Undeserved Revilement -[Rrah]-

[Amur]

We remained silent as Taured worked through his thoughts. There had been a lot to tell and a lot to take-in, so it would only be natural for Taured to spend some time thinking over what he had just heard. When he spoke, stating that he understood, we nodded lightly. Though, his comment regarding Master Hunter Latro did cause us a moment of concern.

“We would suggest that you refrain from mentioning this to Master Hunter Latro. There is a good chance he will not be as understanding as our allied Hunters.”
We said, we didn’t believe that Taured would go straight to Master Hunter Latro and discuss what we had told him. No, the chances were that he was intelligent enough to know that Solomon would not have been pleased by the knowledge that Taured had heard that which The Hunters were highly protective of.

Taured then stated his intention of dealing with Alma. We nodded gently, this was part of the reason he had returned to us after all. However, we could not yet allow him to meet with our allied Hunters; he still had a small deal to learn about their culture before we could bring them in.

“Very well, but, before we can allow you to meet with them, there are still some things you will need to be educated in. Hunter culture is complex, as an outsider and a foreigner there are mistakes that you may make in ignorance. While most would forgive you for that, we assume that you are aware that Hunters function differently, given that they have unreasonably high standards.”
We felt that would be more than enough to explain that our allied Hunters would expect Taured to know what to do and what to not do upon meeting them for the first time.

“Firstly, do not move to copy any of their gestures, the gesture they perform where they touch their insignias is a sign of respect, they dislike people copying that. Second, make an effort to remember their names, in Hunter culture to be referred to either without a name or as a title appointed to you by someone else is considered one of the greatest disrespectful gestures that one can make. We would advise simply asking them each of their names in turn; it will help improve their opinion of you.”
We paused for a moment, since that covered the two most relevant explanations. But there was one more thing we would need to inform Taured of.

“There is one last thing, Taured. One of our Allied Hunters, Faceless-One Delian Terminus –you’ll recognise him when you see him- adorns a piece of apparel known as ‘The Ivory Mask’, it is a sign of shame among their kind. While he is not uncompromisingly bitter like many of his brethren, we very strongly suggest that you do not stare at the mask.”
We informed him, calmly. And with that we contacted Faceless-One Delian Terminus mentally, requesting the presence of him and his brethren. It would take them a moment to arrive at our audience chamber, so we still had a short while to answer any questions that Taured may have had about his upcoming task.

“We have just requested their presence, Taured. If you have any further questions, it would be wise to ask them before our Allied Hunters arrive.”

[Mali]

Taured nodded his head. He wouldn’t tell Solomon about what he had been told. He knew that Solomon wouldn’t understand why the other hunters had allowed Taured to hear the history about their creation. Since Solomon was a lone wolf in a way, he definitely wouldn’t understand their reasoning for wanting to be understood. Maybe it was in part because they trusted Taured to help them deal with the siren in their group, but Taured was thankful for the information.

He listened as Morona explained that there were a few things he needed to know before he could meet with the hunters. He eagerly listened for what Morona had to say before questioning what he was being told. He had moved to copy Solomon the first day that he had met him. He had already made a mistake by copying his actions and yet no one had told him not to do so. Not even Solomon, who, Taured believed would be vocal enough to at least say, ‘don’t do that,’.

He nodded his head again as he was told not to stare at the mask. Okay, so don’t copy their actions, refer to them by name and title given and don’t stare at the mask. This couldn’t be as hard as Morona seemed to make it out to be.

“No further questions. I have my message from Solomon to detect the siren, as long as I can pronounce it decently enough, I should be fine finding the siren.” what he didn’t say to Morona was his indecision on how to kill the Siren. He knew that the hunters wouldn’t be upset by the death, but he wasn’t so sure about others in the village. They might not understand why Taured would come and kill an innocent in their village. Taured and the hunters, as well as Morona would know that the woman wasn’t an innocent, but the rest wouldn’t.

