Celestial Sniper of the Hunt (open)

Chapter - 8 | "Home"

[Hi Lads and Lasses! Before this chapter I'd like to thank @Niftywolf230 for getting a Nat20 on persuasion (little D&D joke) for me to continue this book after 3 years of neglect.]

[- Pringles out!]

I came to much time later, still in the river, drifting lazily downstream. A couple of minutes went by when I felt myself being being stopped by the net. Yes, that's right, the net. (I have a... personal history with this river). Time wasted by as I lay there, sore and unable to move because so.

Suddenly I heard footsteps approaching and start wading through the water. Feeling small hands starting to drag me to shore, I feared that the hunters had found me, until I heard a rather familiar voice sighing and cursing as it's owner dragged me along the ground.

"Stupid... fucking... idiot... jumping into... fucking... rivers... all the time!" she half-shouted.

"...Love you to, pet." I replied in a rather hoarse voice.

"Ah, your awake." She replied in an annoyed tone. "And what have I told you about calling me that! For the last time, I'm older than you!"

I chuckled her reaction. This is Lily, my "little sister" friend. As I said before, she's a dryad. And with how creative nature spirits are with names, you can probably guess what plant she is. She's got blue eyes and brown hair, her skin was a slight shade of green. She likes to appear as a 12 year old for some reason. Her whole wardrobe seems to just be dresses as I've never seen her wear anything else. Honestly the most unique thing about her is that she wears a beret with a pink flower on top, like a Lilly-pad. (As I said, nature spirits are very creative. Note the sarcasm).

She continued. "Can you not just get up so I don't have to drag you?"

"No. Can you not just change form so you can drag me easier?" I retorted in a playful manner.

"... Shut up."

Time quickly passed and we finally made it to our little campsite, and I was promptly propped against a log. It was a nice location. It was sheltered from the winds by rocks, and had a nice little stream for drinking water that lead to Lily's pond, which lead to the river that I was just pulled from.

"So. Where did you jump from this time?" Asked Lily.

"Gorge."

"A new record. And for what reason did you jump?"

"Well I saved a demigod lass, 'bout 13-14 years old, from a group of snake-ladies and a few cyclopes."

She stared at me in shock. "Really!? So where's this girl at then?"

"She's safe, with others that can help her. Oh, and I've got something for your brother to work on."

I pulled out the handful of silver arrows that I claimed from the hunters. Lily stared at me in surprise, taking her time to process the information and connecting some dots.

"ARE YOU TELLING ME THAT YOU RAN INTO THE HUNTERS OF ARTEMIS!? IS THAT WHY YOU JUMPED INTO THE RIVER!?"

"Yep." I reply, popping on the 'p'.

A minute passed by before, "... I just can't with you." And she promptly sat down by the fire in defeat.

"Hey, it's not my fault that I'm a beacon for trouble. You'd think I'd be a demigod at this rate."

She looked at me quizzically. In the past, we've often discussed the possibility of me being a demigod due to my talents and ability to see monsters, as well as my high quality reflexes.

I continued. "Yeah, turns out I am proper mortal, not as in drunk, no. The huntresses found that out the hard way when they accidentally almost incinerated me with some ambrosia."

"Gods, how do you feel?"

"Still have a bit of a temperature but I'm better."

Another minute passes.

"Honestly, you'd think that I'd have seen or ran into some demigods before this, with all the shite that I do."

Lily replied. "Well demigods don't tend to wander far from their little safe-places. From what I know there are 3 groups of them. The first is a camp up in Long Island, another is a town somewhere in the west coast. The only ones that wander around are those on some "quest", and the Hunters of Artemis, who are the third group."

I processed this in my mind. "Hm. What else do you know about the hunters? I already know that they're immortal, deadly, maidens, and quite sexist."

Lily let out a burst of laughter. "Yeah that sums them up nicely." She took a moment to calm herself down and think. "Well apart from that, all I know is that they used to have around 200 members, but after the two wars they're down to a couple dozen."

"Aye, those wars were a pain, massive increase in monster activity."

Lily smirked. "If I remember correctly, when Typhon came by I went and hid in safety while you thought it would be a great idea to stay here and take potshots at him. And you accidentally hit one of the gods in the process."

I laughed, hard. "Aye, and it was a crack shot too. I don't know who, but whoever I hit is gonna hate me for a bullet in the shoulder." I lied. I knew exactly which one I hit. I was Zeus. I just didn't want Lily to worry about me more than she already is. Hopefully he never finds out and just thinks that it was a deflected arrow from his daughter due to the silver. It was his throwing arm too. (Yeah, I fucked up).

"Aight!" I say, clapping my hands. "It's getting late, so let's get some sleep and we can visit your brother in the morning. Sound good?"

"You have just spent possibly hours unconscious, and you now want to sleep?" Lily asked in a joking sort of tone.

"Aye, well, I'm still sore and need to recover. And I divn't want to fuck up me sleep-cycle now do I?"

I pulled out a warm blanket from my waterproof bag (something I bought after the third "river swim" I had), folded my now dry hoodie into a pillow and laid sat-up upon the soft grass and log. Before I could enjoy it, Lily laid down next to me, stealing some of the blanket as usual, and quickly fell asleep against me. That's the thing with Lily, she may be much older than me, but she still is a child at heart.

After a few minutes, the land of Morpheus claimed me as well.

[Hi Lads and Lasses! Big chapter this time. Over 1100 words! Hope you all enjoyed meeting Lily's character. See ya's next time.]

[- Pringles out!]