Basic Scimitar - Crayin

Ashkan Vampyler · November 20, 2004, 01:53 AM

Ashkan made his way to room 29 to start his basic scimitar lessons. Scimitar, as he knew was a weapon that was a lot different to brash and brazen rapier. A weapon, that he noticed was grounded on the rules of dull efficiency and logical strikes. He had seen the scimitar in action once, or at least he thought he had. The weapon had caught his interest, he had plenty of money, which he thought he should keep for when he moved to medonia with his cousins. But he thought, hopefully, he could get a job or something along the way, playing his music one way or another.

Why did Ashkan come back to the battle institute?, there was some sort of drug that had infected him when he was here last, it seemed a lust for combat was unleashed when he learnt the rapier, a lust which had an insatiable thirst for more, Ashkan was back and this time, his determination was more fierce then it had been before. What would happen after this week? would he come back for even more, would Ashkan head to medonia, would Ashkan stay here and loose all his money on training, time would tell, he thought, time would tell.

Ashkan looked at his slip, then back at the door, this was it, this was his training room, Ashkan entered the room and checked out the surroundings. It was a spartan room, quite bare, with a few torches illuminating the room and a shield or few on the walls, intricitly painted on them were some arakmatian forms of calligraphy or what seemed to be that. There were a few columns that littered the room, about four in total, in a square shape in the middle of the room, where inside stood what seemed to be a ring.

In the middle of it, stood a man, half naked, bearing two or three lengthy scars on his chest. The face of the man was mustached and his face bore a unshaven look with stubble protruding from his face. His hair was lengthy, upto his shoulders, his physique slim, not muscle bound, but it only took one glance at him to see that the man was tough, how tough he didn't know. His trousers were a dark green, silk or cotton, a fibre that seemed very light and flexible, indeed, the master seemed more flexible then light.

The man just looked at Ashkan as he walked in, Ashkan just spoke "Serale, here, i got this from the front desk" as he handed Master Metin the training slip.

Crayin · November 20, 2004, 04:38 PM

The man studied Ashkan for a few seconds, then took the note from him. He took a few to read the note, then stuffed it into his pocket. Nodding, he turned around, and walked over to an area of the floor which had two scimitars lying on the ground. He slowly bent over to them, and picked them up. They were the same, in looks and size. Each was made with a silvery metal, and had a gold design apon it, obviously painted the color of gold. The handles were made of wood and red cloth, with little dangly strings attached to the tips of the handles. They were each roughly 32 inches in length, and both curved, as are normal scimitars.

The man made his way over to Ashkan, and handed him one of the swords. He also reached down to two daggers that were strapped to his leg, and pulled them both out, handing one of them to Ashkan. They were about 12 inches in lenght. "Nithe to meet you, Ashkan." The man said in a very deep voice. "My name ith Lodd. Do not ask questionth about my name. People do it too often." Lodd kept a straight face, as if he was serious, and turned around, with his back to Ashkan. He started to winde some sort of tenser bandage around his hand while he stood. "I hear you have had training in the art of rapier. That will be good." His voice was monotone a little bit, a little bit dull. He turned around, "You should then know the thtanthe. I will not go over the proper timeth to ingage in a fight, or how to control your temper, unleth you want. Most people jutht want to thkip that part. Now, show me your bathic thtanthe." The man too got into a stance, with his right foot forwards, shoulder width apart, and his right hand holding the scimitar, the left hand holding the dagger. He held the rapier in front of him, and put the dagger almost behind him.

Ashkan Vampyler · November 20, 2004, 07:43 PM

Ashkan grunted in his mind, great, now he’s going to have to try to decipher what this person was saying as well, could anyone in Riparia speak properly, that was a fact that Ashkan was beginning to doubt, Ashkan was only going to reside in this place until his training was over and he would have to make his way for Medonia so to him, the fact that no one here could speak charismean properly didn’t really bother him too much.

So here Ashkan was, confronted with some more training, he let out a little smile, as he reached out and took the scimitar and the dagger from Master Metin, his name that he had just learnt was Lodd.

What was it the man was saying, something along the lines that the stance between scimitar and rapier didn’t differ too much; the one he saw seemed to differ quite a bit, although he wasn’t going to dispute what the master said. Ashkan just nodded and replicated the stance he took when learning how to use a rapier. Body 45 degrees away from the master, one leg behind the other, with his front leg bent and the back leg at 45 degrees away, his stance was firm his hand gripped the scimitar that his master had recently handed to him, his other hand, held the dagger, it was curved a little, would he learn to use them in dual concert, the concept was pleasing to Ashkan. The scimitar’s weight was a little different to the rapier, the weapon was defiantly heavier, the blade itself looked rather exotic, it was in fact the same blade he saw when the interest had gripped him.