“Actually, I do have a question. The hunters, yourself, and I will know that this woman’s death was necessary, but how do you plan to explain it to the rest of the encampment? Surely they will doubt any trust in me after the death,” he was really concerned about that part. Any trust he would have built from the people would be shattered the moment they heard that Taured had killed someone in the camp. How did Morona plan to fix that problem and explain it to the people?

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[Amur]

We sat on our throne as Taured asked his question; it was a good question; that much we would have to admit to. It was part of the reason we had hoped that Taured would send Alma in the direction of Master Hunter Latro. We were already turning several possible ideas over in our mind, and it seemed that no matter which way we could explain it that the trust of our people would lessen in at least one party. However, there had been recent incidents among our people involving Alma; perhaps we would be able to explain Alma’s death as a result of her own decision-making. Our Allied Hunters would of course, have to play along, but, since they distrusted –perhaps even despised- Alma; that would hardly present us with an issue.

“We have an idea, but it is not a perfect one. Alma has recently been creating problems among our people, and has even publicly taken credit for the end result... We are unsure why, however. We could attempt to twist the sequence of events to make it seem as though her death was her own doing, there is no guarantee it would work. But, recent events will make it seem possible. And it presents itself to us as the only amicable solution.”
We adjusted the way we were sitting, placing our fist against our cheek. As it was the way we usually sat when meeting with our Allied Hunters, this way, we would be able to minimise suspicions from Alma.

“You will also not need to use any methods explained to you by Master Hunter Latro, at least regarding The Siren specifically, that is. We have called them here under the guise that you wish to meet with them to further your understanding of them. They will likely introduce themselves to you. We feel it necessary to further warn you, that while not all Hunters are like Master Hunter Latro a great many of them are usually hostile as a means of defence. They’ve largely had to adapt as such to survive in a land where everyone hates them, just bear that in mind.”
We did not believe that Taured would say or do anything in ignorance, not now that he had, had many of the intricate parts of Hunter culture explained to him. However, the necessity of our warning was in no way diminished by that. Our Allied Hunters were not as bitter as many had become, but, their guard was always up, we knew that from experience.

We allowed the rest of our wait to pass in silence; Taured would have to plan how to kill The Siren himself.

As was always the way, Faceless-One Delian Terminus entered the audience house first. Ahead of the rest of his brethren, this had been the normal routine during our time at sea, and landing had not changed that. The man stood taller than average for a human male, and wore heavy-set, form-concealing clothes, making it difficult to tell how much mass there was to his form. While his face and head were perpetually covered by The Ivory Mask –being a plain white, featureless mask with black-eyes- and a dark-blue, hood-like shawl.

He briefly looked at Taured and acknowledged his existence before turning to us.

“Nemesis Morona”
He recited respectfully, to which we inclined our head slightly. He then turned to face Taured and stood in silence for a short moment, undoubtedly taking a moment to build an initial impression of Taured and make a first judgement of him, as all of the remaining “First-Hunters” did.

“And, you are Taured, aren’t you? Nemesis Morona has already told me about you, I am Faceless-One Delian Terminus. Among the last of The First-Hunters, for the sake of referral just Delian will do.”
He said. And at that he moved to stand to our left, at a moderate distance away from our throne with his hands behind his back. His positioning made sense, the rest of our Allied Hunters looked up to, and respected him. If he positioned himself where their attention could easily be held, it would be easier to simply stab The Siren in the back, or otherwise catch her with her guard down if she was still trying to hold her cover.

There was a further moment of waiting before the other four Hunters arrived at our audience house together, as they always did.

The first of them was Alvina D’alene, very much like Delian, Alvina stood at a height that was considered to be “above” average for a human female; a trait that very much emphasized her slender, feminine form. Alvina opted to make her clothing as plain as possible, usually in the darker colours –we personally had only ever seen her wear black or navy-blue clothing- with light, leather armour for extra protection. Upon first meeting her, it had only taken us a moment to see why she opted to wear such plain attire, as she was completely bald. From her own admission, we had pieced together that her baldness was a natural trait. Though, she actually seemed to enjoy startling people with the fact she was a bald female, the idea was apparently shocking to most singular males.

