Strategy Guide: Betting The Ultimate Hooves Wiki

One more chapter from u/eruwenn and myself.
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Alexa completed her game stream in the early hours of the morning, saying goodbye to her viewers and apologising for having to go. She made a note to check on her private, subscriber-exclusive minecraft world later in the day as there was a house building competition taking place and she would have to watch out for cheaters and troublemakers. Norrin was currently monitoring the users, and working on his own farm within the game.
She looked at the empty bunks. Aaron and Sassie had not come to bed again. It had been two hamar since the Porkchop Express had quietly left Arkellian space, twenty cycles in total. They had made two stops to resupply in that time and on both occasions Aaron had chosen to remain on board. He’d also stopped drinking his favourite morning pick me up, containing the refined solvent, fruit juice and hot sauce. More concerning was that he had not drunk any of the other refined solvent he typically would, and she wondered if this was the cause of his unusual sleep pattern.
She dressed quickly, grabbing her gifted jacket as she made her way to the bridge. As always, Aaron was sitting watching his screens. Sassie was asleep on the chair beside him, her head in his lap. “You didn’t sleep?”
Sassie grumbled and shifted to get more comfortable, kicking Aaron in his side. He looked accusingly at the Inorganic. “Shh. Don’t wake her.” Alexa ran her hands through her hair, straightening it out. For the human it was fascinating, as she controlled every strand of her hair. It could be perfect - always. But she had made a conscious effort to let it become messy, in order to be more organic. “I like the night shift, well, our night. It’s peaceful.”
The ship mostly ran itself once the navigator had entered the course and the initial acceleration was completed. A single person could monitor the ship as it cruised along, and regular checks were made on the various systems at set intervals. Even if he fell asleep, the ship would sound alarms if anything went beyond a specified norm. “It is tedious, and it should be shared.”
The human nodded. It would indeed have been tedious, except he had found something to fill his time. On Earth his uncle had toyed with C.B. radio for a while, and Aaron had discovered something similar was used in space. Open comms channels, where people just chated as they drifted through the void between stars. Even people on nearby worlds would join in, asking about the stars. Out here in the black, people still wanted to connect. He mostly listened, occasionally joined in, found a few familiar voices that appeared at the same times on the same channels. It was relaxing.
Alexa glanced at his main screen. Aaron had the GalacTube portal open, but it wasn't displaying a channel. An impersonal user not found message was all the information to be had, and her voice turned gentle as she asked, "Shio's channel isn't back?”
Jaym had reassured him that it was just her father being overprotective, but it didn’t help. “No. Nothing is back. I understand where her dad's coming from, but it still sucks that my actions took something she loved away from her. Doesn't seem fair.” He looked at the screen, noting the time in the corner. “Better get going; today is a big day for Skeena.”
“Agent Fenink?”
“Yeah,” Aaron confirmed as he rose from his seat. “I think she’s ready to take the next step. I better head down there.” As Alexa slid in to replace him as Sassie’s pillow, the human saluted. “You have the bridge, Number Two!”
Alexa rolled her eyes. “Don’t call me that! I am not poop. And I don’t understand why Sassie gets to be Number One?” He was already out of the door and ignoring her, and she smiled. He was more irritating today, and that was an improvement. She scratched the dog’s belly, leaning over to kiss her head and whisper to her, “I don’t really mind you being Number One.”
As Aaron entered the enclosure he was struck hard in the chest by the huge leokas as it bounded towards him. He hadn’t wanted to admit it to the others, but even he had been surprised by how friendly the leokas was, and how well it adapted to his presence. He scratched Tony, thinking about the absurdity of it all. On its hind legs the leokas was a third taller than him, and it had claws and teeth that should have been terrifying. Instead he got up and played with Tony, making sure to chase him to get the animal to stretch his legs a little. The large predator lay down in some long grass, Aaron pretended he couldn’t see the large green striped cat as it wiggled in excitement. He turned his back, and after a few tense seconds Tony pounced and swept him off his feet.
A scream cut through the air and Tony leapt off him, dashing for the safety of his raised platform. Standing by the door was Agent Skeena Fenink, a look of horror on her face and a large bowl of meat and fish chunks scattered around her feet. “You let him hunt you? Are you insane?”
Aaron stood, wiping the leokas drool from his neck with his sleeve. “We were playing.” He looked up at the raised platform and the large head peering down. “You scared him.”
“I...” She looked up. Tony was watching her as she picked up his food and returned it to the bowl. “I’m sorry?”
Aaron whistled and the leokas cautiously climbed down and approached them. “Don’t apologise to me. You startled Tony, you owe him ear scratches.”
Skeena’s tail bristled. “Touch a leokas? No. Never. Impossible!”
The human looked sternly down at her. “You startled him, you must apologise. And, after tomorrow he will be released into the reserve on your world.” Tony pressed his head against Aaron and pushed him. “You’ll never get this chance again. Trust me, trust Tony. It’s perfectly safe.”
Her tail began to look fluffy, less stiff as she relaxed. “I don’t think you understand what you’re asking?” She looked at her feet, unable to maintain eye contact. “I mean... I want to… but, can I?”
He took a knee before her, lifting her chin with his hand. “I’ll be here, you’ll be fine. Ranjaz would kill me if I let you get hurt. I think you need to do this; you need to understand.”
Her tail swished. She had grown close to the Kittran while on board and was a little embarrassed to have it pointed out. Something in the human’s words resonated with her. He was right, she could feel it. She needed to do this. “Fine. So what do we do?”
Aaron took the bowl from her hands, and Tony instantly perked up. “First we make sure he’s tired and has a full belly.”
What followed was an elaborate game of chase combined with Aaron throwing chunks of food for Tony to race after and devour. He even threw some up onto the raised platform, making the leokas leap up and down. Once the bowl was empty, and Tony had thoroughly licked it clean, the leokas took a long drink from his makeshift stream before stretching out on his side, breathing heavily.
Aaron tossed the bowl onto the grass near the door, and took Skeena by the hand. “It is time.” Together they slowly walked forwards, and for a time there was no sound in the converted cargo hold other than their footsteps through the grass and Tony's heavy breathing. Though Agent Fenink shivered as Aaron took a seat next to the leokas, she just about managed to follow his lead and sit next to him.
In one smooth gesture, Aaron removed a couple of drone cams from one of his pockets and tossed them into the air. "You won't want to forget this moment."
Her chest was tight, and every evolutionary instinct inside her was screaming - RUN! She raised her hand shakily and Tony raised his head to look at them. Her gaze shifted, and upon making eye contact with the leokas she squeaked in terror and swiftly pulled back her hand.
“You’re alright mate,” Aaron said, and she couldn't be sure if he was saying it to her or to the animal in front of them. He patted Tony's side in a soothing manner. “Skeena, relax. He responds to your state. If you are tense, he will be tense, but he will also be calm if you are calm. Just relax."
She nodded once, took a long, slow calming breath and laid her hand on the leokas’ side. The green striped fur was deep, luxuriant. She was surprised at the softness contrasting the strong muscles below. Tony’s ribs rose and fell as he was breathing, and as her hand also rose and fell she could feel the raw power in every giant breath. “Wow," she whispered, not daring to say anything louder.
Aaron couldn't help but notice that all tension had left Skeena. Her tail relaxed, sitting up like a stretched question mark behind her, and her eyes were wide with wonder. “Put your head on his side. Gently.”
