Coming round sometime later Jarrod took stock of his situation, casting his gaze skyward, he saw the sun had passed its zenith and was already well into the afternoon.

On the bright side his arms and neck had stopped bleeding and had started scabbing over. His shirt was utterly ruined, crusted with blood that had been in him twenty-four hours earlier. Stripping it off, he pulled his only spare from his pack, now presentable again in case he did by whatever miniscule chances existed obtain some company. Dragging himself to his feet, wondering how he managed to survive a bush coming alive, ensuring her was free of barbs, bits of bush-monster and grass, he re-orientated himself and set off continuing Westward. Jarrod was keen to get at least a few hours walking in before the sun started its inevitable descent.

Humming contently to himself, yet another treasure obtained resting with a reassuring weight in his pocket, even if he had no idea just what the Chaos-sworn thing did. Finding a small copse of tree’s this time as the sun started its descent, Jarrod filled his waterskins and got ready to turn in for the night. This night though he decided to treat himself, gathering together as many dry and dead twigs and large pieces of wood he could find he managed to get a small fire started with minimal effort. This in turn had several larger pieces of wood fed into it, until he left a pair of large logs on the top letting them burn all night long. He slept much better, had no visitors in the night and in the morning work up well rested and much happier with his situation.

The next two days passed much the same, filled with gentle strolling, under a gentle warm sky. Waterskins filled by the river as needed, bread and fruit consumed as he went with small stands of trees or large boulders sheltering him at night, with a fire both nights. It was such a gentle nice walk that if he let himself suspend belief for a few minutes, he could easily be the only person on this shard right now. Then on day five something new happened, he had choices. A few hours into travelling Jarrod had a fork in the road, either following the river downstream further which would be the left-hand fork, or taking the right hand fork up and over a hillock climbing into some slightly higher hills as it went. There was no signage and, in his haste, to leave Woodend a few days ago he had forgotten to ask directions to Stonemaul. In the end his stomach chose for him, whilst his water supply would hold steady if he followed the river, he was running ever lower on food, down to his last few bits of fruit. If he took the left fork and followed the river he would eventually come across a caravan, a trading post or even a town using the waterways. Into the hills was the great unknown and he didn’t have a gut feeling either way.

Decision made he took the left-hand fork and carried on following the river downstream taking note of the changing landscape. The land was starting to look for lack of a better term slightly more civilised. The grass was slightly shorter, the trees seemed to be trimmed and there was evidence of old campfires here and there. Faith in his decision growing, especially that he would soon find food more substantial than three slightly wormy and mealy apples he carried on. Hours passed, boredom slowly beginning to set in. He was startled out of his reverie by a system message DING.

Due to a significant amount of walking you have exacerbated your light sprain.

You now have a moderate sprain. -10% to walking speed.

Due to a larger amount of walking done over the past 5 days than you have completed in the previous 12 months you have achieved a boost to your CON of +1.

If Jarrod didn’t know that it was frankly impossible, he entertained the idea that the system was being sarcastic with him! Still that CON boost was nice and would make up for the boredom and drudgery of the past few days.

Then for the second time in two days Jarrod found yet another new situation on his long walk! As evening was settled in and the sun was starting to threaten to set, he saw in the distance a thin plume of smoke. That meant at the least other sentient creatures, at its best it meant humans or elves or dwarves. His mind settled, he would either barter for food, or offer services he was going to get his stomach filled tonight.

Striding into a clearing with a number of oak trees forming a barrier against the elements he saw sat around a roaring bonfire a number of figures, all in various states of relaxation.

“Hi, hi there. Oh, excuse me, hello?”

“What? Oh, it’s only a boy, stand down lads. Yes boy, what are you doing here? Are you lost? Where’s your parents?”

Bristling and becoming slightly surly Jarrod snapped back.

