glaring back and maintaining eye contact for about 5 seconds; when he says:

"Relax Gryz, I just wanted to ask ya something. Why're ya even sleepin'? It's mid-day!"

Krond notices Gryyzleback gripping his great hammer tighter in his hand. Krond slowly takes a defensive stance in case he decides to say 'good morning' with it. It wouldn't be the first time its happened to him.

[Gryzzleback Chanteloup]

Gryzzleback sighs and loosens the grip on the hammer. He walks over to a tree and leans against it, casually tearing off a branch and using it to remove a piece of his previous dinner from his teeth.

"Nae much else tae be at in this bampot toon but sleep. Plus, Ah loch sleepin'. Anyways, seein' ye woke me up an' aw, whit dae want tae ask me?"

[Krond Thuliaga]

Krond chuckles at Gryz using a tree branch as a toothpick.

"The thing is; you, along with myself, were one of the few people in town who were able to track down those tether links that the Elemental Lords told us about. Auron, Hugo, and I managed to find the air links but it took a while. I want to be more skillful at tracking and I figured you'd be able to help me. Can you?"

[Gryzzleback Chanteloup]

Gryz stares at the human for awhile and then sighs. He slowly walks over to the large field outside of town, beckoning for Krond to follow him.

"Iff'n it will have ye leave me tae sleep in peace. Alrecht 'en follaw me ye big clodding galoot."

Waiting for the slower human to catch up, Gryz points upwards into the sky. When Krond stares up, Gryz begins to speak.

"Awe rite, try an' follaw me ye simpleton. I'll gab slowly sae ye can kin follaw better. Iff'n ye want tae learn tae be a better tracker ye need tae be able tae follaw th' stars e'en when it is daylecht. Look up, look up an' try tae concentrate oan seein' th' stars. Nae, dornt staur at th' sin ye imbecile. Awe rite, focus hard. Concentrate everythin' ye hae intae tryin' tae see th' stars."

As Krond stares intently at the sky, he fails to notice Gryz step closer with a wicked grin.

"Awe rite, Ah didne think it woods be 'at easy tae gie ye tae lit yer guard doon. Ye really are a thunderin' clapwheel ain't ye?"

"What?" As Krond looks down is surprise, Gryz slams his maul directly between Kronds legs as hard as he can, snickering as Krond topples over, clutching his gonads.

Gryz stands over the prone barbarian and laughs. "Ye big bairn! I've seen puppies gie kicked in th' baawz harder than 'at an' nae whimper! ye call yerself a warrior! Yoo're naethin' but a neep tattied muldooned piece of pourqoui leftoers!"

Reaching down, Gryz quickly unsheathes both of Kronds sword and begins to walk away, giving the fallen warrior a kick in the ribs as he goes. He turns to say over his shoulder.

"Ye call these swords? I've seen butter kni'es mair impressife 'en these. Anyways, noo fur th' real trackin' lesson. Ah gonnae tak' these sae called swords an' gang hide in th' woods. Iff'n ye dornt fin' me by sundoon Ah gonnae hae them melted doon intae a chamberpot an' gie it Lady Val's faither as a welcome gift! Ur beat heem ower th' heed wi' it. A body ur th' other. Ah believe in hans oan experience an' gettin' somethin' ye value back is as hans oan as Ah can imagine. Use yer senses tae follaw me, yer een, yer lugs, yer beak. Once ye stop bawlin loch a bairn, come an' fin' me, if ye can!"

With that Gryz takes off at a full run into the woods, laughing as he vanishes into the trees.

[Krond Thuliaga]

Krond lays on the ground, hands closely clutching his gonads in pain. He looks up just enough to see Gryz take off at full speed into the woods; his two swords shouldered over his furry back as he Does.

"That damn Arluru" Krond says in a shaky voice, "when I find him imma give him a piece of my mind".

After a few moments the pain leaves Krond's stomach and he's able to stand. He gathers himself and takes off into the woods where he saw Gryzzleback enter.

It was easy enough to follow his foot prints near the entrance of the woods, where the dirt was nice and soft, but as Krond got further into the tree-line it was harder to notice them. Just when Krond thought he had lost the trail he noticed something on one of the low hanging tree branches; it was a tuft of fur the same colour as Gryz's. He was sure this was his, meaning he was on the right track. In fact the closer Krond looked the more tufts he could see on trees further ahead. He proceeded in this direction keeping an eye on both the tufts and whatever of Gryz's footprints he could see.

