World Quest: Making Friends Sunlight filtered through small trees and natural orchards as they rode through the forests of Brisshal on horseback, heralded by the songs of birds and the frightened scatter of rabbits and deer. The Admiral was strode atop a dappled palomino, weapons casually put away and reins in hand, with her head held high and a soft smile upon her face. She rode towards the middle of their small formation, left side of the nobleman. The noble was a baron of these parts, his son who would one day take his place riding on his right side. Behind them rode three guards, who kept a respectful distance, but were armed with crossbows to stave off any threats nature or man might wish upon their lord. Not realizing, of course, that their lord was dead the instant the two women wished it. That would hopefully not be a necessity of course, as it would set back the Admiral's progress in making Astorea a safe and self-sustaining nation. Many had gone out with the knowledge that war would soon come to their doorsteps, searching for ways to twist the gentry of Falderen into neutrality. Or perhaps even joining Astorea's cause, and fighting alongside them in the name of Truth, Justice, and the Astorean Way. Yadda yadda, speech and prose. Bribes and blackmail and scandal. Fucks and favors. Assassinations and helping them reach higher stations. Promises and petitioning. Begging. Pleading. Whatever their strongest talents, whatever they felt might work, the players of the game ran off to try and tilt things even slightly back to their favor. Gwyn? The huntress gave an absolute value of zero fucks about all of that, and was here as something of a favor to the Admiral. @Gwyn ap Herne had been invited along to the hunt because she was the best shot out of any other player, and because she actually held by her principles. Both were a valuable commodity if one looked at the situation like a large map in a war room, and that was precisely what the Admiral was doing. Noting the strength and weaknesses of every pawn and piece, even herself, and trying to gauge and guess where the tide of things would turn. She was not optimistic. But, people had surprised her before and could very well do so again. Perhaps the players WOULD convince an earl to turn his back on king and country and stand at their side with his troops. Perhaps enough small counts and barons could be swayed to ignoring the conflicts and not taking sides, not feeding enemy troops, not giving away Astorean positions. She was here to target the more malleable and less prideful lower gentry, who did not have as much to lose and much more to gain by staying out of the fight. Gwyn was here to show off her archery, to reveal the easy calm with which their forces could hit their marks and bring down the armies of Falderen. The nobleman and his son were here to look pale, as the Admiral continued to speak in polite and pleasant threatening tones. "Are you familiar with much of history from the old world, before mankind destroyed themselves four thousand years ago?" The nobleman blanched and shook his head no, already in low spirits. That was likely because the Admiral had revealed to him the terrible secret that every new 'Outsider' who came to this world began their journey in Brisshal. Explained to him, in not exactly peaceful terms, that more of their own could be summoned in his own back yard at will, armed with weapons and already learned in magic. It was an exaggeration of course, but why shouldn't she make the game's New Player Spawn mechanic work in her favor here? It had done wonders to weaken his resolve when they had actually SEEN a new player spawn into the game and start fighting a few low leveled wolves that Gwyn had been tracking. Now he was much more receptive of her words and threats, knowing them to be true. "The obvious issue we face, as I'm sure you've gathered, is one of resources. We lack the means of forming a complete army with which to march on Falderen and dethroning the king. This is obvious to anyone who has paid attention to the situation; however, they overlook the strength of our position. Adecus Forest is where we've made our home, and it is filled with myriad cave systems underground which we've already begun to reinforce and ensnare. When the armies of Falderen come for us, they will not meet a standing army that they can engage in honorable combat. We will smite them from the skies and from the soil, striking as one hand, and one heart, and one mind. Appearing where we wish to tear flesh from their sides, only to disappear again without harm. Laying traps across our forests and fields to lay waste to those glorious formations which cannot fight what they cannot see. Like the Viet Cong of the ancient world, we will poison every arrow and fill pits with spikes before covering them up. We will engage at our time, on our terms, and IF... if the armies of Falderen are even capable of felling any number of us? We will emerge again from the dead, because we are in pact with Synra and death cannot claim us for long. We will return to the fight, smarter and stronger for having witnessed whatever cleverness brought about our demise. We will adapt. We will engage again. Falderen cannot win, and you would be very remiss in siding with them." Thrown die: 43 +15 rep 58/320
