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Post by Noa on Jun 18, 2021 18:26:32 GMT -6
Noa had returned to the edge of the river to do some fishing… and some training… Well, okay, if he was being entirely honest, it was mostly training. If he could do two things at once, he did; it was just more efficient that way. And fishing was nice in that he could sort of just leave his pole there to catch the attention of a fish, and if he lost it, he lost it, no harm no foul. Also it was outdoors, so he could bring all his big creatures - most of his creatures were large, especially if he was bothering with training them in the first place. Though on this particular trip, two of his companions were exceptions to the rule: Rhys, who was always present, and who as a familiar couldn’t be that large anyway; and one of the Houluh that he had adopted on a whim. He only had the two so far, and Nana had been the first. He had thought he would be done with her training after he had gotten her breeding certification, but there was a contest coming up, and he thought he might as well have her brush up on some more tricks to give her a better chance at winning. It couldn’t have been that difficult to teach a Houluh a couple of extra attacks, right? And even if they lost, hey, points were points, and the prize shops had more to offer now than they had before. 1
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Post by Noa on Jun 18, 2021 18:26:56 GMT -6
But since he was going out, he also felt that he might as well take one of his bigger creatures with him. Nightshade, for example. The Wiurn had earned something of a break after their stint in the Pit, but that didn’t mean he was exempt from all exercise. Getting outdoors and into some fresher air would do him some good.
They got to the edge of the water, and Noa began to set up his fishing equipment. Nightshade nosed around for a while, then found a place to take a nap when it became apparent that Noa wasn’t going to pay him much attention. Unfortunately, Noa’s priority first and foremost was to train Nana this time.
On the other hand, Nana waited with what some might have called patience; others would have named it indifference. To this day, Noa wasn’t quite sure which it was. His experiences with creatures, for one reason or another, stayed mainly in the realm of the reptilian - Wiurns and Pliathor, Faeron and Thundergugs. Or maybe a Thundergug wasn’t a reptile, but surely they were closer to that than to a… well, a dog. He didn’t know too much about dogs. Nana was on the quieter side, calm in the face of most things except food. Maybe that was unusual, and maybe it wasn’t; he didn't know enough to say.
It certainly made her less of a handful than Walnut, and Noa was learning, unfortunately, to be glad for it.
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Post by Noa on Jun 18, 2021 18:27:20 GMT -6
But he could still push most of the worst work off to Rabbit, and so there hadn’t quite been enough occasion to get rid of Walnut either, though on occasion he was at least a little tempted, when she had been particularly troublesome.
No time like the present to get started on things, Noa supposed. He walked up to Nana, who looked up at him and wagged her tail a little, curious as to what he wanted. He said, “Claw,” before picking up one of her forelegs and dragging the claws against a piece of wood that he had brought along for the purpose. Then he gave her a treat. That was it; that was the full extent of what he wanted her to do. Nice and easy.
Now they just had to repeat this a few times, and hopefully she would do it on her own.
Nightshade looked up a little at the sound of Noa’s voice, but now Noa could tell him, “Not you,” and have the Wiurn understand what he meant. Nightshade grumbled, but subsided for now; on another day he might have kicked up a fuss over this, but right now he was still too tired from his exertions at the Pit to be much of a nuisance, which was good, since Noa wasn’t working with him right now. He turned his attention back to Nana, whose attention on him had grown much more acute now that food had been introduced into the equation.
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Post by Noa on Jun 18, 2021 18:27:39 GMT -6
Well, good. He did need her to focus on this. He repeated the command, then picked up her paw to drag her claws along the wood once more. Then he fed her another treat, which she nearly inhaled in her enthusiasm to eat it. It was funny, since she was usually so even keeled otherwise, but in the face of food, well… She still wasn’t on the same level as Grunty, but they had some things in common, to be sure.
