Raoul O. Ardelean was walking towards the scene of the assigned case he was tasked with by a mysterious informant. It was a day like any other for the Astralblood Dhampir, sat in a tavern looking over some leads and thinking of the next case to take on when suddenly a raven flew into the establishment and dropped off an envelope right in his hands before flying off quickly as if it never was there at all.



He opened the letter a bit perturbed but not enough to sway him from the arms of mystery it was a letter addressed to him that read as follows, “Dear Mr. Ardelean I have been informed of your investigation skills and problem-solving services. I would like to commission you to help with my and my family’s recent hauntings that have been halting our normal day-to-day business. Please come to Overgrown Ruins to help us with our dreaded ghostly issues. You shall be compensated greatly for your time.

Sincerely, Mindeni Final on Behalf of the Final Estate.”.



That was enough to sway the tired and overworked detective’s heart and so he quickly made haste towards the Overgrown Ruins rereading and analyzing the letter in his hand as he walked.



Suddenly his eyes sharpened as he heard a rustling of the bushes near him, he quickly took out a wooden wand (^{1. Whip Wand}) before swinging it down the end of the wand growing into a long thorny whip and cracking it against the wind.



“Whoever you are out there you better make your presence known before I start looking for you myself”.

"One." A chilled breath as Fustian Shieldbreaker's eyes narrowed. "Two..." The count-focused on three ravens conspiring six feet from roadside. "THREE!" A coiled spring, and he tumbled among feathers, cursing as his uprighting answered a whip's crack. Huffing and exhaling sharply through flared nostrils, Fustian adjusted the neck ring and hood of his ill-fitting yet oversized orangutan onesie before turning to glare at Raoul's arrival.

"My presence?" Fustian huffed, his chest rising and falling rhythmically as an engine does with steam. "MY...PRESENCE?!" Gesticulating wildly at where wildlife should have been, Shieldbreaker continued to address Raoul. "YOU! YOU SCARED THEM OFF!"

Shaking his head and applying aid of his monkey's paw, Fustian threw up both hairy-fingered mitts in frustration. "I mean, you expect to capture a beast that size with just a whip-crack and demanding it show up...No, no, no...First you need proper bait!" Spreading his arms wide and turning in a circle, the man continued. "BUT NO. NO CORVIDS FOR THAT TODAY, ARE THERE?"

With an audible sigh, Shieldbreaker turned to Raoul, tugging at costumed bits before speaking. "My name is Fustian Shieldbreaker. AND YES...Before you ask, it's a rental." Fustian scratched absently at his flank.

The Astralblood Dhampir lowers his weapon as suddenly a very large man in an orangutan onesie emerges and seems very upset at him.



“Woah, woah there big fella let’s just calm down here, what the heck are you talking about whose presence? I thought you were some damn beast or monster about to sneak up on me and take me as prey. Pardon me for my hastiness. I was simply caught off guard. I didn't mean to interrupt your hunt?”, the last part Raoul says with a bit of confusion.



The man looked like some sort of hunter emerging in the forest with a wild look in his eye, so he had assumed the man was here for either food or sport.



“As for me, no no I’m no hunter my dear stranger I am but a humble detective here on business searching for the Final Estate. No worries I understand perfectly the pain of having to wear something you would rather not”, flashbacks of being forced to wear a bat suit by his old friends came and went quickly before shaking his head.



“My name is Raoul O. Ardelean, traveling detective, seeker of truth, Aasmir Dhampir”, he holds out his hand for the other man to shake, “It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance Fustian Shieldbreaker”.

Fustian's eyes narrowed while he drew of breath between teeth. "Tchsss...Oh, you can say I've heard of that place..." Attempting to reach forward and offer a similar grip, Shieldbreaker's jerked motion prompts him to shuffle closer as the orange suit belies its' taut nature from first glance. "Got to...Get...Gah!" With another clumsy jab of his arm, the man stiffly shakes Raoul's hand.

"The Final Estate is why I'm here as well. Used to be the groundskeeper until things got too spooky over there." Looking past Raoul's left shoulder, Fustian notes the slow arrival of around five ravens on the path behind. The birds begin to knock and chitter at each other, and the man continues, "Yes, but I've found the perfect bait to catch the biggest of the buggers with." Nosing upward, Fustian arches an arm and points towards the birds with disdain. "Corvids. Ravens will do, but crows preferred."

Setting the stiff arm downward, Fustian recalled the ominous issue within the manse. "I could see at night, when a low mist came, that's when a sobbing would start. Then a distant muffled horn. And crows would scatter. Figure it's after them, so what better bait, eh?"