Gwyn was not a fan of their current task, but there was an undeniable answer to @The Admiral's call. There was a core of iron and steel in the blood and bone at the heart of the woman that made it difficult not to turn her ear toward. Whether it was a call to fight or one to make peace? Gwyn found herself primed to answer it in kind. They were very different people, sharing as many traits as they did differing ones. She saw a uniting force in their dynamic that she could imagine soldiers sharing with one another, a brotherhood forged in the fight. You couldn't know someone until you saw them with their life on the line, with blood matted in hair and lingering between their teeth, until they dug their nails and heels in in defense of something more. Talk was incredibly fucking cheap and The Admiral did love to talk, but she loved those damned hammers of hers far more. The huntress could appreciate that. The nobles she was wasting her day tracking for however? Absolutely dull and boring and stupid and selfish wastes of space. Their presence and every breath sullied her mood. She didn't care for men of the cloth or of crowns. They weren't royalty by any means, but the lower class of nobles was still higher than the common man in their muddled minds. She didn't like them. They left a taste like copper pennies and bile in her mouth. Or that was just the lingering blooded air of the kills they had passed earlier and her general disgust over the entire idea of 'nobility' showing its ass. Her borrowed mount snorted as she nudged her to the left, eyes scanning the ground with a harsh expression. They'd lost the wolves to a spawned in player that The Admiral had made sure to use as an underline, bold, and italics for her point she had attempted to make to their current group. The noble and his son seemed properly unsettled by it and she took a quiet glee from that. She would have helped, but in game and out she had been told she was a crappy liar. Might as well keep quiet and play the stoic, lone hunter. The weight of the longbow would reinforce that as easily as her keen tracking had so far. "Traps? Yeah I can already make my own of those well enough. Bear traps for crippling, trapping, and bleeding. Barbed nets to slow and bleed. Pitfalls as The Admiral mentioned as well as deadfalls to drop heavy weights to crush. Oh, there's also simple triplines and triggered traps for blades, arrows, spikes, and the like. Boring stuff like snares as well. Get one that snatches fast enough with good weight behind it though and it can dislocate or break a leg, so there's that." She spoke without looking away from the trail she'd turned them on. They were hunting what the wolves had possibly been before they'd been waylaid by the other player. Something seemed a little off in the speeds of the tracks before, but without the pawprints from the pack that was gone. She focused back in time to hear mention of their respawning and chuckled lightly. "I'll agree with that easy enough. I fell off the top of a mountain." She glanced over her shoulder at the noble with a mild expression. "Found my body too once I was back. Right nasty splat, but it was worth it even if I didn't get what I was climbing for." She smiled brightly, teeth bared in a snarl of a grin. "Was worth it for the thrill." Gooseflesh crawled up her arms as she turned her eyes back to following their game's trail, mind split between the rush of that deadly climb and the rush of the blood they'd spill by the end of the day. It had been terrifying to plummet, but the whipping of the wind and the feeling of weightlessness had made her feel like she was apart from the world entirely. Like the threads of fate of reality that bound her to it has been loosened and she would exist in that moment forever. That, of course, wasn't true, but it had been a unique experience. And she hadn't had to worry about crippling herself for the rest of her life like she was fighting to fix in the waking world. The huntress left that thought were it rested and avoided following it down the rabbit hole. Instead, she kept her eyes on the darkened patches of ground that indicated disturbed dew from the morning's layer and the scent of crushed grass. A bit of mud where the grass was thinner showed the larger than average hooves that had passed through it. They were deep too. Cervine rather than equine. "Heads up, Admiral. The stag we're on the heels of is big. Possibly an elite of some sort?" The nobles likely wouldn't understand, but either the damn deer was simply bigger than he should be or it was a higher level creature. Perhaps special, but only the Investigation Mode or a show of force from the creature would reveal that. In Brisshal, however, that meant little. It would have been a horrible danger for a new player, but they were far beyond that. The nobles however and their guards would get quite the hunt to gloat about over their golden platters of delicacies at the next pointless social function they attended. Ugh. Thrown die: 48 [ 106 / 320 ]