He got through a third repetition of it this way with Nana, before on the fourth, she picked up her paw of her own accord. She didn’t quite pick it up high enough to hit the wood, but Noa reacted quickly, lowering it to where she would catch it with her claws anyway as her paw swiped down. Her nails scraped against the wood, and he gave her another reward.
Things had been a little different this time around, so Noa gave her a little longer to think it over before repeating the command. He wanted to see if she would do more of her own volition. For a moment nothing happened, but then she picked her paw back up again, actually seeming to be aiming for the wood this time. It wasn’t really enough force, but it was a big step in the right direction. {She’s getting it!} Rhys said, apparently more excited over this development than Noa was himself, which was sort of funny if he thought about it.
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Post by Noa on Jun 18, 2021 18:29:58 GMT -6
But then, Rhys was generally prone to be more excitable in general, and by this point Noa was already sort of used to it.
“She’s going to need to hit it harder, but this is a good start,” he said. And then, because she didn’t have the whole thing down yet, he held up the board and repeated the command once more. “Claw.”
By this point, Nana had worked it out that he wanted her to scratch the board, so she did just that. Noa repeated the process with her a few more times just to make sure she had it. The force came with the repetitions, as it turned out; as she got faster at it, it turned into a real swipe, that might conceivably do some damage if she tried it against something softer and fleshier than a piece of wood. He had her try it on a few different targets too, just to get her used to the idea of clawing something other than wood. She was a little confused by this at first, but with some treats and patience, she soon had the idea down.
So far, so good. That was one of the two things he had wanted to teach her done and out of the way.
Before they moved onto the next item, he went to check on the state of his fishing rod. Maybe there would be a bite waiting for him... Probably not, but it was better than never checking at all.
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Post by Noa on Jun 19, 2021 19:30:29 GMT -6
Sure enough, nothing had bitten the hook in the intervening time. Noa supposed it was his own fault for never baiting it with anything, but sometimes he was able to catch things even so, when a fish who was particularly stupid latched on anyway. Or maybe they just had a death wish, though he didn't know if he believed that these fish were smart enough to plan out their own demise. Maybe he was wrong; he knew the Seryn were sentient, and Tat-lung did also spend a portion of their lives as fish... But he never caught either of those in this river, that much was for sure.
He sighed, but it wasn't as disappointing as it could be considering he hadn't really been expecting anything to begin with.
Nightshade picked up his head as Noa moved toward the pole. Now that Noa was done checking it, he looked in Nightshade's direction and arched a brow. "Are you hoping to steal a fish from me?"
{Are you done with that?} said Nightshade, turning to Nana, who was sitting in the grass, giving a yawn just as Nightshade said this.
"Nope. We're just about to start again," Noa said. Evidently what Nightshade was hoping for was for Noa to do something with him; Noa probably should have expected that. Unfortunately for the Wiurn, there was at least one other thing he wanted to teach Nana before they wrapped things up for the day, and he was just taking a short break before they started.
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Post by Noa on Jun 19, 2021 19:33:51 GMT -6
Nightshade subsided with another grumble of displeasure, and went back to whatever he had been doing - which as far as Noa could tell, was napping. So much for him getting any exercise. Maybe Noa would put him through some paces after he was done working with Nana. Considering how much he was complaining about not getting attention, he would probably enjoy it.
For the moment, however, now that he was done checking on his fishing rod, it was time to resume his work with Nana.
The next thing Noa wanted Nana to learn was to headbutt her opponents. It wasn’t something he would have thought about for a creature of Nana’s body type, but apparently one of Briar’s knew how to do it, and if Briar could teach a dog to headbutt something, then it stood to reason that Noa could too.
For this one, he didn’t want to start off with a target that was too hard, since the head was more important and also probably more delicate than the claws. So Noa brought out a cushion, and presented it to Nana to sniff, so that she could get it out of her system and not be too curious about it once they started training in earnest. She gave it a thorough once over before subsiding, watching him with that same expectant gaze. By this point Noa was sure that she knew what was up, since they had already trained her in one thing today.
