Kaliban as always, is... impressed by the group's diplomatic corps.
Bonesnapper... not cuddles or snuggles, go figure.
What did you used to grow here? What do you do, now if i may inquire?
"That there turnip just keeps talking..." Kev mumbled, distracted by Dawn. "D'nno. Wasn't born then there. We tend to the goats though. Know how to survive out here, unlike them there cows. Lost our last one ten years back."
Emma Jane didn't have the heart to tell Dew in Dawn that trees snap very like bones with enough force.
Dawn considered for a moment. "I don't think I'm related to turnips. Maybe blackberries? I'm more vine-y than squash-ee." She started heading for the mayor, then paused. "Where did you loose all the cows? They seem like they'd be easy to spot. Maybe they learned Invisibility? Can you get cow sorcerers?"
"Naw." Kev responded, then his face pinched as if seriously conaidnerting the idea. Ultimately he just shakes his head in further dismissal. "Might not. Be a sight to see if ever was."
Seeing that Dawn was instent on just walking around searching for someone vaguely mayor-like, the bowman went to pull up ahead and guide everyone else through the village. There's not exactly much to look at, but you all notice the sullen faces on the face of each gaunt man woman and child you pass. Some of them see me to be more wiry with a touch of muscle as opposed to dangerously thin. Further in, there are several buildings have holes haphazardly boarded up. Twice in a row you pass buildings that seemed to have completely collapsed.
"Mayor Rain'll be at the store. Only place for him to work." Your guide gestured to one of the collapsed plots. "That was his office home."
"Are you having sinkhole problems, or did something knock them down?" Dawn wasn't sure how hard it was to knock down a building - she'd never tried - but it seemed difficult.
Rain... curious. Kaliban's eyebrow raises.
Any Weathersmiths come out here or pass through, recently? He seems happy to continue talking as they find the mayor.
"The seccond thing. Them there brothers did that." He speaks, crosing the party throughnthe village square. There's a line going up to the well at it's center where a couple of other men dutifully try to dredge up enough for evwryone. "Not a one. Don't care none 'bout us. Somethin' 'bout irritation. Wild-storm passed by recently though. Restocked the well a bit. Less rationing for a here few days.
"Should we get in line for our rations? I would hate to miss out."
"No." Kev says simply.
"Irrigation?" Dawn said, remembering there recent farming experience. "It's a watery thing where you move it from where it is to where the plants are. Sounds like something the rain guys would be talking about."
"Yeh maybe." They comment, uncertain.
After some time Kev brings you to a nicer building. Nicer if only perhaps the fsct it was a little less dusty and actually had class window panes, even if three of the front fscing ones were cracked. An oval sign hangs from the flat faced structure above the door depicting a pot, hammer, and a coinpurse.
Kev brings you in without ceremony. A gaunt figure with whispy gray hair amd shaking hands stands at the counter, though he barely looks up from the scroll he carried. The shelves around you seem very bare, evidently it's not restocked very often.
Your guide asks you to wait out here for a momment while he get's the mayor, though you barely have to wait more then a minute unlock past encounters with offices.
Whatever you mught've pictured them to look like, the lean man with air corded muscle in simple grey linens isn't usually what comes to mind. His face was clean shaven, and though it was riddled with stress lines it seems strikingly young. The slight point to his ears hint of a mixed heritage. "Ahh, so you're them there campers from that there hilltop, eh? Varried buncha aren't you all. I am Grem."
He leans against the store-counter, the shopkeeper paying him no mind. "Pardon me if that there dolt brought you here without asking first. You seem like capable people but, it's not as if we can afford to pay for a monster contract."
"Monster contract? Bonesnapper?" Emma Jane asks questioningly.
"Bounties. We'd pay, you kill." The mayor clairfies. "Bonesnapper is this big, hulking grey skinned monster. Came to this here town a couple weeks back with his Gnasher, his brother. Started causing a havoc. One of us got lucky with a thrown torch, was doing somethin' to it. We kept up with the fire til he stopped movin'. Bonesnapper fled, and after 'bou a week we've seen 'm around here place again."
"Hunh. Well, we were really just passing by. Trying to find this guy. But you could talk us into trying your monster."
"Did the Bone-snappy one do anything, or was it just the one that got burned that was a problem?" The thing in the woods could have attacked, but didn't. That suggested it wasn't intrinsically violent to Dawn...or that its violence came premediated.
"Both." He assured, grimfaced "Fire dine went and killed the first. So we be keeping them there torches lit moment the sun starts to settle. He's staying away for now."
The mayor shakes his head, "Dunno' when he'll just start rock-tossin, has the arms for it. Yet I won't make you do it for us, not when there's nothin' f'you to gain save good thoughts." A cough followed by a sharp look from the shop-keeper has Grem exhale slowly. "...Water is scarce out here. Travelers likin' yourselves are oft unprepared for the journeys. We'll stock up your supplies for you."
Kaliban looks from the guide to the mayor and shopkeeper. Where is Gnasher? What remains of it... You certain it's dead?
Any ideas what brought them here?
"Burnt him. Powdered his bones after for good measure. Won't make the same mistake twice." He snaps, scowling at nothing seen. "Come down from them there Blackridge mountains, we thinks presume. Towards the west. Many beasts tend to as winter comes to pass."