Raoul shakes the stiff-handed strong man’s grip noticing the callouses in his fingers most likely from his hunting exploits. Raoul quickly took out a small notebook and began writing down Fustian’s words and accounts of events.



“Used to be groundskeeper at the estate”-he wrote and underlined it establishing the Fustian fellow as a part of the case as an eyewitness to hauntings.



He writes down the man’s mention using Crows and Ravens as bait he stops and looks curiously at the man a bit confused, “Bait? For the haunting fellows?”.



He then continues writing down Fustian’s eyewitness account of what he says, “I get using crows I think? Have you talked to any of the family about this or what you saw?”.



After listening to his response and writing it down he stuffs his notebook into his coat pocket before placing his finger on his chin deep in thought, “What exactly am I dealing with? Ghost? People? A Misunderstanding? Who knows but I do know that I’ll get this thing solved”, he ponders in his mind.



He then snaps out of it and faces the fellow in front of him, “Alright fellow can you do me the favor of guiding me or telling me where this estate is. I thought I had an idea where I was going but I believe in truly lost”.

The sun changed overhead, somehow imperceptibly, but now low behind Shieldbreaker's form. The man adjusted to straddle the pathway, placed both hands on his hips and sighed. "Found this in a mousetrap a week ago. One of them went off, I went to investigate since the resident feline is away. I don't know why the mouse was clutching it. Perhaps it ties in." Reaching into the flap at the back of the onesie, Fustian slowly pulled a single black crow's feather from his rear.

An ominous wind blew in the damp chill of evening, and Fustian coughed into his other elbow. A burp of sour whiskey-breath to the air passed freely as he handed the feather to Raoul.

Fustian shivered and pulled back in an attempt to cross his arms. "I figure capturing the thing that scares visitors away, has to do with either puttin' all of these crows in one basket, or by havin' a big, shaggy dog..."

Holding a finger up, Fustian tilted his head to hear the low wail begin.

"Shh now! There it is!"

A low fog blossomed along the sides of the pathway, and as Fustian Shieldbreaker looked down, the ground trembled ever so slightly.

Raoul’s eyes widen with slight disgust as the man proceeds to take out a piece of evidence from his rear. He quickly reaches into his jacket pocket to take out a glove and places it on to touch the black feather.



He observes it with curiosity thinking out loud, “Crow Feather found in a mouse trap? Could something as simplistic as this catch a crow? No, couldn’t be this has to be deliberate and on purpose. But how? Could someone place this on there? Is this a red herring perhaps trying to lead us off on the wrong track?”, The dhampir’s brain was now working in top gear and he was just rambling off to himself at this point to focus on analyzing the clue at hand.



His attention was shattered as he saw the fellow hold his finger and warn of something.



He glances around as the low wail noise begins, and whispers, “What?” before almost falling over in surprise from the small earthshake.



“What was that?”, the man says in confusion as the shake stops, “Is this the work of whatever we’re dealing with here? Is it a ghost? An Elemental? A werewolf? A dumb ill-spirited mage? Any of these could be a possibility”.



Before the detective can go back to rambling and thinking of how to proceed he snaps himself out of it and says, “Alright, Fustian led the way. I need to take a proper look at this estate to figure out what’s going on”.

"Oh...No..." Fustian Shieldbreaker gasped, "Not again!" Another low rumble preceding the wailing, this one much closer as if over the next reed-topped hill. "Got to...Get out...Of the..." Tripping over both his words and the monkey suit, Shieldbreaker fell to the mist-clad earth. "Don't worry about me!" The man wailed, "BUT..." Fustian's eyes were wide with a primal fear as he pointed ahead shakily. "WHAT ARE DOES?!"

Ahead of his gesture were a buck and doe happily chewing the foliage. Both took a moment to pause, twitch their ears, and vamoose with sincerity.

"AAHHHH!" Fustian piped, as a pink pachyderm prodigiously popped perilously pathwise in approach. Behind the pink elephant a smaller, more gentle elephant, greyish in color and sobbing between trumpeted wails bobbled here and there.

Fustian stopped.

The smaller elephant stopped.

The pink beast did not.

Pouncing on Shieldbreaker, a mighty trunk unfurled! A cold breeze blew discarded litter! A murder of crows whistled overhead as lightning flashed in the distance!

This time the smaller elephant let out a short toot of elation, and rumbled happily towards Raoul.

The pink elephant held.

Fustian's bladder did not: Truly trapped was he under the foot of this beast.

