Rise Of Myth: Heir To Valor 36 A Bounty On Hunger

"Last time the beast struck was here, farmer disappeared, leaving only a boot. Seems to be hunting in this area." A dwarf responded, resting a crossbow against his shoulder.

A group of five mercenaries were waiting out behind a barn, almost a mile away from the fortress, a small herd of sheep were resting nearby. Three humans, a dwarf, and a half-elf made up a small mercenary group, one of several attracted by the lucrative bounty.

"What do you think it is?" Asked the man with the torch.

"Probably a pack of wolves, or a large warg, should be easy money between us." Responded the half-elf, who appeared to be something of a trapper, equipped with a long man-catcher polearm with a vicious spike. He was standing a short distance away, straining his largely human-like, but pointed ears to pick up the slightest sound from the woodland hills.

About a half hour later, around one in the morning, the group heard a distant, deep howling sound from the hills. The sheep woke and began to bleat, making strange fearful noises and huddling close together.

"That's neither wolf nor warg…" The dwarf was looking around nervously, holding his crossbow ready to fire at anything that moved through the trees in the distance.

"The sound is almost… human? It does not sound quite like the howl of a beast." The half-elf was studying the hills carefully, leveraging his elf-given eyesight to try and breach the darkness.

A man clad partly in plate moved forward, seeming to be the leader by his confident tone. "Let's move forward, toward the hills, this barn is just where the last attack occurred, if we use it as bait, the damages will come out of our pay." He instructed.

The five crept forward towards the hills, following their leader with some hesitation in their footsteps. As they head into the spa.r.s.e trees, the howl issued once more, sounding louder, but still not close. The noise was strange, like a man howling in anguish, but a low, deep sound that echoed down the hills.

The five ascended the hills and came to a reasonably level clearing, with no trees dense enough to hamper the use of their long weapons.

"We'll take the beast here." The leader instructed, the man bearing the torch came forward and dumped a large sack to the ground. Freshly butchered parts of pig spilled out of the sack, seeming leftovers from a butcher's shop.

The five set about placing some traps and netting along the ground to hamper whatever creature came charging out of the darkness.

"Uuuuoooooooooaaaaarrrrhhhhh!"

The howl suddenly issued a heard time, loud enough to cause the elf to wince and clutch his ears. The rest of the group immediately readied their weapons as the thudding sound of something as heavy and large as a bear could be heard scrambling towards them. The ground shook slightly as the thudding beast approached, the half-elf saw it first, his eyes widening in horror and his stomach churning, feeling the need to hurl at its grotesque appearance. The dwarf swore and hastily loosed a bolt, only to miss as the broad steel head buried itself into the bark of a tree.

The beast was as large as a car, resembling a strange, misshapen man running along on all fours. Its arms and legs were as thick as the trees, as it moved with an alarming swiftness, it covered ten meters in barely a second, pouncing on the unfortunate man holding a torch, frozen in fear. He did not even issue a scream while he could before the beast crushed him under its weight, ripping a ma.s.sive chunk of flesh and bone from the base of his neck with large, powerful jaws lined with two rows of jagged teeth.

"Surround it! Get its legs!" The leader barked as he moved forward with a large bardiche. The beast seemed to be ignoring them as it ripped apart its first victim of the night, swallowing meat, bones, even pieces of ripped apart mail, not bothering to even chew.

The half-elf recovered from his stupor, das.h.i.+ng forward and locking down a thick ankle with his polearm. A man carrying a similar hook-like polearm held the beast's opposite leg.

Finally acknowledging the remaining combatants, the beast howled and to their surprise, grabbed the half-elf's head with its ma.s.sive, clawed hand, enclosing his head completely. Just as he released his weapon to struggle from the beast's grip, he was thrashed about like a doll and tossed aside, whatever bones in and around his neck having been snapped and broken several times over, he remained lifeless at the base of a nearby tree.

"The pay is not worth this, we need to leave, now!" The dwarf called out, loosing a bolt that burrowed deeply into the beast's fleshy torso.

"We can kill it! More coin for us this way!" The leader roared and swung his weapon down on the leg still held down by the hooked polearm, held in a pair of white-knuckled hands.

The bardiche cleft through the thigh of the beast, severing the leg completely as blood gushed from the stump. A chill crept over the leader however when he noticed the blood was not warm in the slightest, in fact it covered his body in a cold, damp feeling instead. Worse yet the beast did not seem to recoil in the slightest at the loss of its leg.

The beast responded with a ear-piercing howl, shaking his vision as the noise hammering his ears threatened to throw him from his feet. It whirled on the leader, thrusting its hand at him, five, nearly foot long claws found their way through his breastplate with little resistance, rending his chest open. Warm blood ran along the beast's cold, grotesque hand as it howled again, seemingly in delight. The last man previously holding the beast's leg down was crippled by fear, trying to crawl away as his legs failed him. The dwarf had long departed, discarding his weapon and frantically rus.h.i.+ng down the hills towards the city, not sparing a glance behind him as only the satisfied howling of the beast could be heard.

. . .