The second was Mathieu Corvus; He stood at the same kind of height as the average man tended to, and usually kept his dark brown hair as short as possible –though, he was most definitely not bald- from what we had been able to understand, Mathieu was considered something of an odd Hunter. Instead of wearing the lighter armour that his brethren favoured, he usually opted for heavy, full-plate armour. However, the most striking feature was not what he was wearing, but, was instead the weapon he used. A long-bow, so large that it stood taller than he did and fired arrows that could be mistaken for spears, nevertheless, his large frame clearly showed that he was able to use his weapon of choice efficiently.

The third was the most outlandish Hunter –or just person in general- among our people. Raphael Corvus was the youngest Hunter among our people, at the age of nineteen he had only recently become a Hunter. However, he had already garnered quite a reputation for himself among our people alone, for nothing more than his looks. He stood shorter than the average male, and than the rest of his compatriots, and was slender enough to have an almost feminine look to his form. Couple with his flowing, waist-length, platinum-blonde hair and relatively loose-fitting robes, Raphael had a grace and beauty about him that males did not usually possess.

And finally, “Alma D’alene”, in an odd way, the fact that she appeared so average alongside the rest of our Allied Hunters was what made her stand out, at least in our eyes it did. She stood at a relatively average human height and typically wore clothes closer to that of “the commoners” that many a Hunter seemed to despise, though, she did wear a short-sleeved top which would allow her to have the insignia on her left arm constantly displayed with pride –the circle-bearing-four-points with the image of a rose in its center- and always had her long dark brown hair neatly tied back, giving her green eyes an almost odd emphasis.

In turn, each of them greeted us with relative respect and then stood in silence. We briefly motioned their attention toward Taured.

“This is the man that you all wished to have us educate in the history of your clans. He has heard what we have had to say and understands the cause of the distaste you have towards all those outside of your clans as a result. He has requested to meet with you, in an effort to further understand the culture of your clans.”
We said calmly, and with that, their attention turned toward Taured. Delian, Mathieu, Alvina and Raphael were all playing along now, with any luck, Taured would too.

[Mali]

Taured listened to what Morona had to suggest for taking the fall for the death of the siren. It was interesting to hear that this Alma had already stated that she would take credit for the result. It didn’t mean that the people would just think that it was Alma’s fault as she had already taken credit for, but he hoped that their faith in him—what little of it there was—would be broken by this act.

Nodding his head, he knew that not all hunters were like Solomon, but he suspected that they all pretty much had the same hatred for other beings. Of course, there was an exception where treasured and precious people were involved, there would be no hatred toward those people, but that varied from person to person. Of course, he would never say anything out of ignorance, not now that he knew the history and some key things he should keep in mind when addressing the hunters.

The first hunter made his way into the hall and Taured immediately knew that this was Delian by the mask that he wore. He tried not to stare at the mask, but he believed that it was polite to look at someone when they spoke, and that meant eye contact. However, the mask blocked the sight of his eyes, so would it be considered staring at his mask if Taured tried to make eye contact with Delian?

He nodded his head to the man, acknowledging that Delian would be fine way to address him. He moved off to the side and the other four hunters entered the hall. The first took Taured by surprise. He did a double take before calming himself down. It was odd to see a completely bald woman, but it would be rude to gawk, so he had to remain calm. As the hunters walked into the room, Taured took note of the spot where their insignia was shown. Since what he had to say would lead to them touching their insignias, he would have to keep a careful watch as to who was stumbling along to figure out where everyone was moving their hands towards.

The bald woman, whose name he didn’t know yet, had her insignia on her right forearm. Delian and the long haired hunter had theirs on their chest. The ordinary-looking hunter and the heavily armoured hunter had their insignia on their left arms. As he looked from hunter to hunter, nodding his head as they entered the hall, he took note of the two women. Who was the siren?

