Notes on Monster Hunting

by Chad Retterath

  Oitter leaned closer to me. “Nice speech. Really riled up their spirits.”

  “You think you can do better?”

  “No, I actually thought it was very nice. And I’m not really a leader.”

  I laughed. “You think I am? I became a sergeant out of necessity.”

  Oitter shook his head and watched the trainees stand as Palon gave orders.

  “You’re a leader. You’ll realize it someday.”

  We had ten logs in our area set up, so we split the soldiers into groups of two. No two roles were at the same log to teach them how to fight alongside a different person better. A heavy with a regular, a munitions with a marksman, and so on. Palon led them in some basic exercises while the rest of us watched and judged what we were working with. I could finally see the title of elites, as these people knew how to handle weapons.

  “You can move on, Palon. Basics won’t be a problem.”

  He nodded. “Who here has seen a proper monster? The word is thrown out all the time, but a monster is just an animal that people are afraid of. So, anyone see one before?”

  A few people shook their heads, but nobody properly responded.

  “Claws and fangs are the two most common things to watch for when fighting a monster. They’re always sharp and often huge. Which means you should always avoid being within biting range.”

  Palon showed them how to attack against a creature that’s bigger than a person. Since most of us don’t use shields, he had to remember how to fight without one during his lesson. I enjoyed watching him teach the soldiers. Cremn and Palon were always our best fighters. Palon is simply amazing with a sword.

  “It isn’t fencing. You need to watch the claws or fangs or anything dangerous on the creature, but you will need to be the aggressive one. Counter attacking a hungry animal isn’t possible because it’ll keep attacking once it starts. The faster you kill it, the less time it has to kill you.”

  Palon was wearing his armor without a helmet and was swinging his sword around while he was teaching. His hair was quickly covered in sweat and became disheveled. I stopped him and gave him some water while Ralet gave a soldier a waterskin to pass around.

  The lesson continued, and I just sat in the grass beside Ralet, Kully, and Oitter. Their faces became pink from burns, but I kept my hood on and felt great. The sun wasn’t as hot as other days, but there were no clouds in the sky to offer a break from the light. Skrale came up behind me at about midday and placed his hand on my shoulder.

  “Let’s break for lunch. Then I’m going to talk to all the soldiers together after.”

  “What about?”

  “We keep calling these creatures monsters, so I want to give them a real example of something we’ve fought. You can join me if you’d like.”

  “What are you going to talk about?”

  “Haven’t decided. Any ideas?”

  I stood and pulled my hood down. Skrale’s eyes moved around my wild hair and a small smirk moved the edge of his mouth.

  “I already showed them our scars and talked about the mason to my group, so maybe a witch?”

  Skrale nodded. “Always terrifying. Let’s do that.”

  I let Palon finish what he was doing before I called for a stop. Army chefs had prepared a basic meal for the soldiers outside the west gate. We were offered some, but Skrale instead had the scouts make food. Since we wouldn’t need the scouts to go find contracts for a while, he thought this would be a better use of their time and still give them a reason to be paid. It wasn’t great food, but if they do it everyday they’ll eventually learn to make it better. They served us slices of pork with some stringy green vegetable. Oitter was relieved. He had enjoyed sitting in the sun all morning.

  Skrale called everyone over when most people had finished eating. There was at least four hundred people gathered around. It was a big group, and it was only the first. After five days, we’ll switch to a new group to train, then another until everyone in the army that Krellick chose has had some level of training.

  “Hello,” said Skrale loudly. He stood on top of a crate, which basically made him as tall as Teke. “Sergeant Beatrice and I will tell you about a creature. We want part of the training to be learning what these monsters can be, so everyday we’ll share a story about a real creature we’ve fought before. Today, we’ll talk about a witch. Anyone hear of a witch before?”

  A few hands rose.

  “Beatrice, it’s all you.” Skrale stepped off the crate.

  “Am I supposed to stand on that?”

  Skrale nodded.

  I climbed on top of the crate and looked over the field of people. Four hundred sounded like a lot, but they didn’t take up much room when they sat close together. Krelik and some other men were standing in the back again. I pulled this journal out and flipped back until I found the witch entry from Skrale’s book.

  “You’ve all seen spiders, right?” Heads nodded. “A witch is basically a giant spider. Really giant. About as tall as I am on top of this box when it’s in its normal form. But witches disguise themselves as almost anything. The last witch we fought, which was in western Tullinbran, was hiding as an old lady. When a witch moves into a new area, it kills something or someone and takes its place. So a witch had killed an old woman and then killed anyone that visited her. To make it worse, a witch has the ability to control minds.” I waved Skrale over and crouched beside him. “Can I talk about Jerum?” I asked quietly.

  “Yes, but they don’t need to know all of it.”

  I nodded and stood back up. “The first witch our company fought took control of a hunter, who ended up being killed in the fight. We lost one of our own because he couldn’t stop attacking his friends. They have eight legs that each end with a tip sharper than a spear and their mouths are filled with fangs.”

  Someone in the front raised his hand.

  “Yes?”

  “How do you even fight something like that?”