“Mm not a boy. I’m awakened. My names Jarrod and I was hoping to share your meal this evening. I can pay for it, or I can stand guard tonight or something”

“Oh-ho! Jarrod, no need to get so grumpy, we’re not out to get you. You just look a little young to be awakened that’s all, you must only have done so recently. Now you say you can pay? Well tell you what, let’s see the colour of your silver first and then yeah, we can get you a bowl of this most appetizing stew!”

Jarrod fished a pair of silver coins out from his pouch and handed them over

“Thank you. Sorry I didn’t catch your name there, what was it again?”

“Reason you didn’t catch it is cos I never told you rich-boy. My name is Francis, but around here in these parts I go by The Butcher as well.”

“Well pleased to meet you Francis, you and your gang? Club? Friends. You and your friends here are the first ones I have met in nearly five days straight.”

“Give him his stew boys, then he’s on his way”

Jarrod was really after a place to sleep tonight as well, a chance to talk with some other humans, but the more he looked over this motley collection of rag-tag folks the less he was enthused by that prospect. He wasn’t even entirely sure he wanted the stew now, but it had been paid for, so he might as well tuck in. A roughly carved wooden bowl was shoved in his hands with an equally rough spoon. The stew that slopped into the bowl was a greasy grey in colour, which was honestly the very first time in his life Jarrod had seen food be that colour. In it floated some bits of meat, or what he assumed to be meat that looked more gristle than anything along with a few chunks of unidentifiable vegetables.

Smiling lightly at the “chef” he grinned, tried to bear it and ate the stew as fast as he could. Even if it was probably the single most unappetizing meal he had ever consumed, it was warm, it had meat in and it was better than travelling rations that he had subsisted on for days now. Eating his fill, he looked around again at the group of folks in the clearing, noticing more and more details. Not one of them was clean, but not just with the odd bits of dust on their clothes. Fingernails were dirty, their clothes unkempt as well as unwashed. Their hair was greasy and stringy, the whole lot of nearly a dozen looked underfed and they were starting to eye him hungrily. Their eyes were bloodshot in places, all of them had the ruddy red cheeks of heavy drinkers and their equipment was poorly made and the maintenance on it was even worse.

Once he had eaten his fill, Jarrod handed back the empty bowl, nodded to the group and left the clearing, throwing a quick thanks over his shoulder.

The moment he was out of sight of the clearing, he started to jog, he was admittedly spooked. He was unsure of what the men were, what it was that the butcher butchered and why with the river right there none of the men had even washed. All that aside, he had an uneasy feeling, it settled in the pit of his stomach and would not go away when he thought about them.

Gaining some distance from the clearing, taking a few bends in the road Jarrod stopped and assessed where he was. He needed to go to sleep but did not want to advertise his position with a fire. He had no feeling or prickling sensation that he was being watched, so wanted to get under cover sooner rather than later. He found a large gorse bush around 50 metres away from the road, where he thought in the dark, hiding underneath no one would be able to spot him.

He wormed his way in, scratching his arms and legs, catching a bramble to his face for his troubles but soon he was completely underneath. He even managed to shift around a few rocks that were underneath his back as he laid down, wrapped in his cloak. He settled in for what he was sure would be a fairly uncomfortable sleep.

He awoke an hour or two before the light of dawn even broke the darkness of night. It was unusual for him to awaken before the sun crested the horizon, especially without cause, casting around he couldn’t hear what had brought him back to consciousness, whereas sight was out of the question. A few moments passed, and then he heard in the distance a series of crunches. Twigs snapping, rocks being kicked, people unable to see where their feet were in the dark.

“Yeah, the boss said to find him, his purse had more coins in, if we get rid of the little bastard, we get it all. Yeah, yeah don’t worry. He’s probably just a common thief, no one really walks for five days at that age, with that much money without a guard, or being part of a caravan unless they got it through illicit means.”

Jarrod’s blood ran cold. His breathing caught in his throat, and he stopped moving entirely. He was focused on breathing as silently as possible and making sure he made as little noise as it would be possible to do so. The footsteps became slightly closer but in a meandering fashion, they were not heading directly towards him as far as he could tell.