Chapter 2–Bad ideas

"Fi-rah!"

Shit he heard that.

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A large shuriken still sticking into his back, Spirit Breaker wheeled and charged, while Gondar fled back into the forest, his thoughts racing nearly as fast as his feet. He'd never, in all his life, run so fast.

Mental note. Shuriken into back: not effective against extra-dimensional monster-cow.

Keep running. Just a little further…

He heard the nine foot bull-man trampling the underbrush behind him, leaped… and his trap sprung. A net made of steel wire, twisted together to form cable, tangled the bull up and pinned him to the ground.

"Haha!" chuckled Gondar, approaching Spirit Breaker. "Gotcha!" he whispered in the bull's ear as he struggled and, just barely avoiding Spirit Breaker's flailing arms, used his crescent moon blade to slice the back of the beast's knee. Then, muttering his Jinada prayer, he stabbed its throat, hitting arteries. Backing off, his heart racing, he let the beast between the planes bleed out before him, and collected himself.

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Stupid! Stupid! STUPID! How'd you think that'd work? It's cable, sure, but Gondar! He nearly escaped! He would've if he hadn't just phased a moment ago! He would've killed you! STUPID!

All the same, I did it. I did just bring down Spirit Breaker, which is not quite Magnus, but good nonetheless…

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Gondar watched as the offensive was finally routed as Ursa the one bear army tore Magnus to shreds, and wondered if his bad-idea-gone-right: his little victory against a tired Spirit Breaker, really meant anything.
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Gondar and the rest of the Radiant army were on the offensive now. There were swarms of creeps underfoot, or rather not since they were only an inch shorter than Gondar but underfoot for many of them. The fire and ice sisters Lina and Rylai were slinging around spells of staggering power, each trying to outdo each other, while Ursa and (Treebeard? need to look up the name…) the Treant Protector smashed through scores of creeps. On the other side could be seen Lucifer the Doombringer, Leviathan the Tidehunter and the bone brothers: Skeleton King and Clinkz the bone fletcher. The Dire's fighters were outnumbered, but that didn't comfort Gondar.

Gondar was slicing through creeps, one at a time as opposed to three or four at a time like the others, and feeling supremely useless. Then he looked up from a creep he put down. The Lord of Bones was striding towards him, his massively oversized blade held confidently over his right shoulder.

Oh, this is a bad idea…

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Gondar leapt back, dodging the skeleton king's first swing. Ursa lumbered between Gondar and Clinkz, trying to get his claws to the skeleton archer's neck.

You should be running. He's not that skilled, you've got cover from the archer, but you should be running.

Gondar sidestepped the skeleton king's downward stroke, hopped in, and thrust his mancatcher-sword at the skeleton king's arm.

What're you gonna do, Gondar? He'll just regenerate it all within a minute.

The skeleton king projected a blast of hellfire from his left hand, but Gondar pushed him down with his leverage and the blast missed him, yet still singed his fur with it's infernal heat.

This is stupid, you know it.

Gondar twisted his mancatcher and jammed his knife into the king's wrist, combined it gave him leverage and vantage point enough to shatter half the bones in his hand and wrench it free of his arm.
The skeleton king's sword fell to the ground and, fast as lightning, Gondar shoved his stunned foe away, preventing him from recovering his weapon.

Good, now run while you still have the chance.

Gondar did not run. He slashed the skeleton king in the skull, chipping it. Leaned back, avoiding the punch. He then spun his dagger and parted 2 rib bones from their lord with a swipe of the blade.

Good job, now you've made him mad. Now get out or finish the job before he takes it out on your spleen or something

Ducking a grab aimed at his throat, Gondar hooked his dagger around the back of his foe's lower spine, muttered "Jinada" and thrust his crescent moon blade onto the braced spine, effectively severing both the king's legs.

Of course, the king merely reattached his spine and slugged Gondar in the face with his stump, then wrapped his remaining hand round the bounty hunter's throat and punched him again.

Gondar, who'd been hit in the face more times than he could count, was nonetheless somewhat staggered by the blows, and what with not being able to breath and all, was getting pretty desperate. So he put up his hands and blocked the next strike, then hoisted his legs up and wrapped them and his right elbow around The Lord of bones' arm.

They both fell, Skeleton King letting go of Gondar's throat. Gondar then applied an armbar (he was half done already) and slashed down, severing his foe's arm at the elbow. They scrambled up, and Gondar slashed in, his serrated mancatcher-sword sawing off part of the skeleton's skull.

Time to end this.

Gondar leapt up as only a bobcat could, soaring above his foe as he tried to tackle the bounty hunter, then spun around and bifurcated him again. He then finished the job by decapitating The Lord of bones and driving his dagger through his blazing eye.

Gondar took a step back as his foe collapsed, then reformed.

His voice full of rage and wounded yet still massive pride, the Skeleton King jeered "Are you ready to do that again?" at the tired bounty hunter.

Gondar smiled and sat down as skeleton king was picked up and crushed into bonemeal by Ursa, who'd finished pursuing Clinkz and trading blows with Doom a short while ago (Both had escaped, but Doom bore several new scars).

"Ha! You should leave these things to me, bounty hunter!" roared the one bear army before turning and congratulating Treant Protector for smashing their outpost and Lina for chasing off Tidehunter (much to Rylai's chagrin).

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I go toe-to-toe with The Lord of Bones, keep him there while Ursa takes his sweet time with Doom, outthink and outfight him him completely and take out one of his lives and THIS is what I get?! Some bear telling me to stay out of this? Arrogant bastard.

It was good advice though. Someone like me, against someone like him, not a good decision. This day's been full of stupid decisions.

But hey, turned out pretty good.

For a series of bad ideas.