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Post by Noa on Jun 19, 2021 19:34:27 GMT -6
Maybe she could even tell that Noa still had some treats on him. Well, it worked to his advantage, so all the better. He said, “Headbutt,” and touched the cushion to her head. Then he gave her a treat.
{Oh, let me try,} Rhys said, apparently seeing an opportunity for himself to join in. He took the cushion from Noa and held it at the ready. Noa said, “Headbutt,” and this time Rhys was the one to tap it to the top of her head, before Noa gave her a treat. `
Perhaps she sensed a pattern. On the third attempt, she was the one to bump her head to the cushion of her own accord. Noa gave her a nice big reward for that, pleased that things were progressing more quickly this time around. Perhaps they could finish up soon, and then head back home so Noa could work on other things.
For that to work though, they had to keep going. Noa gave her the command again and held out the cushion to see if she would do the same thing, then gave her another treat when she did. They repeated that process a few times, with Rhys sometimes taking over holding the cushion, to make sure she had that idea down - that she had to touch the cushion with her head when she heard the command.
Once they were confident that she had that part down, Noa decided to move on to the next step in the process.
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Post by Noa on Jun 19, 2021 19:34:44 GMT -6
This time he had Rhys hold the cushion a little further away, with the board behind it so that there would be something hard enough to offer resistance, rather than this becoming some sort of matador affair with Rhys and Nana. Noa gave her the command again, and in her eagerness to get the treat, Nana ran at the pillow and butted it with her head, just as Noa had hoped.
He was glad it had worked. He wasn’t entirely sure how to prompt her into giving the headbutt the proper amount of force, but apparently giving her a little run up for it did the trick, so long as she had sufficient incentive. And then once she was used to it, he felt reasonably sure she would do the same going forward. That would be what more practice was for, to reinforce the idea even further.
He gave her another nice, big treat, then repeated the exercise again. They did this a few times, until she got the gist of it, and then Rhys and Noa took turns holding other things - all of them padded, since this was just for show, and Noa didn’t anticipate using this command in a live combat situation. Even if Nana had to fight, it would be more effective to have her bite or claw at her opponents; and Noa really hoped he didn’t find himself in a situation where he would have to rely on her as his line of defense.
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Post by Noa on Jun 19, 2021 19:39:08 GMT -6
Even Rhys or himself had more potent ways of hurting or restraining an opponent, though that was more the case because of their magical prowess than any physical power. What a pity that Nana lacked both.
But he did need her to be able to perform this on command, preferably without having to use the same pillow as her target every time. As with teaching her to claw at things, there was a little initial confusion, but after a little encouragement and some patience, Nana got the idea down. They practiced it a few more times just to be sure, then called it quits.
From there, Noa did a little more fishing, then gave in to Nightshade's badgering and did some light work with him too. It was just enough to satisfy the both of them, since Noa didn't want to spend too much time or effort here, and Nightshade wasn't in the mood to do anything too strenuous either. Rhys contented himself on the sidelines, occasionally offering suggestions or egging Nightshade on.
By the end of their trip, Noa had caught a grand total of absolutely nothing. A little disappointing, but this was offset by the fact that Nana had picked up everything that Noa had intended to teach her. So that was one of his goals accomplished, at least, and he could content himself with that, since this was the outcome he had the most control over anyway.
With that done, it was time for the four of them to pack up and head home.
10 (exit)
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Post by Nadia on Jun 22, 2021 2:19:13 GMT -6
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Post by Noa on Aug 9, 2021 23:24:53 GMT -6
What a bizarre predicament to find oneself in, Noa thought, as he led a small fishing party down to the side of the river.
