Board Thread:Roleplaying/@comment-5583506-20160209154925/@comment-5583506-20160225152951

"Let me tell you a little story of what it means to be a Beast Slayer, and from there you can judge whether or not this is a place for you. This story begins with a young boy, having been born into a group of Outsiders. His father was a banished City-Dweller and his mother was one of the Outsiders. The leader of the tribe didn't like this so called "half-breed" the least. Though the boy had been born a pure Nord, he was still regarded as a freak of nature by the leader, just because of his heritaged on both sides of this world's twisted ideology. And as such he earned the hatred of the rest of the tribe as well. Eventually even his own parents came to follow the view of their leader, and realised that they had made a mistake. This boy was the result of their mistake."

Trymir gazed out over the group coldly. "Then came the day when the tribe was attacked by Beasts. A group of five Skeever Beasts had found the encampment and decided that an Outsider tribe would be a sweet-tasting morsel for them. They had all been asleep and the boy had been watching this from afar. He could have run down there to warn them. To save them. But he saw that if he ran down there to them, he would have joined in their fate. The boy simply watched as his entire tribe fell under the Beasts, including his parents.

Then came the day when he was found wandering the woods by an Argonian in a cloak and hood. A Beast Slayer, he said that he was. He asked the boy for forgiveness for having been late to stop the Beasts from attacking the Outsiders, seeing as he had been there himself on that day. The Argonian hadn't attacked them however, even if he had the chance. When the boy asked him why, he told him that if he had attacked the Skeever Beasts would have taken him to, seeing as they outnumbered him. He said that he had chosen not to fight them because he wanted to survive. Survive to live and fight another day. If he had engaged in battle with those monsters, his life would have been forfeit and the Outsiders would still have been dead. His skills in battle would have gone to waste and his body would have just been torn apart to fuel the very enemy he was dedicated to stop.

The Argonian brought the boy back to this very keep and learned him the ways of the Beast Slayer till the day came when the boy was faced with his old enemies again. The Skeever Beasts. Once again they had sought out to prey on a tribe of Outsiders. Though in reality he didn't hold any grudge against them for devouring the people who had unjustfully hated him his entire life. Even so, he wanted them dead. He wanted them dead because he regarded them as an obstacle in his own life. How could he ever survive and live the life he wanted when there were monsters like these roaming the world? So, he engaged them. Even though there were too many for him alone to face them he attacked. He used the skills he had learned from the Argonian and took them on by himself. One Beast fell, two, three. When he came to the forth, standing on the nape of its neck, he glanced down at the people below him, running like ants. He could see the terror in their eyes. How weak and afraid they were. Afraid that everything they had ever dreamed of would be taken from them this very day. He sympathised with them, but during that brief moment when he saw the world from their perspective, he lost grasp and focus of his own. The fifth Beast plunged into the fray, leaned over its mate, and snapped both of the boy's legs off below the kneecaps."

He fell silent for a while, observing the group under caution. "When the boy came to his senses again he had lost two limbs and was being patched up by his comrades who had arrived later at the scene. The Beasts were all dead and the Outsider tribe was safe. They had already moved on and even though it had been within their power they had left the boy to bleed out in the mud. He then realised what a fool he had been. He had for one moment thought of fighting for people he didn't know, and it had cost him dearly, could have costed him his life, and they still wouldn't have raised a shoulder."

To their surprise the old Nord lifted one of the legs of his trousers, exposing that beneath were strange contraptions made out of metal stuck into a pair of leather boots. "I was fifteen years old when I lost my legs to a Beast, all because I lost focus on my own self-preservation. My point with this story is that you may think it selfish to fight for the sake of your own survival, but that I am here to tell you to put those thoughts aside. There is nothing selfish with wanting to survive. It's what marks us worthy of mankind. What point is there in sacrificing your life, your hopes, your dreams, your skills in battle to a gigantic monster who will just continue to run rampage long after you are dead, devoured and gone? You will have accomplished nothing. Mankind will have accomplished nothing. And those people you died for, will still die, due to the lack of people who fought these creatures because they had the will to see what the future holds. You don't lay down your lives for these monsters when the odds are against you. It would be a loss, if anything. When you fight, you do so because you want to see this Beast dead, and yourself alive at the end of the battle. People will survive because of this regardless. But if you so much as try to put yourself into the role of the Outsiders and the City-Dwellers, identifying yourself with a victim. Then you are going to die a victim. I was lucky. You may not be so lucky, if you try to put yourself in their place.

Centuries ago, people fought against each other for decades. Ask yourself this. Do you actually think that those who fought in those wars fought because they shared the ideals of whatever lunatic had sent them out there in the first place? Though I won't deny that there of course were those types, the majority of those who fought in those wars fought for themselves. Fought to survive. They weren't about to be filled with a volley of arrows or skewered by a spear. That thought never crossed their mind. Fear kept them alive. Fear and the will to survive and see the outcome of what this war would bring them, whether it be salvation or destruction."

He then fell silent again. "Think about it, all of you who hold any doubt in your hearts. Fight with your self-preservation in mind, and you will survive, and thousands of people will live because you can carry on your fight against these Beasts. Or identify yourself with the weak and sacrifice yourself in a foolish attempt to save lives, thus forfeiting your own life and your skills that could have been put to use to keep those people alive, if for but a while longer.

Ask yourselves what you are. An asset for mankind? A resourceful warrior who knows when to draw his or her blade and when to stay put? Or a liability for mankind? A waste of potential straight down the jaws of a monster with more deaths to follow at the hands of your killer?

Fight for yourselves. Fight with self-preservation. Fight for survival. Keep your own hopes and dreams alive, so that others may live to see their own bear fruit."