But for a Slime

Garnedell and the hunters hadn’t moved the whole time, but broke out in excited whispers which was punctuated by a surprised shout when the arrow slammed into the tree and shattered midway down its shaft. The arrows wobble in flight had bent the shaft enough that when the arrow struck the tree, the shaft had been bent significantly and the sudden stop had snapped the shaft in two. Joe turned and offered an apologetic frown at the broken arrow.

“Sorry about that, guys. I didn’t expect the arrow to do well, but I didn’t want to completely break it!”

Garnedell glanced at him with some confusion, and Joe remembered to simplify his speech, trying once again, “Uh… Arrow… Kart! Sorry!”

Garnedell’s eyes lit up with instant recognition and turned to one of the hunters to translate his apology. After a quick bit of conversation in which Joe could tell the hunter was rejecting the apology, Garnedell returned to Joe and let him know the hunter wasn’t upset, waving away the apology. Joe smiled in thanks, then remember his pack of slime gems and offered the man a slime gem as a form of apology. A few minutes of rejection and insistence later, the hunter accepted Joe’s gem and thanked him profusely in return. With that finished, Joe felt a bit of relief and suggested that they be on their way. The hunter’s looked towards Joe and it took him a bit of time to realize that they were looking to him to lead the hunt. He quickly shook his head no and rejected the offer.

“Oh… no, no, no! I don’t know the area at all!... Um.. I hunt… no!”

Garnedell offered the translation, and Joe could tell they misunderstood and Joe tried once again, “I hunt good. I no hunt …” Joe trailed off the sentence, miming his ability to hunt, but showing he didn’t know what or how to hunt in the woods in the area, pointing at the various woods then shrugging with exaggeration. Garnedell quickly understood and this time it seemed they all understood. Joe then smiled brightly and offered the hunters to lead the way, waving them forward.

The men smiled and headed south, following the stream into the forest that he came from. Well, that makes sense. The animals will be where the water is! The travel through the forest following the river downstream proved easier than his trip upstream to find the village. They followed a small trail that was on the west side of the stream deeper into the woods. Well, no wonder I didn’t find it. I never crossed the stream! But man, I wish I had! Joe sighed remembering the hard slog through the forest when there had been a trail only a hundred feet away, at most maybe thirty five meters away.

The hunters and Garnedell chatted quietly for the first part of their journey but after having traveled a bit into the forest, the hunters quickly fell silent and shushed Garnedell as well. We’re getting close to the hunting grounds! Joe grew quieter as well, focusing on his footsteps and picking where to step with greater caution. Only a few minutes later, the hunters had spread out in a short line and turned off into the woods. Joe followed suit, joining the end of the line and maintaining the distance the hunters seemed to prefer: about twenty to thirty feet or five to ten meters. The distance widened and narrowed organically as each hunter naturally stepped around trees and underbrush while maintaining the stealthy steps of an accomplished hunter. Joe did pretty well in maintaining his silence as well, although he had to regularly guide Garnedell through the forest since the boy seemed deaf to the massive amounts of noise he was making.

It took about five minutes, but Joe was finally able to teach him where to step and help him walk silently. It proved easiest for Joe just to have Garnedell follow directly in his footsteps, which Garnedell did with decent ease. It took another ten minutes after Garnedell had finally learned to stalk silently before they began to see signs of prey. The smaller forest life darted through the underbrush and trees seeming at ease, and the hunters seemed to be able to flow around without disturbing the wildlife at all. Joe found himself struggling to do the same, but at least was able to not startle the animals too much by keeping his movements slow and smooth. Huh… I wonder if they have a higher level skill that lets them somehow be invisible to the wildlife? Sure makes hunting a breeze! After another ten or so minutes, one of the hunters quickly held up an arm then slowly pointed to his three o’clock. The entire line froze and crouched as one. Only Garnedell seemed to be caught by surprise, but followed quickly after. It took Joe a bit to find the animal, a large boar like creature but almost half again as large as some of the pigs he had seen back home on Earth. Although, I guess some of the monstrous pigs back in the States at State fairs are about this size! I wonder if this is a normal sized pig, or… Joe glanced towards the hunters, but did not find them appreciably excited. Huh… that means this is the normal size for a pig. Man! That’s huge! As he stared at the pig, he noticed another hunter had raised his hand then also pointed directly at the pig. A third followed shortly after although the fourth seemed to be struggling a bit before he also raised his hand and pointed. What are they do… oooh… They’re letting each other know they see the prey! Joe quickly followed as well, long ago having seen the pig, and raised his hand and pointed to the pig.

When he had raised his hand, the first to see the pig nodded before bringing his hand down and nocking his bow. The other three duplicated the first and Joe quickly brought up his bow with an arrow nocked. When all had their arrows prepared, the first stood slowly once more and began stalking forward, all hunters zeroed in on the boar and moving forward carefully. Joe was caught a bit flat footed, then stunned to immobility when he realized the four hunters were moving without any sound at all, even though all four were staring avidly at the boar. How are they watching where to place their feet when they never look down?! It took Joe a few moments to overcome his shock, but then he quickly reoriented on the boar, focusing on it before glancing down to carefully place his feet, stalking closer as well. The hunters pushed forward quickly and sure footed while Joe followed but found himself slowly falling behind. No way I can keep up when I have to keep looking down to see where to place my feet!