Raoul followed behind the hunter for a bit before he was alarmed by something going on he ducked quickly and worriedly, “Hey what’s going on friend, everything alright?”, he said curiously before suddenly feeling a slight rumble under them.



“The letter didn’t mention this? What’s happening? Hey where are you going?”, he said, hand outstretched towards Fustian with concern.



“Are you alright”, he said as he jogged slightly towards him worried he’d hit his head or was seeing things that weren't there as he pointed ahead.



He looked up and forward confused as he pointed, “Aren’t those just forest animals' friends? Don’t you deal with those sometimes? Look there’s nothing to worry about, those guys are friends, watch”, he said walking slowly closer wanting to pet one to show Fustian everything was alright.



He stopped in his tracks as he spotted a pair of elephants one strangely pink and the other one smaller and gray.



“Hey, easy now”, the detective said as he raised his hands slowly trying to calm the situation.



He was about to rush forward and help Fustian before suddenly he was tackled to the ground by the smaller elephant who hit him directly in the abdomen taking the breath out of him as he fell to the floor with the little creature on top of him licking his face. He gasped for air quickly before sitting up and looking into the creature’s eyes suprisngly the little fellow was cute and looked harmless. He glanced at the pink elephant, still worried but not wanting to move another inch in fear.

In a ghastly response, full of fear and panicked breath, Fustian Shieldbreaker turned his head towards Raoul. "Just...Give...Him...The...Feather!" The pink elephant slowly turned to look between Fustian and Raoul, expecting some form of action from either as it obviously had the high ground.

Interrupted by another chilled blast of air, Fustian's eyes darted nervously to take in the predicament. "This is it," the man mumbled, "this is how I go. Held accountable for all the times drinkin' on the job. I should have never have signed on to be a groundskeeper at DesNey's lands."

Slowly holding up his hands to the elephant to show that he was free of any armaments, Fustian continued to mumble the gibberish that flimsily established his need to be on the road this day. "They warned me. 'Don't go usin' any of the property off the property'...An' that's what I did, bless me. Brought that feather past the gate. No wonder the little tyke's mad..."

Still continuing his fractured reasoning, Fustian sweated amid heightened nerves. "...And don't get me started about monkeyin' around with those Crow folk. No wonder they've been mockin' me for tryin' to catch what doesn't want to be caught t' begin with!"

Fustian attempted to sit up in a quick jerk, but was restrained by the padded foot of the elephant.

"That's it!" The man ejaculated, "We just need to hoe our own row! I mean, Crows before hoes! No...Grah! Don't try to work above our pay grade?" Frustrated and tired, Fustian neared collapse. "I...Suppose...A good bath...Would suffice...Gotta...Start...Somewhere..."

Raoul barely moved his head towards Fustian as the man spoke, not wanting to make any sudden moves. He pets the small elephant on his lap with his left hand and with his right he slowly reaches into his pocket pulling out the feather as was instructed.



He holds it up at the pink elephant and says in a calm and relaxed tone not showing his concern, “Hey there friend looking for this at all? We’re not here to hurt you at all, we’re just here to help out some friends over there”, he motions towards the estate in the distance”.



He smiles gently and places the feather on the floor next to the pink elephant and then just starts playing with the little gray elephant who seems cheerful. He glances over Fustian not saying a word, only giving him a look of true calmness to show him that everything will be okay, to relax. The pink elephant moves its foot off of Fustian, its rage disarmed from seeing Raoul play with its child. It glances at Fustian. Any sense of danger is gone from him. All it sees is just a very funny man, almost like a pet.

Heaving a final sigh, Fustian Shieldbreaker passed out: The experience being too much for his senses to make heads or tails of. A series of strange and unusual visions revealed themselves to the man; beheaded gravestone busts floated through amid a shocking green haze, a grim barbershop quartet providing anguished vocalizations as numerous neon-colored elephants wove in circles. Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera!

Feeling as if the inevitable had passed him by, Fustian arose from the plot of land and began to dig himself out of the hole he found himself in. A short time later, the man stumbled warily down the road and sought assistance from a stable-boy. The youth gladly helped Shieldbreaker emerge from the smelly orange cocoon of a monkey suit, and several buckets of water came to aid in an outdoor scrub-down. Cursing behind a covered stable, Fustian was at least happy to scrub the muck away.

And that, dear reader was Fustian Shieldbreaker's tale for this day. A simple premise at best and cautionary one at worst. For all innuendo and metaphor cast aside there but lay one core truth: Unless you want to get stuck in an unsavory situation, don't monkey around with someone else's property.

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