Just like the previous morning, he’d set up a sniper’s nest of sorts on the now-familiar tree branch overlooking the stream. This time, though, he’d come better prepared; he’d brought a blanket to use as padding. If he was going to be stuck up there for hours, he might as well make it as bearable as possible.
Every time a rabbit or some other small creature emerged from the thick underbrush, Hunter’s fingers tensed around his bowstring, and his heart leapt into his throat. But no luck. By the time darkness fell, he could’ve bagged a dozen rabbits, but the one he was after never showed.
All that waiting had frayed his nerves, and doubt had began to creep in. Maybe the rabbit had shown up, and he’d just failed to spot or recognize it. Maybe the same thing had happened that morning, too. Or maybe, after their close call the previous evening, it had said ‘screw this’ and moved to a quieter part of the woods.
Or maybe it was still down there, hidden beneath the undergrowth, peeking up at him and laughing its little furry ass off.
How could he even know?
Then he caught movement in the corner of his eye and the Rite of the Hunt flared to life in the back of his mind, sending chills up and down his spine.
His quarry had finally appeared.
He fumbled with his bowstring, but his hands were sore after hours of tension, his fingers stiff and sluggish. Below, the rabbit cocked an ear and froze, nose twitching as it sniffed the air. Maybe Hunter had made a sound, or maybe the creature had some preternatural danger-sense of its own.
In the end, it didn’t matter. What mattered was that it was a hair’s breadth from bolting back into cover, and Hunter was still caught in the middle of raising his bow. Desperate, he did the only thing he could to buy himself a few precious milliseconds. He pursed his lips and let out a sharp, piercing whistle.
His instinct proved right. Startled, the rabbit froze in place, perfectly motionless, ears flattened against the back of its head. It bought Hunter just enough time to level his bow and take the shot—though not enough to do it properly.
Over the past few days, his progress with the bow had been nothing short of spectacular; he’d gone from literally zero to an okay-ish novice archer in record time. Still, okay-ish and novice were the operative words, and that shot proved to be well beyond his skill.
The arrow struck the ground with a dull thud, burying itself in the dirt just inches from the cowering rabbit. For a heartbeat, it remained frozen. Then, its temporary paralysis shattered, it bolted, vanishing into the undergrowth in a blur.
“Fuck!” Hunter shouted, his temper finally snapping after hours of sitting still on that damn tree—again!—and he hurled the bow to the ground in frustration. “Fuck!”
As if to add insult to injury, a notification popped up on his HUD:
Your Archery is now at 12.
You tap into a well of sheer determination and ferocity in the face of adversity. Your anger, frustration, and sheer spite sharpen your focus, increasing your ranged attack accuracy and critical hit chance by 25%.
Hunter stared at it, seething. He cursed at himself, he cursed at the damn rabbit, and he cursed at Aumir for his bright ideas. What was the point of this hunt? What was the lesson here?
And more importantly, how was any of this supposed to make Herne more amenable to granting him a proper audience? To witnessing his Ascension? To amending that cursed accord of theirs? Was there any meaning to this foolishness at all, or was it just a bit of good old-fashioned hazing at his expense?
At that point, it didn’t matter. Getting that rabbit had become a matter of principle. Hunter refused to be outwitted, outmaneuvered, and outdone by a skittish ball of fur. Not like this. He jumped down from the tree, snatched up his bow, and stomped his way back to the cabin. Fifteen minutes later, he was back with reinforcements.
He’d tried to do things the proper way, Aumir’s way, and it had gotten him exactly jack shit. It was time to do what he should’ve done from the beginning. He didn’t even care that it was almost night; he was getting this rabbit, and he was getting it now.
This time, he didn’t bother with his usual perch on the tree branch. It was a good vantage point, but he had to stay on the ground to keep Fyodor under control. The direwolf, only too happy to come along to an evening outing, was by his side, bushy tail raised and swinging like a flag.
They took their place on a broad, flat rock by the water. It was nothing special, but for what Hunter had in mind, it would serve as well as any other place. He rested a hand on the direwolf’s back, closed his eyes, and let himself slip into a meditative state. With his Meditation skill sitting comfortably at his Rung’s soft cap of 25, emptying his mind had become second nature.
Once he’d set his Essence to cycling at a steady, easy pace, Hunter reached out through the mental link to Biggs and Wedge. The two ravens were perched somewhere high in the canopy above the rabbit’s nesting grounds, alert, focused, and ready for his orders.
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Flaring his Resonant Flow ability, he synchronized the frequency of his Essence with that of his familiars’. Thanks to their shared bond, the connection held strong, pulsing steady and clear between them despite the physical distance. In that state of resonance, sharing abilities, thoughts, and even senses between them became far easier. It wasn’t perfect, of course; but for what he had in mind, he hoped it would prove close enough.
His plan—more sheer improvisation than a proper plan, really—was simple, if a bit shaky.
It all hinged on the synergy between his abilities.
If he focused hard on the Rite of the Hunt, he could pick up a vague sense of his quarry’s direction relative to his own position. It wasn’t precise, unfortunately; more of a tug in the mind than a compass needle.
Then, if he could channel that tug through the senses of his familiars, he’d be able to compare it from multiple vantage points. With Biggs and Wedge positioned at different angles above the area, he could effectively triangulate the signal and pinpoint the exact location.