"I'm not hearing much to work with on what this thing is or what it fears. But I can appreciate water as payment well enough."
Alasayn strokes his chin, trying to recall what precisely this beast may be. The villagers were to be no help, so he had to rely on the smartest person he knew. Himself, obviously.
From their descriptions of gray skin, hulking figures, and even the fact they came down from the mountains leaves no contest in Alasyn's eyes. The village was beset by a pair of trolls, managing to kill one by sheer fluke of fire getting past it's natural regeneration. It seems to him that must be why the othwr has avoided breaking the torchlit perimeter at night, for fear of suffering a similar fate.
”It’s a troll, must be. The villagers somehow managed to do one in, and the perimeter of torches has kept the other one away. We could kill it, of course, but we could also try to trap it and give the town an endless, if rather grisly food source.”
Emma Jane smacked her head with the palm of her hand. Of course! Trolls. She needed to get back to school and hit the books again, her brain was getting dull.
"Hmph. Wouldn't be the worst thing. Folks here abouts could do with some good meats f'change. Rather not torture a beast that'd crush me with a snap though." The mayor reasoned, having apparently actually considered the idea.
Dawn looked mildly concerned with the idea. "I mean, it's one thing to kill and eat something, but to eat something without killing it...I can only see that ending in it escaping and smooshing half the village. Also, I bet troll tastes gamey. And what will you feed it? Regeneration won't stop it dying from thirst and hunger, right?" She paused. "Right?"
"Your there talking cabbage has good sense." Grem agreed.
Kaliban isn't quite comfortable with the conversation... but he isn't one to preach ethics.
Hed act if needs be, but not preach.
Trying time, yet is seems we've reached some agreement.
Dawn, Emma Jane... where did you see the creature retreat to?
"The woods?" Dawn said brightly. Then she considered. "Oh, there's a lot of woods. Let me see if I remember..."
Dawn distinctly recalls there being an extreme dirth of woodland for multiple miles all around. Upon reaching the agreement however, the mayor asks Sev to take you all out to where they first saw the creature retreat, marked by the yet to be cleaned ruined structure of a wagon. The two feel very confident in their ability to track such a large, lumbering creature, if they felt the need to do so as of now.
Hmm... I suppose helping folks is looked kindly upon. Come, let's see what comes of this.
Catching a trail, Kaliban lopes off slowly.
"Best luck to us all." Sev comments, as Kaliban starts to depart. "if you don't can't find that there beastsie's lair, best be run coming before nightfall. Always comes out after sunfall."
"So we gonna try the talking, or are we skipping to the violent solution?" Dawn asked the others. She had no idea how ogres would act, or if they could be talked with, so she wanted the others imput.
[b]"Trolls aren't especially known for their penchant for talking. If we intend to deal with it, I'm fairly sure the solution is a violent one."[b]
"Agreed. I've never met a troll, but my studies confirm that they are not particularly adept at acting ethically. Any agreement we would come to with a troll, even on the off chance one could be had, would be dubious at best."
I've heard once they catch your scent, they are difficult to shake. I can't imagine any attempts at communication being pleasant. Kaliban shrugs.
"All I know is you have to hit them. A lot. And then some more."
"Violence is the answer, got it," Dawn agreed. "Let's go hunting."
After some time following the trail, the group comes to a small dip in the terrain that seems to lead into an old sinkhole. The entrance seems to have been covered by what looks to have once been the wall of someone's shack. The wood looks old yet sturdy, and there are wood chips and crunched bits where massive hands have repeatedly gripped the sides. Nestled by the entrance is a pile of bones stripped almost entirely of flesh, whatever's left behind attracting flies.
Hmm... Time to roll the bones, indeed.
Kaliban looses his axe and approaches to take a closer look.
Emma Jane draws her shortsword and begins humming a song of courage.
As they get close, Hilde sets her pack down, figuring either she'll have time to get it or she won't need it anymore. Then she takes her bill and spins it a couple of times, dropping into an over-hand strike, resetting and thrusting as quickly as she can.
Winking at Kaliban, she moves up near him, ready for this lumbering hulk to present her a target . . ..
Obviously, she's making him look good . . ..
Alasayn does his best to be stealthy while looking around the area. He raises a handkerchief to his nose when presented with the rancid smell of rotting meat.
Dawn joined the others in being sneaky and watchful.
Though most of you are actually being quite careful with your approach, Hilde finds herself stepping on a half-gnawed femur. The weakened bone snaps before she call her foot back. This sudden noise is almost enough to distract the undine and leshy, whom were busy observing their suroundings more closely.
Both of them notice that there seem to be an extra set of tracks around the covered hole, and especially near the bones. In fact, a fair number beside the one Hildeberg stepped upon are scarred around the area.
Straining whatever it is that makes up her ears, Dawn is able to catch the faintest sound of snoring from somewhere down below. It hitches momentarily at rhe bone snap, but resumes again after several tense seconds.
Always takes a closer look at the tracks, mindful not to make a wrong step onto a brittle bone. The prints are almost canine, nearly as large as a wolf's yet misshapen in some way. One of the class is bent at an odd angle, making them more closely resmble claws then paws. Then it hits him. Trolls, dogs. It seems this pair of brothers had a pet. And what better pet dor a troll, then a trollhound?