[CRP] A misled vendetta

[Silence]

	What'd I do now? I mean, why challenge me teh a duel out of nowhere? Usually yeh at least know the guy yer challengin first, right? I mean, did I like call somebody yeh know something bad or stop yeh from doing something without knowin? Or is this just 'let's find some way teh beat up the street urchin when he's stronger than we are'?

	The best way to show how good you are is to duel a creature which would be more or less of a worthy opponent. To duel a new & a very kind creature with totally no strength or skills does not speaks good about the challenger.

Alder folded the letter from the human like creature and tried to figure out what he had done. Out of the blue, he'd been challenged to a duel, and when he had asked the reason behind it (in his own way), this had been all he had received. What was the guy on about? He seemed to be saying that a challenger had done some wrong... yet wasn't the other creature the challenger here?

Alder spent about five minutes reading and rereading the letter with an expression of passive curiosity before a frown slowly crossed his face. The fact that somebody could blame him for what he had done in that duel to him meant that the people of Widu were still just as low as ever in how they treated him. This was just when he was beginning to think that they might be starting to see that he was a person too, but apparently they still couldn't put their old hatred of Alder, the supposed changeling and street urchin who had lived off of the work of others for most of his life behind them.

Well, either that or this person was very very stupid. All the more reason for the boy to be annoyed. People who acted before thinking created the majority of the world's problems as far as he was concerned, and this person was clearly either just looking for an excuse to beat up the boy, which meant that they still were incapable of thought, or worse, had not even tried to get the story behind the duel before trying to get revenge. Hell, he hadn't even spoken to the person who Alder had apparently 'wronged', when, not only were duels a common place way to get stronger, but also, she had accepted it. That meant that she too was willing for the duel to go ahead. Even an idiot could make that conclusion, but apparently this challenger wasn't thinking. Well, this was almost certainly about his duel with the fairy or pixie or whatever they were called now.

Alder cursed softly, then went to the training ground as was his custom. He had long since passed the point where hacking at a wooden training dummy would do any good, but he still had to keep in practice. That was not his real reason for being here today though. He would spend three hours every day here, which was more than long enough to observe the comings and goings of other creatures. Now, the new guy with the sword... looked mostly like a human, but you could never be sure around here.

Once he turned up, Alder made his excuses and left, just to come back moments later from another direction and wearing a different form. He usually preferred not to use his abilities, but this was a special case. With this form, he sat down for five minutes and observed the entire training ground. The new guy was nothing special as far as Alder was concerned. Yes, he had some potential perhaps, but if Alder could be taught to fight, then everybody in the world could become masters with enough training. The man's stances were off in subtle ways that Alder was sure he could take advantage of, and his swings were slow and lacked power compared to what Alder knew he could do. In other words, he was not a threat.

With that in mind, Alder went and accepted his duel. It might have been easier to write him a letter explaining the situation, but he had tried that approach with many people, many times before, and it rarely worked. That meant that he might as well try an experiment now while he couldn't lose. The experiment was this: if somebody won't listen to reason, is it possible to beat reason into them? If so, what is the best way to do it?

The boy arrived at the arena an hour before the prearranged time, just as the sun was starting to go down. He was equipped with nothing but a dagger that was barely longer than two fingers placed end to end. The only remarkable thing about this dagger was that although it was nicked in many places, it was polished until it shone, with not a speck of rust on it. It was the weapon the boy had first used when coming to this arena, and while he had better equipment now, this was what he had brought with him today, and he had brought it for one reason only. As his opponent approached, he placed the dagger purposefully on the ground and opened his fists, falling back into a defensive stance. When his opponent attacked, he would slap the flat of his sword away or step aside if he could and then... wow, that man did look angry. Whatever, that would just make the experiment more conclusive.

Alder's hope was that if he could beat the man with no weapons, he'd be taken seriously. He had to beat the man first, make him realise how totally outclassed he was, and then maybe he'd listen once his rage had been replaced with whatever was left of his reason.