Taured waited for Morona to introduce him although he knew that the hunters already knew who he was. It was only polite to wait to be introduced. He knew none of the other hunters’ names so he had no idea how he should address them, but he would probably figure it out. As long as he didn’t use any derogatory terms to address them based on how they look, surely he wouldn’t be rude.

“I thank you allowing me to further understand your culture and nature. I am enlightened,” he smiled to all five of the hunters, not allowing his eyes to rest on any particular hunter for too long. He wondered how long he should wait before getting to the point of his reason for being here. As far as the siren knew, he was here to learn about their culture and history. But the others knew otherwise.

“I have a message I would like to deliver, Master Hunter Latro Angebote seine Kollegen Jäger willkommen auf dieses Land und hofft auf einen Tag Hunt Seite an Seite mit den seine gleich.” Now it was time to watch what happened closely. He watched the hunters with a close eye, making sure to flicker from one to the other instead of resting solely on the two women. Whoever moved to copy the action of the other hunters was the siren. The other four hunters would move with fluid motions toward their insignia while the siren would be slightly delayed and move hesitantly.

Even once he knew who the siren was, there was the difficult task of deciding how to deal with her. He hadn’t decided on how he would kill her. He didn’t want to do it abruptly; it wasn’t his nature to do so. But he had to deal with this somehow. Maybe he could challenge the siren to a duel and question her integrity? That way the people of Morona’s village couldn’t question his killing of the siren. Since they believed in a duel to the death, it would be fitting to challenge her. And even though Solomon’s swordsmanship had nearly bested Taured, he knew that his use of magic would back him up and allow him to finish the match with victory.

So, who was he going to duel?

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[Amur]

We watched with great interest as Taured played along, surprised by the accuracy he had managed to speak Nirvanian-Common. Of course, he likely had no idea what he was saying, but, much as we had hoped, Master Hunter Latro had given Taured all of the necessary tools to dispose of The Siren either himself, or with Solomon’s help. Even our Allied Hunters seemed to be somewhat surprised at the greeting from Master Hunter Latro, but, they nevertheless moved to make the appropriate sign of respect for the delivery of the message.

It was here that Alma gave herself away, as our Allied Hunters moved to immediately touch their insignias, Alma had hesitated, looked at them and then followed the action. We already knew that to be the exact reaction that Taured had been looking for. Now, he just had to figure out how he was going to dispose of The Siren, if he hesitated for too long something would seem out of place and Alma would get suspicious. We were already beginning to concoct various solutions, which we would give to Taured mentally, with our help-

“I don’t like the way he looked at me.”
The deep, rich voice of Raphael was the first to speak. We blinked at his response, suddenly realising that our Allied Hunters had already noticed that Taured was struggling to find a solution himself. We kept an impassive expression as we then realised that we had yet to tell Taured that Hunters had a reputation of being tactically unpredictable. Mentally cursing ourselves for forgetting that fact we made a mental to apologise to him for it later.

“I can’t believe we allowed him to hear our history.”
The still –strangely- boyish voice of Mathieu called out in a derisive sneer. This had an immediate effect on Alma, whom, clearly believing her cover to still be intact jumped in on the taunts.

“What did I tell you? We should not have allowed anyone to hear that which is sacred to us, least of all him.”
Alma’s taunt was followed by a chuckle from Alvina, whom simply folded her arms over her chest.

“It’s not every day I would agree with Alma when her decision was so radically against the rest of ours, but, since we all seem to be regretting our decision.”
She commented casually. We cast our gaze over to Taured, whom was understandably, very visibly bewildered by what was going on around him. Delian cast us a very small glance, to which we nodded to very subtly. He knew that we couldn’t allow this to continue for too long, not since it could potentially sour relations with him and his order.

