It's an astonishingly long story, since it was a rather astonishingly long life. It's not even half done, the end's yet to be written. But he was my first char and sorely missed, so I felt the need for his story to be noted down somewhere... to the best of my abilities.

Samdas waved aside the thicket branches with glee, bursting into the village square with all the exuberance of his 17 years. He was young. He was healthy. He was in love. And he had an apron. This apron had been a hard buy. He had been looking for an apron in the various villages that he chanced upon, but no one had one, or they had refused to part from it - the last woman had been particularly stubborn, she had wielded her knife menacingly and had hissed at him to "begone!". Of course he had left as peacefully as possible, it wasn’t right to use his mace for such reasons. But the incident still stung whenever he thought about it.

The apron finally came in into his hands in a most unexpected way. Awaking one evening while on the hunt, he awoke to a figure grinning at him in the semi-darkness. An adventurer had managed to creep up on him! For a moment Samdas had been most annoyed. If it wasn’t a beaver or lynx or bear, he didn’t want his sleep disturbed. But the adventurer had a pleasant laugh and a nice enough manner about him. More importantly, stowed away in his pack was an apron. An apron that the wily adventurer was willing to let go for in exchange for Samdas’ broad knife, 4 of his best ropes and almost all of the food supply he had been carrying with him.

It pained Samdas to see all of that go, the knife especially. If he had been a lynx it would have felt like losing a claw. But the apron was worth it. It had been dyed an attractive blue, and was even embroidered with some of the most intricate patterns he had seen yet. He had hardly been able to bear using his dirt-crusted, calloused hands to pack it away.

He didn’t have any use for an apron as a hunter of course, and he had no real appreciation for fine clothes - they were there to be keep him warm, protected and decent. But he knew that Anna could and would appreciate clothes like these. Anna. The name alone made him smile.

Anna was different from the other girls. Of course he realized that maybe all lovers thought the same about their loves, but she was. Crawling away from a rather brutal fight with a Njerpez warrior, he had finally arrived in the village after days of looking for a capable healer. The many healers (three, the most he had ever seen in one village) had mended his bones and healed his wounds. It was Anna though that had really saved him.

During the fight the horrifically strong warrior had brutally slammed the hilt of his broadsword right into Samdas’ face; splitting open skin, crushing bone, and grinding away flesh. The warrior had laughed evilly, watching in sadistic enjoyment as Samdas had reeled back from the shock. Raising a hand to his face, Samdas had tried in vain to stop the blood from gushing out. The last laugh was Samdas’ though. He kept his wits about him, calmly collecting a handful of blood, and flinging it right at his enemy’s eyes. He blinded the compassionless warrior sufficiently for him to land an excellent blow on the cruel head before standing back as his three dogs finished the fight for good. That was the end for the Njerpez warrior; and nearly Samdas’ end as well. But Samdas was still alive and he had to live on.

For days he was sure that he won’t. That he couldn’t. The pain was unalleviated, unadulterated. He had treated his damaged face with water and removed some of the broken bone, but he still looked like a monster. The cartilage in his nose had been smashed, it would never be straight again. His jaw was broken in a few places, eating was almost impossible. Teeth had been knocked out and his left cheek and cheekbone felt like they were missing. He didn’t want to look into the quiet pools of water anymore, and he shied away from any human tracks. At least the animals didn’t judge.

But he still needed healers. And so during a rainy evening, he dragged himself into a newly discovered village. He prayed to the spirits for a healer. He prayed not to be noticed. But Anna still noticed him. He almost ran from her when she greeted him. He was so sure that she would scream like the other few villagers had. A woman had actually fainted. She didn’t do either. Her eyes had looked keenly at his face, but it wasn’t in fear, or in cruel fascination. She had been concerned, she had been gentle, and she had insisted on leading him to the healers of the village instead of just simply giving him directions.

:o wow, that was great... can't wait for you to write more. this is exactly what urw is about, the game is just a frame for your imagination. *sniff* your story brings a tear to my eye - beautiful!

Glad you like it :) however it does end rather badly. I've yet to get a char that can survive past a year...


For months now he had been lavishing her with gifts, just to see her smile, just to win her favour. She had always been thankful of course, and had said how much she liked the gifts. But he could tell that she would really adore the apron. It was something she really needed, he had hung about the village watching her (it was closer to stalking), and had noticed her rather ragged and tattered apron fluttering in the wind as she hung it out to dry.