After a little while the tufts of fur became less prominent, and soon all Krond had to go on was whatever small trace of footprints he could find along with any freshly broken twigs and branches. Krond stopped for a second to gather his thoughts, "great, now what?" Krond muttered to himself. He stood there on the spot for a minute and remained silent, thinking of what to do next. As he did, a northeasterly wind began to gently caress his skin; and offered a nice cool embrace on the hot summer day. As Krond was taking a moment to enjoy the wind, he heard a small humming that he couldn't hear before. Or at least he thought it was humming, it was faint and distant, and sounded as if it was riding the wind. The closer he listened to it the more he was sure of who it was; it was Gryz's gruff voice being carried on the wind. Krond had a new lead, and followed the direction the wind came from.

After about another 10 minutes of wandering north-east, Krond caught the smell of freshly cut pine. "What the hell?" said Krond.

Within a minute of smelling the fresh pine he Krond enters a small clearing in the middle of the woods, but it was strange. The trees didn't looked like they were cut cleanly with a saw; in fact, they kinda looked like they were hacked off. There was at least a dozen trees toppled over this way. Krond took a closer look at the base of the trees where they had been cut. Almost immediately he recognized what had happened:

"That son of a bitch used Gram to hack off the trees! UUGGHH that'll dull the blade!", Krond said angrily. He frantically looked around for another clue as to what direction Gryz went, he saw another tuft of fur on a nearby branch and a fresh trail of tracks easing east. Krond continued his pursuit.

*to be continued . . . *

[Gryzzleback Chanteloup]

Singing tunelessly to himself as he moves through the woods, the Arluru, Gryzzleback, stops as he hears a buzzing. Perking his ears up he followed the sound, and he begins to laugh when he looks up into some trees and sees a group of wasps nests close to each other. Quickly scaling the tree, he attaches one of Kronds swords to a rope and dangles it between the various hives. Shimmying back down he grins as he observes the set up before bending down to pick up a handful of rocks which he quickly ricochets off of the hives. Smiling as the wasps begin to swarm in a frenzy, he walks off.

Weel nae sense carryin' thes dull sword aroond anymair. Main as weel leave it fur Krond. Ah sure he'll be canty tae gie his oversized butter knief back. Lang as he can gie it it frae those wasps haha. Pity he doesnae hae toogh skin loch we do. Hmm, isnae thaur a bear den aroond haur? Wonder whit he'll dae if Ah lay a false trail intae it? Heh, th' big dummy probably miss it. Ur he'll blunder reit intae it. Either way works.

[Krond Thuliaga]

Krond makes his way through bramble patches and thornbushes, trying damnedest not to lose the trail.

"That bastard went through all of these . . . OW! . . . Thornbushes on purpose!" He says irritatingly. "But it'll take more than that to stop me."

After getting through the patches of bramble and into more normal woods, Krond continues down the trail. He wonders just how far Gryz could have gone; but, at the very least he's managed to keep track of where he went. As he continues farther in a more-or-less eastern direction, Krond finds himself coming upon a brand new clearing in the woods that is slightly smaller than the last one. This one happens to be filled with much more flora than the last clearing which brightens up the forest floor with an array of colors; bees can be heard buzzing around collecting pollen from the flowers.

As Krond makes his way to the centre of the clearing he hears the sound of bees buzzing around him with more vigour than they just were; as if something had spooked them. He looks around to try and pinpoint where the sound of the swarm is coming from; as he does he looks up into a nearby tree. It was then Krond sees a bundle of bee hives and an unexpected surprise that makes his eyes go wide with horror. Tied up in the tree with rope, next to the bee hives, is none other than Gram. It was tied up at the handle and slung over a high branch, dangled right between the bees hives halfway up the tree.

O_O "God-fucking-damnit Gryz . . ." Krond says in an irritated voice. "Well, this might be a funny story someday."

Krond ponders how exactly he's going to get Gram out of the tree with a swarm of bees that seem to be pissed off; Gryz's doing most likely. Krond could possibly use some of his throwing knives to try and hit the rope from a distance but doubts that the force of the knives would be enough to cut the rope; it seems particularly thick. Which means he's more than likely going to hafta climb up and cut Gram down with his dagger.

"Fantastic" says Krond. "This is gonna suck."

Krond walks up to the base of the tree that Gram is tied to and begins to climb. The force of him climbing the tree makes it shake a bit, which only upsets the bees more. About halfway up the tree the bees start to take heed of Krond and start flying around him. He tries his best not to flail around cause he knows that'll only upset the bees more. But the feeling of some of the bees crawling on his back makes him shutter and he swats some of them away.

