Preface: This thread is open upon request. Please PM me if you're interested!
The story takes place during the pre-war years of the Connlaothian Civil War and well after the Tower of Uthlyn Plot and the thread Lady of the Books.Please read their respective plotting threads (which I've linked here for you) for further details on the aforementioned events.
And now, begins our tale...
Since the days of the offensively massive pests had come to an end, things had not quite gone the way that Urtok had expected them to. While the people of Languish had indeed been quite relieved to find that they would no longer be beleaguered by rats the size of full-grown crocodiles or pigeons the size of an Albatross, none of them believed that the bugbear had anything to do with it. No, instead they went on fawning all over some fraud named Ansgar? What the heck was up with THAT!? Ansgar, really? Why was that jerk trying to steal his thunder? Well, whatever. He supposed he couldn't blame the guy. Were he not himself, he'd totally be envious and want to try and take credit for his awesomeness too.
Unfortunately, there was to be no hero's welcome upon arriving home, no parades or celebrations of any sort, no dashing bugbear statues made in his handsome image, no bards to sing of his heroics, but perhaps the very worst thing of them all...there would be no idolizing of his overwhelming awesomeness. No. Instead, the silly humans did all of these things for that phony! Good grief! The jerk already had churches and monuments erected in his name for like...no good reason Urtok could think of and now he was after Urtok's reputation as well? Seriously, Ansgar was a brazen glory hog!
Nothing had gone the way he expected it to. In fact, aside from all the incredibly obnoxious Ansgar exalting, life had gone back to the way it was before his grand adventure in Uthlyn had occurred. Well, it ALMOST went back to normal...for everyone except the bugbear himself. He had returned to his cave- or tried to only to find that he had somehow been evicted while he was away. He honestly had no idea how that worked, but the eviction notice had read that he'd been delinquent with rent- wait. What? Rent ? Since when had he been supposed to pay for THAT? He really had no clue, but the troll who read the eviction notice for him said it was all very official and was a nice guy. Even gave him some home-made spider web candy.
But now Urtok faced quite a dilemma. He no longer had a home and without a cave, he couldn't be a proper monster! He needed a new pad and fast! But he wasn't sure where to look. He'd been living in his cave FOREVER – which was as long as he could remember! Where would he go now? He sought out other caves within the area but there were no vacancies.
He dreaded it, but he had no choice. Sighing , he made his way to the local inn, The Lazy Leaf. The owner of the establishment, Mister Birch, looked up when he heard the bell door ring. He tried not to get his hopes too high (like he always did) , but he was eager to see if a wealthy stranger might be dropping in to- his face fell when he saw who it was.
"You might wanna make the door bigger, Mister Birch, "the bugbear grunted as he squeezed his way inside, ducking his head and sucking in his great belly, "It's not very monster-friendly and I think you're missing out on some really great financial opportunities here. "
Edward Birch rolled his eyes, but never had the audacity to do so when Urtok was listening. Even if the bugbear was an imbecile, he was a sensitive one and still quite dangerous when incensed. Urtok could easily break him in half if he had the mind to do it and he honestly did not know why the mayor tolerated him. After all, this monster was probably part of the reason why outsiders avoided Languish and why his business suffered, "Oh really?" He inquired, not really caring to know the answer , but humoring the stupid creature. It wasn't wise to ignore the bugbear, for whenever he grew bored, he tried to entertain himself which usually entailed him breaking something.
Urtok finished wiggling through the door and lumbered up to the front check-in counter that Mister Birch suddenly busied himself with dusting off.
The human tried to ignore the stench. Urtok was always smelling like wet dog that had rolled around in week old garbage. "Yeah. You know, with monsters. Mostly bugbears like me. I mean, there aren't enough caves or bridges to go around for all of us and not all of my kind wanna do things the old-fashioned way like , you know, slaughtering humans and crunching their bones and drinking their bodily fluids and-"
"I get the point, "Birch told him abruptly, "so you're suggesting that you think I should let other bugbears stay here? "
Urtok nodded enthusiastically, glad that the man understood, "Exactly. There are a LOT of monsters here in Hellvion and not many places for them to go when they're homeless so I thought- "
Birch sighed and did not look up from his rigorous counter-cleansing, " And how would I or the people of Languish stand to benefit from allowing such a thing? No offense, Urtok, but you're not exactly all that...monster-like. "
"What a racist thing to say!"
"Well, it's true. Most bugbears in your place would have killed or eat- "
"Okay, fine! You're seriously missing out on some killer profits , but I won't argue with you. But uh... would you do business with me, then?"
Birch stopped and looked up, " You want to rent a room? What about your cave?"
Urtok shifted uncomfortably on his feet, " It's still there , "he said after a moment and then added hastily, "and it's still mine. I didn't get kicked out or anything lame like that." He laughed nervously, confident that the man would believe his words because he was Urtok Pigeonstomper, the most charming and handsomest bugbear in all of Connlaoth. If he had a mirror to look at himself now, he'd be charmed by himself too!
Silence. Birch stared at him incredulously and for a moment the poor old innkeeper's mind stumbled over the concept of having a monster for a tenant, "Right. Um...well, I have plenty of vacancies , but I won't let you stay here without paying a gold a night. "
Urtok scoffed, "Pffft! That's it?" The bugbear reached down and pulled a coin purse free of the belt he wore around his enormous waist. Had no one seen him do such, they never would have supposed that there was ,in fact, a belt beneath that grand belly roll of his. He pulled the string of the coin purse open, plucked out a gold piece and tossed it to the man. "There ya go! One gold! I counted it myself. I know how to count , you know. Pretty cool, huh? I bet you're jealous. "
Birch caught the gold piece and stared at it. It wasn't much, but it was the first gold piece he'd seen in a month and by the size of Urtok's coin purse...he imagined there could be a whole lot more! What did he care if Urtok was a monster? This was a REAL paying customer! One that would probably stay longer than most. Birch couldn't say no to making some coin. "Very well, Mister Pigeonstomper. Your room is number two-"
"What? I want number one!" The bugbear whined. "That's the AWESOME number. Losers get all the numbers after it. "
Birch sighed, "I'm sorry but number one is taken by...someone and we do not disturb him. Ever. Room number two is much nicer anyways. It's far more spacious and has a much larger bed and a view of ...corn fields. You like those."
Urtok stamped his foot, "Can't you just tell him how awesome I am and make him move? I'm sure he'll understand."
"...No. I cannot and I seriously doubt that he would, but how about this? How about I take the numbers off the door and switch them so the room to your door reads like it's number one? "
Urtok grinned, "You're a genius!" Yes. He quite liked this idea very much!
Closing: @ Beastie , Oh God...I am SO sorry about how long this took as long as it did, but I DID warn you did I not? I WARNED you that I am HORRIBLE with openings! That said, you don't need to make your first post an interaction with mine. You don't even need to be in Languish if you don't want to. I can figure a way to force Urtok wherever he's needed. xD
This IS going somewhere eventually, but my post was getting to be too long and so I forced myself to quit. Please let me know if something needs changing or if you have ideas! I am perfectly open to rewriting something that'll work out better for you. All I ask is for help in figuring out what that is!
Quick reference information:
Setting is Languish, a small farming town located on the outskirts of Hellvion, Connlaoth. The people there are not very bright and quite accustomed to dealing with bizarre things, like Urtok. :/
