If there was one truth Balyn had learned in his time as a hunter, it was that rubbery blue things really didn't like being stabbed or electrified. Which made it terribly inconvenient that his rifle spear couldn't be rubbed with Bolt Paper to give it that extra zap, and his saw cleaver was no good for stabbing.
Maybe I should take up fencing, he thought. That Reiterpallasch would be perfect for this.
A thirty-foot-long tentacle whipped him across the face and sent him flying.
Maybe I should pay more attention to what I'm doing?
Dazed from the impact, he tried to get back to his feet. Ebrietas did not appear to be charging him down to follow up her advantage. Balyn momentarily felt a surge of relief, before he realized that the sparks forming over her head were not just aftereffects of the blow but that he was literally seeing stars. Channeled from the heart of the abyssal cosmos, blinding blasts of energy speared out, puncturing him again and again until death mercifully embraced him once more.
~X X X~
"Welcome home, good hunter."
Balyn cupped his chin in his gloved hand and regarded the Doll thoughtfully. If she was surprised by him being thoughtful about anything, she didn't show it.
"You always say the same thing whenever I come back to the Hunter's Dream," he finally said.
"Does this create a problem?"
"No, it's just, well, you've been here a while, and I'd think you'd like to mix it up a bit, expand your horizons."
"I believe that my horizons are sufficiently expansive for my taste."
Balyn sighed.
"Does this disappoint you, good hunter?"
"Well…I guess not. And it's kind of reassuring that after getting sliced, stabbed, stomped, chopped up, chewed, incinerated, shot, mauled, or dropped from a height that I can always come back to a friendly greeting. It's just that after a half-dozen failed attempts to defeat the Daughter of the Cosmos, I'm really starting to think about how my relationships with women always get into a rut and how I can take things to a different level."
~X X X~
A/N: I think we can assume the Doll will go and hide Gehrman's copy of How to Pick Up Fair Maidens the next time Balyn leaves the Dream. Just in case.