“I should think.” Delian began “Someone should beat what he’s just heard from his skull, leave him as a broken shell.”
He paused for a moment, folding his arms over his chest and leaning his head back slightly, making him seem as though he was deep in thought. We knew otherwise, of course.

“And since, Alma’s views on the subject seem to have been the right views; I think she should be the one to get the honour.”
Delian commented coldly. At that, our Allied Hunters backed away as Alma drew a slender pair of short swords from her back. We looked at Taured and gave the slightest of nods, from this point; our Allied Hunters could not help him further, so he was on his own.

“I thank my brethren for the privilege of this kill.”
She sneered... We couldn’t help but marvel at the fact that she had yet to find it strange that we were not voicing opposition to her or her “brethrens” actions.

[Mali]

Taured watched carefully as the hunters seemed shocked at first at what he had to say. However, the shock didn’t last long as they all moved to touch their insignias except for the short woman. She looked around, hesitant and then moved to copy the action. This meant that this woman was the “High Huntress Alma D’alene”. Taured wondered if that was really her name or if it was just a hidden meaning message. Upon hearing the name, Solomon had visibly reacted to it, meaning that it could just be a message Morona had sent him to tell him what was going on, but it could also be her name. How would he address her now?

Taured was thinking about how he should word his next phrase, how he should ask this “Alma” to a duel when one of the hunters spoke up. And what he had to say shocked Taured. What was this about? He hadn’t looked at any one of the hunters for too long and yet this one said that he had looked at him funny. This started to frustrate him. He was here on their request to help with the siren issue and they had the nerve to accuse him of funny business?

And the comments continued on, stating that they regretted telling him their history. He had told them he was honoured by such an act and yet they had the guts to tell him to his face that they shouldn’t have. The nerve of all of them. It was then that the siren jumped in and agreed with all of them. The bald woman crossed her arms over her chest and stated that she didn’t often agree with Alma. So Alma was her name. It was good to have that misunderstanding cleared up.

It was then that Delian spoke up and Taured had inkling that something was fishy. As he said that it should be Alma to beat the knowledge from his body, he knew that something was going on here. He couldn’t quite figure out what exactly they were up to, but he knew that there was a plan to what they were saying and no need for him to become further frustrated with how they were treating him. As Alma drew her short swords, Taured chuckled, what kill could she possibly be referring to?

“I accept your challenge, Alma, however, I bested Master Hunter Solomon Wyvern-Slayer Latro, walking away with both my life and his dignity. I assure you, my death shall not be your victory today.” at this, he drew his sword from his belt, spinning it in his hand before gripping the handle in a relaxed grip. Whether they chose to believe him or not was their choice. However, it was the truth and he even had two witnesses, the large, bird Aime and Varden.

“Where shall we do this?” determination was clear in his eyes as he stared Alma down, intent on finishing her off. He had no idea what spell or move he would use to end her life, but he knew that she couldn’t be the victor today. He would have to use everything he had. If she were nearly as skilled as Solomon, then he might just be bested at the sword. He wasn’t flawless when it came to a duel, but that was where his magic backed him up. He’d never lost a match yet—aside from his mentors in Ilirea—and he wasn’t about to let that change now.

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[Amur]

We had continued to be shocked by Alma’s inability to see that something was not right with the situation unfolding. First off, our lack of objections to her and our Allied Hunters reactions should have immediately alerted her... Clearly, we now owed Faceless-One Delian Terminus an apology; Alma’s focus on trying to keep her cover intact had clearly dulled her common sense, just as he had said it would.

As Taured mentioned that he had a victory over Master Hunter Latro we couldn’t help but be surprised. Our Allied Hunters glanced at each other in uncertainty. Alma, however, simply scoffed loudly at Taured’s words.

“Pfft, I’ll believe that when The Isle of Origin begins sustaining life once more.”
She sneered in response.

We had to hold our tongue as Taured actively asked Alma where she wished for the fight to take place. We had hoped for this to remain as out-of-sight as possible, since it would be easier for us to fabricate a sequence of events leading to Alma’s death, it wasn’t something that we particularly wished to do; however, it was the easiest solution to our situation.

