Duality Merged - Chapter 5 ..will Break Your Bones

“We should explore the forest in the coming days. There’s still half a week left before we finish our quest, which should be enough time find something else to eat, at the very least” Charles suggested, getting a nod from the rest of the group. They’d gathered for a group meal as their third day in the forest came to an end.

“The river’s to the south and we came from the west, while the apple tree’s to the east. We should go north if we want our chances to be the best,” Max reasoned. “I do suppose north would have the best chances of hiding anything worthwhile,” agreed Charles after a momentary pause at the man’s deductive ability. And while it wasn’t anything special, Charles had already labelled the man as someone more brawn than brain. Max, however, unaware of the low opinion Charles had of him, seemed to be mighty satisfied at getting the latter’s agreement.

“Well, it’s good we have a plan for the future,” Charles stated, “It should be about time for the first shift to start. You two should get what sleep you can while Sis and I keep watch,” he continued as he grabbed his spear and made his way towards the entrance and, once he arrived, sat down in what, after spending sixteen hours in it, felt like his designated spot, wooden staff close at hand.

He didn’t get long to himself, however, as he was soon joined by Janette who sat down beside him. “What do you think happens next?” she asked, using his shoulder as an impromptu pillow. “After we’ve completed our quest?” he asked, feeling his sister nod her head against his shoulder in agreement. “One of three things,” he started, “We’ll either be released into this new world, Tedrasia, or we get thrown back into our own. Both Eotz and our Traveller Title did mention travelling between the two worlds, so that’s definitely plausible. The third possibility is that we get a new quest, but who knows what that would entail”

“Well don’t you sound thrilled at the thought of returning,” Janette teased as she blew softly into Charles’ ear, “School, I’m sure,” she said, giggling at the sight of her brother’s twitching eye. “It’s not the school I’m dissatisfied with” he started, “It’s the insufferable idiots and their idiotic problems,” Janette interrupted with a roll of her eyes, “I know, Brother. We’ve been siblings for over a decade You could just, you know, not interact with them then,” she finished with a teasing tone. “That’s unfortunately not how things work, Sister, and you know that. We’ve had this conversation more times than I have bones in my body,” he said, getting a pout in response. “I suppose you’re right once more, Brother,” Janette relented as she laid her head back down on his shoulder and closed her eyes. And he was indeed correct: civilized society doesn’t like outliers and those who don’t conform to whatever norms set by the masses. It was usually easier to simply fit in.

And so time went by in silence as they simply enjoyed each others company. “Our shift is just about done,” Charles remarked. “When do you think it’ll happen?” asked Janette as she stood up, offering Charles a hand. “The day grows ever closer, Sister. Patience,” he said as he accepted her help, grabbed his spear and walked inside. “Evening, Max. It’s your turn to stand watch,” Charles said after having awoken Max, “Keep us safe while we sleep, will you?” he added with a grim smile.

As Max and Molly made their way towards the entrance, Charles laid down on the now vacant and warm spot left by Max, “Goodnight, Sis,” he said. “Goodnight, Brother,” came the answer, as they both drifted away into a blissful sleep, or as blissful as the hardened dirt of the cave would allow them, only to be awoken by a scream that stopped as abruptly as it started.

“Already?” asked Charles out loud to no one in particular, as he sat up with a start at hearing the scream. It wasn’t the first time he’d been woken up by that scream but, this time, there was something more to it: terror. He’d just told his sister to be patient, hadn’t he? And yet things were happening faster than he thought, much faster, in fact. He’d expected something to happen on the second to last night, not now: it was only the third night, after all.

As he and Janette quietly ran towards the entrance, however, it quickly became clear that their expectations had been wrong, evident by the growls and yips that drifted inside the cave. Finally reaching the entrance, they saw Max stepping back with his staff held out in front of him, swinging it from side to side in an attempt at scaring the creatures harassing him. Molly, meanwhile, was holding on to her shoulder while sitting behind Max in an almost catatonic state due to being jumped if the slight rips in her jacket were any indication.

While there weren’t a lot of the creatures surrounding Max, only about what seemed to be eight, they were unlike anything they’d ever seen before: they looked like oversized bipedal rats just tall enough for their heads to be in knee-height, but unlike actual rats, their heads would best be described as a melon squished around its width, causing it to elongate. Their maws, however, were what was truly unsettling about them, filled with jagged teeth as they were.

As Charles moved up to take point beside Max, the latter seemed to grow bold enough to step forward and managed to bash one in the head with an overhead swing of his staff, followed by the sickening crunch of bone breaking as the head cracked like an overripe melon, spraying bits of bone and a blood and brain juices up into the air. After the successful hit, Max moved back to stand next to Charles, with only a slight paleness to his face at the gore.

