It's Good to be Back, or Bad... [Snopy, Steiner, Private ask before joining]

Over two months had passed since the Hero of Honor had returned to the camp site that he had called home for many years since he had began to train in isolation. To him it was a sight for sore eyes. The old patchwork tent, the self-made fire pit that he had crafted to cook fish from a nearby river where he got water from, and a large open field nearby which was perfect for training exercises all brought a slight smile to his face as he passed by each thing admiring it as if it had been so long since he had seen it. He supposed a lot had happened to him in two months and that was probably why his emotions were in such flux. He was healed now, whole, and without pain yet looking back at this camp ground that he had abandoned two months ago to travel around the world in a sort of bucket list checking event, he couldn't help, but feel he had outgrown it a little. The once welcoming sight of his former home was now nothing more than a place where he felt uncomfortable. It was like the places that were once so vast and so providing around him were now too small for him to truly enjoy the pleasure of being in them.

He let out a sigh as the realization that this would probably be the last time he came to this particular camping ground hit him like a ton of bricks. He had come here to see his old home, but even now he longed to move on to a place where his training would truly be uninhibited by the lack of space. With one more sigh, Steiner began to do as any person would do when they are moving. He began to pack, solemnly moving to different locations, and stuffing object of import on an emotional level and a practicality level into a backpack and a rather large gym bag. In truth, Steiner didn't have many things that he considered to be truly valuable and he had always traveled light so the packing didn't take very long for him to complete. In fact by about fifteen minutes in, Steiner had managed to pack up the majority of the camp, and for the first time got to see just how empty the spot felt without his belongings strewn about. He paused for a second, soaking in all of the good and bad memories, before lifting the twin bags, and beginning to make a trek for as far away from civilization as he could.

He would have made it pretty far if not for the sound that entered into the forest at the moment he began to walk out into the fields. A rather large and audible gunshot was heard for miles around as Steiner began to look around, confused as to what the hell was going on, and even more so his body entered into a state of high alert. He looked around, his eyes darting around, and looking for signs of conflict as he dropped his duffel bag and backpack on to the ground as he drew his broken sword from its' sheathe. He had received a bit of training from Mirja, nothing to write home about, but he knew that he could more than defend himself even with this broken sword if the need for him to do so arose. His body was tense and his eyes scanned the tall grass around him for visible signs of movement, but he was only met with the gentle swaying of a summer breeze. A few moments passed and Steiner remained tense, but poised. It was then that he heard more gunfire, coming off from in the distance, and the sounds of Hollows wailing in pain and agony.

He didn't hesitate as he made his way through the fields at a brisk pace, hopping over fallen trees, and easily dashing through the vast waves of what looked like an endless grass sea. By the time Steiner began to pull closer to where the sounds of conflict had originated, Steiner's mind began to worry about what sort of scene he was going to walk up on. It wasn't uncommon for Hollows to attack on the outskirts and it wasn't uncommon for vast groups of Hollows to migrate around from place to place looking for meals. Some would call them packs, but Steiner knew better than to assume what the hell they were because most of the time Hollows were unintelligent creatures that were driven by hunger and anger. They didn't perceive things as people like he did. That being said, sometimes Hollows congregated together to assault tougher prey, and even more so to attack groups of people traveling outside of the protection of the city's defenses. It was when he neared what could be called the edge of the forest, heading out to another large field that belonged to one of the few parks outside, that Steiner spotted a rather large congregation of Hollows, all of which were quickly devouring what looked like a Hollow corpse with a hole through its' eye socket.

He counted five as he ducked behind a downed tree and observed what had happened, his mind instantly jumping to the worse possible outcome. Whatever had shot that hollow was more than likely dead and even more so was more than likely digesting in several of those Hollow's stomachs. The ones who had probably not gotten their fill were currently eating their fallen brethren with little care that it had been one of their "pack" moments ago. It made him sick, but he didn't have time to be sick because in that moment he felt a single drop of what appeared to be water fall down on his shoulder. Instinctively he would reach to touch what had fallen on him, only to be met with a sticky substance that appeared to be....saliva! It dawned on him in that moment that there weren't five Hollows, but six. Looking up immediately, a rather weird looking Hollow jumped down from the tree tops, and Steiner rolled in response. The creature, who's body resembled a monkey, was camouflaged perfectly for what it had been doing earlier.

Hiding in plain sight in the trees above, Steiner wondered just what sort of state he would have been if the creature had kept its' mouth shut. For now, he couldn't think about such things. He had to defeat the creature in front of him before it decided to make a meal of him. For a second there was silence between the two, as both of them stood firm, and watched for movement, but the Hollow would be the first to make its' move. However, this Hollow had not been trained by a super fast demon wolf, and as it lashed out at full speed...instinct took over. Steiner spun around it, looking like he was dancing, and casually used his sword to slice right through its' mask. Its' horrible scream filled the air as it tried to rear back for a second go, only to find Steiner's sword impaling it straight through the bottom of its' jaw right into its' brain. The creature shook for only a second, one agonizing second as black blood spewed all over Steiner's vest and khakis.

For a moment, Steiner realized just how far he had came, and just how much better he had become with just a little training from Mirja. He wondered just how much stronger he could become if he continued to train with her? That thought would have to wait as the sound of five Hollows howling hit Steiner's ears. The death screams of their fellow pack member had drawn unwanted attention to Steiner and now as he turned to look he could see the beasts booking it toward him as fast as they could. "Shit...", Steiner said to himself as he turned away from them, still clutching his sword, and made a run for it. He needed to get to familiar territory, he had mapped the field outside of this cluster of trees, and it would be the ideal place to fight a group of beasts such as this. But it would take a miracle to live through all of this and he didn't know if he had the necessary skill to deal with five Hollows as he doubted his current level of skills were capable of dealing with this many at the same time. He would try, but there were no guarantees.