It was obvious from the start that Gwyn was not a fan of her current situation, and that her being here was more favor than fun for the huntress woman. Perhaps she had balked at the mention of nobles and the nature of the Admiral's mission, wanting nothing to do with the sorts of stuck up prigs that came hand in hand with a noble station. Perhaps she merely had better things to be doing than babysitting gentry on the sorts of tame hunts that no longer provided a challenge to her. Regardless of her reasons for not enjoying the task at hand, the Admiral was appreciative of Gwyn's assistance with it. Gwyn was able to track, to hunt, to tune in to nature and to danger and make the most of the situation by showing off how incredibly lethal she could be. The Admiral, for her part, would bear the brunt of any retaliation the noblemen and their guards might take at being threatened... and of course do the threatening. It was a skill that did not translate to the game's mechanics. Something that could not be programmed away as a mastery that anyone might take and exploit. Thus far in the existence of Terrasphere there simply were no social mechanics to the skill selections, unless of course you counted Music, which allowed one a range of expression through instrument and dance and song. But the art of coercion and bribe, or threat and thrill? Anything from bartering to blackmailing to a simple how do you do had to be done with the skill of the player themselves. That meant that somebody like Gwyn, who could brave any summit, had trouble tackling the sorts of back room dealings and subtle power plays that politics called for. The Admiral envied her that. Perhaps that was why Gwyn was such a good huntress; she focused on what was real and what was there, not on games and gimmicks or illusions and allusions of power and promise. When she spoke of her traps, it was with the matter of fact surety of somebody who had employed such tactics before; not the sort of threatening theory that the Admiral was conjuring, hoping that vague ideas of the dangers that Astorea would create for the armies of Falderen might serve better than the most blatant threats. Let them imagine the worst, and sweat at night. The huntress seemed thrilled that whatever the wolves had been chasing might be close, and the Admiral smiled at her innocent glee. "Ride on ahead and make sure that the path is safe for our good lords," she 'instructed' Gwyn with a smirk, releasing the woman from the tedium of listening to rich men talk so that she could focus entirely on her hunt. Though her reasons were of course two fold. Not only would it allow Gwyn to relax and enjoy herself a bit more... it would move the huntress farther away, so that she wouldn't hear what the Admiral had to say next. "You can't possibly think we'll just cow to this," Baron Hyatt protested, gripping his reins with white knuckles and trying to keep the fear and the choleric from his otherwise dignified voice. He wore his beard long and braided, with a gold ring to cinch it neatly together. Green and Amber were the colors of his house, and so he and his son wore them in plenty, while the heraldry on his guards mirrored the scheme. Their house symbol, a deer with apple blossoms growing from its antlers, showed the family's historical ties to the land as hunter/gatherers and then as farmers and ranchers. "I think you don't have a choice," the Admiral responded with silky assurance in her voice. "Historical lesson number two: Sherman's March to the Sea. You see, if you make an enemy of Astorea then we will not play by the classical customs of war. We will do whatever is necessary to not only survive, but thrive. And if that means marching upon every village between Dormont and Stokbon and razing it to the ground, then so be it. Wells will be poisoned and fields salted. Villages burned, and lives lost. Just to make sure that the next time an army wishes to march upon us, they will know how high the cost will be. Just to leave a swath of destruction about as that will scar your history books and haunt your nightmares, reminding you that we are not to be trifled with. Just so that any force which rallies against us must march day and night through the wasteland we have created, so that they can know what kindness we will visit upon their own villages when we finish ripping the hearts from their chests." Smiling, she gestured at the woods around them with a wave of her hand. "Total Warfare is what it is called. It is a tactic that states that there is no limit to the unkindness the invading force can visit upon its enemies. Civilians and nobility will not be safe from the forces we send out. Forces that are small, but quite adept at their tasks. Here, a carriage of foot soldiers who appear to be a few monks on pilgrimage, who slaughter a whole city during a night's raid. There, a few pyromancers that turn fields to ash and malefimancers that blight the earth so that nothing will ever rise from the soil again. Industries ransacked. Towns turned to pyres. Anything and everything that is not with us will be against us, and we will not waver in destroying it. Not because we have to, dear Baron. Because we can." Thrown die: 83 +15 [204 / 320]
The ranger hummed under her breath as The Admiral waved her on. "Of course, I'm sure they'll be fine. They're surrounded by heavy hitters after all," she said dismissively. The guards were pointedly not included in that, but she wasn't going to say as much. Nothing would happen to their anything but wild host. Not unless they stayed their hands in defense of them. Or were the thing they needed defending from. Not that Gwyn was prone to turn on people that had done nothing to deserve it, at least not without proof. She didn't have proof they were slavers, abused their servants, cheated people out of house and home, or had political assassinations done in their name. No proof of their sins. The Admiral would have that and she trusted the woman enough. So when she was asked to go ahead, she did. With a cheery whistle and pressure from her knees in the mare's side, the paint took off. She kept her eyes down to watch the trail carefully. The nervous nature that all horses shared would give her a heads up when it spotted something ahead. Riding prey animals into battle wasn't the greatest of ideas unless bred and trained