She looked at Lefu’Yendra, calm and peaceful, smiling reassuringly at her. Tony, a leokas - the servant of death! - was resting beside beside her. She looked at his head, and not even an ear twitched. He was sleeping. She nodded cautiously and, with only a tiny pang of fear, leaned over to place her head on the side of his chest. She had to lie her full body across him, her arms barely large enough to wrap halfway around the torso. The powerful beast's chest rose and fell, lifting her with it. Then she heard it: the heavy beat of his heart. Emotions she couldn't put words to swept through her, and tears began to run from her eyes.
Aaron couldn’t help but smile as he relaxed and leaned back, stretching his legs out in front of him. He didn’t say anything. There was no time, no world beyond the enclosure. Just the sound of a leokas and a Kasurian, breathing in sync.
After a long while she sat up, bowing her head deeply. “You were right. I needed that.”
The human smiled and stood. Tony opened an eye and then returned to his nap. A full belly and some energetic play; he was content. “You did amazing. Both of you.”
As they exited the enclosure they encountered Estrilla sitting on a large medical case. “You survived. Excellent!”
The small Kasurian snapped out of her dream-like state. “Doctor! Why are you here?”
The yellow Kachna motioned to Aaron as he locked the door. “Captain’s orders. In case Tony decided to take a bite.”
Skeena rounded on the human. “You said it was perfectly safe?”
Reaching up to scratch the back of his head, he gave a weak smile. “Kinda. I mean the Doc was right here and I was pretty sure you’d be fine.”
“Pretty sure?”
“Sixty percent, at least.” He smiled and then patted her on the head as her jaw dropped open. “But, never, ever do that without me around. It’s crazy dangerous.” He walked towards the stairs.
She called after him, surprise and anger in her voice. “Why? If it’s so dangerous, why?”
He stopped in the doorway. “I told you. You needed to do it. I can’t leave you in charge of Tony thinking he’s a monster. A servant of death - what a load of shite. He’s flesh and blood, fur and bone. A beating heart. Stop fearing him. Stop worshipping him. Understand him.” He smiled kindly. He was proud of her and didn’t want to berate her. “His species is endangered. If you want to save him, then learn what they need. Protect them. When we met, you had him in a small room. Completely unsuitable. Because you didn’t understand.”
Her tail drooped. She looked at the human, and when she spoke sadness was in her voice. “But, I’m not you. I’m not Lefu’Yendra! I can’t change things, it’s impossible.”
“Bollocks.” Aaron took out his phone, finding the video he had just shot. “You’ve already done the impossible.” He held up the screen, showing her lying on Tony, arms across his body. “Look at you - a mother-fucking badass - who literally, and I mean fucking literally, embraced death. Nothing is impossible for you. You trusted me to keep you safe. I’m trusting you to keep him safe. And all of his little fuzzy buddies.”
She nodded. There were tears in her eyes again, but behind the wetness a fierce spark had been lit. “I understand. I swear to you, Lefu’Yendra, I will protect them and continue to learn.”
“Cool.” Aaron turned back to the stairs and began ascending. “And you can always give me a call if you need me. See you at lunch.”
Estrilla looked at the emotional, yet determined, Kasurian. “You ok?”
Skeena nodded. “Definitely.”
On the deck above, Allistan had finished tidying the kitchen, and had penned a list of supplies they would need before leaving Kasur. As much as he found the leokas fascinating, it would be a welcome change to have space in the food cryo storage for more fresh food for the crew. He was halfway through preparing lunch when Aaron entered. “Captain, no. It is my turn to prepare lunch.”
The human waved his hand. “Stop with the Captain already. I have nothing to do.”
“Sleep?” the Fae’Dan suggested.
With a dismissive shrug Aaron ignored him. “I want to test the new replicator items. Estrilla said the safe chocolate was ready, and I thought it would be fun to put some samples out for after lunch.”
The Fae’Dan nodded, taking out his pen and giving it a satisfying click. “I will prepare a selection and arrange a scorecard and feedback sheet.”
The human was once again impressed with Allistan’s efficiency. He had organised the ship’s shifts, taken over quartermaster duties, and even taken to handling their paperwork and fees at the stations they stopped at. “I don’t know what I’d do without you, buddy.”
Allistan shook his head. “Many of the others can perform these duties.”
Aaron gave the slender Fae’Dan a playful punch to the gut, watching as all four eyes flinched. “But, they didn’t. You stepped up, and I appreciate it.”
At lunch the crew were boisterous from the beginning, arguing over who had taken too long in the washroom and thrown several schedules out. It happened to have been Chae’Sol, but everyone agreed his hair was immaculate and he was forgiven. Jaym was so impressed she asked for advice on products, and after a moment’s pause Danyd also started asking hair care questions.
Ranjaz was the first to point it out. “You’re bald?”
The engineer swung his hooves onto the table, hauling back his trouser leg to show the silky fur on his legs. “I got hair where it counts, fuzzball.” The table once again erupted in laughter.
Allistan took several trips to place the meal on the table. There was a shared roasted vegetable platter, an elaborate salad, a selection of whole and sliced fruit, and some lightly seared Koran steaks for Ranjaz as well as interested omnivores. Aaron was objectively the best cook, but Allistan was a close second, and preferred by the crew as his dishes were less likely to have side effects.
The peace lasted as long as the food, and it was soon Aaron’s turn to be questioned. Embar slapped a large red hand on his shoulder. “So, are you up for some further physical training?”
Estrilla tutted. “You and Chae’Sol increasing his nanite resistance and beating him up is hardly training.”
The Niham laughed. “Believe me, it is not one-sided, and we intend to keep our arms attached.”
Embar took another large bite of the Eluin fruit he was working on. “He must learn restraint. He has to control his temper.”
You broke his arm!" the Doctor cried, waving an accusing fork at the Rinoxian.
Chae’Sol coughed, and raised a hand. “That was me.”
Aaron stepped in to defend his tutors. “Actually, it was my fault. I bet him a thousand credits that my arm was stronger than his wooden training sword.”
Danyd’s face grew round with horror. “You let him break your arm for a thousand credits?”
The Niham was irritated. “No, no, the sword broke. He went double or nothing on Embar’s training axe, but we forgot it had a steel core.”
The Satryn stared at Aaron. “Are you the illegitimate son of Tulseria? Some demi-god here to taunt us mortals?” A hush went around the room, and the nervous glances didn't escape Danyd's notice.
Ranjaz, however, seemed oblivious. "Fuck, no," he laughed. "He injected Inorganic nanites into his ass, all because he wanted a sandwich. Humans are absolutely mental, Danyd. Just be glad he's the last one, otherwise the whole galaxy'd be fucked”
Aaron did his best to unclench his jaw. "It was not my ass," he said, and when he offered no further corrections, Jaym, Danyd and Skeena turned to stare at him. He shrugged. "I hadn't had a sandwich in a thousand celes.”
Estrilla, meanwhile, had been glaring at Ranjaz. "The secret nanites," she emphasized as she threw a small round vegetable at Ranjaz.
Ranjaz caught it and expertly returned it so that it landed with a splash into the Kachna's drink. ”They’re part of the crew now, might as well know what they got themselves into.”
Aaron didn't seem at all to be concerned. "It's fine, I trust them." His nonchalance turned out to be partly because he was preoccupied with something else. When his phone finally connected wirelessly to the large screen on the far wall, he smiled. "Everyone, we have some special footage from the cargo hold I'd like to share." A quick glance to Skeena got him an enthusiastic nod in reply - she, too, seemed eager to share what she had accomplished.
