Chapter 93

Rain eased his paw down, shadow slipping from his fur, extending, black scythe claws sliding out of nothingness, the leaves of the bush curling away as they brushed up against the ruinous surface of the scythes.

He was a hunter, a thing that stalked the night, a monster that inspired fear like no other. All were like terrified bunny rabbits before his monstrous yellow gaze, a thing that slid from moonlit shadow to moonlit shadow, hounding its prey.

At least, that might have been the case, if it wasn’t broad bloody daylight.

Instead of being a nigh invisible creature of the night he was a spot of easily visible darkness on the bright sunny canvas of the day, showing up in clear sight amongst the leafery of the forest. The horned boar monster stared right at Rain as he crept through the foliage, its little piggy mind wondering why the hell this creature thought it was being stealthy, if it did think that, well it was doing a terrible job and fooling nobody. Still, those black claw scythes radiated danger, and even though the boar was enormous this black furred monster was still very very large. Deciding that wisdom was the better part of valour it took a step back, then another, yes, better to not risk this strange wolf thing that seemed to think it was being stealthy.

It was then that Opal who had been waiting hidden behind it thrust out her rapier and stabbed deep into its ass.

“SQUEEEEEEE!!”

Shrieked the boar as its ass was violated by the needle of metal, a laughing Goblin girl swinging of the hilt and pushing it deeper.

Out of its mind with panic and pain the boar charged, charged straight into the foliage, unfortunately for the boar right at the spot where Rain was ‘hidden’. The black fur Moved, a predator in motion, exploding forward, leaves and branches flying up around it. The black scythes swept up and took the boar under the head, four blades punching up through its jaw and straight into its brain with a satisfying schthunk sound.

The boar dropped like a rock, its head ripping free of the blades and in doing so the blades went out the front, canyons of flesh writ across its face and already starting to writhe. The boar hit the ground with an earth shaking thud, its brains and flesh wriggling away across the grass.

“Those weird blades are a little unsettling you know ... Give me one.”

Rain blinked at her. “You want-? No, I can’t do that, it’s too dangerous for you, and besides these are claws not blades, I can’t make blades, totally different thing.”

Opal scowled at him. “Fine, giant claws, whatever, give me some of them, I want to add them to my collection of pointies.”

“We don’t have any healing potions left Opal, if you accidentally cut yourself with this stuff it won’t just be a cut, it will be a wound liable to make you bleed out. Find something else to obsess over.”

Rain turned on the fuming Goblin girl allowing the dark claws to syphon back into his fur as he reached out and eagerly grabbed hold of the boar. His jaws came down and he bit into its side, ribs failing and breaking apart as his teeth inevitably cut through its flesh, scooping out a great mouthful and then gulping it down.

“‘s good,” he muttered between bloody mouthfuls. Hunting hadn’t been hard in the forest, the floating pairs of wolf teeth ensured that, but they hadn’t come across anything large, no, mostly small animals, which was a problem as his endless burning hunger needed a lot of food. He’d been forced to make do over the last few days by having the teeth hunt down everything that breathed or moved, stripping the forest bare of animals, deers, foxes, rabbits, birds, anything, all chased down and killed by the wolf teeth then gathered together and eaten, hundreds and hundreds of animals. It wasn’t as though he had a choice, he could feel his hunger nipping at his heels, edging into that state of extreme mindless hunger like that after he had eaten Adlen. He couldn’t risk going back to that, he couldn’t put Opal or Lyra in danger from himself again. Not happening.

It was starting to be a real cause for concern that the hundreds of animals wouldn’t be enough, but then they had stumbled on top of this giant horned boar monster. Nearly directly stumbled upon it, not seeing its green camouflaging mossy fur until they were practically on top of it and only spotting it by the great curving horn sticking from its forehead, a yellowed cracked ivory.

Of course, he had hesitated.

The boar was a monster and that meant killing the thing was going to add to his levels. There was a real feeling of uncomfortable apprehension about that, which would have been an alien and unthinkable thing to feel in his past life. Being wary of leveling? The one true key to having a good life in this world? Madness.

What was more he hadn’t told either Opal or Lyra that he was now in part a leveler. He didn’t even know how to begin to approach that problem, he somehow doubted Opal would react well.

But those were things for future Rain to worry about, at that point he was absolutely ravenous and just the sight of the boar made his mouth water. He had barely needed to glance at Opal to communicate what he wanted, although that was hardly difficult to understand. Opal had grinned and snuck off around the boar, circling, while he pushed ahead, drawing the boar’s attention, and then they had sprung their trap.

And now Rain gorged himself on the dead boar, damping down that burning hunger within, the satisfying squish of its heart as he tore into it pushing him on. He would have continued on happily like that but then, out of nowhere, something struck him in the side, something pointed, something that dug painfully into his flesh.

He lurched back with a roar, stringy lines of red dripping and flecking from his blood drenched muzzle. He turned his head, left, right, searching from whence the attack had come, then seeing nothing glanced down to find a black arrow poking out just below his ribs. He snarled and grabbed it, ripping it out and tossing it aside.

It was a moment of distraction, enough for a huge longsword to sweep toward him, powering through the air with Skill empowered weight.

Rain hadn’t been idle however, as soon as he had felt the arrow pierce his side he had started shedding darkness, black mist seeping from his fur and coalescing, taking form. The blade came down on the half formed shape of a scythe clawed paw, crashing into it and lodging halfway inside, darkness misting around it.

He turned his head to find the owner of said blade, a large Orc with oversized tusks parting his lips each capped with copper. He seemed startled that his attack had been stopped.

Rain punched his half formed other dark paw into the Orc’s stomach and the Orc’s guts spilt free, fleeing from his body, falling around the scythes as Rain sunk the claws deeper until they were pushing out from his back and scraping against his spine.

“F-foul thing,” gritted out the Orc in immense pain, his eyes pin points of agony, he lifted a shaking hand and slapped hold of Rains arm, his thick Orcish fingers curling into his fur.

“Burn.”

Sparking flashing electricity exploded from his hand, an instantaneous agony that made Rain lock up, his body going so tense that he couldn’t move a muscle, his vision going white, flashing strobes, a roaring in his ears, he couldn’t breathe! He felt more than heard the Thunk of an arrow slamming into his back, then more Thunk Thunk Thunk Thunk. He wanted to cry out in pain but he couldn’t even do that, only stand and take it as his body burned, smoke rolling off his burning fur in waves. This was too much.

With a savagery that caused muscles to tear and split apart he forced his arm to move through sheer bloody will. The scythes in the Orc rose slowly, agonisingly slowly, cutting up through his stomach, into his rib cage, slicing through rib after rib, cutting into the now screaming Orc’s lungs, then with a snarl and a lurch he cut through the Orc’s heart.

The burning sensation ended instantly and he stumbled forward as he regained control over his shaky limbs, breath ragged.

Thunk.

He roared and ripped his paw up, cutting through the top of the Orc and shredding his head. He spun around, paw whipping forward, darkness billowing from his fur, a half dozen wolf jaws being flung into the air.