to be more resilient to fear, but they had heightened senses that could pick up a possible threat a mile off. The tracks were fresh and from the shortening gait it would seem their quarry was slowing down as it relaxed without the wolves tailing it or was thoroughly exhausted. She could work with a tired mark no problem and their noble company would certainly be in no danger. Rather... there would be a poetic kind of kill in it. The stag, however greater it might think itself compared to the rest of its kin would die the same. It would be menaced into complacency, cornered and slain at the hands of the players. All it was missing was flowers making a fragrant halo around its head. She looked up to see the crown of antlers vanish beneath the crest of the next hill, the light of day split by its branching horns for just a moment before it was gone over. Almost. She could almost taste the iron in the air again.She pulled her longbow from her back and adjusted her mount's speed into a gentler loping movement. Gwyn didn't want to startle it off back into a run before she needed to. She would close the gap as best she could to ensure the horse had its stamina back. Then she's have as much fun as she imagined possible on such a dull mission as this. Thrown die: 81 [ 285 / 320 ]
The good Baron paled with each passing word, while in stark contrast the son at his side was growing hot and aching to spur into action. How dare this stranger bitch from another land come to them and think them FOOL enough to fall for her empty threats and lies? Astorea had clearly only taken its seat at Castle Dormont because of such games and treachery; there was simply no way a band of misfits and murderers could have overwhelmed the forces of the Falderen army. They had obviously answered the King's call after already allying themselves with the sickening knife-ears, and thrown open the gates as soon as their tree-worshiping bastard friends began to knock at the doors. Then, hiding away while their savage allies went on a killing spree, the so called Astoreans waited until their work was done for them. It was the only explanation of how so few people could have accomplished such a grand thing; he refused to believe that stories of their strength was anything more than propaganda. The nerve of this bitch to make his father even consider otherwise! As she delivered her final threat, to burn and pillage everything within Brisshal just to prove that they could, he gave an audible snarl of rage and thrust a finger at the armored woman. "She has threatened the Barony! Kill her, kill her now!" Confused, but complying, the three marksmen in the rear took aim and fired at the woman's back before the Baron himself could, in his shocked and stunned silence, order them to stand down. The air hissed with the sudden twang of drawstrings and the metallic bite of bolt striking through chainmail. Smiling, the son watched as the woman's body was suddenly slumped forward against the neck of her horse, which whinnied loudly and stopped abruptly, afraid of the noise and collapse of its rider against its body. Blood seeped down her back and onto its flanks, causing the mount further agitation. "Ignorant CHILD!" the Baron hissed, striking his son across the face with a ringed backhand, the house signet and a wedding band cutting small ruts in the young man's cheek from how hard and fast the blow had come. "Do you realize what you've done? Were you paying attention at all to the things around us? The huntress whose eyes sometimes glow as she follows the trail of the beasts? The person who appeared out of thin air only to take down several wolves, alone? You've damned us all! What of the archer friend who will no doubt notice their friend's demise when she returns? What if she chooses to hunt US like wild sport, while she waits for her immortal friend to return and raze our orchards!" "But father, sh-" "But NOTHING, Damien. You are my heir, but there is nothing to inherit if you see it all burned to ashes before it even passes onto you! Assume only a tenth of what she spoke was truth; do you still think that WE can stand up to it ourselves without the army's help? Will they send us aid when we've met with our enemies in secret to even discuss the possibility of treason? If we lie about what happened, will they still waste any soldiers protecting us when they have a war to contend with? We are alone here, and you have just shot their olive branch. In the back, like a CRAVEN!" A gentle pat of her horse's neck saw the beast calmed enough that she could sit up once again, and take the reins. Gasps of horror and surprise came from the men in the rear who began to reload, until an urging hand from the Baron bade them stop. "You father raises some interesting points," the Admiral said with a bitter smile, blood dripping from her mouth from where it had been spat up. "It's poor conduct to have somebody shot in the back, right to their own face. But try not to fret. I'm happy to chalk the whole sordid moment up to... a hunting accident. Speaking of which, if I know my Gwyn at all, she's found her mark. What do you say we ride to catch up with her, and watch her fell the beast? Perhaps then young Damien will have a better eye for the situation that you are in." She reached around to her back and yanked out one of the crossbow bolts, tossing it to the boy so he could catch it and examine it with his own eyes. "Provided of course that this hasn't served object lesson enough for him. Ah, the naivety of youth..." She smiled with all the mirth of a snake, ignoring the Health Point warning in the corner of her HUD which told her she was at just above half health. Instead, she played it confident and cool, as though such a volley had been little more than a momentary nuisance which she could easily forgive and forget. Thrown die: 6 +15 [306 / 320]