It was worth a try. Now Alder just waited for the arena master to give the signal to begin the duel.

[Orion]

Orion was one the of the very youngest residents of Widu and Kiene. The first thing he could remember is in the Widu temple. Unfortunately, Oron had no memories of the past or about him, so he tried to learn all about this world as much as possible.

In the last days and weeks saw too much bad dreams, even nightmares - so he was doing a lot of meditation at the Widu temple and tried not to go too often in the taverns. However, all the rare times when he went to the tavern, he get to know more new residents.

One nice day as he was walking out from the temple - he saw something very horrible - a creature known as Alder was dueling one of the town's newest residents - the kind Fairy was dueling him and was of course loosing badly.
How can someone be so cruel and challenge some who can't even defend themselves? He said it in loud voice becoming even more and more angry.

For the first time in his life while he was in Widu - rage and anger consumed him after seeing it and he thought of nothing more then throwing it all out at the creature known as Alder - so right away he issued a challenge letter to Alder and wanted to settle things with him in a duel.

As Alder accepted his challenge, Orion went to the arena where Alder was already waiting for him. He saw Alder put down his dagger and prepared to fight with fists. Orion was carrying his longsword along with him, but as he felt very angry, he did not thought about using it - his fists would do just fine there. So he left his longsword behind his back and prepared himself in attack stance and waited for the signal for the duel to begin - he sure was to charge first

As Orion prepared for his attack, Alder could feel something....unusual around Orion he may never have felt before.

[Silence]

Alder made a vague motion in the direction of his opponent's sword.

"Err... yeh know, yer supposed teh like... use that... yeh know, the ah... sharp pointy thing. I just thought I'd be fair like. If yeh really are angry at me, I thought I'd like... give yeh a chance."

Alder spoke slowly in case his opponent decided to charge at him while he was speaking. He expected him to draw his blade, but then the arena master gave the signal to start and his opponent charged towards him with far greater speed than he should have been able to. Alder was barely able to swat aside an attack towards his midsection with his left hand whilst moving right so that he would be on his opponent's left, where it would be harder for the man to attack him with his right hand side. Alder on the other hand, was ambidextrous and didn't mind using his left hand to deliver blows if that was what it took to win.

What he did not expect was for the young man to spin so quickly to counter attack that he was forced to bend his knees and duck whilst splaying his right palm against the man's chest to throw off his balance and aim, managing to avoid the blow by inches. Most inexperienced fighters would have considered this a victory. Alder did not. The motion had left him far too low and had been forced on him far too quickly so that he had been unable to compensate for his balance. His stance and his balance had both been thrown off and if the man so much as brought a knee up or an elbow down now, Alder would be totally unable to avoid it or block it and would not just be hit, but thrown to the floor as well, one of the worst possible places for him to be.

Alder moved as if he was going to dive right. His right leg snaked out as if leading his body, his eyes darted to the right. His hand came up as if to ward off blows coming from the left, as if he expected an attack to come from there, in which case moving to the right would be the right thing to do. His entire body language conveyed that he was going to go right, it was planned and the decision was made. It was, of course, a bluff, but a bluff that few except Alder could pull off and an equally small number could see through. Alder was a changeling, and the more you tried to see through his ruses, the more he could manipulate your viewpoint. A man so fuelled by rage as his opponent didn't have a chance. He was a changeling and so he could mimic movements in battle just as he could mimic mannerisms of a person he was impersonating, and right now, he was mimicking a fighter who was going right.

The ruse was over in moments. Alder's right foot hit the floor hard and he used it like a coiled spring, propelling him in a dive to the left. His opponent's attack came down just a little too far to the right to send him sprawling, and he was able to move quickly away and come up in a roll, reset his stance and prepare for the next attack.

That had been far too quick. This man had not been this physically capable when Alder had observed him earlier. In fact, he might actually be physically better at this than Alder was. That meant that things weren't going to be easy, but Alder had defeated much stronger foes than this guy before. Hell, he had managed to defeat a full fledged spell caster before and had even held his own against Teide a few times, although he had never beaten her. Somebody in this young man's state of rage would be totally unable to think straight, so...