Raphael Corvus, however, simply chuckled.

“No need to remind the commoners of their place beneath us so visibly, Alma. Best keep this quiet; it will only cause another needless conflict between us and them.”
He replied for her, prompting a small nod on her part. We shook our head gently, once more our Allied Hunters quickly moving to keep the situation quiet and under control. We allowed ourselves to remain impassive as once more Alma’s clear desire to keep her cover intact smothered her common sense enough to prevent her from noticing that we still apparently had nothing to say about the events unfolding before us.

“Yes, no need to upset the commoners with our personal disputes.”
Alma agreed out loud, spinning her swords by the hilts skilfully before running at Taured, ready to strike... Still she had not seen the obvious flaw with the current situation? We were beginning to wonder how our Allied Hunters ever had difficulty trying to plan her death in the first place.

[Mali]

Taured had no idea what Alma was talking about, Isle of Origin, but it was no matter to him. It was obvious that the other hunters probably didn’t believe that he had a victory over Solomon either but that didn’t matter. He would crush her hopes and ambitions just as he had Solomon’s when dueling. Solomon had been so ambitious to crush Taured, to kill him, and so was Alma, but that wouldn’t last long.

His question was answered and he agreed with their answer to an extent. There was no need to upset the people of Morona’s village. He didn’t agree with the term they used to refer to the people in the village. Did they really see everyone else as commoners? Or was that just to keep Alma going? If these hunters were anything like Solomon, then they probably saw everyone as being below them.

He watched as Alma spun the blades and then ran toward him. She ran at him and he moved to the side, dodging her first strike, his blade came up and met hers as she spun on her heel and tried o strike him again. Taured noted the grooves and serrated edges of the blades Alma used. He didn’t know their exact purpose but Taured assumed that they were to shatter his blade or disarm him. Even if he were to fall prey to the serrated edges of her blade, he would still have his magic to back him up.

She pushed against his blade as hard as she could before moving one off and made for a jabbing motion, which Taured blocked with magic. “I call upon natural forces, create a wall and stop the blade,”

[/b][/i] A small wall formed between them as he pushed away from her and watched as the first blade smashed against the invisible wall, breaking the blade in two.

“One blade down?” he chuckled as Alma almost growled in frustration. She span the blade again before circling with Taured who also span the blade in his hand. He moved in first this time, their blades clashing together, he pulled back and made for a jabbing motion when his blade got caught on the serrated edges, causing it to crack along the edges but not break in two.

Things were going too far, his sword was cracked now and would have to be repaired as soon as he was done here. However, he couldn’t fight with a broken blade. It was time to deliver the final blow. “I call upon the force of gravity, double upon Alma.”[/b][/i] As soon as he said this, he collapsed back from the force and energy required for the spell, resting his weight against his blade which he stuck in the ground. There was sweat over his brow as he panted. He watched, waiting for the gravity around Alma to double, just a little curious of how she would die. Would she be crushed or would she splat?[/size][/blockquote][/blockquote]

[Amur]

As we had very much expected the fight to follow between Alma and Taured had been short lived, the moment he uttered his spell we could not help but frown. Spells altering the gravity of any individual were often draining and complex, and almost always resulted in a mess afterwards, whether that be down to bones poking through flesh or the body simply becoming little more than a red smear on the ground.

We sighed gently as Alma seemed to struggle against the spell before she became crushed into the ground, splattering blood in all directions. Leaving the kind of mess we had hoped would not be left after her death.

“While we are appreciative for your effort, Taured, did you have to leave such a mess? This is an audience house; we have to keep it presentable.”
We asked him, it was nothing a quick spell wouldn’t fix, and it wouldn’t be particularly draining either, however, we had figured that Taured would have shown more courtesy than that. We simply shook our head gently; there was little reason in pushing the point further, there was no way he had done that out of malice.