He then said, “Is this the same stance as you wish?”

Crayin · November 22, 2004, 03:20 PM

"Yeth." The trainer said, with a nod. "It ith a good thtanthe, but will evolve to your needth when fighting." When he mentioned a word with an 's' in it, he put heavy emphasis on it, as if trying to get pronounciation right.

He slowly raised his sword high up in the air, above his head. "I will thow you a thlath." He said, then brought his weapon down to knee hight. "It'th jutht a thwing of the weapon at the enemy, tharp thide out." He repeated the move again, swinging it sideways this time, to his right. He then quickly brought it down to the ground, pushed it out in front of him, and brought it up, sharp side up. "That ith an uppercut. They can be tricky to block, and deadly too." He then pulled his sword back and put it to the ground. "When you are thlathing, keep your dagger to the thide, like this..." He held his dagger to about waist hight, and swung his sword to the left. "Thith leaveth the dagger open to quickly reach out and block or attack your enemy. Try it."

He quickly took a step backwards, allowing Ashkan to try the new move.

Yaevin Ralahir · November 24, 2004, 06:55 AM

typical - wrong account.
sorry

Ashkan Vampyler · November 24, 2004, 07:13 AM

Ashkan got back into your stance, there was something infuriating about the masters speech pattern, would he have to endure this consistent stream of intangible speech for his entire stay in this city? He stood back in his stance, it was hard to apprehend what his lisp cursed master was saying. The subject and intent always came through though, there wasn't too much that needed long interpretation.

All Ashkan was able to perceive from the lispical mutterings of Thodd was that he wished for a slash and then an uppercut, thank the gods that he wasn't explaining his moves and not showing them, for that would of been a very difficult experience for the both of them, luckily it was only a minor lisp and that the mutterings of the saurid at the counter were nigh on impossible to comprehend.

Ashkan got into stance, it was different, but it felt very natural, more fluent rather then the brazen linear technique that the rapier employed. He held the dagger ready in position as he stepped forward for a slash, he put his foot forward as he simply moved his blade through the air, slashing in the same manner as he would with his rapier, this was a weapon that was a lot more suited for slashing then the rapier, there seemed to be a lot more momentum due to its aerodynamic shape and it's convexed blade. He did it again, this time, with no step forward, then once more, slashing first time from left to right, then right to left, then diagonally both ways.

Then, he moved onto the uppercut, he tried it as his master did, but was unhappy with it, he didn't move his body save his arm and the blow felt rather clumsy. He traced back, remembering that his master had put a lot of body in his demonstration, Ashkan tried again, the second time round, it felt a lot more natural and easier.
He bent down a bit and came up with the blade with the blade faced upwards for an uppercut, he did it again, this time stepping forward as he did last time, he did not know why he did it, to him it felt a lot easier. He did one more, the same fashion as the last, lowering himself before bringing the blade upwards for a last uppercut before turning to his master to await further instruction

Crayin · November 25, 2004, 12:18 AM

"That wath... ok." He said with a nod. "Now, I would teatth you what a thtab ith, but thtadth not that great of a moof in uthin' the thimitar. Inthtead, I'm thinkin' to go right unto blockin'. Both the weaponth in your handth are uthed for blocking." He cleared his throat, and raised his weapon. "Thtrike at me thlowly, with your thword. Let'th thay... chetht lefel? Horithontal? Thlowly, tho you can learn how I move."

He backed up, and raised his sword and dagger in the defense position. "Go."

Crayin · November 25, 2004, 12:34 AM

"That wath... ok." He said with a nod. "Now, I would teatth you what a thtab ith, but thtadth not that great of a moof in uthin' the thimitar. Inthtead, I'm thinkin' to go right unto blockin'. Both the weaponth in your handth are uthed for blocking." He cleared his throat, and raised his weapon. "Thtrike at me thlowly, with your thword. Let'th thay... chetht lefel? Horithontal? Thlowly, tho you can learn how I move."

His dagger was some what behind the tip of his sword, with his sword pointed at the roof, and his knife aimed out at Ashkan.

He backed up, and raised his sword and dagger in the defense position. "Go."

Ashkan Vampyler · November 26, 2004, 08:51 PM

Ashkan got into stance, hrmm, straight into blocking, before, with the rapier....the dorin instructor had left blocking to the end, now he had just learnt how to slash and he was being asked to attack, perhaps this master was far better then the dorin, didn't look it though, that speech irregularity really seemed diminishing, although logically, it had no bearing on his combat skill.