Alder's gaze flickered to the floor, scanned it then to a coin that he was fiddling with that he seemed to have produced from nowhere. He then tossed the coin and said calmly "Tails". Of course it was another bluff to try to distract him, but of course, in a world where people used magic all the time, you couldn't just ignore a coin. Alder was far too far away to do anything, so the smart thing to do would be to watch him out of the corner of your eye whilst tracking the coin. Alder didn't care what his opponent did really. The coin was just meant to buy him a few moments. His opponent was probably watching for movements like bending down to pick something up to throw or sudden movements in a particular direction. Instead, Alder flicked fist sized rock from the floor into the air with a twist of his ankle, caught it on the top of his foot, and then in the blink of an eye, transferred it to his hand and threw it.

His opponent somehow realised what was going on and caught the rock before it hit him between the eyes. Alder couldn't help but wish it had gone maybe half a foot further before he had caught it. Then he would have scored a clean hit. No matter, the rock was not his real attack either. Alder continued his motion, flicking his ankle even further so that he kicked off his shoe, he continued spinning, using the momentum he had from throwing the rock, kicked his shoe into the air with his other foot, caught it with his other hand and threw that too, heel first.

Now the shoe itself was nothing but a crudely fashioned lump of leather than barely functioned at all and would cause next to no damage as a projectile. It was what was inside it that was the key. A dagger, hidden in the sole, was currently flying hilt first towards the rage filled young man. It was just a hilt, not a blade, but it would add weight to the attack which would be unexpected. It didn't matter though, as the man, still not wielding his sword, was able to avoid it entirely and looked like he was about to charge. Now that wouldn't do. Alder had the initiative right now, and he was damned if he was going to lose it.

Scooping up a fistful of dust from the floor, he scampered towards the larger man, tossed the dust before him, and then jumped, feet first towards him, planting both feet hard on his opponent's chest. It was not a trick he would usually try, but in this battle, he was aiming to create an impression. The disadvantage of that was that he ended the move flat on his back, having sacrificed his balance for the attack. He was hoping that the dust would blind the larger man for long enough for him to crawl away. As it turned out though, that was unnecessary. Taking a nine stone boy, moving at hight velocity and feet first straight to the chest had been enough to knock Alder's opponent down, and Alder, since he expected to find himself on the floor, was on his feet first.

Maybe this wouldn't be as difficult as he had thought. Still, why was this young man suddenly so much stronger than he had been in the training ground? And why was Alder's instinct for danger giving him feelings of imminent bad things?

A few feet away, a coin clinked to the floor, tails face up.

[Orion]

Before the signal was given for battle to start it seemed that Alder was trying to say something.

Alder made a vague motion in the direction of his opponent's sword.

"Err... yeh know, yer supposed teh like... use that... yeh know, the ah... sharp pointy thing. I just thought I'd be fair like. If yeh really are angry at me, I thought I'd like... give yeh a chance."

However Orion was so focused for the upcoming duel that he either did not hear or did not care about that. As the master gave signal for the duel to start, Orion charged in. He was so much more different then usual - he not much cared about the equipment he or his opponent had, nor cared about the surrounding and had only a single thought in his head - to charge in without thinking of any defense or consequences.

Some would say when a warrior becomes blinded by rage - this is a weakness of a warrior what could lead to his downfall. Of course they were right. However for Orion for some reason this worked a lot different - it gave him so much more strength, power, speed and he felt unstoppable.
Orion did not payed attention to the coin as he himself had not yet encountered any magic, so it was simple for him to catch the rock and evade the shoe which he did with so much more faster then he usually does on the training grounds.

Then suddenly Alder tossed the dust which made him close the eyes. Soon after that his opponent's feet hit his chest in the attack which was covered by dust. A very smart and tricky move. Alder sure expected Orion to loose his balance and fall or at least feel pain, however oh how wrong was he - Orion did not moved from where he was standing, nor felt any pain. Perhaps his rage and strong focusing and determination was far stronger then the inflicted damage or maybe something other? Not waiting for the dust to settle Orion launched a strong punch in the dust around the direction and place where his opponent had landed....like he was "sensing" or "foreseeing" where Alder was in the dust.