However, with that in mind, we had to wonder if Taured knew how to magically induce heart failure and other, vastly, less messy ways to end life with magic. Such methods were complex, we could attest to that, but required much less energy to perform... Or had Taured simply been trying to put on some kind of show?

Our thoughts were interrupted as the doors to the chamber opened, and as one our Allied Hunters turned to face the doors with weapons at the ready. Kaime merely stood looking around the room, his functional eyebrow arched ever so slightly before he strode towards us, almost spectacularly ignoring The Hunters. And the red smear on the floor –as he calmly strode through it- before stopped before us and kneeling.

(We couldn’t be sure, but we were almost certain we had seen him grind the heel of his boot over whatever part of Alma’s corpse may have remained intact... Seemingly just to add insult to injury... Not that we could have explained such an action.)

“Lord Morona, the merchants have decided to return to their homes stating that they need to ensure that their compatriot receives a send-off in accordance to their beliefs.”
We gave a small nod and watched in silence as Kaime first gave a very small downward glance from his knelt position before getting back to his feet... He wasn’t telling us something, we could already confirm as much.

The gauntlet was still absent from his left arm, and with the way his arm was bandaged up, it left his shoulder exposed, giving everyone that may have wanted to look a perfect view of the impact-point of the sting he had suffered during his youth.

Nevertheless, he returned to his usual place at our right before speaking to anyone else in the room.

“Apologies on the behalf of Lord Morona, Taured; Hunters are widely known for being tactically unpredictable back in Empire Nirvana.”
Kaime stated for us, suddenly causing us to remember that we owed Taured an apology. However, Raphael Corvus simply chuckled in response.

“Why, whatever do you mean? We tried to warn her against this course of action, but she clearly couldn’t escape the grasp of her old ‘reputation’, Kaime.”
He said coolly, skirting the edge of the red smear on the floor as he spoke.

“N’aww. Such a waste of life too.”
He quipped lazily. Stopping in his march to turn his attention back to Taured, standing in silence for a moment Raphael seemed to take a long moment to actually look at Taured.

“Delian tells me that he has already told you his name... I am Raphael Corvus.”
That was apparently all it had taken for the disposition of our Allied Hunters to soften.

“Alvina D’alene”
She said factually, clearly not wishing to converse much further beyond that.

“Mathieu Corvus”
With their initial greetings out of the way silence fell once more. We were not yet going to clean up the bloody mess that had been left in the wake of Alma’s death just yet, as we already knew that it wouldn’t take much to do so.

And, we were certain that there would at least be some questions to follow. So, we remained waiting in silence.

“You... Have met with Master Hunter Latro?”
As it turned out, Mathieu was the first to ask his question. And it was a one that we had expected, especially since Taured had claimed victory over Master Hunter Latro in combat, which, seemed odd to us... If he had bested Master Hunter Latro in combat, surely he wouldn’t have spared The Hunter’s life... Master Hunter Latro would have ambushed Taured in some manner, wouldn’t he?

[Mali]

Taured looked over to Morona as he asked if he had to make a mess in the audience house. It wasn’t his intention to make a mess, but he knew of no other way to kill Alma. It had been something he had thought of off the top of his head. If he had figured out which spell to use earlier, then he would have used something different. However, instead of thinking of how he could kill Alma, he had been worried over actually doing it. That took away from his usual calm and calculative thinking.

He smiled briefly, trying to gain some composure from the spell before swallowing hard, standing up straight from his sword which had held him up. “My thoughts were focused on the action, the spell was off the top of my head... I apologise for the mess.” Taured smiled again to Morona before taking in a deep breath.

It was then that the doors to the audience house opened and Taured watched as all the hunters drew their weapons. They were quick to arm themselves. But then again, he understood why they would be so quick. Turning his attention back to Kaime, Morona and the hunters, he wondered why Kaime would just step through the mess. Didn’t he care about getting dirty? It wasn’t a huge problem to get dirty, but to walk through someone like that, Taured held in a shiver.

