How To Avoid Death On A Daily Basis: Book Two Read online

  HOW TO AVOID DEATH ON A DAILY BASIS

  Book Two

  by

  V Moody

  Copyright: V Moody 2016

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, copied in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise transmitted without written permission from the author.

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  1. Journey To The West

  2. Needs Must

  3. The Farmer’s Wife

  4. There’s No Such Thing

  5. When You Got To Go

  6. Then A Hero Comes Along

  7. Sword Art Offline

  8. Rogue Ogre

  9. The Goodbye Girls

  10. Fengarad City Limits

  11. The Commander And The Princess

  12. Welcome to Fengarad

  13. The Emporium Of Needs And Desires

  14. Man On A Mission

  15. Frog Capture Plan

  16. Win Lose Draw

  17. It’s Nice To Be Wanted

  18. Wait For It

  19. By Royal Command

  20. A Wild Princess Appears

  21. Book Smarts

  22. Sword Smarts

  23. Last One Out

  24. Save The Frog

  25. Trade Agreement With Nabbo

  26. Let’s Talk About Sex, Baby

  27. Dudley Done Right

  28. Together Again

  29. Meet The Family

  30. Waiting For A Star To Fall

  31. Trial By Fire

  32. Tin Man

  1. Journey To The West

  One of the things I bought on my way out of town was a small cooking pot. The smells of the chicken and mixed spices (sold by the butcher in a small bag—who knew?) as we sat around the bubbling pot made all our stomachs growl.

  “If I’d know you were going to buy all this stuff,” said Claire, “I would have given you a list.”

  “Good reason not to tell you, then,” I muttered under my breath. Both girls looked hacked off at missing the chance to do some shopping. “Once we get to the city, you can buy whatever you want.”

  “And how long is that going to take?” Claire asked, with a definite implication that no matter the answer, it would be too long.

  She wasn’t wrong. Our clothes were in a pretty bad state and didn’t smell good. The food I had bought, while a marked improvement on our usual diet of rabbit, rabbit and more rabbit, would only last for maybe one or two more meals.

  “Feel free to go back into town and get what you want,” I added. No one looked keen on doing that in the dark.

  Everyone felt better once we’d eaten. No one had the energy to keep grumbling, and the four of them fell asleep very quickly. I was tired, but too worried to relax. We were out here on our own with no idea what we were supposed to be doing or how we were going to survive. And we would probably have to kill again.

  I took out the sword I’d acquired from the blacksmith. I imagined stabbing a living, breathing being with it. My breath became ragged and my body tensed up. Cold sweat trickled down my back.

  When the blacksmith gave me the sword, he also gave me a whetstone. I started stroking the blade with it, the way he’d showed me. I couldn’t match his speed without nicking my fingers, so I took it slow and steady. Even though the weapon was the cause of my distress, sharpening it was oddly relaxing and helped calm my mind.

  I had told the others about my deal with the blacksmith’s apprentice and how I’d got the sword. Rather than feel jealous or annoyed that I hadn’t told them earlier, they were all excited by the upgrade to the group’s arsenal—although, owning a sword and knowing how to use it were two entirely different things.

  They very much saw everything we owned as belonging to the collective. It didn’t matter who used which weapon or who carried the money. The one thing our group didn’t lack was trust. I wondered how long that would last.

  The next morning, we considered going back into town to buy some supplies. Grayson and his men would be gone, so we wouldn’t run into them. With money no longer an issue, we could buy whatever we fancied. Surprisingly, Maurice pushed for us not to do that.

  “I know we’ve got all this cash now, but chances are there’ll be a bigger choice and better quality items in the city. It’d be a waste to buy stuff now that we’re just going to end up chucking away in a couple of days, right?” He spoke quickly and was itching to start our journey westward. He opened up the map Claire had copied. “According to this map, the distance from Probet to Fengarad is only a little more than the distance from Probet to the clearing in the forest, so it shouldn’t take us very long to get there. The way I see it, the sooner we get to Fengarad, the better.”

  The others were keen to be supportive of Maurice’s plan and agreed we should set off immediately. Having made this decision, they all turned to me, having suddenly remembered they weren’t the ones who got to decide anything.

  I shrugged. “Okay. Let’s go.”

  Did I think it was a good idea? Definitely not. Even a short detour into town to buy some basics wouldn’t have taken more than an hour or two. It would have made much more sense to get stocked up before setting off—we had no idea what was out there or what problems we might face—but I didn’t say anything.

  In my estimation, staying hungry, uncomfortable and uncertain, would keep everyone on their toes and, more importantly, easier to control.