Granted, it was a bit of a reach, but he had no way of knowing whether it would work until he tried it. At this point, he was out of patience, out of time, and more than willing to gamble on a long shot.
Juggling between three distinct points of view while meditating, cycling his Essence, focusing on Resonant Flow and the Rite of the Hunt, and keeping an easily distracted juvenile direwolf from wandering off was, without a doubt, the greatest strain Hunter had ever put his brain under. They only silver lining was that, relatively speaking, he was in no rush. Whatever hidey hole the rabbit had retreated in, it wasn’t going anywhere anytime soon.
It took him the better part of a quarter hour just to figure out how to triangulate the signal he was getting from the Rite, and then just as long again to guide the two ravens through enough repositioning to narrow down the rabbit’s exact location. Fortunately, Fyodor didn’t give him any trouble. After the first ten minutes or so, he decided he was bored enough to flop down and take a nap. Hunter didn’t mind. He could work with that.
When he finally had the best guesstimation he was going to get, it was time for the next part of the plan: flushing his quarry out of cover.
The gloom of night wasn’t going to be a problem; thanks to Low-Light Vision, he and the ravens could make out details just fine. As for the direwolf, what little starlight filtered through the canopy and the occasional clearing along the stream seemed to be more than enough for him to navigate with ease.
Hunter reached into the small pouch hanging from his belt and pulled out a strip of Fyodor’s new favorite snack—lightly cured venison infused with Aether, something Aumir swore by. The direwolf caught the scent almost immediately, sniffing at the air in his sleep before stirring awake, ears twitching and nose already tracking.
“See this, boy? Want it?” Hunter wasn’t sure how much Fyodor actually understood, but he clearly had his full attention; his eyes were locked on the strip of meat, irises wide as saucers.
“Here’s what I want you to do. Go and make as much of a ruckus as possible. Fetch!”
Hunter tossed the treat in a wide arc toward the patch of undergrowth where he’d figured the rabbit was hiding. Accuracy wasn’t his top priority; Fyodor was the size of a small pony. When he plowed through that thicket, everything in there would be startled halfway to death, rabbit included.
Then, either the rabbit would bolt, playing right into the waiting talons of Biggs and Wedge, or it would stay put, and Hunter could move in and pick it off himself. Either way, this time, it wasn’t getting away.
Eyes locked on the treat, Fyodor tore through the vegetation like a russet-furred torpedo. Chaos followed in his wake; rabbits, squirrels, chipmunks, and other startled critters scattered in all directions, fleeing the thicket in a flurry of motion and panic, frantically looking for safer cover.
This was the hard part. Without the Rite of the Hunt, picking out his specific quarry in that exodus would’ve been next to impossible. Hunter did his best to focus his mind and Essence, honing in on the extrasensory tug. Even so, the odds of spotting the rabbit, nocking an arrow in time, and landing a shot were abysmally low.
That’s where Biggs and Wedge came in.
Their senses sharpened by Low-Light Vision and Rite of the Hunt, the two ravens scanned the fleeing throngs of critters from above, eyes sharp and minds attuned. Meanwhile, Hunter maintained his focus, continuing to triangulating the position of their quarry.
For a moment, the trace of their quarry remained still. Then, as Fyodor nosed around the undergrowth in search of the treat, the rabbit finally decided it was time to get the hell out of Dodge.
If Hunter had more time to prepare, he might’ve come up with a plan to corral the escaping rabbit; force it down a certain path, corner it, trap it. As things stood, though, there was no telling which way it would bolt. He had no choice but to put his faith in his familiars’ ability to track it, and hope they were up to the task.
As it turned out, they were.
“There! Rabbit! There!” Wedge cawed through the mental bond, his excitement overflowing. Both he and his twin dove from the canopy in unison, swooping in to intercept the unfortunate little creature.
If they’d taken the form of birds of prey, the hunt would’ve probably ended then and there. But without raptor-like talons and hooked beaks, Biggs and Wedge had to settle for pelting the rabbit with blasts of Ill Omen.
Even with that overkill, though, the rabbit’s speed and agility made it a tough target. It zigzagged through the undergrowth like a creature possessed, and it might easily have slipped away again.
But that’s when the poor thing’s luck finally ran out.
Whether out of some kind of familiarity or sheer dumb luck, the rabbit made a break for the stream, right where Hunter had been waiting. With no time to reach for his bow, he did the only thing he could: threw his arms over his head to make himself look bigger and screamed at the top of his lungs.
Ridiculous as it sounded, it actually worked. The rabbit skidded to a halt, frozen in place by sheer terror—just long enough for Biggs and Wedge to line up their shot and unleash a barrage of lime-green witchfire.
The blast of magic caught the critter square in the back. It dropped instantly, without a twitch or even a sound, its flight cut short mid-stride.
Just a second later, a notification flickered into view on Hunter’s HUD.
You have successfully completed a Hunt.
Your Rite of the Hunt is now at 5.
Your Rite of the Hunt is now at 6.
If Hunter had expected some rush of savage pride or triumph, it never came. Just a wave of relief, bone-deep tiredness, and a hollow pang of guilt and pity for the small, innocent creature whose life he’d just brutally taken.
He let out a slow breath and stopped his cycling, allowing his Essence to settle quietly in his channels. Then he lay back on the flat stone by the stream and let the cool night air brushing over him as his eyes drifted shut.
The hunt was over.
For now, that was enough.
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