However Alder's warrior instincts of danger did not lied to him and his mysterious abilities to "change the course of the battle" in an unexpected movement made him to jump back right before Orion's strong punch hit the arena stone floor. The blow was so strong as his right hand made a smashed the stone floor not only making a hole in it but also making his right hand stuck deep in the floor. Such turns of events made Orion "remain still and confused" for a moment which was a perfect chance for Alder to go for offensive - after jumping back a bit he skillfully started to run towards Orion who still had his eyes closed from the dust and made strong punch with his right to his face, followed by another strong punch at his stomach and a fall-back jump back.

Two strong blows were delivered towards Orion and most warriors after that might not be able to stand up, however after receiving these blows made the opposite effect - it seemed like Orion either does not feel or care about them enough. With an angry scream he pulled his stuck right hand towards Alder through the stone floor, which caused not only the floor to be damaged more but also some of the stone shards from it fly towards his opponent while he rubbed his eyes with his left arm. Alder's mystical abilities and his instincts which told that he should make a fall-back jump paid off greatly as he has more time to swirl, dodge and jump away from the stone shards flying his way.

As Alder was finished evading, Orion had his eyes open and he once again charged in with his left hand ready for a strong punch.

[Silence]

Alder tried desperately to reset his stance in the few minutes available to him. It was rapidly becoming clear that if he got hit even once by this man, it would all be over, and the arena master might not be able to stop the duel before death or permanent injury. That explained where the danger was coming from.

Alder stepped to the side as the larger creature came charging towards him in an attempt to stay out of his range. However, without time to reset his stance and regain his balance, the boy's usual sense of timing and at least decent technique turned into a stumble, and the stumble turned into a fall. Alder reached out before him to stop himself from hitting his head on the ground, splayed his palms against the ground, and would have been quickly up again, were it not for the fact that his hand gave out and Alder was reduced to a fit of foul language as red flashed before his eyes.

Had he not been so full of adrenaline, Alder would have noticed earlier that his knuckles were actually split where he had hit the larger creature. Somehow, he had done more damage to himself than the other one. Bearing this in mind, he gave a silent order to all of the beetles that made up his body. "Report... how bad are things?"

The rush of information wasn't as bad as he had feared. Only his right hand was damaged, and although he had not been able to evade all of the shards of stone, he had managed to avoid any worrying wounds. There were a few minor scratches from them, but most had simply bounced harmlessly off his cloak. Only about three of the wounds were bleeding enough to even consider, and then only enough to make a note to pour some vinegar on them later and not to put any weight on his bare foot for fear of driving the shard of stone further in. Right, mind back in the moment...

Alder shook himself back into consciousness just in time to notice a kick coming in towards his still prone form. Apparently his fall had been enough to avoid the initial brunt of the charge, but he was still far from safe. Maybe it was worth performing another experiment. Alder cursed inwardly with a few words that he had only heard once coming from an especially drunk sailor. There was no time to avoid the kick at this point, even if he hadn't been on the floor. So instead of avoiding it, he gave a second order to his beetles.

His body seemed to sag as the kick connected, as if he had been made of some kind of goo. Instead of resisting the kick, he caused his body to cushion it. That reduced the initial impact. A moment later, the momentum of the kick had thrown Alder some distance from his opponent and he again had room to push himself to his feet and reset his stance before ripping off a strip of cloth from his cloak and using it to cover his fists so that he didn't wound them like that again.

"What the hell are you made of? And why in Zachrin's name didn't I notice it before?"

Alder shook his right hand, sending a few dead beetles from the damaged area away from his hand. All that an observer viewing him in the dim light would have seen was a few bugs falling from his right arm.

