An Outlet

After returning back from the shrine and talking to the friar and Voah, Hunter was exhausted. He felt an empty pit in his gut and his leg was still recovering so he was still feeling jolts of pain shooting up from his leg. Once he arrived back he entered the shack of the twins and added more wood to the fire to help warm up the rabbit stew. Once it was warm he ate alone and stared at the fire with not thought in his head. Several hours went by as he stared at the fire. Ever since he woke up injured he had a lot of free time on his hands with little to do. He had already recovered enough to move around a bit as well as making a new bow and some new arrows. Granted he still needed more arrowheads and feathers to finish the rest of his arrows, but he was not ready to go shopping just yet. At this point any place crowded put him on edge.

Hunter laid on the bed staring at the ceiling as his mind began to wander. It's been over a whole week since he killed me a man. He managed to kill over ten natives on the island during his suicide mission. His eye began to twitch and already he was starting to get the itch again. When he was not killing people he was hunting animals or training.

The big problem is he had nothin' to scratch with, since he was injured and could not hunt or train. He was hungry, despite eating the plain rabbit stew. He was hungry for action. Hungry for the hunt. He was not just plain ol' hungry, he was feeling weaker and helpless. While those magical creatures were growing stronger in the jungle. He was scared to lose his edge. He needed to keep his strength up. He needed to maintain his discipline, because the hard reality was he needed a job to live. Sadly he had limited skills that would allow only him to be employed as a trained hunter. He considered working in the tannery, but the pay was less and the stress was high. It was a job he could not see himself doing for a long time. He thought about changing his job to a wood worker and make archery sets but alas he only knew how to make the custom bow for himself so he didn't see himself doing well at that either.

As his mind wander more he wondered if he really had to change jobs at all. Surely he could hunt again when he recovered since meat was always in demand. So he would just have to endure it and wait despite being very restless. In the end he just needed to come up with a creative way to stay distracted. His only hobbies included hunting, trapping, fishing, archery, training and making some weapons. This irked him since most of his hobbies required him to be healthy. As he looked at his hands he realized he had taken a lot of lives with them. They were the hands of destruction, however he realized he also used the to make things as well such as weapons, traps and tools.

Suddenly the images of the natives and the redcap flashed into his head and made him grunt in pain as he remembered the pain from his fight. He needed to find a way to deal with this pain. He went to Voah but since she too, was in bad shape they could not train together. Then he looked at the log on the fireplace and saw the images of the fire engulfing the wood and he had a vision of the redcap made of wood. He then sat up as he felt he needed to make that thing in his mind. He got up and hobbled out of the shack and to the old empty pig in the back where he made his new archery set.

There he found several left over pieces of wood that he could not use for archery. He collected them and took them back to the shack and set them at the small table. Then he went into his pack and found a small carving knife and a whetstone. After sharpening the blade, he began to whittle the piece of wood as he envisioned the image onto the wood. As Hunter focused on his carvings he became possessed with the details as he was bringing his creation to life slice by slice. He was unaware of the time as he was covering the table with wood shavings. He was oblivious to the time as he kept working till he finished. Then the cleaned it up to remove the splinters and burs. Then he looked at the sculpture with some satisfaction as he could now show others what his nightmares looked like.

Once he was done he decided to make another sculpture of the natives he killed. He again envisioned the image in the wood and began whittling away piece by piece. Again more wood chips piled up on the table as he was obsessed with his work. ironically this sculpture had less details than the first so it took less time and Hunter managed to finish it before the twins came home.

When he was done he cleaned up the wood scraps and threw them in the fire pit to reduce any waste. The twins were hungry and were glad the fire was keeping the stew warm since it was cold outside. As they ate the rabbit stew the twins asked Hunter about the figurines and he explained to them that they were what he fought on that last mission. They were surprised to see a bit of color in his face and more expression compared to before. They were hoping he was going to make more improvements down the road. After an hour or two of TLC, the three went to sleep.

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