Krunch Bloodrage

Krunch Bloodrage
In-Universe
Title	The Scholar
Gender	Male
Race	Bloodrage
Affiliation	Kethenecia Bloodrage Clan
Occupation
Status	Dead
Location	Legara
Relatives	Chief of Bloodrage Clan (Father) Ray'd (Brother) Tah'vraay (Soul-mate) Benn'joon (Daughter)
Out-of-Universe
First appearance	Book 1 ~ Page 11
Last appearance
NPC-appearances

Krunch Bloodrage is the elder son of the chief of the Bloodrage Clan. His younger brother Ray'd is the Bloodrages' battle leader. The deceased warlord, Lord Stoll, describes the pair as "a scholar and a warrior", with Krunch being the scholar.

Krunch has taken a side in the "good/evil" debate that is, essentially, Cale and Richard's relationship. While Cale believes strongly in good and Richard equally strongly in evil, Krunch believes that people do what they must to survive and everything is, in essence, relative. Due to his secular nature and the fact that he is generally able to give logical reasoning to his beliefs, Cale often looks to him for truth and advice. Krunch refers to Cale by the nickname "Pinky". Like most others of his species Krunch suffers from aquaphobia and will only travel by boat by being thoroughly strapped to the deck.

Though possessing great strength and battle prowess, Krunch, the scholar, has shown himself to be highly intelligent, judging by his obvious education and linguistic ability: In the printed version book cover he's seen reading a book while the rest of the group engage in fierce combat.

History

Krunch was born a child of the Chief of the Bloodrage Clan, and grew up the elder brother of Ray'd. Krunch evolved into a scholar, while his younger brother would turn to the path of a warrior, eventually leading him to become War Leader of the clan.

At one time Krunch had been captured by the Legarans and placed in their dungeons. It was there that he met a very young "green kid" named Benn'joon. With her in tow he escaped the dungeons and returned to his people, adopting Benny as his daughter and practically raised her. Krunch quarreled frequently with his father, a staunch believer in "empirical" expansion who supported Lord Stoll among other warmongering leaders, so Krunch left the tribe sometime in the past for reasons unexplained (Benny cryptically stated it was because of her, but specific motivations are still a mystery).

He watched over Benn'joon as she grew up, his presence saving her life numerous times, most likely from Temmet Aelloon's doings - as she owed him a lot of money, although the Sword of Truth would suffice.

Book 1

First Appearance: Page 11

Krunch featured on the cover art for Book 1 along with Cale'anon, Benn'joon, Richard and Aelloon.
However, in the actual story, Krunch wasn't present in the Nestorep tavern, like the others.

Benn'joon had managed to get herself into a lot of trouble near the village of Nestorep with her new allies Cale'anon and Richard having slain several of Aelloon's men, and getting caught in the claws of a Dragon of the Legion. Krunch charged in to help by tackling and killing the dragon, then reporting to her that a full wing of dragons were after her. The group ran to the nearby mountain, and found an entrance through the mountain wall where they could hide from their attackers. They made a camp and started to discuss their next move - either find the Sword of Truth or journey to Legara and kill him. Because of Cale'anon not wanting to kill any man of the law they instead decided to search for the sword. As they tried to make their way out of the mountain, they came by a gnome sentry, who told them they could not pass, but Richard engulfed the gnomes' head in flames, and they passed anyway. Soon, they were attacked by a larger group of gnome soldiers, but Cale'anon made the fighting stop, by negotiating with the gnomes' leader; Chief Engineer Toyk. Toyk enlisted the group in the Mechastone Defense Force and contracted them to kill the gnomes' enemy, the troll Lord Stoll. Krunch and Toyk made up several battle plans, at least including a plan A and a plan B. A soldier called Fitch then lead the group towards Stoll's camp, but accidentally made them walk straight into Stoll's second-in-command, Styx' marching army. Because of one of the trolls, Tim, appearing extremely unintelligent, Cale'anon believed them all to be half-breed trolls and deemed it safe to openly ask where their leader was hiding so that they could kill them. Styx imprisoned the group, throwing Richard and Benn'joon in the Pit of Despair, while taking Fitch, Cale'anon and Krunch to Lord Stoll himself. On the way, Cale'anon and Krunch convinced Styx that they should actually be allies, and Krunch killed Fitch to prove his point. Because of that they were allowed an audience with Lord Stoll, who fortunately had a fine relationship with the Bloodrage line - so Krunch could easily convince him that they would instead help destroy Mechastone, but betrayed him and murdered him. That was when Styx, now first-in-command, ordered the other trolls to kill them, and a fight broke out. Luckily, Toyk had followed plan B and made the Mechaston Defense Force attack in the same moment. Eventually, the gnomes won the war - and in return for their aid the group was given a scroll, a page from the Archmages' Codex, with a map leading to the Sword of Truth.

Book 2

In the ruined castle of Gamlon Krunch spends his time writing, but is disturbed by Sooba's farts.