As the video played, a hush fell over the Lounge. When the video showed Agent Fenink's bravery in reaching out to pat the leokas, Ranjaz leaned over to hold Skeena's hand and squeeze it proudly. A few short moments later, all who had not known what was coming reacted in audible shock as the hug appeared on the screen.
The moment lingered in video for what felt like an extraordinarily long time, then suddenly cut out shortly after Skeena finally pulled away from Tony's furry side. There was the span of a breath or so in which nobody dared speak, after which everybody suddenly began talking over one another, offering their praise and amazement for the brave Kasurian.
Ranjaz was practically bouncing in his chair with excitement. "That was the most amazing thing, Skeena! We've gotta... you've gotta..."
"Got to what?" she asked.
"We absolutely need to put this on GalacTube!" Ranjaz looked to Aaron, clearly seeking support.
The human thought it over. "Not a bad idea," he said, ignoring the Kittran’s whoop of joy. "You could post updates on Tony, and your new life, too. I know I wouldn't mind knowing how things go with you two once you settle in on Kasur.”
"I don't know much about that stuff," Skeena countered, though the look on her face clearly said that she was considering it.
Aaron briefly glanced at the Kittran, then was ready with the assist. "Ranjaz has a channel, he can help you set up all the details. In the meanwhile," he said as he pulled up the GalacTube portal on the screen, "pick a name for your channel and we'll get you started out.”
There was a flurry of encouragement which seemed to further settle the matter for Skeena. She began staring at the GalacTube portal intently, as though it would somehow reveal a name. While she pondered the rest of the crew fired out suggestions ranging from good to bad and beyond.
Allistan, of course, immediately brought out his notepad keeping a list of the most popular names people yelled out. He compiled a final selection and tapped it with the tip of his pen. "Name suggestions," he announced, then clicked his pen. "ThePrettyKasurian?”
Skeena’s tail fluffed and she gave Ranjaz a light push for his suggestion. “No, that’s silly.”
“CatCuddler?” Allistan offered next, and Danyd beamed. But Skeena shook her head and Allistan moved on. “KasurianTailz?” Another headshake. “FeninksFriends?”
Highly disliking the direction the offered names were going in, Skeena took a deep breath and looked to Aaron. "I had an idea of my own," she said, then paused as everyone around grew quiet again. "DeathsEmbrace," she managed to squeak out into the silence of the room.
Aaron rolled the name around in his mind, considering it. "Pretty awesome name, I'll admit, but it sounds a bit dark. How about HugOfDeath?"
The brave leokas hugger beamed, and her tail swished. "I love it!"
With a few quick taps of his phone, and a final confirming not from Skeena, the first video was thus uploaded to the HugOfDeath channel. To celebrate this momentous event, as well as their last full cycle together, chocolates were shared as well as stories and jokes. Time passed quickly as everyone laughed and bonded, and the human felt a weight lift from his shoulders.
As Allistan was collecting the results of the tasting an alert suddenly came through to Aaron’s phone. The GalacTube portal had gone down due to massive demand. Looking into the use statistics, it seemed that half of Kasur was watching - and sharing - Skeena's video, along with millions of others across the Galactic Federation. Aaron congratulated her on her success and newfound infamy, and started running off a list of promotional items she could start selling - including a large leokas plushy with a tiny heartbeat. He promised to buy the first one, and even gave her a tagline for the adverts: So cute, you’ll love them in a heartbeat. It drew several groans from around the table.
Belatedly noticing that Jar'Beck hadn't joined them for lunch, Aaron left the celebrations to check on him. With his hands full of food and a selection of chocolates, he had to improvise when he came to the lawyer's office and found that the door failed to open automatically. “Knock knock!”
The Ashi pushed a button on his desk screen and the door slid open. “My apologies, I was caught up in my work.” He then saw the plates laden with food. “Oh, Captain. You didn’t need to trouble yourself.”
Aaron winced at the use of rank. “AAAR-RON. Cut the Captain shit.” He put the plates amongst the notes and datapads. “Also, you don’t need to lock the door. I told him to stop.”
Jar’Bek’s eye twitched. “He broke in here last night, I know it. My seat was adjusted differently again this morning. He does it just often enough to slowly irritate me.”
The human nodded. “I’ve spoken to him, and he said he’ll stop. But, honestly, ignoring him is the best way to handle it. I don’t think locking your door makes a difference.”
The Ashi clenched his fist. “No! I will beat that Kittran at his own game. I have studied human pranks,” he proclaimed, and Aaron groaned. Prank wars never ended well. “I have a cunning plan.”
Aaron was going to have to head this off. “Yes, perhaps, but I think I may have a more cunning one. Ignore him.”
“Well, mine’s pretty cunning, Captain,” countered Jar'Bek, clearly determined to get revenge.
Considering the fact that Ranjaz was a master criminal with a somewhat mysterious past, and had no difficulty bypassing the ship's security, the human remained doubtful. “Yes, but not cunning enough, I imagine.”
The lawyer was slightly offended. Surely, he was smarter than the petty thief. “Well, that depends how cunning you mean, Captain.”
“Well, pretty damn cunning. How cunning do you think I mean?”
Jar’Bek leaned in conspiratorially. “Well, mine’s quite cunning, Captain.”
Aaron was losing his patience. “Alright, then, let’s hear it! Let’s hear what’s so damn cunning!”
The lawyer leaned in closer, ready to reveal his master plan. “Right, well, first of all, you get him to come with you–”
Instantly, the human had heard enough. How suspicious would the Kittran be if he asked him to come to the lawyers office, the very one he was previously banned from? “Oh yes, very cunning. Brilliantly cunning. I ask him to come with me and then…then stab him, perhaps. How cunning can you get?”
Even with his raider background, and knowledge of the viciousness of humans, the lawyer was shocked. “Stab? Goodness no, I thought a pie to the face would be suitably humiliating.”
Aaron saw his reply coming, and couldn't restrain himself. He couldn't decide whether it would be more suitable to slap the Ashi, or himself. “Do you know what Ranjaz is particularly good at?” He waited for effect, not expecting a reply. “Ducking.”
Next

New to this story? Click here for the Beginning
Previously on Ballad of the Venturing Owl
In preparation for making this available on additional platforms as well, I commissioned this image with Patreon funds! This image was done by https://twitter.com/onibaku1_5 .
Donations to my Patreon, paid for this image of the Captain drawn by this artist (A warning, they have an nsfw twitter as well, and I don't claim to have any input on what they draw.)
I recently won a discord contest, which resulted in this image.
Back to school on Thursday. It'll probably help get me back on task when it comes to writing. Fingers crossed.
Outside the beast roared from the other island. The sun beamed down at a bright brilliant noon, and the sky was crystal and blue. For all the world it looked like a brilliant day, if not for the fact that the beast was on the other island, staring at the thin bridge separating the two.
The Twelfth shifted, throwing off his beastfolk facade, and scales grew like tumors across his body as bones shifted beneath the skin. Perhaps that was too descriptive. Much like an actor could change position in a heartbeat, donning another character like water, so too did the Prince become someone else entirely. His scales gleamed like hot ashes from the transformation, and turned to steel just as quickly. The pig, the great boar that had once ruled the island, snorted dismissively at him.
I could smell it from this distance, a stench of the wild woods and of rank death, and I hesitated at the brink even with the dragon’s shadow over me.
Remiel took a step in front of me, taller and wider than I’d ever be. She pointed her spear straight ahead.
The pig took a single step back, and then rushed the edge of the cliff. Rocks shook and fell beneath the pounding of its massive body, and great waves whelmed the shore.