'Gonna have teh ask for some help here Munay... you can control these bug things, right? Can yeh take some of em from somewhere I don't need and replace those ones? I can't spare the focus right now.'

Alder's necklace was moderately surprised at his mental message, more at the fact that he had figured out what it had been doing all this time in such a short time than at his request. However, in its usual accepting and loving way, it conveyed via a series of images that it would do so and that it was proud of him for working out its trick so quickly.

Alder spat to the side to pull his concentration to the current situation and out of his thoughts, then readied himself for Orion's next charge.

[Orion]

Orion did not actually much cared about stone shards doing any damage to him - as long he get his hands out, it was all what mattered for him to be able to do his next attack. There been something very strange going on with Alder, however Orion not much payed attention to it, nor much cared what happened - he was focused ONLY on delivering his next attack.

After Orion successfully get close to Alder and was able to make his kick, for some reason it was far less effective then the stone floor of the arena. Since his opponent was still standing, that meant only one thing - the duel continued and Orion charged in again, this time again with his fists. As he was close enough, he delivered a powerful blow.

Since from this duel Alder has learned a lot already, he understood that a direct confrontation may not be the best option. But some of tricks worked very well. As Orion delivered his blow, Alder tried to pretend his opponent that he cannot evade his punch in the face, but when he saw the attack coming, he used his mystical abilities to duck as the punch went right above his head. After missing the punch, Orion used his left hand to deliver his next attack from above to Alder while he was ducked. However, this was exactly what Alder was waiting for and was ready. He once again focused his strength to use his mystical abilities to move from ducked position on his arms and with their help jump back and on his legs.

This result Orion delivering another blow and hole to the floor of arena. While he was pulling it out, Alder used his chance to charge in and deliver a strong kick to Orion's back which was followed by another jump back just in case to evade the possible counter attack. Orion did not bother to look for Alder while he pulled his arm out, so the kick was delivered successfully. But just as the last time, Orion did not cared about that or did not felt it. He turned where Alder landed and was ready for the next charge.

Orion so far had made 3 strong punches to the stone floor and received some blows which all so far has allowed him to put his rage, anger and energy for something other then his opponent. But the duel still continued.

[Silence]

Don't let him get a hit.

This was a matter of brute force against skill and planning. To be fair to the guy, Alder hadn't even expected this to be a challenge. Yet he was having to focus here. One hit and it would be all over. If he let the man have one clean hit, Alder doubted he would be in any state to stop him from getting another. With that in mind, he had been keeping out of range of him, using hit and run tactics when possible and just focussing on defence when need be. Since the start of this fight, Alder had done away with his reckless tactics like the double footed kick he had done at the start of the fight.

Alder's opponent charged again. Was he really totally unaffected by all of the blows that he had taken? Most people would at least start to slow down at this stage.

Alder pivoted on his heel and sidestepped the man's charge, swaying his head out of the way of a punch that was thrown sideways in his direction as he did so. As soon as the immediate danger was over, Alder raised his leg and used the momentum of the already in place spin to throw out a spinning kick in the other man's direction. It barely made contact. In fact, Alder doubted that it would have done anything, but it was still something.

If he could just stay mobile and keep nicking the larger creature, he would eventually win, no matter how strong he was. Float like a butterfly and pinch like a flea... it would work.

[Orion]

Orion did not feel or did not care the last kick of Alder and once he jumped off and back - Orion again turned against him. All this duel Orion was just charging and did not thought about receiving any damage. However after the last kick, he once again started to think about what he saw....the small fairy.....and the challenger.

As some more thoughts crossed his mind, Orion seems stopped and did no charged in any more. While he was charging Alder, never ever he had stopped to think a bit. Orion watched over the arena and could not believe himself what was happened...the fairy...she was not dead and that means, she soon can be healed by Widu healer, the queen Victorious. After Orion thought about his opponent...and why he attack him with such anger...Alder may not been nice to the fairy, but he also was not an enemy.