Krond is almost at the bee hives now and the bees have gone full-fucking-retard at this point. The start swarming around him trying to protect their nest, Krond takes a sting to the back of the neck and several stingers into his back. "Arrgghh!" He groans, as the stingers pierce his skin. Just one more foot until he gets to the rope hold Gram. Krond can barely see past the swarm of bees at this point, but he finally manages to get up high enough to reach the rope. He unsheathes his dagger from behind his back and takes aim at the rope, he rears back his arm as far as he can get it and with one mighty swing he cuts the rope. Gram plummets to the earth and digs into the ground, shaking the tree ever so slightly from the impact of the heavy blade. And with that, Krond leaps out of the tree from where he was perched and does a tuck and roll as he hits the bottom to minimalize the impact. When he gets to his feet he looks up at the bees nest, the bees didn't follow him down. They were more or less just trying to protect their nest from him; there was no need to pursue.

Krond walks up to Gram and lifts it out of the ground. He inspects the blade for whatever damage might have happened to it when Gryz decided to go bananas with it and cut down those trees. There wasn't any real damage to the blade but it was noticeably more dull; nothing a simple whetstone couldn't fix.

After taking a 5 minute breather, Krond shoulders his sword and begins to look for Gryz's trail again. This time, is appears as though the trail has taken a slightly southern turn. Krond presses on, though he shutters at the thought of what Gryz has in store for him next.

*to be continued in part 3 . . .*

[Krond Thuliaga]

Krond begins to head south, the trail still seemed relatively fresh so he couldn't be any more than a half hour behind Gryz. As Krond continued on, the trail took him over a few small rivers and some more rough patches through thornbushes. It was tough, but Krond was confident that he was still heading in the right direction.

After about 20 mins of following the trail from the clearing with all the bees, Krond notices something strange about the trail; it had broken off in 2 different directions.

"What dafuq is this all about?" he says in confusion. Krond stared intently at the split in the trail trying to figure out what happened. Did he accidentally lose the trail somewhere? No, the footprints in soil were definitely Arluru and they were heading south like before. But there was another trail that broke off of it heading east again; these tracks were also Arluru. Krond ponders for a bit, "How the hell did he go in two separate directions?"

But then an idea hits Krond, "wait . . . are one of these a false trail? Its definitely not out of the realm of possibility for Gryz to do that" he says. "So if one of these is a false trail, how do I decide which one of them it is?" Krond scratches his head and begins to think. Even if he decides which one is false and which one is real there still remains the fact that Gryz might have hidden his other sword, Fanghir, at the end of the false trail.

Krond takes another look, and spends the better part of 10 minutes trying to discern which trail was the false one. At closer inspection, he notices that the footprints on one of the trails was slightly deeper than the other. This could either mean one of two things:

1) Gryz suddenly became heavier somehow and the extra weight cause the print to go deeper into the earth. Or . . .

2) The foot print was stepped in twice. Which would make sense if someone tried to carefully backtrack his way through their own foot prints. Its a trick to try and rouse anyone following them to think they headed off in one direction and then went in another.

The trail with the deeper prints was the one that headed east; which meant that that one was the fake trail. Krond felt a bit of pride in being able to figure out which trail was fake, but that still begged the question: did Gryz head off in that direction, hide Fanghir, back track his way to this point, and then head back to town? There was really only one way to find out.

Krond took a couple of his throwing daggers and placed them on the split in the trail forming an 'X'. This way, he has a marker to let him know where the split in the trail is on his way back. Better to be safe than sorry.

Krond takes the detour east hoping this isnt a waste of his time. Its not long before Krond follows the trail into a rock facing and then, much to his displeasure, into a small cave. ". . . God-fucking damnit Gryz" he says to himself, "What the hell did you get me into?" Krond looks around the area; the ground in front of the cave is beaten down as if someone, or something, had trodden on this land several times. He tries to look into the cave as far as he can, but he can only see up to 20 feet in front of him before it goes into the darkness. Reluctantly, Krond decides to enter the cave; hoping that there are no nasty surprises waiting for him inside.

As Krond enters the cave, he keeps one hand on the right side of the cave wall so as to not lose his way; this also provides him with something to lean on in case the ground become rough terrain. About 20 feet in Krond slips into the darkness of the cave and continues to go straight. The cave is pretty simple, straightforward with no turns or passageways. The light from the entrance of the cave can still be seen from where Krond was, albeit it looked like the size of a marble at this point; Krond was in the cave deep enough that its light could hardly pierce the darkness this far in. Even if the sword was here it was very unlikely that Krond could see it. So, Krond figured he'd leave it to chance that Gryz had the sword with him still and decided to head back to the split in the trail and back to town.

As Krond stood there for a second deciding whether or not to head back, he heard something very feint coming from the direction in front of him. It was hard to tell what it was, it sounded as if it was pulsating; louder at some parts and more feint at others. Krond tried leaning in and listened more closely, it almost sounded as if it was breathing; soft yet powerful breathing.