Then it leapt. The front half touched down safety on the other edge of the bridge, and the latter half struck it firmly. Wood shattered and ropes tore, and then, it bodily dragged itself up. The cliff face tore at the creature’s stomach, spilling itself. Hot black blood poured free from the wounds, and thinks squirmed in the depths of it, hot and raw and awful.
But by the time it was on all fours, the wounds were already sealing, only leaving its boiling thick viscera behind where the bridge once was.
I swallowed. All the bravado abruptly left me. I turned to look at Sampson. His fingers were curled tightly around the spear.
I tried to think of what the Captain would do, and all I could think of was how disappointed she’d be that the Twelfth couldn’t do it.
The Twelfth roared, smoke drifting out from his teeth, and then breathed fire. I’d seen Irony do it before, a great gout of it in the depths of a possessed mountain, and I’d seen reapers burn from it like hot garbage, but it had nothing compared to this. My skin felt scalded even from a distance, and the plants around him smouldered from exposure to the harsh light coming off. It moved less like a tongue of flame and more like a beam of light and struck the great boar.
It roared in defiance and the skin boiled, coming off in hot chunked, skin and muscle and fat rendering as quickly as candle wax. I could see bones, and I could see bones charring.
But the Twelfth had to stop breathing fire eventually, and the great boar took a step forward despite one leg reduced to bone alone and the other only attached by thin strands of muscle.
The grass burned underneath the beast’s blood, and trees wilted. A bee hive fell from one, and broke, but the bees were already dead inside.
I took a step back.
The beast charged. Every ounce of self preservation sent me diving to the side, sword clacking uncomfortably against my hip and the beast struck hard enough that scales scattered off of the Twelfth’s body, and there was a crunch of bone (I couldn’t tell from who).
The shockwave shook the island and shattered more glass. The beast healed, skin knitting back together as if that was how nature ought to work.
Except for the hole in the beast’s forehead, which still leaked blood readily. It was still there from where we’d first been attacked.
I didn’t know why.
“Fuck,” Sampson said, intelligently, drawing his weapon. The Twelfth took a massive swipe, and bone shattered across the beast’s body. The air smelled like bacon, nauseatingly so. The beast was still on fire despite the high rate of healing. It sizzled and bubbled like old fat.
I raised my Heart and tried to focus myself like Jess had shown me, so I could at least be there. Remiel took one look at the both of us and stepped forward, spear drawn.
Then lightning struck the great beast, and Andrew joined us, his robes billowing. He took one look at the lot of us, his eyes stopping on the great coat that was wrapping my body, and gestured. The winds picked up, whipping the fire burning across the trees back against the beast. The Twelfth roared and struck again even as the tusks pried loose a scattering of more armored scales, and blood fell like rain.
“It’s not working,” I said.
It hadn’t worked last time. Why would it work this time?
“Then we buy time for the others,” Andrew said, and his robes billowed. His bestial features were damp with humidity, and lightning crackled across his body.
It discharged and struck home, and for a moment, the beast lost traction. Its hooves slid back against the ground. The Twelfth took a single step forward with a noise like creaking bone, and then roared, sinking teeth into the skin.
“It’s not going to work,” I said again, under my breath.
I didn’t know why it wasn’t going to work. But nothing else had. Nothing except the hole in its forehead.
If the Captain were there, she’d’ve figured it out in an instant. But she wasn’t. She was hurt, hiding in a room with the other injured. Perhaps if Folna were there, or Thyn, but they were protecting the rest.
The only ones who could do anything were the lot of us. The B team. The Twelfth, who’d spent most of his life in a lighthouse pretending to be normal, Remiel, who was guarding the wrong dragon, Sampson, who was fighting for his new family, Andrew, whose companion had been a traitor-
I hesitated and looked back at him. His heart gleamed powerfully in his chest.
“Did you know about Elodie?” I asked.
“Bad time to ask that,” Andrew said. “Focus on figuring this out.”
“Can’t you do it?”
“My school was about force,” Andrew said. “Thinking was for other people. My speciality was boiling bones.”
I swallowed, and my heart sank.
“It’s the gunshot,” Sampson said. The Twelfth roared again, but this time, the boar pushed him back inch by inch, until his back legs pushed against a tree and sent it falling over with a cataclysmic tear of shattered roots and shattering old wood. “It’s the gunshot,” he repeated.
“What’s the gunshot?” I asked, desperately.
We hadn’t brough any guns. I wasn’t trained, neither was Remiel. The boar roared once, and the Twelfth took a step forward, desperately straining. Scales popped off of his form like shrapnel, decorating the ground.
Then something broken, and blood dripped free. His eyes went wide.
Remiel dove in, and her spear sliced through the thick fur of the boar, scattering drops of thick blood.
There was something here I was missing. Something familiar. Something that none of us knew about, but that I’d known before.
But all I could see was the Twelfth’s eyes light up with pain, and Remiel’s spear slam into the beast’s heart. It pumped like a geyser as Remiel darted out of the way, spraying the same ichor across the surface where she’d been. The grass writhed with it, dying by plague.
Then, and only when the beast had slowed, the Twelfth collapsed. Sampson breathed out a sigh of relief.Remiel raced to his side, pulling his frail normal form into her arms
But the birds weren’t back, and the sky had changed from blue to teal, and I could still taste that something wasn’t right.
My eyes went wide.
In the very next instant, the boar’s eyes snapped open, but Remiel was already in the trees. Not seeing its prior prey, it stared in the only other direction it could.
Eyes, too many eyes, fell upon me. I swallowed, taking a step back.
Then it stood up, bones cracking as it readjusted to be ready to run, and it charged. I’d seen it before. I’d seen this exact thing before, but it was buried under everything else I’d done on the island.
I was frozen in place. Here, I was prey, and my heart knew it, and my brain told me to flee but everything had frozen up.
But that too was familiar. What was it?
I could see my death coming and couldn’t even move. My heart beat as fast as the face of ship’s knots, as fast as the Captain’s feet in a fight.
I’d been here before- I’d-
Then I realized what it was, and in the next instant Sampson pushed me out of the way. His eyes met mine and the world froze. His beak worked.
“It’s a hunt,” He said, and I saw, not for the first time, the great creature strike. Sampson hurled himself to the side and hit the ground hard, trees snapping behind him, and his eyes went wide. “It’s a hunt!
I helped him up, frantic, spear acting as a cane for the bird.
The beast was waiting on us.
“It’s a hunt,” Sampson repeated. “We’re- we’re hunters. We have to be hunters.”
I didn’t understand- but I did understand one thing.
I had options. I could check on Sampson, turn my back on the boar in front of me, and trust Andrew could handle it. He wouldn’t. Sampson would be in rougher shape if the boar got to him. Our best bet?
The other option?
I grabbed the spear and swallowed. We’d fight.
“I know what to do,” I said. My voice was frail, weak, tiny. What would the Captain do?
She’d hunt.
“You do?” Andrew asked.
“Get your spear,” I said. Sampson used his like a walking stick. I could hear his pain, could hear it like the frantic beating of his heart and my own called out to him.
The island wanted to hunt. It wanted hunters, and it wanted prey. We could be one, or we could be the other.
It all started to click.
The wounds that were healing? They weren’t from hunters. They were made by the wrong weapons, and by the wrong people.
So there was only one thing for it.
Andrew hesitated, and the boar stared down at me with every single one of the beast’s many eyes. It opened its mouth and panted, showing off every long tooth and every horn growing without care. My fingers shook on the spear, aching from holding it straight.