He was, of course, the only one of said party who was liable to do any fishing. The rest of them were purely along for the ride, companions and hangers on at best. When he brought his Wiurn down he could at least count on them to make an effort, but... No, he rather thought that none of today's company would do him much good in that department. The little feathered creature, riding around in his pocket as it was inclined to do, was much too small to be of use, never mind the fact that it couldn't fly and was by all accounts still in its infancy. And Rhys... Well, Rhys might make a better showing of it, but he wasn't exactly proficient at catching fish, and was more likely to scare them away with his efforts. That might be remedied at some later point, if Noa felt inclined to teach him the ropes on this whole fishing process, but he also didn't urgently need Rhys to become a handy fishing companion. He had other, more pressing matters to attend to, so a project like that would have to wait until he grew bored.
As for his third companion, well, forget it. This creature couldn't even affect the physical realm. How it might catch a fish was anyone's guess, and Noa rather thought it couldn't.
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Post by Noa on Aug 9, 2021 23:28:17 GMT -6
But it was because of this creature that he was here, now, in this predicament to begin with. He had traded for it, knowing its cost, from that trader in the city, the strange one who never revealed themselves and always asked for the strangest things in exchange for magical crystals. Noa had at a different point in time traded them fish for the stuff, which seemed like a very lopsided deal to him indeed. Fish for crystals! Who would have thought such a farce was possible? And yet it had happened, and he had benefited from it, so he was hardly going to complain.
But a creature was much more expensive than a crystal, and the purchase had done away with much of Noa's stockpiles -- or his aquarium stock, if you would like to call it that, though he found that they kept much more easily in stasis, like almost everything living that he kept on his estate grounds. Well, either way, it meant that he had to go catch more. On a perverse whim, he decided that the creature responsible for robbing him of said fish may as well be companion to the capture of more, for all the good it would actually do his efforts.
The process of getting it to follow him anywhere had been... challenging, to say the least. Even with Rhys's help, using telepathy to communicate concepts to it, it had been slow going. The creature was not sentient, for all its fancy appearance.
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Post by Noa on Aug 9, 2021 23:33:32 GMT -6
But then, appearances could be deceiving, and here in the labs, when it came to the creatures that resided here, they often were. The labs could create any number of different looking beasts, with all sorts of abilities and twisted natures.
And yet, this creature -- a Nebuli, he had learned later -- had actually come from the Mansion. Maybe it wasn't lab-made at all. Noa wasn't sure; it was hard to be certain about anything from the Mansion. Even the resident scientists didn't seem to know too much about how exactly it worked, and if he thought too hard about the fact that it seemed to hold living residents that came and went based on the theme of the month... No, the less he thought about the Mansion, the better. It was like inviting a headache to come and take up residence in his skull otherwise.
At length Rhys did prevail, though not without a good deal of effort, and the Nebuli deigned to join them on their little foray. It had never seen a river, and apparently that was the extent of the appeal of this journey for it. Well, whatever got it from point A to point B, Noa supposed, though he sensed that this wouldn't be the only challenge of working with an ethereal creature. For all his experiments, he didn't often work with ghosts, and didn't have any real idea as to how to handle them.
It was, all things considered, a good thing he had Rhys.
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Post by Noa on Aug 9, 2021 23:37:07 GMT -6
Not that Rhys was any more familiar with ghosts -- or at least Noa didn't think he was, anyway. But the Faeron could communicate with pretty much anything with a mind, and in this case that was possibly the only coherent communication channel Noa could manage to establish with this thing at present.
He din't even want to think about attempting to train it. These ethereal creatures, they didn't eat, did they? And he wouldn't be able to push limbs into place or anything. Some people managed to train this type of beast, he knew they existed, but he had yet to try it himself.
He didn't need to worry about that for the moment, however, as this was simply a fishing trip. The aim of this trip really was fishing too, this time around. At most Noa thought he might teach Rhys to use a few spells -- he had been Noa's familiar for long enough that he really ought to know some by now -- but nothing more serious than that.
It was funny, because most of his fishing trips before had been more for the opportunity to train some creature in a big open space than for the actual act of catching fish. He'd managed to catch some anyway, somehow, but never very much at a time. He wondered if his luck would turn now that he was devoting some actual effort into the endeavor, or if the fish would sense the fact that he was after them and stay away.
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