  Skrale pulled off his shirt. The gash from Jerum’s sword and a collection of new scars from the last witch hunt spotted his chest and arms.

  “You fight the mind control. Each of these spots is a place she stabbed me. My legs have some scars as well. Our lead medic created a potion that helped me fight the mind control by entering a rage.”

  “You fought one on our own?” asked the same man.

  “No. Widdy and Beatrice were far away with crossbows with Groose and his bombs. Teke was ready to patch me up after and we had even more hunters ready.”

  “But you still walked up to one and killed it?”

  “Yes, he did.” I said. “One of the most incredible things I’ve ever seen.”

  Skrale smiled and stepped back to let me continue.

  “Witches are considered to be a ‘must kill’ because they are guaranteed to always be a threat to any people nearby. It’s unknown where they actually come from or how they reproduce, so they often appear unexpectedly. Lucky for all you, witches don’t usually appear this far east.”

  “We don’t expect that you’ll ever have to fight a witch, but we want you to understand that creatures of all types exist throughout the world and we want you to be ready to fight them when you’re confronted by your enemy. Using creatures within an army is unusual and cruel, so we’ll share a new creature each day until we feel you’re ready to expect anything.”

  Skrale dismissed everyone back into our squads to continue the day’s training. Palon grabbed a snack, even though we just ate, and sat with the rest of us farther away than we were before. Groose was going to teach bomb safety to everyone before focusing on the munitions specialists. Oitter wasn’t excited to help. He expressed his discomfort and worry for his health. I reminded him that he could be cooking for the company everyday instead. They started by gathering everyone behind Groose as he pulled a firebomb out of his bag. He lobbed it at one of the logs. Fire quickly shot out and up. The log and the grass around were all burning as the fire spread.

  “See? That wo
uld hurt if it hit you.”

  Oitter groaned and took another step away from Groose.

  Groose threw another bomb at the log. The heat and the light disappeared almost immediately as the torol powder extinguished all the flames.

  Groose turned to the four munitions people. “Always keep a few torol bombs as extras. If it’s all you have left, throw it at the eyes of the creature because it could blind them. At the very least, the impact of the powder exploding from the shell will disorient them for some time.”

  I leaned over to Ralet and whispered, “That’s actually a really clever idea. Why has he never done that?”

  “I was thinking the same thing.”

  Groose grabbed an orange bomb out of the bag.

  “Oh shit,” I said.

  “Oh shit,” said Palon.

  The four us stood and ran backwards. Groose instructed the soldiers to take a few steps back, which we knew wouldn’t actually be enough. Oitter swore a few times and turned to face us. Ralet waved at him. Oitter stuck his middle fingers up at us.

  “Rude,” said Kully.

  Groose shifted the tellick bomb around in his hands before throwing it through the air. It struck the log and erupted into a small ball of fire as stones flew out with chips of wood from the shattered log. All the soldiers ducked and covered themselves. Groose just put his forearm in front of his eyes. The explosion was loud enough that everyone else briefly stopped training and looked at us. I waved to Heff, who was laughing.

  “That’s a tellick bomb. As you can see, it killed the log. It will kill most things it hits.”

  “Yep,” said Kully to the three of us. “That log is really dead, Groose.”

  Oitter whispered something into Groose’s ear. Groose shrugged, pulled out a piece of jerky, and handed it to Oitter. The scout looked at the jerky, then at Groose, then at us. I’ve never seen a man look so genuinely confused.

  We laughed and walked back to the soldiers. A few of them had some small scrapes and cuts from the shrapnel, but it wasn’t serious. Groose later told me he used the last tellick bomb he made because it had more powder and less shrapnel than the others.

  Oitter walked over, still holding the jerky and sighed. “Can I talk to you privately for a moment?”

  We walked away and I leaned over to look at the jerky.

  “I don’t know why he gave this to me.”

  “It’s Groose. Nobody ever knows why he does anything.”

  Oitter pulled both knives out of their sheaths and effortlessly moved them around his hands.

  “You know, I can fight. I’d like to help teach anything else. Groose’s helper isn’t my kind of job.”

  “I know. It’s only temporary. Who would you prefer to work with?”

  Oitter sheathed his knives. “Anyone else.”

  “Stick with me for now. We’ll figure it out.”

  “Thanks, sergeant.” Oitter smiled. His face was always freshly shaven, leaving his cheeks and neck a little pinker than the rest of his face. It made him look young, though I knew Oitter was older than me by a few years or more.

  Groose took the four munitions people to the side to learn more about individual bombs and powders, so we took everyone else to focus on some specialty work. Palon had the heavies hold a shield and push each other over. Kully started with sewing, as that was too common on battlefields, and Ralet had the marksmen use crossbows for now. I had the sergeant and corporal of each group with me, plus Oitter.