It saw me, and I saw it, and I couldn’t help but feel like it understood, in that moment, exactly what I’d come here for.
I didn’t know myself.
Sampson did. He took a step forward, and pointed his spear at it. I could see every breath he made, could see how it shook his body. It wouldn’t be long.
I took a step forward, and it didn’t react, eyes sliding down the length of the spear to eye the tip. Behind me, Andrew picked up his spear. He took a step forward, and then another, until we were by each other’s sides.
“So?” Andrew asked. “What’s the plan?”
“We hunt,” I said, and I took a stab with the spear. Not how I’d fight a monster, or how I’d fight a mortal, but a boar. The boar took a step back. Andrew’s fingers wrapped around the heft of the spear until his fingers turned white from pressure, and he took a swing forward, and the boar stepped back.
“This is- he could snap us like twigs.”
“We hunt,” Sampson said, in a voice so small I could barely hear it. I straightened.
My mind whirred. Because it was working, and I didn’t know why. It hadn’t all clicked together just yet, what exactly was going on/ Why hadn’t the dragons been able to deal with it this time?
They weren’t approaching it like hunters. The dragons were creatures. The island didn’t care about the battles of beasts, they cared about the hunt. The weak defeating the strong, blood- It all clicked. It was all thematic.
The attempted murder had been about the greatest hunt of all; the hunting of a Prince. I swallowed, ignoring how my heart fluttered rapidly. My arms shook again.
The beast’s breath fell rank upon me, smelling all the world like death, and damp things deep in the ground. It snorted, and abruptly stopped moving backwards. It stood its ground.
The entire island was a hunt. Nobles waiting for weakness before pouncing, intruders stealing eggs from nests. We’d been playing the wrong game the entire time. It was waiting for weakness before it could destroy us.
Sweat dripped down my skin, sinking into the coat the Spider had given me. My arms shook. My fingers ached. These were all truths.
I was done with the truth. The truth was stupid. The truth was I was weak.
I was done being weak. I swallowed back the nausea, the growing panic, and set it to the side, steeling myself. For a moment, I wasn’t Charm, the useless Navigator whose only weapons were words and a sense of camaraderie. No, in that moment, I was back in the forest with the Captain, and I was following her orders to hunt.
I stabbed forward with the spear, and in the next instant, the beast replied, thundering over me. A hoof the size of a house stabbed down, and I rolled out of the way, spear tumbling out of my numb fingers. Andrew didn’t hesitate and his spear sliced deep up into the creature, spraying the ground with blood as black as pitch and squirming with life, like motes of the dying sun.
And he laughed, standing tall as the beast broke trees like chopsticks and thundered past, howling in pain. The wounds refused to heal.
“I’ve never been one to hunt,” He said, and I saw the spirit of the island burning behind his eyes, a great roaring flame that demanded we hunt. He reached down, offering his hand. I snatched the spear back between my numb fingers and took his with the other. He hauled me back to my feet. “But I feel like you need a partner.”
“Right,” I said.
“Shall we dance?”
Sampson stepped forward. I could hear the pain in his heart, and could feel the grate of something broken inside of him. He'd fallen hard.
“Is three a crowd?”
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Belvedere Castle was surrounded, Spike and Nessues were killed and now there was only one enemy left. Sure, plenty of the Olympian forces were battered and bruised as they moved in closer but after literally hundreds of monsters were slain it clearly didn’t matter. Lamia was essentially alone as she emerged from her small castle, flanked by two senior empousai as she watched the Olympians appear before her.
Unlike the gods, demigods, and even her own monsters, Lamia isn’t dressed for war. She wears a black sleeveless top and gold earrings as her dark hair is in a regal braid with gold trimmings. She carried a black umbrella opened over her head to shield her from the rain. Her singular snake tail remained unarmored as she slithered out with her maidens.
She seems rather casual in the current situation despite what was behind her. The doors were wide open and inside one could see a plethora of bright green runes that were glowing and flashing. In the center of the floor was what seemed to be a small chasm that was the most dastardly shade of black that could ever exist. Not only was it large enough to fit a few people inside, it was also... breathing? The subtle inhale and exhale of the portal seemed to be almost visible for anybody who stared too long and if they were targin too long they were likely going to be sucked in.
“Ares and Athena…” she says gingerly, “I daresay,I’m a bit outmatched aren’t I?” The gods remain quiet as they try to control their rage. They know exactly what is behind her and they can’t help but feel more insulted than ever. “To think it took the Lord and Lady of War to descend from Olympus and oversee an invasion of my doing? How.. remarkable.”
“How dare you?” Athena asked quietly as her form glowed with shining gray light, her very presence making the empousai uncomfortable but Lamia did not waver. “How dare you even put a crack into the reality of this world and bring that evil so close to the Home of the Gods? You must truly have no shame.”
“Yeah,” said Ares as his ferocious red light radiated from him, “as much as I hate to admit it I have to agree with my sister of all people. It takes a lot of nerve to even try and bring the essence of Tartarus so close to our turf. You may be one of Zeus’ old ‘little friends’ but you need to remember your place! So how about this, I can fuck you up right now then shove you and your two little friends right into that portal before we seal it! Quick and easy, back me up Athena!”
“Oh, now I see where the aggression in the family had gone. By all means Lord of War, You are more welcome to try and ‘fuck me up’ though with a face like that I bet you can just give me back my old legs and… Ah, well. Maybe another time. I'm sure you love to get the upper hand and take credit for something that your sister will easily be able to accomplish.
“Motherfu-
“Sounds like a plan.”
She winked at him as he lunged towards her. Athena was after him as his power was not as easy to resist as Aphrodite’s. One thing about Ares’ existence, it gets to Athena more easily than she lets on. Lamia and her empousai maidens rush back as the demon women unleash fire upon the god but it was no use, the fllames could not stop Ares’ assault with Athena right behind him. It all happened so fast that the gods barely noticed the glints of bronze in the room. Athena did not see until they had begun to cross the threshold and abruptly halted. She wasn’t quick enough.
Some of the green symbols shattered with light as thick celestial bronze chains flew out from the hole in the floor. The Pit seemed to puke the trap that was set for the gods. This was one of the few times where Athena was not prepared as she and Ares were both ensnared by the chains and felt like their power was not only being contained but drained. Drained by the very Essence of Tartarus itself. Such an act could lead to truth and absolute oblivion and the divine siblings were rightfully afraid as they struggled to break free, their forms glowing brighter but also more dim. They were unable to teleport or shapeshift their way out of this. Lamia could only cackle to herself as she watched them slowly be dragged into the chasm.
“When I sense your presence I had to change plans,” the monster sneered, “your queen must pay for all the children that she has forsaken, especially my own. I will take away her favorite son and the greatest Voice of Reason her family then watch as she fails to maintain Order while being so distraught. I thought that all I needed to do was kill the demigods to show her the consequence of her actions, to show her what a real mother could do when her children are taken from her! But no, I needed something more and I’m pleased with the results of my efforts.”
" Haven't you done enough?” Athena asked in frustration while Ares cursed at Lamia in Ancient Greek, “I know it was you, I just know that you were the one who cursed the demigods by allowing monsters to sense them. All of those lives lost over some petty revenge!”
”What?!” Ares exclaimed as he used his strength to slow down the moving chains that bind him. The heels of his boots were digging into the stone. "That's why those kids have always been hunted? All these millennia! And you knew!” His flaming eyes were getting low and were subtly cow-like.