As soon as the horse's head and her own could see over the heel, she turned her heels into the flanks of the mare to drive her to a faster gait. A second nudge and she was already flying into a full gallop over the crest of the hill and down the grassy slope, careful to set her hooves right given the muddy lowland-like fields around them. It wouldn't do to slip and possible injure herself and her rider, or lose their target. The paint was a nervous thing, but she had been used on hunts before and had long since been broken into such situations. She knew where this game of theirs led. The stag froze long enough, one hoof hovering nervously midstep, to turn its ears back. The sound of heavy hooves unlike the more delicate ones of deer, was all it needed to hear. It was off like a bolt and Gwyn was quick to pull her bow and fire a Scatter Shot with a longer time until it triggered. The arrow intentionally flew past her quarry's left shoulder before it shattered and split into many, peppering the ground in front of the deer. The change from one arrow into the many of the volley was what she was looking for. The sudden change had startled the massive buck and it turned sharply to the right. With a whooping call she stood in the saddle, leaning over the neck of the mare as they both moved as one and closed in on their prey. She curved slightly, coming closer and closer to the left flank of the deer after it had altered its course. With another loud call the deer spooked further, jerking again to the right. It wasn't perfectly facing the direction that they had come, but she didn't want to force it to overshoot. Instead, she nudged the horse to keep pace and remain at its position to slowly and carefully force the stag to adjust its run. The huntress intended to lead it back toward the hunting party as best she could before she was forced to end it. Easier to put on a show if there was an audience and there was more to The Admiral's game than she cared to show so Gwyn was content to play along. She was more than content to bring down quarry to scare more prey animals with. The nobles weren't far off that mark after all. They wouldn't put up near even this weak of a challenge, however. A sudden movement had her pulling on the reins, moving the mare a pace to the side in their full run. The stag had a little fight despite its flight it seemed. The beast had tossed its head to force them away, striking out with its antlers. It wasn't enough, however. No where near in fact. Gwyn grinned and jerked the reins to bring the mare in. The mare was brought in two paces and shouldered into it with a startled noise from both of the four-legged animals. The stag corrected once more to draw away and lined up perfectly. She let the paint drop back enough to settle the animal some and drive the creature straight up and over the hill. The two returned the way they came, destroying the previous tracks and leaving behind far more obvious ones of the both of them. She had moved a ways ahead of the party to track it without the sounds of their conversation to alert the creature and so there was a long moment where she was lost to the labored breathing of their trio and the warmth of the sun beating into her back. When she saw The Admiral, the nobles, and their guard company appear ahead? She grinned wildly. Time it was then. Once again the pattern began of forcing her borrowed mount into a full sprint and riding up closer to the side of the stag. This time, however, she alternated sides. She'd drive it to the left and then to the right and then back once more. The exhaustion and panic were driving the stag mad, its eyes rolling and ears swiveling desperately. It would occasionally toss its head or kick out as it ran like such a show of force would be enough to ward them off. Gwyn whistled and snarled behind it to let the confusion and the fear sink its claws and fangs in deep. Her dearest deer hadn't the right mind to realize how close it was to the rest of her company and by the time it reacted, faced with the decision between right, left, or running straight through... it was already too late. With another loud sound, this one a mimic of a wolf's menacing growl behind it, the stag made the choice she drove it into picking. It charged for the hunting party and Gwyn unhooked one foot from the stirrup. One foot remained while the freed one was tucked under her to lift her to half-standing in the saddle. She wedged the toe of her boot under the saddle horn to keep her grip. From there it was simple to bring down the blade of the guillotine, though her judgement was an arrow. The Pinning Shot was fired from her position looming above the stag, her mare running shoulder to shoulder with it as she put on a last burst of speed. The arrow found its mark and slammed into the back of the creature's skull, forcing it down. The momentum of its full run brought the body curling sickeningly over top its own head and the neck gave a disgusting crack before the whole thing rebounded, swaying back over the head and neck now anchored to the ground. An unnatural sprawl of legs and slide of the body fell to the side, twisted horrifically at the base of the neck. The head and antlers, despite it all, were untouched. Its head lay perfectly flat