'What could that be?' Krond thought to himself. And then it hit him . . . Krond remembered a little while ago that someone thought they saw a bear wondering around the wilderness. If that were true then this may very well be his den, and if THAT were true then there was probably a bear sleeping no more than 10 feat in front of him. 'Is Gryz tryin' ta kill me or something!?!?' Krond thought. He tried to control his own breathing so as to not accidentally alarm the bear and wake it from its slumber. Krond slowly began to back out of the cave ever so slowly, making sure not to step to hard on the way out. It took him nearly twice as long to get out of the cave as it did going into it; but eventually Krond got back out to the entrance where he started.

"By the Gods, that could have been . . ." and before Krond could even finish his sentence he heard a resounding roar coming from deep within the cave. "Time to go!!!!!!" He yelled as he turned around and ran as fast as he could in the opposite direction of the cave. At full speed Krond managed to put a fair amount of distance between him and the cave in a matter of minutes. He looked behind to check and see if a towering bundle of fur was chasing after him and, thankfully, there was not.

Krond took a minute to regain his composure and catch his breath, not everyday ya come face to face with a bear inside his own den. After a short breather Krond began to look for the throwing knives he had left at the split in the trail. It took him almost no time to find them again as he had a good visual memory and a knack for remembering where things were; one Krond's specialties. Once he found the Split, he followed the other trail south and back towards the direction of the town.

It only took about 15 minutes to get from the split in the trail back into Holdfast. As he emerged from the trees a couple of the townsfolk sort of stopped what they were doing and stared at krond for a moment. What they saw was a man, covered in dirt, scratched bloody from head to toe, and had several red marks on his skin that were clearly made by bees having their way with him. The face was one of pure frustration and exhaustion. Auron approaches Krond and asks "Good god man, what the hell happened to you?" he said concernedly. But Krond just stares off in front of him, breathing heavily, and says "where . . . the fuck . . . is Gryzzelback?" Auron rears back his head a little bit in sheer confusion and points towards the tavern, "he's in there. Why?" Without saying a word, Krond stomps heavily towards the tavern, ignoring the stares he gets as he passes by the other townsfolk.

Approaching the tavern, Krond kicks open the door and enters. He walks past the kitchen and into the main sitting area. Sure enough, in one of the corners of the room sat Gryzzelback; drunk and food crumbs peppered all over his face. He hadn't noticed that Krond entered room yet. Fanghir was stood up against the wall next to him, it appeared as though no damage had been done to it. Krond marched over towards Gryz and, without saying a word to him, took him by the collar of his shirt, lifted the Arluru off his seat, and punched him as hard as he could in the muzzle. Gryz took the hit hard and fell back down into his seat, though you can tell that being drunk had numbed some of the pain. As Gryz sat there, rubbing his muzzle from where it was struck, Krond says "What the hell was all of that?! Were you TRYING to kill me?! I'm surprised I made it out of the swarm of bees alive, but then you lured me into a bear den with a false trail! Dafuq!?" Krond begins breathing heavy having said all that in one breath. As he stands there, he waits for Gryz's response . . .

[Gryzzleback Chanteloup]

"Ooch! Weel Ah guess Ah deserve 'at."

The Arluru grins widely and staggers back to his seat and brushes the excess crumbs out of his fur before sitting down. he kicks up his hind paws on the table and takes a long drink from a flagon before addressing the irate barbarian.

"It worked didne it? Ah tauld ye 'at if ye want tae be a tracker, ye need tae want tae fin' whit yoo're trackin'. Iff'n ye didne caur abit those butter kni'es ye wooldnae hae gain ben thorns, ower rivers, intae wasp nests an' intae a bear cae... ye did gang intae th' bear cae reit?"

As Krond angrily nods, Gryz snickers to himself.

"Glaikit human, 'at was a false trail. Ye still hae a lot ot learn. Mebbe some day I'll teach ye mair. Or mebbe someday I'll beat ye senseless fur hittin' me. Jist coz Ah'm auld an' lazy doesnae mean Ah cannae ur willnae smack ye aroond a bit fur amusement. Now if yoo'll excuse me Mr. Dead Pig Wearin, Basket-Face, Butter Kni'es Holdin, Clype-Dreep-Bachle, Gether-Uping-Blate-Maw, Bleathering, Gomeril, Jessie, Oaf-Looking, Scooner, Nyaff, Plookie, Shan, Milk-Drinking, Soy-Faced Shilpit, Mim-Moothed, Sniveling, Worm-Eyed, Hotten-Blaugh, Vile-Stoochie, Cally-Breek-Tattie!"

As he continues ot insult the human, Gryz slowly gets to his feet and slowly staggers out the door, heading back to his makeshift den, the sounds of his insults fading into the night. Krond is left alone in the Inn with his swords and his thoughts and hopefully a new understanding of tracking.

((OOG to cast, this was to show the training of Tracking 2 to Krond as taught by Gryz and RP'ed by myself and Tony))

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