"I had my suspicions!"
“And the Wise One is correct as always!” Lamia piped up as she waved a hand to bind the gods more tightly. “It is true, I was the one who cast the spell that allowed monsters to track down demigods through their scent. Thousands upon thousands of demigod children from as young as six to nineteen, dead. And yet, after all this time, it seemed to be in vain as Hera cares very little for your brats and their kind. Possibly because she never had one of her own… Now there’s a thought..” She drifted off for a moment and with all the focus she had on her impending victory, she barely heard the hooves in time.
Lamia, and her associates were shot in the heads by by celestial bronze, razor-tipped arrows. Within seconds, the chains lost their grip and the runes around them stopped glowing.
"That," says Chiron in a rare acidic tone, "was for my students."
Lamia could only expressed her shock at her old mentor as she crumbled into black dust. The empousai followed along as Ares and Athena began to fight their way out of the chains. With no spells to properly maintain the chains, the gods were able to wriggle weel enough so that they may shapeshift into snakes and slither out of their prisons. Afterwards they sprang into their mortal forms and pointed their spears at the Entrance to The Pit. They chant in Ancient Greek, creating a minor earthquake in the process as The Pit was unable to fight off their magic enough and would seal itself leaving behind an ugly crack in the floor.
Ares huffs as he straightens his spear, “I hate being trapped. So fucking much.”
“It seems that it is not as funny when it happens to you, says Athena in a somewhat shake voice. She looks to Chiron, one who she’s been able to trust over the millennia. “You have our sincere gratitude, Chiron. I have the feeling that if we were pulled in we may never come out.”
“Of course,” said the old centaur, “I merely did what I needed to do and gave her only a small amount of what she deserved.”
“How much did you hear?” Athena asks warily.
“Enough, “ he says gravely, “I had never known, never deduced, that one of their own had done such a thing. We are not strangers to demigods who turn against their peers due to their personal issues with Olympians. But this…” He can’t finish and merely sighs sadly. He makes a 3-clawed sign with his hand, crosses it over his heart, and pushes back the evil that lingers within the room. “So many faces, families, stories, and futures. All ended abruptly by one woman. One monster.”
"My sons, my daughters, grandchildren, those who all fought in my name. Gone.. because of her." Ares clutches his spear tightly, waves of power radiating from him and could be felt throughout the park. "Tartarus is too good for her, she needs to be put down… permanently. She should be dragged through every River in the Underworld, whipped for a thousand years while bound in The Pit and then thrown into fucking Chaos itself so she may never walk this Earth again!!"
Chiron and Athena are quiet and seemed to have no objections to his suggestion. After some moments, Athena soon regains most of her usual composure and speaks up.
"I agree that her actions are unforgivable as she played with the Fates themselves and had forsaken thousands across the world. However, the path to vengeance is a dangerous one. Those who walk with vengeance and hate within their hearts will surely give in to their wrath and so they may bring their own destruction… or they may bring upon the destruction of others on a divine scale. Ares," she says to him in a calm tone, "we must report this all to Zeus immediately, he would have destroyed her himself if he knew of this and how she is the reason many of his own children have died.”
"Bah! Assuming he's not attached to her still. He's always been sympathetic to his little mistresses."
"I can speak to him," Athena says confidently, "I will convince him to finally turning his back on Lamia. He’ll always listen to me."
“Lucky you,” Ares responded in a bitter tone and continues to grumble darkly.
Athena’s stormy gray eyes fall on her children’s mentor, “Chiron. This revelation is much bigger than even I expected it to be. Considering the things that I have witnessed from the children in battle and from their predecessors in the past, I believe that it is best if they do not know as to why they are hunted just yet.”
“My Lady..” Chiron says sadly, “I assure you that my students are more than ready to know. With all due respect, I believe that they deserve to know more than anybody!” He didn’t mean to raise his voice as much as he did to The Wise One but the slight squint in her eye made him bow his head. “My apologies, I just…” he sighs as he raises his head. “This is just so much for one afternoon.”
“I understand your frustration, Old Friend,” Athena speaks in a sympathetic tone, “I personally wish that my children were better prepared with this knowledge. However, from what I’ve seen, the demigods simply can’t handle this truth right now. War, trauma, tragedy; these are all things that test the character of mortals and one can see where they stand in life and where their path will likely take them. Their ambition is strong and I have no doubt they would want to fix whatever problem is in their way, including this spell that Lamia has on them.
“Yet, I also see the anger in their hearts. I see their desires for vengeance, their innate wrath, their hubris, and the extent of which their passion gets in the way of their rationality. From my understanding, there are some among them, and maybe even beyond those at the camp right now, that would give everything to exact vengeance on Lamia and could make even the most devastating sacrifices to do so. Knowledge is power, it also brings wisdom, however it welcomes sorrow. I am sorry Chiron, but you may not reveal this to the children for the time being. That is an order.”
Chiron wants to argue, the gods could see it in his eyes, but he is a Servant of Olympus and he knows better than almost everybody that it was unwise to defy the will of the gods. “As you wish Lady Athena,” he responds with a bow of his head, “I assume that I may at least speak of this to Lady Hestia?”
“Absolutely,” she says, “though with her ability to look into the past through the bonds of others over the millennia, I can’t help but wonder if she already knows. I will have to speak with Hecate as well, magic on this scale is not possible to be done without her knowing about it.”
“She shouldn’t have gotten away with this,” says Ares, “all for the sake of getting to my mother…” Ares is falters, something is bothering him but he seems to be keeping it to himself for now. “I like the idea, the one about not telling them. Lamia was a demigod before she became a monster, four thousand years and she is still hungry for revenge. Her and her fucking obsession with Hera after being made to eat her own children drove her to have a hand in thousands of conflicts. To be honest, she did me a favor there. Whoa now, lemme finish huh?” Athena was glowing as she listened to her brother, the rain that fell on her turned to steam before it could even touch her as Chiron backed away so that he would not get singed.
“I don’t think we can tell them, not yet. This isn't the time. They’re tired, spent. The Engines of War need fuel and maintenance. Whenever you do tell them Chiron, I know a few of them are gonna be hungry for Lamia’s head and they should. The level of brutality that some of them delivered was the fucking chef’s kiss today and it’ll be sweeter once they marinate for a bit. I can name a few that’’ll be on a rampage to get her and I’m gonna make sure they do. Nobody curses my kids and then thinks they can pull me in Tartarus. I get it, she’s suffered and mourned the loss of her children. That’s too damn bad, she’s gonna have to suffer a lot more when they decide to go after her one day.”
“They must have noticed Tartarus’ presence here has ceased,” says Athena, “we must speak to them and dismiss them. Then, we move from there.”
The three of them would exit the castle and make their way out to the close by area. If any demigods were conscious and able to move after Nessus’ recent death they would likely find themselves able to see the gods and the centaur make their way out, their expressions a bit grim.
“Heroes…” Athena projects her voice out to the demigods. “Today has been long as much as it has been turbulent. You came to help liberate this park and to put an end to the monsters holding this area hostage while threatening the nature spirits to make you play their twisted game. For this, you have our sincere gratitude and praise. Your own Activities Director put the last arrow in Lamia the snake-woman and Daughter of Hecate, the mastermind behind all of this. With this act and Ares and I sealing the a portal she opened to Tartarus, this victory is yours to claim. After all, we would not have made it this far without your efforts and sacrifice.”