along the ground, as if on a silver platter of packed earth instead. The antlers arched up, a mockery of some odd decoration or rare plant tended in a noble's exotic gardens. The momentum of her and her paint was brought to a halt just in front of the party, the mount digging in her hooves with a whinny and a petulant snort. Gwyn did little more than resettle herself in her seat, barely winded, but grinning wildly. "Got it," she said cheerfully before looking over at The Admiral. Her expression dropped entirely at the blood on the woman's lips, the looks on the faces of the other humans, and the bloody crossbow bolts. "Not the only one that got got, then?" The ranger's gaze went icy, having only glanced over the nobles before they locked back on her partner. She waited for the verdict, but couldn't help but meet the eyes of the lord flatly. Gwyn did not lie and she did not care to hide her opinion. It should be well and obvious enough to the man that there was a very dangerous theme shared by the heraldry of his house, her slain prey, and the new prey in her sights. Thrown die: 39 [ 345 / 320 ]
The noblemen and their escorts rounded the hill with the Admiral riding alongside, arriving just in time for Gwyn's spectacular demonstration of hunting etiquette and enthusiasm. Stopped off the beaten path, they watched through trees and slivers of sunlight as the massive stag bound through the woods, pursued by the amazonian huntress. The Admiral kept control of her own mount as the great beast began to charge right for them, the horses of the others spooking as they feared the wrath of the powerful forest creature. And then it came crashing to the forest floor, kicking up leaves and plumes of dirt and falling well short of them all. She reached up and wiped blood from her mouth at Gwyn's ominous gaze, realizing that there was a question lingering on the woman's face: do the gentlemen now die? At Gwyn's question she gave a brief chuckle of amusement, then leaned to the side and spat blood into the dirt to clear her mouth. "A simple hunting accident, nothing more," she cautioned Gwyn as she pulled another bolt from her back and tossed it to the ground, leaving one more embedded in the chainmail. "These sorts of things do happen, though I've been assured that great care will be taken in the future to prevent any harm to Astorea, or her peoples..." She smiled sweetly again, dug out the last bolt, and tossed it in front of the corpse of the huge stag that Gwyn had felled. "After all, it wouldn't do it WE started confusing who OUR prey is. No; great care should be taken to make sure that we don't mistake friend for foe, or mark the wrong prey. There is, of course, more than enough room in the woods for us all to make our way without... accidents happening." Dismounting, she held out a hand and kindly assisted Baron Hyatt and his girth in dismounting from his own steed, then gestured to Gwyn's kill. The massive stag she had brought down in but a few shots, and fewer breaths. "I... think we can come to some sort of compromise on that, yes," the Baron wheezed as he looked the beast over, then turned his eyes to Gwyn, to the Admiral, to his feet.
As she watched The Admiral pull her arm up to smear away the evidence and spit out the rest, she resisted the growl that threatened to crop up in the back of her mouth. So much time in the woods and learning the walks of animals left some of it lingering and it was effective enough when it came to communicating with them and communicating intent toward more humanoid folk, be they prey or not. However, she was called off like a hunting hound inches from the kill and her lips twisted into a petulant expression aimed at the other woman. Whatever specifics she had wanted, she had gotten, if they weren't already dead or dying. That would have to be enough and perhaps The Admiral got her revenge in the meek resignation of the noble, his eyes skittering between them. There was no way out of this situation and there never would be unless the servers shut down. She smiled, though there was little life in it, at the man as she spoke simply. "Chin up." "I'm happy to let you have this token of our strength of alliance. I'm sure your guard detail can manage to haul it back home. It would make quite a sight stuffed and mounted." The huntress eyed her fallen mark and waved dismissively over the corpse. It doubled in size compared to its standard kin and while it was nothing overly extraordinary beyond that, a status symbol was a status symbol to these folks, right? If not, well then it was just another threat she guessed. Gwyn could admit she was shit at these complex games and she didn't care for all the dancing around and manipulation, but what had to be done had to be done. She wasn't going to let innocents die because either side of the political conflict seemed stupid and not worth the time and effort to address. She'd never be a diplomat, but she could pay a chess piece on The Admiral's board. If she trusted anyone not to throw her to the wolves over petty reasons, it was the other warrior. Maybe for a prank or a challenge, though. That she could see. However, with The Admiral drawing her game to a close it was time to return. Gwyn would leave her companion to hunt down the results from others Astorea had called upon to aid it in gaining a foothold in the region outside of the castle turned capital's walls. Her calling was wilder and until she was next leashed in, she'd be answering the siren song of the hunt. This time unfettered by nobles, politics, and unworthy prey.