One of the rats, likely in the hopes of taking advantage of Max previously being out of position, lunged at the smaller of the two men before it. Charles, stepping back in a panic at being attacked while he was focused on the sight of the dead rat’s inners flowing down its matte grey fur, swung his staff in an upwards arc towards the left side of his aggressor. However, perhaps due to his panic and lack of experience, he only managed to clip the creature’s left leg. The leg was broken, surely, if the oddly satisfying feeling of bone splintering being transmitted through his staff, and the crisp snapping sound not unlike that of a twig being broken, was anything to go by. The attack, however, successful as at it may have been, failed at throwing the rat far enough off course.

The rat, now grabbing on to the upper right arm of Charles, didn’t hesitate as it bit into his bicep. The creatures jolly shriek at the taste of his blood and his flesh being rent between its jaws was in stark contrast to the sheer agony being displayed on the face of the arms owner. Pain exploded from his arm the moment the hateful creature bit into him, it’s razor-sharp teeth parting cloth and skin to reach the flesh and blood contained underneath, only stopped by the creatures thankfully short teeth, overloading his nervous system, causing him to pause for a moment.

But his pause only lasted a moment, as he retaliated with the savageness of a hate-filled beast at the end of its life. Letting go of his staff with his left hand, he drove his thumb into the filthy creature’s glowing beady eye, eliciting a screech one would expect from such a hellish thing, only muffled by the flesh of his arm. The creature, however, bit down on to his arm in retaliation with newfound fervour, sending yet another spike of pain shooting through his arm, and yet another when Janette, pale as she was from seeing her Brother in the situation he was in, bashed the thing in the back of the head with her staff causing the rat to get pushed into his arm before it slumped, no doubt in the same state as the one Max killed.

Panting, not from pain, but rather the borderline lethal amounts of adrenaline coursing through his veins, he removed his thumb from the dead thing’s eye with a wet sound that would have undoubtedly tested his stomach had it not fallen on ears deafened by the hammering of his heart and the sound of his blood rushing through his veins. Staff grasped as firmly as his injury would allow, he stepped forward and swung it in a powerful arc fueled by vengeful anger. The oversized stick hit true and sent one of the remaining four creatures barreling across the ground where it laid twitching, breathing with the wet whistle of someone with a punctured lung, quickly filling with blood, leaving three of the filthy cretins alive.

[ Obtained: Quarterstaff Proficiency Novice I ]

Max must’ve managed to kill a few of the rats himself Charles realised in the moment of clarity the notification brought him, as he took stock of the situation, “Eotz bless the poor fool’s soul,” he muttered before he sprang into action once more. His shoulder wouldn’t allow him to remain standing for long, he knew, so he would need to be proactive in ending the fight.

The fight, thankfully, didn’t last much longer and with the end of the fight, so came the end of his adrenal high, causing him to drop his quarterstaff, as he now knew it was called, and crouch down grasping his right bicep as the pain finally made itself known, seeming to amplify with every beat of his heart. No matter how used to pain you are, it never truly stops hurting. You just learn to tolerate it, to push it away for the moment and let your future self deal with the agony. Not unless your nerves are damaged. And they wouldn’t allow that.

Charles, mind fogged by pain as it was, did manage to recognise his sister running towards him with a long strip of white cloth; where she’d gotten it from he didn’t know. Janette crouched down to his right and removed his jacket and hoodie in rough movements, well knowing there was little she could do to amplify the agony her brother was in beyond anything he hadn’t experienced before. Finally seeing the wound on her brother’s arm, she couldn’t help but let out a breath of relief. The hateful rat-like creature seemed to have been more focused on drinking the blood than tearing chunks of flesh out of his limb, so while it bled as a stab wound would do, that was ultimately just what it was: just a lot of stab wounds.

After she finished wrapping the wound and reclothing Charles, but before he could utter his thanks, she punched him square in the jaw with the expected result of the already lightheaded Charles, fainting. Realising she’d let her emotions get the better of her, she couldn’t help but feel slightly embarrassed. But even this embarrassment at punching her brother quickly turned into a feeling of righteous indignation; how dare he get himself hurt to such an extent, well knowing how she’d feel? He deserved it she thought with a nod as she started dragging him towards the cave.

Max, perplexed at the sight of the two, one dragging the other, couldn’t help but ask, “What happened to him?” He had, after all, seen the young man up and about not long before. “Blood loss,” was the answer, accompanied with a nod no doubt directed at herself, perhaps as if to agree with her own words. Max shrugged, no longer bothering with the two, and walked towards one of the more ‘intact’ of his victims. Instead of bashing its ugly skull in, he’d managed to break this one’s spine with a well-placed swing of his quarterstaff, as the notification called it. He’d managed to kill half of the creatures by himself, much to the man’s self-satisfaction.

Crouching down next to the ugly creature, he noticed, for the first time, that their ears were like tattered leather. Turning the creature over on its stomach he noticed something else, namely the two outgrowths on the thing’s upper back of the same look as its ears, and the surprisingly thick tail. The tail, unlike the one you’d expect it to have based on its rat-like appearance, started off thick and tapered off into a point, not unlike that of a furry lizard’s.