The four hunters were now ahead of him by a good three or four meters and they suddenly crouched. Joe froze as well, keeping most of his focus on the boar, but also keeping a half an eye on the closest hunter as well. The distraction proved to be his undoing, and the hunters all released at the same time. The shocking fluidity and uniformity of the obviously team effort was quite shocking, it dragged his eye away from the boar. The high loud squealing of the boar brought his eyes quickly back. He saw all four arrows had punched deeply into the boar, all in the abdomen. Why would they shoot there! That’s not a kill… Joe suddenly noticed that the four hunters had pressed themselves up against a tree, hiding from the line of sight of the boar. OK, that was smart. And I was really stupid!

Despite Joe’s foolishness, luck was on his side that day, and the shock of four arrows striking the boar and driven it away in terror. Or the boar never actually caught sight of him and simply chose to run. When the squeals of the boar grew weaker signifying that the boar was fleeing them, the four hunters quickly came out from behind their trees and jogged towards their arrows. Joe followed behind quickly, the need for stealth no longer important as all four hunters were now jogging quickly forward. They’re still pretty silent though! They’ve got to have some kind of cool stealth ability! Or they are… elf level skilled. This is nuts!

Joe lowered his concern for maintaining stealth since Garnedell was already destroying their ability to be silent and simply focused on keeping up with the hunters. The four had stopped at the location where they had shot the boar and all four picked up their arrows. Huh… they all used the bamboo knife arrow. The arrow would fall out easily when the animal ran away. I guess they run after the boar until it bleeds out! Their arrows must not be able to easily penetrate the rib cage!

Just as Joe thought, the hunters took off in a light jog after they picked up their arrows, following the thick trail of blood lining the forest floor in front of them. This pig isn’t going to last long bleeding like this! The continued on this way for a good thirty or so minutes, coming on the boar every five or ten minutes before it would be startled into running again. After thirty minutes, the boar seemed to finally be slowing down with them coming up on it every minute or two, and Joe was quite surprised. It should have bled out by now! How much blood does it have! But the boar still kept on fleeing before them until almost forty minutes after they fired their shots, they came upon the boar gasping as it lay on the forest floor. The hunters came upon the boar cautiously, staying away from it but still drawing arrows. Three of the hunters kept their arrows on it while the fourth sidestepped around behind the boar before crouching and stilling himself. Joe joined the three hunters, bringing his bow to bear on the pig, and then waited silently as he watched the event play out, still uncertain what was happening.

The lone hunter behind the pig stayed still for a good one or two minutes before he carefully put away his bow and arrow and pulled a large knife. Stilling once more for another minute or so, he waited quietly, then suddenly, at a sign Joe couldn’t see, began stepping forward silently and with incredible stealth. How does he do that! Joe’s attention was now entirely on the hunter as he moved forward cautiously, always from behind and above the boar’s perspective. Huh… he’s staying out of the boar’s sight. Make’s sense!

The man arrived at the boar where he quickly brought a knee down firmly on the boar’s side and his right hand down on the boar’s neck almost simultaneously. The boar quivered and jerked weakly while the man subdued it, then stilled, too exhausted to continue. The entire time the hunter had spent subduing the boar, he had kept his left hand holding the knife wide and to his left so that the boars wriggling wouldn’t accidently jar his knife hand and cause him harm. After the hunter felt he had the boar well in control, he brought the dagger to the boar’s throat before whispering a silent phrase which all three hunters echoed and Joe awkwardly did as well. Huh… some kind of prayer of thanks or something? I better say something as well!

“Thanks for the bacon, pig,” Joe muttered a bit irreverently but with sincerity.

The man brought the dagger to the boar’s throat and sliced quickly, easily parting the boar’s neck. The boars squealing cries changed to a raspy wheeze before coming to an end as the animal struggled a few more minutes then calmed. The hunter maintained his grip on the boar for another minute after the animal had stopped squirming and breathing before standing. The other three hunters came forward to join the first, and they all pressed hands to the animal before offering a prayer like phrase once again, although Garnedell did not join this time. Joe decided to follow Garnedell’s example and maintained his silence. The hunters stayed around the kill in ritualistic silence for several more moments before all standing and began working quickly.

One quickly hacked down a smaller tree before bringing it to the pig. Another tied the boar’s limbs together then helped the one who brought the limb to thread it through the boar’s tied legs. The third sliced through the boar’s neck more carefully, opening the cut more deeply. When all this was done, two went to the boar’s rear and lifted up the pole it was hung from before dragging it to a tree and leaning it against the tree, leave the pig dangling upside down with the neck cut open and blood draining into the forest floor. The hunters then took their time to clean their dagger and arrows before returning them about their person. They were then finally able to relax and stood around in a loose circle, smiles and jokes now coming out in their speech at the happiness of a successful hunt. Joe joined there circled and smiled brightly even as he offered an obvious double thumbs up.

“Nice going, guys. That was really, really impressive! How do you guys move so quietly? It really is so… What?”

Joe interrupted his congratulatory speech as he saw a look of terror spread across the hunter’s faces as each hunter shifted from grateful joy to unspeakable terror. Joe spun quickly, looking behind himself even as he heard a throaty growl so deep that it literally rattled some of the leaves at his feet. He began to look up, and up, and up, and up…

“Oh… ”