While Orion been thinking about it all, his rage seemed calmed down greatly, but so his speed and powers - in fact - he has used so much of it that he felt a great bit tired. Orion's high speed and strength have returned to normal. But the duel was still open and continued. As Orion been just standing there and not attacking, Alder charged in him. Once was close to him, made a strong punch in his chest.

The speed of Alder was much greater then his, even for Orion with full strength and power. But he was drained and no way he could evade this. In the last moment Orion crossed his both arms and put forward to deflect Alder's blow. Orion felt his strong blow and his defense just helped to make it cause less pain and less damage and remain standing there. However, the attack did not stopped there as Alder twirled around while preparing a powerful kick to Orion's face which he had no strength to endure, nor speed to evade or make another block.

Alder's kick made him to receive lot of damage due to his very drained body and made Orion fall back on the arena floor. Before he did not even felt it, but now his body refused to move. It seems that the lesson he learned about the balance of the energy & power was true - if you use all fast, you will have nothing left later. There was nothing to do about it now, but some nice meal and nice sleep in the Wide orchard would make him feel fine and well again.

This duel certainly was over for Orion and he has lot of things to think about. He clearly was no match for Alder in his usual state without the strange powers.

"Alder wins" shouted the Arena master.

[Silence]

Alder reset himself into a neutral stance, no longer the sort he would use for combat. That was it, it was over. For some reason, his opponent had stopped being a human brick in those last few moments. Hopefully he hadn't broken anything, but if he had, so be it. The young man deserved it as far as Alder was concerned for all of the trouble he had caused Widu's street urchin for no reason other than he hadn't bothered to think or gain the information before acting. Alder threw down a piece of paper with a look of disgust towards Orion and walked away. If this were anybody else, he would have commented that he had fought well and asked where he had gotten that strength from and if he had been smart enough to hide it from the street urchin earlier. However, he was trying to find out if you could beat somebody into the point at which they would listen to reason, and being nice was not going to help that. The paper was a note, written in Alder's usual handwriting where each word seemed to be written by a different person.

	I take it this was all about the fairy. If that's the case, then yeh should probably talk teh her and get the whole story before yeh come teh me demandin some kinda justice. The whole story is this: She told me she wanted teh hunt Xanthereels at some point and I warned her that was a bad idea unless she wanted teh spend a long time trainin. Eventually, I ended up tellin her that the quickest way teh get better at fightin is teh go teh the trainin ground every day and duel somebody whenever yeh can teh severe injury in a stat based duel. So, yeah, I beat up the fairy, but yeh can ask around if yeh like. Usually, I'm the one getting beat up in the arena, and I just go back as soon as I got enough strength in me teh have another try, just so I can keep gettin better. That's what Reaver, my teacher had me do, and that's what I do do, and fact is, it works. I offered the fairy the same deal, made sure she understood what she was going in for, and then gave her a duel so that she could learn as well. Got it? So calm down... if yeh like, I'll offer yeh the same deal. Any time yeh want a lesson in how teh do stuff, give me a duel and I'll see what I can do.

Only after he was walking away did Alder allow himself to breathe normally. If his opponent had managed to stay like that for some time, he wasn't sure if he could have beaten him... in fact, he probably couldn't have. All he had managed to do up until the point that his opponent lost his power was just stay away and home for the best. Well, it was the older creature's choice what he wanted to do now. If he still tried to attack Alder for duelling the fairy, this experiment, and clearly the older creature's brain as well, would be failures.

[Orion]

As the battle had ended, Orion slowly tried to stay up. He had a lot of injuries but somehow he was not too upset about it. It seemed like Orion somehow enjoyed it all....too much for a normal human. Orion noticed a letter written by Alder and took it for the reading.

As he read the letter, he realized that this more or less seemed his own fault and that there is still SO many things he has to learn about things work in this world. He still was new here, but there was no reason for him to keep fighting Alder.

I see it is my fault and i must learn a lot. Anyway, well fought! And I will be looking forward for a rematch when i will get my mind & many thoughts in order!

There was some wounds and injures Orion had to take care and even more things to think about. The Widu orchard seemed most perfect place for all that.