“Yeah, what she said.” Ares still looked grim even with all the carnage that had taken place. Something had definitely happened though he obviously had no plans of sharing. “I’ll keep this short: You kicked a little too much ass out there, fought like some true warriors. Get your wounded and dead, pack your shit, go home, sleep. You’ve earned that much.”
“This was not easy for any of us,” says Chiron, “Olympus knows (these two included) that these battles will never be easy. However it must be said that you all fought with bravery, remember your training and took care of your friends, family, and your world. That is something to be proud of and I am proud of you all.” His tone is sincere but he knows that it may not reach everyone. “As Lord Ares has stated, it is time we depart. Gather your weapons and armor if you can, damaged or not and begin to pack everything away into the vans. Within the next hour or so, we shall depart for Long Island and arrive later this evening. Those who are still able to fly and wish to fly to camp must check out with their counselors or myself so that you are properly covered in Mist. As I have said, it’s been a long day. For now, we must rest.”
It won’t take too long to clean up around the park. With a wave of their hands, the remaining enemy weapons and fortifications in the park begin to dissipate, the war dogs disappear and the spartoi sink into the ground. The Hunters bid the campers a polite farewell before disappearing into The Ramble and the party ponies move in to give some high-fives and chest bumps to any campers willing to take them… assuming that the campers are not holding any grudges towards centaurs in general. Ares and Athena personally make sure to commend their respective forces as well as their children before they leave though Athena did give into her better judgement and give her two sons an amused facepalm when recollecting their actions.
Once everything is packed up and the vans are ready to go. Chiron gives the word to head back to camp. Anybody who wants to sleep in the vans are free to do so, it’ll take a couple hours to get back to the camp. So, the vans drive on. They carry the hopeful, the afraid, the exhausted, the fallen, the broken, and many others. They drive on, to an uncertain future.
OOC: Well, that’s it y’all. Uhm.. I’m writing this very last part all unedited and off the top of my head so bear with me. Honestly, I think yall kick a lot of ass. I don’t really think I have the words to explain how much gratitude I have for everyone who participatde in this plot. Seriously I can’t thak y’all enough for this. SOme of these replies made me laugh, swallow sadness and even pause so I could reread just what the hell was typed lol. Forreal, I’m pretty lucky to be abel to have told this story and I appreciate the patience and feedback. Hopefully I can top this one day. We’ll have to see. The thread is yours interact with and write out the aftermath. No fighting, we don't have the energy for all dat.
-💙 Sly
PS: If anybody has any plot threads that they want to finish up they can just let me know on here or on the discord server. Y'know, for closure and stuff.
PSS: I apologize if I left anybody out and for not following up on some things. And I also feel I should say that I'm pretty lucky to have written with some seriously talented writers. Congratulate yourselves, y'all haven't even peaked yet.

The leaves cracked loudly under my shoes as I ran, my cords bounced as I dashed through brush and twigs. I came to a sliding stop at the edge of a clearing and lowered myself to the ground softly. The tall silver clad beast stepped into the same clearing and scanned the horizon, his eyes were hidden beneath his demonic mask but I could tell he was searching for me amongst the grass. His armor was plated with various layers and his helmet resembled a fanged knight creature and his boots were wood up to his shins. His sword was long and hung down to his ankle on his left side, the handle was wrapped in a night black cord and the pommel was rounded and thin with dragons inscribed on the metal. I kept beneath the grass and watched as he darted back and forth around the clearing, as he stomped around, I began to watch the branches above his head. After some time a twig snapped to his right and he whipped his head around with a growl, staring into the forest. As he stared intensely at nothing, I watched Sarah glide across the branch and pull her crossbow from behind her back, she slowly pulled the drawback and loaded a large wooden arrow with a black metal ball on the end. I smiled and fell back on the first day id met her, she watched me take on a witch with nothing but a weeding tool while she ran for my parents. Now she was on the control end of the most powerful bow rifle in the world. As the twinge of her crossbow filled the air and the arrow flew towards the night, I left the safety of my cover and spun around with my scythe, throwing a large cover of grass between me and the knight. He turned towards me and screamed as the arrow hit him, detonating the tip and throwing him across the grass. He landed with his arms and slid to stop, the grass blew with the wind and covered him head to toe, obscuring his vision. I heard my name from the treetops now John! I whipped my scythe behind me and charged the knight, he held up his sword to block as my left foot entered his inner hemisphere, I swung against the blade and they collided with a loud metallic clang. He slide his hand from the handle to the upper back of the sword and pushed against my scythe, sliding me backwards with ease. I pulled away and allowed the blade to swing past me, pivoting on my heel and bringing the scythe back to the front, pushing the edge to the side of his neck. The blade clanked against the armor of the silver knight and he threw his left gauntleted fist into my gut. As I rolled across the grass of the clearing Sarah volleyed another 3 arrows at the night, he bounced around for a minute or so while I got to my feet and charged him. I leapt off a small boulder and let go of my scythe, I twisted in midair, positioning the scythe blade to face the opposite direction and align with my feet. I leaned forward and put myself into a spin with my Achilles tendon leading the spin, as the scythe lined up with my spine I wrapped my arms around my back and gripped the pole with an iron clench. The knight made eye contact with me as I was on my final rotation, the blade acting as my heel I finished my spin with downwards kick and drove the blade of the scythe into the gap between the knights helmet and his neck. I carried through on my kick and decapitated the beast, rolling as I hit the ground and picking my scythe back up before he could react in case his spirit wasn't encased in the armor. A metallic groan filled the air and steam hissed from the now headless armor, the head rolled away and the body fell forward, hitting the ground and causing dust to stir up around me.
A crossbow bolt landed right next to my foot and Sarah repelled down, rolling as I did only moments ago and landed next to me, disturbing the dirt once more and filling my lungs with dust. I coughed a bit and smiled at her you couldn't have done that in the grass? I kicked a bit of dust at her and smirked you're made cause I wanted to be close to you? what if the armor was possessed without the helmet? she waved her hand in front of her face and returned my smile. so how many hollows is that today? I asked as she opened her satchel and retrieved a notebook, she flipped through the pages for a moment before answering looks like that was the last, we got all 7, and we did it before it got dark!
I walked over to the armor and ran my fingers along the inside of the hollow collar piece, red dust lined the entire inside of the metal. Sarah, more blood spray, seems this has one had a heart as well. she walked over and stared at the empty shell its getting worse John, you know if we can't find her then the whole world will be filled with these things, and these souls will never rest. A tear rolled down her cheek and hit the dry ground at her feet, I could practically feel the tear fall as it was heavier than any drop of blood that was shed today. Over the last 2 years me and Sarah had been moving across the continent, searching for a man called "The Bane" he was a vampire king who gave a large part of his eternal collection to the country side. A sect of Clergymen had been hunting him and they found that witches he worked with in his early days had been sacrificing children to him, and using their hearts to build these hollow monsters. We needed information he had on an event a seer had foretold a few months before her death, but with the church after him, we knew it would impossible to make contact. So instead we decided we would lay these children to rest, and find the witches along the way.
Sarah pulled her bolt from the ground and tugged at the line she had used to repel down from, she caught the hook from the tree branch as it fell and stowed her crossbow on her back. we gotta move, I don't want to be out here after dark I stood up from the armor and strolled over to her, taking her hands in my own. don't think I can protect you? she looked down at my hands and traced the scars on my knuckles. its not that, but I think you've been going too hard since your dad, and I don't want too see you get hurt. I nodded and kissed her hand you're right, lets take a vacation, ill call my brothers and ask them if they can pick up the case.