Krunch and the party followed the directions given by the map, leading them to the abandoned ruined castle of Gamlon in which they were to find "the Shriek". They made camp inside the castle yard and stayed there for days while Krunch spent his time trying to figure out Toyk's scroll, and writing poems of their journey. Soon the pure among them, Cale'anon, got the attention of both a lady ghost and a young elf girl.The girl explained that the ghost could lead their path to Kethenecia if only they knew the past first - then she combined her magic with the ghost's to create a portal leading to the past, but only allowing the innocent Cale'anon to go through. Cale'anon was gone for days, and in the meantime Krunch and the rest had to protect their camp from a group of bandits descended from the Vulii elves. Cale'anon returned to finish the battle, having acquired knowledge of Gamlon's past, and also knowing that the young elven girl, Leena, was actually the Shriek. However, the most useful accesory he acquired in Gamlon's past appeared to be Tavor's magical swords, which revealed the actual map to Kethenecia whenever they were bathed in blood. Happy with the results Krunch commanded that they left for the port of Tyne.

Krunch and Richard about to save the crew at The Father's Bones, by combining strength and magic.

In Tyne Krunch went off to hire a ship, eventually getting the attention of captain Tah'vraay and her crew of The Father's Bones. Krunch, suffering from a heavy aquaphobia, tightened himself to the deck with robes, and the ship took off. One early morning, two crew members tried to rob Krunch, but they were maimed by Richard's magic. Shortly thereafter, Cale'anon discovered a Legion warship approaching. The hostile warship fired several harpoons aiming for The Father's Bones due to Tah'vraay's bad history with the Legion. Richard was hit twice by the harpoons and rammed into the ship's mast, so Tah'Vraay finally decided to fight back. A heavy melee fight broke out between the two ships, and Benn'joon protected Krunch, until he decided to break off the mast that Richard had been rammed into with his raw strength. He then threw it at the enemy warship, while Richard set fire to himself and the rest of the mast, successfully sinking the Legion's warship.

Krunch, Benn'joon, Cale'anon, Richard and Sooba before the entrance to Kethenecia.

The journey towards Kethenecia then continued, and they left Tah'vraay's crew once reaching the shore of the Ketten Wastelands, after paying a ridiculous amount of money for the trip. As they walked through the wasteland Krunch retold the ancient entwined past of humans and dragons in that region. They traveled through the desert, finally encountering a sand dragon, which Richard proudly turned into glass while Krunch argued for the validity of the scrolls from the Archmages' Codex. As more sand dragons were coming towards the party, Krunch convinced Cale'anon to act out the scroll's message and stab the glass dragons' eyes. That action indeed revealed the forgotten city of Kethenecia before the party.

Book 3

Krunch and the others entered the once hidden city of Kethencia, soon after they encountered Tavor, Cale's brother in arms that appeared to had died. Cale was confused by the reappearance until Krunch explained that some oaths "transcend all." They continued to travel through the city until they came across a statue depicting the events that would soon transpire, Krunch soon translated a script on the archway that, although an exact translation was impossible, said "Journey back to travel forward" Figuring out that this was a portal and that they needed something or someone of immense power in order to open it. Tavor expressed that they had someone of 'impressive' power already that was capable of such a feat. Despite Krunch's insistence that Richard did not have the power to open the portal Richard decided that he would do so. Krunch called Cale over, Cale thought that Krunch intended for him to open the portal even though Cale is not a mage, but Krunch simply wanted him to watch what would happened to Richard whether that would be a good or bad thing. At that point Richard crucified himself to begin the opening of the portal, for comedic effect.

Richard succeeded in opening the portal, with the help of his battle cry 'For Pony' and inspirational speech/threat from Benny, providing a way into what was discovered to be Kethencia's past just before it's fall. The party left Richard's unconcious body with Sooba in the village where they appeared as they made their way into the city. Soon after however they came across an army about to leave the city to go to the aide of Gamlon. Then a soldier known as Vaycon pointed at Krunch saying that a 'chained one' was loose. The dwarven general appeared pleased to be doing some good as he was bemoaning the fact that they probably would not be able to make it to Gamlon in time to do any good. Krunch warned the army that they were beginning to anger him and he threw a soldier into the dwarfs horse at which point to dwarf left his horse and ordered his soldiers to kill Krunch. Thankfully the Archmage appeared telling the dwarf to leave them be and the bring them to the tower.

When they entered the tower Cale worried somewhat for Richards safety as to his knowledge Richard was passed out unable to do anything, at which point Krunch advised him that that it was best that Richard was not there as Richard was a danger to the fragile nature of time.

Later in the series

After discovering Legara's plans to invade the Northern Territories and his own father's accidental duplicity (the Legarans tricked him into attacking all of his neighbors) in that Krunch worked as the chief mediator in getting the tribes back and working together to resist the Legarans.

When Cale decides to attack the King of Legara through the portal, Richard, Krunch, Ray'd, Dorel, and the other Bloodrage follow him. The King is revealed to be Tavor and he promptly stabs Krunch. After Tavor's death Krunch's body is brought back Kethenecia where Benny desperately tries to revive him and fails. his body is then cremated on a funeral pyre.

See also

Krunch appearances