Once Ashkan got into stance, he did as his instructor asked and slashed horizontally at the chest of his instructor. He did it quite systematically, almost reverting back to the method of slashing that the rapier used, he stoped just before he slashed and tried again. He followed through with the slash, but his focus wasn't there it was more on the movements of his master, Lodd Metin. The sword seemed to be a sound as it slashed through the air, closing in on Metin's chest, but all Ashkan could really do was sit there and watch for the technique his master uses in deflecting the blade.

Crayin · November 26, 2004, 09:23 PM

Quickly, the trainer brought up his dagger, and it clashed with Ashkan's sword. He then brought up his other hand, and brought the sword around to Ashkans throat. If Ashkan had already had this training, he would have been able to bring his dagger up and parry the trainer's sword. This all happened in a flash, and with Lodd's sword at Ashkan's throat, Ashkan was helpless.

"With the dagger and the thword, you can uthe either to block, and the other to attack. It really helpth thometimeth. Try to thtay with the groove." 'The groove' was a wierd way of putting it, but it really meant to stay in motion. "You try it. I will attack you thlowly, and you block me with either weapon, and then attack me with the other one."

Lodd returned to his original position. As Ashkan got ready, he started to advance, and in a very confusing motion, juggled both his scimitar and his dagger. He tossed them both up, and caught them in the opposite hands. He advanced on Ashkan with his sword in his right hand, and took a swing. It was obvious that the swing was not as fast as it could be, but it was not the slowest either. The swing came at nipple hight for Ashkan, the same at Ashkan had done to Lodd.

Ashkan Vampyler · November 27, 2004, 03:48 AM

It was just before Master Metin slashed his blade that Ashkan was hit with an epiphany, perhaps some of the things he had learnt in rapier could be applied here, it was either that, or the learning of the rapier had stuck to automatic recall. Either way, he did not block the slash as the master had instructed. Instead his actions to a new, not so radical path, hopefully, this sort of move would also work with the scimitar, after all, it was a lot easier to parry with a scimitar then it was with a rapier, or so he had been told.

Instead of blocking with the dagger and striking with the scimitar...or vice versa, it didn't matter anymore, he stepped backwads and swung the scimitar not against the blade but with the blade, the idea behind it was the same as it was in the art of the rapier. Go with the blade as to push it away further, the result is an opening on an opposition. In this case the opening would be filled with a stab with the dagger, he didn't want anything to go wrong so he would, if successful, move the dagger forward quickly for a very small distance and then stop, hopefully his master could read his moves.

It seems like Ashkan might have to face a severe relearning process, either that or his master would be quite impressed at his seemingly improvisation. Either way, Ashkan did only what he had learnt to do only in the previous week.

Crayin · November 27, 2004, 01:56 PM

Lodd was very suprised at the move he had just seen, and just stepped back as his mind tried to process. "Uh..." He let down his guard, letting his weapons point at the ground and his arms relaxe. "You'll..." Confusion in his eyes, "Um, I think you will go far..." Then an amused look came to his face, as a smile appeared. "That wath awthome." He let out a smile, while putting the dagger and scimitar away into the bag.

"I'm going to let you go home tonight, and practice. When you come back, we will learn more, and I think that will be the end of your training ektherthithe." He walked over to his bag, and pulled out another bag. "I will let you keep thothe weaponth over night, to practith with. You can put them in thith bag if you don't feel comfortable walking around town with them out in the open like that."

He put his stuff away into the bag, and picked it up. "Well, I will talk to you tomorrow? Same time?"

Ashkan Vampyler · November 27, 2004, 07:59 PM

Ashkan was quite please at the reaction he had gotten from Lodd about his strike, the thing he was most glad about was his natural instinct had proved useful, it was a good sign. But, could his instincts be trusted, were they even instincts? or automatically recalled techniques, either way, he was quite proud of himself, he looked at his Scimitar and his master, "Actually, if we will be finishing tomorrow, i'd like to come in nice and early. Serale, Master Metin"

Saying this, they commenced their departure and Ashkan headed back through the city, back to his home, which wont be his home for much longer as he had plans on selling it soon, he pondered on how much money he would receive for it, he had no idea, he had heard that generally, prices were about five thousands, he hoped his assumption was correct, he would need the money to be able to settle down in another city. Ashkan paused and looked over, he wrapped his scimitar it a cloth, to conceal it, carrying a scimitar through the streets at this time might cause some troubles, he headed back through the city, heading home.

Once Ashkan had reached home, he searched for his mother, was she home? Didn't seem so, after that, he made his way out to the tree at the back in the same fashion that he did while training for the rapier. But not before he filled up a jug of water from the water tank, the jug was ceramic, which would keep the water cool while he worked. Ashkan was already in his gear so he got straight into it, tonight had been quite messy, his instructor seemed to be a little strange...they had seemingly gone through everything rather quickly, as if the master had his own private agenda, hmm, strange, he thought. He also stated that tomorrow would be the last day, which was strange, his other training had taken quite a lot longer...hmm, perhaps it was the trainer, either way, Ashkan was quite anal about learning things efficiantly and properly and there was a bug in his mind that was telling him that it wasn't going to be so with this instructor, perhaps he could iron out his sloppiness with intermediate.