Val slowly woke from his bed, enjoying the comfort of a real, warm bed, he considered the option of simply remaining in bed all day, having missed this luxury. The backseat of cars, tents, sleeping bags, canvas cots, he had slept in half a dozen different kinds of makes.h.i.+ft bedding but nothing compared to a proper frame and mattress with soft pillows and blankets.

As he contentedly lounged and stretched across his bed, the light splas.h.i.+ng sound of water reached his ears. Sitting up and looking about the room, he noticed the bed across from his was empty, but the noise was coming from behind a tall part.i.tion in the corner, where he recalled a large tub sat.

*Hmm, Asha's up already I guess, and bathing?*

Val did not hear any maids drawing water for them, though after weeks of light sleeping, it was not surprising that he could have slept through an earthquake last night, and he technically had a history of doing so.

"I had them draw water while you were sleeping, had you not woken I thought about using it to wake you." Asha's pleasant voice reached out from behind the part.i.tion.

"Hmph. Sounds like you slept well. Where's Huginn and Muninn?"

"Gathering information, I a.s.sume, or relaying messages, they'll be back shortly."

Val got up, dressed in some linen trousers he had purchased the night before, he walked over the door leading to a balcony. The room faced the street and while it could be noisy, it also gave one access to the view of the bustling market. Business seemed to be booming as usual, the sounds of merchants hawking their wares through the morning. The sun had yet to reach its peak but light poured in from the large opening in the roof of the fortress-city, scattering across the interior from a large tower with a mirror-like surface.

A few moments later Asha was dressed, in more casual attire, but still sporting her cloak. It seemed she had taken her armor to Joanne's shop first thing in the morning. Val himself got dressed and the pair descended for some food, but what greeted them was a rather rowdy hall.

"What's the commotion about? Seems livelier than usual." Val took a seat at the bar, Boldir poured a mug of tea for him, and set about furnis.h.i.+ng a plate with some pork, eggs, and bread.

"That contract you were asking about last night. They increased the reward to a hundred and fifty gold." The dwarf barkeep replied, handing him a plate laden with food and a fork. Asha herself had some tea, though opted for lighter fare of bread and fruit preserves.

"What? What happened last night?"

"Mercenary group, freelancers mostly, five of them left to hunt the beast, only one returned."

"Where is the survivor?" Asha asked, now curious of the contract.

"Recovering his sanity, wasn't injured seriously, just a sprained ankle, but he was pale as a sheet and now refuses to leave the city or discuss the beast any longer. Seems he's retiring and planning to find quieter work."

"They find out what it was?" Val asked between mouthfuls of food.

"No, but apparently it is larger than a bear and much faster, large claws that can rend steel plating. It was too dark to make out many details about the beast, but supposedly the group took its leg before they fell. Strange thing is, some folks searched the area, but they did not find the beast's leg, only the weapons, bits of armor, and a lot of blood. There were some prints but the whole thing was a chaotic mess and the scouting party did not dare follow the tracks too deep into the hills."

"So everyone here is now trying to gather information and form their own groups for the higher bounty?"

"Partly, others are biding their time, thinking if they wait a few more days the bounty will go up again. See the man in the black cloak over in the corner?" Boldir pointed out a darkly dressed man to Val. "He's something of a handler for some of the established mercenary outfits that operate out of these parts, 'Black Dogs'. Even some of the bigger players are showing interest in this affair now."

"Wouldn't large mercenary groups be caught up in the war going on?" Asha asked.

"Some are, but it's not really much of a war yet, skirmis.h.i.+ng at best, some of the outfits have been hired to do some scouting, fodder work really, the Black Dogs are not really much for open battlefields anyway. Usually their business is protection, escorts, and other, more private lines of work."

"What do I need to satisfy the contract?" Val asked curiously.

Boldir raised an eyebrow to him. "You interested in hunting the beast yourself? If it's coin you need, there are less risky means for you."

"The coin would be nice, but I am interested in whatever it is that is haunting those hills. If it stays here, fine, but something like that could be a serious problem for other survivors of my kind."
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"Hmph, well, either way I don't advise it, if you insist though, it's standard procedure; you will need to kill the beast and bring its head as proof, sometimes even the whole body, but this one they're only asking for the head. That said, some folks have already tried to get away with turning in the heads of other beasts, so it may end up being an entire corpse."

"Well, either way, Asha, got any plans tonight?" Val grinned at the elf, who seemed a bit taken aback.

"If you insist on hunting this creature, I don't mind accompanying you, but I won't do it for free." She smirked, seeming very satisfied with returning Val's usual brand of medicine.

"We can split the coin, fifty-fifty seems reasonable to me, I'm not a greedy man."

"Ha, you can keep the coin, if I help you, you may consider yourself indebted to me for a favor."

Val raised an eyebrow, debating for a moment what kind of favor the elf could ask of him, though figured it was probably related to his background.

"Fine, a favor for a favor it is then."

"Very well, however we're not hunting this beast till Joanne's done with our gear."

"What good will it do to have armor made from hides when this thing has ripped right through a man's breastplate?"

Asha scoffed at his ignorance. "Taking a bad hit is one thing, but good armor will still give us more room to breathe, it's the difference of a glancing blow and having your arteries slashed open. Besides, Boldir can attest to this fact, she's as knowledgeable about armor as she is about the beasts from which her materials are procured, she might know something about this one."