  While being on edge made people more prone to being awkward and snippy with each other, in the case of our party we had those attributes pretty much maxed out already. Complacency and overconfidence were more likely to trip us up.

  Shame I didn’t take my own advice.

  What Maurice said about the advantages of getting to the city was true. And had the map been to scale, it would have only taken a few hours to get there. The map was not to scale.

  The road was wide and dusty, but flat and straight. At least we wouldn’t get lost. On one side were open fields, on the other, a border of trees. Beyond the trees lay the forest.

  Despite the bright sunshine and clear skies, the forest emanated a dark menace. Just looking in its direction made my skin crawl, like something was looking back. The thought of what might be waiting for us behind those trees was enough to keep us walking on the far side of the road.

  How did we pass the time? Maurice mentioned how Fengarad sounded Swedish, so they started speaking with terrible Swedish accents, although Dudley’s effort sounded more like Chinese. Yes, this is what passed for entertainment. They also shared various details about their lives—where they grew up, what they did in their spare time; all the usual getting to know you stuff. But in a Swedish accent. They kept this up for hours!

  I say ‘they’ because I didn’t get involved in the bonding session. I didn’t care about their hopes and dreams before we ended up in this weird fantasy land, and tuned out of the conversation. Not that I looked down on whatever kinds of lives they lived back home, it just didn’t interest me.

  By the time the sun had started to disappear behind us (I still found it disconcerting that the sun set in the east), we must have travelled several miles yet the horizon ahead of us showed no signs of a city.

  We made camp behind under a large tree in one of the fields, and ate the rest of the food.

  The next morning we set off again, a little more subdued. With the sun beating down and our general level of fitness being about the same as the fat kid who always gets picked last in P.E., it didn’t take long before our purposeful marching was reduced to a slow shuffle. Our water skins were nearly empty and the food was gone.

  I
had thought we’d find some small animals we could hunt, but so far we hadn’t seen anything. There were probably some creatures in the woods, but we weren’t hungry enough to risk it. Yet.

  There was some talk of heading back and getting proper supplies. It seemed like a waste of effort to turn around now, but we didn’t have many other options.

  “What’s that noise?” said Flossie, tilting her head and half-closing her eyes.

  We all listened and then slowly started walking into the forest towards the sound—the sound of running water.

  We cautiously tip-toed past the treeline, and the temperature immediately fell to a goosebumping chill. Weird animal noises echoed around us, but the rush of flowing water kept drawing us in further. After ten minutes of weaving our way through the trees, we found a shallow river running parallel to the road and we eagerly refilled our waterskins. The other good thing about the river were the fish swimming in it.

  Easy pickings! Not quite.

  Maurice tried using his recently acquired spear to catch our lunch. He stood with the water up to his knees, frozen in classic hunter pose. Well, other than the Batman cowl he insisted on wearing—apparently, he didn’t want the underwater world knowing his secret identity. The fish, which varied in size from tiny to arm’s length, swam between his legs, ignorant of the doom hanging over their heads.

  Wait... wait… strike! The spear stabbed into the water and struck the rocky riverbed. The fish went about their business like nothing happened.

  After a bunch of failed attempts, we all had a go. With the same results. Spear fishing, it turns out, is hard. We also tried sticking our hands in the water and grabbing the fish, which went about as well as you’d expect. My new sword wasn’t much help and I wished I still had my spike.

  We hadn’t eaten since the night before and I had no intention of being defeated by those scaly bastards.

  After several hours, I figured out a way to catch them. We used one of the blankets, held by a person at each end, and lowered into the water. Then we waited. When a fish swam over the blanket, we lifted it up. You had to get the timing right, otherwise the water would cascade out like a waterfall, providing an escape route for the fish.

  Yes, it would have been better if we had a net, but we didn’t have one of those so we did the best with what we had.

  Using this method, we caught six fish in quick succession. They lay on the river bank, flopping about. I had seen enough crappy tv shows about fishing to know what to do. I took my stick and hit the biggest one on the head. That’s the most humane way to quickly kill a fish. On our planet. In this world, it had rather a different effect. The fish started screaming.

  Now, I’m not a fish expert, but I’m fairly sure fish aren’t supposed to scream. I hit it again, but it kept screaming and then all the other fish joined in. If you’re wondering what a fish scream sounds like, pretty much like this: Ahh! Ahhhhh! Ahhhhhhh!

  My party looked horrified and ready to start screaming themselves. I went over to where our stuff was piled up and took out my new sword. I walked over to the fish and cut off their heads, one after the other. The screaming stopped.

  It may seem somewhat hypocritical after all my soul-searching over killing the mice, but they were just fish, and it’s amazing how pragmatic you can become when you’re really hungry.

