roc
[rok]
noun
a bird of enormous size and strength
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“I don’t get why we need to bring this much stuff to kill one bird.” Luke said as he hefted his oversized backpack. He needed to adjust it before they really started to climb the mountain, making sure it wouldn’t slip off.
“First of all, we’re not here to kill it.” Nera corrected. “We’re just trying to get one feather. Second of all, it’s not just a bird. It’s a Roc. That means we need to prepare accordingly.”
“A rock? I thought we were after a bird. And why would a rock have feathers?”
The other party members stopped and turned to look at the large man. Luke paused as well, looking at his team members and waiting for them to answer him.
“Luke, you do know what a Roc is, right?” The party leader, Adam, asked.
“Sure. Why wouldn’t I know that? They’re everywhere.”
“Can you tell us what you think we’re talking about then?” Nera asked. Luke answered by picking up a small stone. The other two groaned. “How have you survived this long as a monster hunter?”
“What do you mean?”
Adam sighed as he responded, “What she means is we have serious cause to doubt your continued survival. Now, I can’t believe I’m asking you this, but do you know what any of the monsters we fight are called?”
“Nope.” Luke said proudly. “I don’t have to know what they’re called to kill them.”
“But don’t you have to study them? You know, to know their strengths and weaknesses? Or just where they live?” Nora asked.
“Weaknesses? I know the weakness of every single monster out there.” The other two looked at each other skeptically. Luke paused and took out his battle axe. “It’s called axe! And if not axe,” He pulled a large war hammer out of his backpack, “then hammer!”
Both the other party members felt the beginnings of a headache. “I can’t even begin to tell you why that’s wrong.” Nora said. Part of her wanted to smack the much larger man over the head. That part of silenced by the fact that she wouldn’t be able to reach.
“Really? Seems like it works so far.”
“Okay, look, we can try educating you when we get back to town.” Adam said with a sigh. “Let’s focus on the Roc. That’s r-o-c, not r-o-c-k. A rock with a ‘k’ is just a stone. A Roc without a ‘k’ is a bird.”
“Oh. So, we are killing a bird.” Luke said, nodding his head. “Got it.”
“Well, again, we’re not here to kill it. Just get a feather. Also, see that big boulder over there?” Adam pointed to a massive boulder, easily twice as big as Luke was. The large man nodded. “Well, a Roc is not a big as that boulder. It is big enough to pick up that boulder with one foot.”
Luke’s forehead scrunched up in thought. “That’s...a really big bird.”
“That’s right. A really, really big bird. I could go into more about it, but none of that matters now. What matters is that we’re going to climb up that mountain to the Roc’s nest, get a single feather from it, and climb back down. If the Roc is present in the nest, We’re going to hide until it’s not. Can you tell me why?”
Luke thought as hard as he possibly could. “Because it’s too big for axe and hammer to kill?”
Adam and Nera glanced at each other. She felt her eyes glaze over. He rubbed his temples to try and head off the coming headache.
“You know what?” The party leader said. “That’s close enough. Let’s get this over with.”
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You'd think in a fantasy world, knowledge of super dangerous monsters would be fairly common, if only to know what places to avoid at all costs. But some people are just dumb. Even a world of monsters and magic can't suppress human stupidity.
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