Ashkan wanted to warm up a bit, the walk home cooled him down, but at least his muscles were stretched, so he went straight into pushups and situps, the sort of basic workout, he did about fifty of each, he didn't want to push himself too much, just get the blood flowing. After that he went for a bit of a jog around the yard, he did about five laps, all in all being about five hundred meters, after that he picked up his scimitar and went straight to work. He slashed the tree and slashed it from all different types of angles, like he had learnt that night, up, down, left, right, diagonally, inversely. There was no angle that Ashkan did not try, then he tried some more radical things, he did a slash spin, from right to left he continued the momentum until he had spun around and was back into his starting position. He had his dagger in the other hand, the one which had the name "Louis Vampyler" inscribed on it, but he did not use it, only keep it there, he was focusing on the scimitar side of things.

After about three hours of grueling laborious training, Ashkan decided to cool off and call it a night, his water was fully drained, but the cool weather of winter made sure he cooled down quick enough. He took his weapon and jug back inside and drunk some more water, it was beautifully refreshing, he looked back at the tree, there was a good portion of slashes and scars left on the tree with bark literally littered all around the place.

The next day, in the morning, Ashkan went back to the same room that he had gone in before, opening the door and greeting Master Lodd Metin once again for the last day of his training..."Serale", he said as he entered the room.

Crayin · November 29, 2004, 01:02 AM

Instead of seeing Lodd standing in the room, there was a very large orc. The large creature was wearing long robes that touched down to the ground, and were made of a ratty brown material. His face was... well... ugly. He was missing half his teeth when he grinned when Ashkan entered, and he had about three scars across his face. It also looked like one fifth of his skull was missing, and it showed against his shaved head. He stood 6'8, and was very in either bone structure, or muscle.

"Ahem." Came a deep voice out of the throat of the beast. It was very loud, very strong, and again, very deep. "You're late. Three minutes late." His eyebrows turned from grinning to disappointed. "And being late..." He leaned down towards Ashkan, "Is not a good thing!" He yelled this part, as spit flew out and hit Ashkan, spraying all over his clothes.

The orc turned around, and picked up a sword. "Professor Lodd was a weak and pathetic teacher. Luckily for you, he broke his leg last night, while in a bar fight. With me." He turned around, holding a large katana that was approximately 35 inches in lenght. "I will be teaching you for now. I hear you are a smart one. Well!" He took a step towards Ashkan, "Intelligence is about five percent of battle! Strenght!" He was yelling again. "I wan't you to do three hundred push ups at the end of every session. I won't watch it, I have a life to get to. For now, you will show me how to move in battle! You know the stance, just show me how to move your feet."

The big body loomed over Ashkan, and the orcs right eye started twitching. Only then did Ashkan see the name tag on the cloak, "Professor Oobathankaror." When the professor saw him looking at his name, his face scrunched up. "I said show me!!!" He yelled.

Ashkan Vampyler · November 29, 2004, 01:36 AM

Ashkan had come into here and suddenly, 6'5 feet of pure flesh and blood beset him, spitting all over him and raging around barking out orders in a voice which wasn't anymore understandable then Lodd's....Ashkan just sighed, was there anyone plain and normal in this god forsaken town? The orc had just concluded his thoughts about that fact.

Saying that, both Lodd and Professor Oobo....whatever had very very different methods of teaching, at least it seemed light it, perhaps that'd be a good thing, he had been secretly desiring a better teacher after his session yesterday, his other master seemed quite light while this orc seemed to be an strict spartan overlord of technique. How ironic, although, Lodd had not been given a proper chance, time will tell, but certainly this teacher seemed to be a lot better already....Except for the free sample of phlegm that he had received.

Ashkan did only what he could do, which was what the teacher asked. Ashkan got straight into stance and started to move around a bit, footwork?, the rapier did not utilise such methods, but the scimitar seemed to place heavy emphasis to it. Ashkan probably looked like the idiot of riparia at this point for his uneducated footwork...hold on, as he had just realised, the entire town was full of idiots, or seemed to be anyway.

He just moved around a bit, in a sort of dance way, bouncing around as a student of Zinn'ka would, with his scimitar in one hand but no dagger in the other, perhaps it was just one of the travesties that came with his former master. He just sighed as he bounced around on the floor of the training ground, hoping it'd be somewhat acceptable for the strict training regime that the new orc had dictated.