  2. Needs Must

  After our experience with preparing rabbit, gutting and cleaning the fish was quite straightforward, if a little messy.

  We roasted them over a fire and picked the flesh off the bones. There were a lot of bones. It tasted like regular fish, thankfully. We now had a ready supply of food and water. We also had the chance to wash our clothes and ourselves.

  The girls went first while the boys sat on the road pretending we couldn’t hear them splashing about. Images of naked girls kept invading my thoughts, so I got up and started practicing with the sword.

  I was really regretting giving up my spike. It was light and easy to use—aim at the head, stab, stab, stab. With a sword, you have to know what you’re doing. All I had to go on were movies I’d seen, and I’m pretty sure they weren’t the best source of reliable info.

  What I discovered very quickly was that even a short sword that feels quite light at first, will make your arm ache after a few minutes of swinging it around. I’d alway planned on getting into shape at some point, like we all do I guess, but never really needed to. The bus stop was down the road from where I lived, and my job involved me sitting around most of the time. It never occurred to me one day I’d be fighting monsters.

  Maurice followed my lead and waved his spear about, while Dudley examined the passing clouds. What we needed was more muscle.

  “How many pushups can you do?” I asked Maurice.

  He shrugged. “Ten? Twenty?”

  “Really? Have you tried recently?”

  “No, but ten isn’t a lot, is it?”

  “What about you?” I said to Dudley.

  “I couldn’t say, off the top of my head. About the same, I expect.”

  “Okay, then, let’s see.” Neither of them moved. “Fine, I’ll go first.”

  I got into position and started. The first two were easy. Number three and four were a bit of a struggle, and number five was a battle. Six got me down, but there was no getting back up. I stood up, panting.

  “Five.” I nodded at Maurice. “Your turn.”

  Maurice put down his spear and got on the ground. He did three.

  “That’s five,” he said.

  “That was three. The last two, your knees were touching the ground. We’re going to have to get a lot fitter than this if we want to fight properly. There’s no point having decent weapons if they end up wrecking us more than whoever we’re fighting.”

  “My turn,” said Dudley, sounding very confident.

  He got in position. First pushup was okay. Second one, his whole body trembled, but he managed to get back up with elbows locked. He lowered his body to the ground for number three, and stopped.

  “That’s two,” I said, in case he’d lost count.

  “Wait,” he said.

  We waited. And waited. Very slowly, his body rose back up, his whole body shaking like a washing machine on fast spin. He finally made it to three pushups, and then collapsed onto his face.

  Next, we tried sit ups and we each did thirty, which sounds quite a lot, but they were much easier and we were probably cheating them. All our faces glowed with sweat and we were too out of breath to speak.

  “What are you doing?” said Claire.

  I don’t know how long Claire and Flossie had been watching us, but probably long enough for us to make fools of ourselves. Not that it mattered very much right then. The girls had finished washing and were holding their wet clothes. They had both wrapped themselves in blankets, which covered their middle, but left plenty of skin showing. Legs. Lots of legs.

  “Aren’t you going to go wash up?” asked Claire.

  I realised I had been stood there gawping. “Yes. Of course. Right. Bathtime for baby!” I had no idea what I was saying. Maurice and Dudley joined in, equally flummoxed.

  “Absolutely. Time for scrubbing the old bod,” said Maurice.

  “Wash wash wash,” added Dudley.

  With all the running around and trying not to die it was easy to forget we were young men with hormones and stuff. The sight of the girls was a firm reminder. Very firm.

  As we got to the river I said, “You know, I think the best way to wash our clothes is to keep them on.”

  The other two agreed immediately.

  “Two birds, one stone,” said Maurice.

  “Brilliant idea,” added Dudley.

  We waded into the water, all three of us relieved we would have a chance to let things ‘settle down’ before getting naked. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, that’s probably for the best.

  Once we had bathed and given the clothes a good rinse, we returned to the girls. They had hung up their clothes o
n branches to catch the sun and were lying on their backs, the blankets falling away here and there to reveal even more flesh.

  “Damn,” I said, clutching my stomach. “I need the bathroom. I might be some time.” And I rushed off. I didn’t need the bathroom, although I did need to relieve myself. It didn’t take very long. Both times.

  When I returned, Maurice and Dudley had needed the ‘bathroom’ too.

  “They’ve been gone ages,” said Flossie, sounding concerned.

  “What’s wrong with you guys?” said Claire. “You think the fish wasn’t cooked properly?”

  “No, you two would be affected too, then,” I pointed out. “Just, er, nature taking it’s course,”

  I hung up my clothes on the nearest branches and lay down feeling much more relaxed. Within a few seconds I had fallen asleep.