The apron would do more than make her smile. The apron might even get her to say yes! He visualised his recently completed cottage, his overflowing cellar, the hordes of items he had… he was more than ready to take a wife.

Eagerly he looked for her familiar silhouette in the fading daylight. She wasn’t at her usual spot. Widening his search, he headed for the nearest village store, hoping to catch her shopping for her weekly supplies. She wasn’t there either. Oddly enough neither was the storekeeper. That was surprising. Iku never left his store, his greatest fear was being robbed. It was unsettling to see all the slabs of meat and bags of rye-flour just sitting there without Iku’s watchful eye over them.

As he pondered this, one of his dogs gave a whine. They started tugging on their leashes forcefully, in an almost unheard of display of rebellion. Samdas gave in, and they almost bolted for the forest. Forcing them to stay in the village, Samdas tried to calm them - and himself. Something was terribly wrong.

He took another good look around, his eyes darting wildly about as he tried to spot Anna. But there wasn’t even one remotely female figure in sight. With mounting dread, he greeted the village elder hobbling towards him.

Anna was dead. All the women folk were dead. And so were some of the men, including Iku. A Njerpez attack had injured some villagers. A plague finished them off. Anna had chipped in by tending to the sick, although most villagers had refused to go near the plague victims. They might have been right to do so. Anna soon became the plague's new victim, and was now buried right under her favourite tree.

The world became a swirl of muted colours and sounds. His eyes couldn't seem to focus on any one object. Samdas could hardly hear the elder’s words either, his once powerful ears were failing him. He stumbled after the elder, following him to Anna’s tree, where the elder left Samdas alone, with his grief. The patch of ground where Anna lay under was painfully bare. For one wild moment Samdas fought the urge to grab his shovel and dig her out. She couldn’t be dead. At last however, he reached into his pack, gently laying the apron to rest right under the tree. Then he walked off.

He kept walking.

When he next took a proper look at his surroundings, he realized that he was surround by trees. Unknown trees. In his grief he had walked on, into unmapped territory. He was lost, unsure of where home was - but he couldn’t care less. There was nothing to go home to. Home was an empty word now.


He must have ate and slept for a few days, maybe even more. His food supplies were gone and he was even starting to sprout a beard. He couldn’t really remember though. And he actually didn’t really care if he was out of food or if he looked scruffy. His stomach though did care about food, and it drove him to start hunting again, even though he didn’t really want to.

But still he hunted.

Samdas squatted down and examined the tracks beneath him. Paw prints. His memory immediately identified it as badger, and his hunting instinct kicked in. He followed the tracks, and almost stumbled over his prey. His dogs immediately surrounded it, eagar for blood. Swivelling around on the spot, it made desperate swipes at the dogs, heroically keeping all three dogs at bay.

This would not be an easy kill. The badger was an old fighter, decorated with the scars of many battles. Samdas could see that it was also angry and desperate. But most importantly, it obviously possessed a will to live; something that Samdas himself seemed to have lost.

As Samdas tried to bring his mace down on it, it leapt up and bit him hard on the hand, ripping through soft tendon and flesh with ease. The pain made his eyes water. As he attempted to lift his mace once again though, Samdas thought he caught a glimpse of someone watching nearby. Someone who resembled... Anna.

Throwing every caution to the wind, he turned his back on the embattled badger to get a better look, filled with a hope that he would confirm what he thought he saw. Staring unblinkingly into the forest he took a step forward, eyes searching every shadow. Behind him were the howls and hisses of outrage and aggression as the fight went on. He ignored that.
He took another step, praying to every spirit he knew that it would be Anna. Instead he stumbled. As he went down, he thought he saw her again, standing at the forest edge. He wanted to run to her, but his vision was starting to swim before him. He fell heavily on one knee. Something was pressing down on him hard. He tried to blink, but his eyelids felt heavy too, they refused to open. For a moment he panicked; not because he couldn't see, but because instead of everything being dark, there was a blinding whiteness, even though he was sure he had his eyes closed. He fought against the gripe of fear, and struggled to stand up again and open his eyes.

Suddenly however everything made sense once again. And he stopped struggling immediately. Out of the whiteness was came Anna, she lifted him up gently as she gave him her most beautiful smile yet. Everything suddenly made sense, and the young hunter felt a great lasting peace.

how sad, how beautiful! such a touching story!