Nathaniel Goldman's Journal of The Weird and Strange

December 5, 2017

So I'm working on my swordfighting technique. Maggie wants me to learn one-handed and with a shield because of some invention she's working on. Mr. Matthews is teaching me werewolf swordfighting styles. Mostly really powerful lunges and big sweeping cuts. Usually done two handed, but Mr. Matthews is making it work. Henry is working with the orks on his fighting. Maggie upgraded the baseball bat so that it's now instead of being a cylinder it's somewhere along the lines of a rectangle that expands slightly outwards the higher up you go. Maggie made him these gloves that go with the warclub. It's pretty much Thor's hammer minus the electricity and flying. He's working with the orks, and I didn't know orks had a fighting style. Apparently the goal is to always keep the weapon moving and use inertia to your advantage. Cassie, meanwhile, is learning all about elf fighting styles. The elves taught Maggie how to make magical stun arrows, which pretty much hit you at several miles an hour and give you massive bruises but don't kill you (I may have gotten hit with one). Anyways Maggie made a special bow for Cassie and she's now learning all sorts of special archery techniques and elf dagger fighting (move quickly, in-and-out stabs and slashes, do NOT fight anything heavily armored with a dagger that's what your bow is for). We're gearing up for the assault. Every day after school Maggie is working on something. We're not taking anyone with us with the possible exceptions of Val and the Matthews family (I count Phoebe as a member of the aforementioned "us"). We don't want to risk anyone else, plus if something goes wrong we don't want to leave a bleeding elf in the middle of nowhere. Too many questions asked that way. But we're really doing this.

As Nathaniel writes, don't leave a bleeding elf in the middle of nowhere. Those are words to live by.