So Morona had forgotten to tell Taured something else about the hunters before meeting with them. He had figured that there was something that had been left out, but at the time it had been happening, he couldn’t simply ask. He listened to the brief conversation between the hunters and Kaime before one of the hunters skirted around the smear on the floor to stand before Taured. He waited until he was given a name, by all the hunters present. At least now he would know what to call them should he need to speak to anyone of them.

It was then that he decided he should clean up the mess. Giving a nod to the hunters, he turned to the smear on the floor. “Disperse the gravity, crush the bones to dust. I call upon my strength, evaporate the blood”

[/i][/b] Within moments, the bones were crushed and the dust drifted off in a slight breeze while the blood evaporated into the air, leaving no stains on the floor or wherever else it had happened to splatter onto. He just thought of something, he put blood into the atmosphere... Oh well, it wouldn’t do harm.

As soon as Taured had finished cleaning up the mess, Mathieu asked about his meeting with Solomon. Frowning, he turned to look at Morona before nodding his head. Why would something like that matter right now? For reasons Taured was unsure of, he decided that he might as well inform the hunters, Kaime, and Morona of what happened with Solomon. They were curious because of his claimed victory over the master hunter.

“Yes, the council offered him sanctuary if he became an ally, which he turned down. His intent after was to duel, claiming that if he won, my death would be the result,” He paused, thinking about what had happened again. He wouldn’t call Solomon his friend, but he hoped that the hunter had some form of respect for him now, even if just a little.

“However, I do not fight to kill. I stated that if I won, I would walk away with his life intact. However, after the duel was over, I left him so incapacitated that there was no way for him to go back on his word for our terms of the duel.” He didn’t want to tell everyone exactly what happened, as he was sure that Solomon wouldn’t want his reputation too tarnished. But he had to tell them the basics of what happened.

It was now that Taured chuckled faintly. “I even walked away with a sample of venom from his weapon of choice. It was a good day, might I say.” Taured looked around, waiting for some kind of reaction from the hunters, Kaime, and Morona.[/size][/blockquote][/blockquote]

[Amur]

We gave Taured an incredulous look as he stated his reasons for leaving the mess on our floor and apologised for it. Perhaps it was the result of his youthful mind, but, we knew several; infinitely less draining and much cleaner spells to cause rapid death, that we were able to use on a whim, even when put on the spot as Taured had been. Nevertheless, we merely shook our head gently and remained sat in silence as Taured cleaned the mess from the floor, his spell leaving almost no evidence that Alma had even existed in the first place.

Taured gave us an almost confused look as Mathieu asked after Master Hunter Latro, but, answered the question anyway. We understood the nature behind the question, however, that was down to history that Taured had yet to learn. As Taured explained his meeting with Master Hunter Latro every one of our Allied Hunters –except Delian- recoiled, and almost immediately began speaking to each other in Nirvanian-Common before rapidly departing.

We blinked at the response.

“... I’m going to trust you with this one, Nemesis Morona.”
He uttered calmly before striding out of the audience house himself... Was he placing his trust in us to reveal the full scale of The Incident? Or was he simply giving us permission to divulge the current state of Hunting Clan Latro to Taured? He had not explained his decision to us very well, and, we knew that if we got the explanation wrong that there would likely be some kind of discussion, at-length, about how we should not have misunderstood what he meant.

We thought for a moment longer on our decision and deciding that it would be better to take the safest route and potentially under-inform Taured as opposed to riling the ire of our Allied Hunters and telling him too much.

“We apologise. They simply have a measure of concern, partially down to being brethren, as is to be expected, all Hunters will look-out for one-another. Their main concern, however, stems from the fact that that Hunting Clan Latro no longer exists... Master Hunter Solomon Wyvern-slayer Latro is the last known survivor of that clan, and up until very recently he has been thought to have been killed roughly three years ago.”
We stated calmly.