  “You need to be the eyes and brain of everyone else. People will get confused and scared, but as long as they have your orders to follow they’ll be fine. It’s when they don’t know what to do anymore that they panic and make mistakes. Corporals, if the sergeant is in anyway unable to give an order you need to be ready to step in and take control right away. In a few days we’ll do some exercises where you need to give orders, but for now you should watch the others to learn what they’re good at. See what they can all do, so you know who to call to handle a situation. For me, Palon is always the one I call when I know we need a defense or an attack. He can do both. I call Groose when we need something destroyed or creative solutions. And so on. You need to know everyone in your squad if you’re going to order them around. So go watch.”

  They walked off and spent some time watching and even participating in some of the training. I sat down and relaxed. The sky had a few clouds slowly moving above me.

  Oitter sat beside me. “Tough life for a sergeant, huh?”

  “Want to go back with Groose?”

  He put his hands up and shook his head. “I’ll just sit here silently.”

  I finally caught up with my writing as the sun continued its journey through the sky. I called for an end to the day and dismissed the soldiers for the night. They all looked exhausted, but satisfied. We went back to camp, where we’re waiting for some stew to cook. Palon wanted to cook some because he liked the food I bought and thought he could make something good. It smells nice. It’s early for dinner still, but we’re all so hungry. The other squads have returned to their fires and the smell of food is everywhere. Jenn came around and said that Skrale needed someone from each squad to help collect firewood in the morning. Ralet volunteered immediately, which was nice.

  Oitter is fitting in nicely. It’s not like he’s someone new for us to get to know. Just someone else to have around and help out. I want to follow Skrale’s example and leave things for someone to see if someone ever reads this.

  Year 546 - Forty days before Midyear. Current Company Structure

  First Squad:

  Skrale - Captain

  Teke - Sergeant

  Orkin - Corporal

  Widdy - Marksman

  Trennor - Munitions

  Second Squad:

  Lekk - Sergeant

  Urny - Corporal

  Rux - Heavy

  Henli - Medic

  Carner - Munitions

  Third Squad:

  Heff - Sergeant

  Iliun - Corporal

  Rexel - Heavy

  Lopuk - Medic

  Wennel - Munitions

  Fourth squad:

  Beatrice - Sergeant

  Ralet - Corporal

  Palon - Heavy

  Kully - Medic

  Groose - Munitions

  Oitter - Other?

  Scouts:

  Jenn

  Prenn

  Yutt

  Day 163

  We’ve continued training the same group of people for two more days. My group has learned quickly. I can’t speak for the other squad’s trainees or Skrale’s platoon. The munitions volunteers really admire Groose. This morning he brought everyone studying munitions into town to do another demonstration of how to build the different types of bombs. Krelik and some other high ranking military members watched and took notes. They are eager to learn and I think they intend to produce enough to use throughout the army.

  Skrale isn’t happy about it, but he’s not surprised. He knew how amazing the munitions were when he first recruited Groose.

  Teke ran a similar workshop with Kully, Henli, and Lopuk for all the medic trainees. Even the medics that trained before attended and probably learned a lot from Teke.

  We only have one more day with these people before we move to a new group to start training again. Ideally, everyone we train will keep it up while we’re working with other groups.

  We ended early today because of the demonstrations. Ralet and I walked through town to the east gate and out a little ways. More farms stretched all the way to the horizon. I think the whole city is surrounded by farms for miles. The dark shapes of farmhouses sit on the horizon so it looks like they are in the middle of the fields.

  Ralet stopped at a butcher’s on our way back and bought five steaks. The butcher was a fat man with long arm air. I stepped out of his shop almost as soon as I entered. Everything was covered in grime. It wasn’t what I wanted to see while buying food. Ralet didn’t seem to mind, or he didn’t vocalize his d
iscomfort. He had been quiet lately while he focused on training the soldiers. He did a good job with the marksmen work without having much experience leading groups. It was needed practice for him.

  Palon excitedly took the steaks and immediately began cooking them. Kully rummaged through our supplies until he found the last of our beer. I haven’t bought any drinks in the last few days, so we’re starting to run out. Heff slowly walked up and loudly sniffed the air.

  “That smells good.”

  We all silently stared at him. He smiled and ran his hand over his head.

  “Any chance I can trade someone for part of one of those?”

  “What do you have?” I asked.

  “Apple pie.”

  I looked at the steaks cooking over the fire. “Deal. Mine isn’t cooking yet, so get the pie and bring it over. We’ll split it in half.”

  “Trading steak for pie?” asked Palon. He seemed offended.

  Heff gave me half a pie for a half my steak, which didn’t seem to even out. It was a lot of pie, so I split it with everyone in Fourth.

  “Where did you get this?” I asked with a mouth full of food.

  “A baker let me taste some as I walked through town. It was good, so I just bought a full pie.”

  Skrale walked up and cocked his head as he looked at Heff, obviously confused.

  “Evening, captain,” said Heff with some chewed food still in his mouth.

  “What are you doing?”

  Heff held up a slice of pie. “Eating dinner. Want some pie?”

  Skrale still looked confused, but he walked up and took the slice from Heff. He sat down and took a huge bite. “This is good pie.”

  We all nodded and grunted as we kept eating. After we finished, Heff returned to his squad and Skrale asked me to walk with him. The moonlight was bright enough for us to easily walk through the fields. I didn’t know where we were going. I just let him guide me.