She perked up as I mentioned vacation like a real vacation? I smiled at her and spun her around, kicking up dust and causing her to lose her balance no a fake one, an illusionary vacation of the mind I laughed and fell over in the dirt. But first you beautiful crossbow queen, we need to talk to collect our pay. I stood up and pulled her to her feet, I slid over to the knight and grabbed his helmet and sword, I pushed upward on the handle and hung it against my shoulder. The reverse side of the blade pressed into my shoulder and inflicted its revenge against my tired muscles in an attempt to gain retribution for its owner. I picked my scythe up and slung it across my back, I put the helmet in my bag and took hold of Sarahs hand before walking back the way id came. As we strolled through the dense forest I caught Sarah staring at the sword you know It might not be too late for you to learn how to be a swordsman I frowned as she spoke I know its not too late, but the sword is an art that takes more diligence than I have, and ive done quite well thus far with the scythe. she nodded and looked down yea, I guess you're right, sorry. she looked forlorn and before I could let her dismay grow I spoke up did you want to learn how? She continued to look down I used to watch jack teach my sister how to fight before we left, she was so agile, jack just seemed to know she was capable of more than cooking or shooting, I just wish I was like her.
I gripped her hand tighter and listened as we approached the town. I didn't know what to say to her, I didn't know if she could be good with a blade, I didn't know if she was capable of more. But I knew I wanted her to be whatever she wished for. When we got to the village I let go of her hand an gave her my wallet get us an appointment at the bathhouse and the inn, we can hang out here for a while until I can sort things out. She took my wallet and skipped off, rather content with herself for being trusted with my money. I trudged onward to the guild house and kicked the door open, the people in bottom floor tavern yelled my name and a large bald man I knew by the name of Corden came over to inspect what I had is that the samurai bounty? he said through sips of his ale from a large wooden cup. that's what its called!!! I was trying to figure out the name the entire way over here with Sarah, he laughed at me and patted my shoulder. how's things going with her? she's a righteous lass I tell you what boy I cackled and threw a quick punch at his ribs your wife no fuse short of a cannon either my friend, tell her me and Sarah said hi he laughed and nodded.
He walked back to his seat and I glided over to the next guild counter, dropping the sword and the helmet on the table and reaching for my wallet before realizing I gave it to Sarah. I looked back up at the young girl working the counter and thought to myself for a moment before opening my mouth to speak I need to register this bounty complete under a new guild card. She put the helmet on the shelf below her and grabbed one of the many wooden cards she had on a stack behind her what's the name? I smirked and pushed the sword towards her the name is Sarah Lenex. The girl giggled and looked up at my while she filled out the card you look a lot more like a John then a Sarah. I laughed with her she doesn't know yet so don't tell her anything, and put half the bounty as credit on the account. she nodded and handed me the card, she took the sword and put it with the helmet then turned around and retrieved a rather large sack from the table next to her. It jingled as its contents shifted and before she could drop the bag on a table a small rumbling began in the tavern. The joyous drinking and hollering came to a halt and various other hunters and warriors stood up and drew their weapons.
Corden inched his way over to me and stood in front of the young girl behind the counter, he leaned down to me go find Sarah, if anything comes this way well give you time. I nodded and dashed out of the front of the Guild hall, several swordsmen in tow as I ran down the speckled brick path that lead to the inn. As I turned the corner around the mayors house he shouted from his elevated widows walk we've got a dragon on the horizon John, I called your brothers already. I waved to him and continued running, the rumbling didn't seem characteristic of a dragon and if it was on the horizon it wouldn't have started the damage yet. I stopped and skidded across the road as I turned another corner, the swordsmen branching out to check if the various attendants of the homes were alright. I set eyes upon the Inn and dashed forward, as my finger touched the door knob the world around me came to a halt. Silence filled the air and I became blinded by a sudden light, it rose from behind the windows and blew the roof of the inn to kindling.
I was thrown back against the stairs and before I could pull myself to my feet the flames crawled from one house to the next, moving like snakes along the wooden beams and torching the homes. Before I knew it I was surrounded by an inferno that had once been the village, men and women ran from well to walls with buckets of water, trying to douse the living flames. I stared up at the inn as two figures walked out of the raging fire and out onto the path in front of me. The left figures face are into view and I felt relief wash over me, Sarah was fine, almost shimmering, like some sort of beautiful ruby. The figure to the right was tall, grand in pose and incredibly well dressed, she wore a dark red signet around her neck that was shaped like a shield with wings and each of her fingernails was painted a beautiful maroon color. Sarah helped me to my feet and with the help of the women she supported my weight as I gained control over my body. Once I was able to stand I looked up at the woman did you save her? she looked down at me spoke, her voice was well tailored, one of a high European noble, she saved herself, but I gave her a nudge in the right direction. Sarah put her hands around me and pulled me in tightly, she spoke softly with her head buried in my chest I have to tell you something John I nodded ive got something to tell you as well, but you can go first I suppose. she pulled away and before she could say anything I found myself looking into her eyes, they were no longer blue like they had been when we were younger...they were red. She stared up at me and tears rolled down her clean beautiful face. I knew what she was going to tell me, I took her hands in my own and inspected her fingernails, long and curved at the edge, I pushed her hair behind her ear and lost my breath as the upper part of her ear came into view and I was greeted with a pointed earlobe. Have you always known this? she shook her head and spoke through gasps its a rather new discovery. Our conversation was broken by the sound of cavalrymen, their horses galloped with numbers and the roaring of hooves indicated that there was only one possible group of men who could have come this quickly. The tall women felt my realization as well and put her hand on Sarahs shoulder we must go, the clergymen will not let you live. and there's not much can be done by this...hunter. I shook my head im not letting them take her, I won't, and you can't have her either.
I drew my scythe and stared at the direction the horses were coming from, the path, unfortunately, was clear of debris. I pulled Sarah in close and kissed her forehead I don't care what you are, witch or no witch im not letting you go. The captain was the first in view and the fires began to die down as he spoke look what we have here he said as Sarah and the woman receded behind me. a witch hunter, and two witches, you must be ready for one hell of a bounty young man, proceed with the execution. I placed my scythe parallel to the captains brigade and drew a line in the ashen dirt. im not executing anybody, and they're not witches. take your men and deal with the dragon. The captain laughed the dragon is right behind you boy. I turned and looked at the tall woman, her head-dress held two small horns and a gem in the middle, a common signet of a dragon tamer.
I turned back towards the captain and spoke with a wavering tone as I tried to defend Sarah they didn't mean for this, leave them be and ill handle this. The captains man lower their spears and stepped in front of him I don't think well be doing that, I see it in your eye you have a twinkle for that little witch, if you don't kill her right now, then we will kill all of you. The tall woman began to walk forward but I shifted the shaft of my scythe so it blocked her path take Sarah and go. she abided, Sarah gripped my arm but I shook her off, I felt the tears well in her eyes as the soul crushing maneuver caused her to fall back into the arms of the woman. Sarah...GO!. Her sniffles became the loudest thing in my ears and my soul grew in anguish as she yelled my name, I heard flapping and the men all stood back and looked up as the woman took Sarah away.
Big mistake witch hunter, you've only delayed her death a couple minutes, these are the best archers in the country, and as soon as were done with you we will shoot her down. The thought enraged me and I felt my veins tighten, I slowed my breath and raised my scythe over my head. I tossed my scythe into the air, causing it to spin in place in front of me, I grabbed the edge of the wooden staff that lead up to the blade and gripped it tightly, it stopped spinning and tucked itself neatly in my hand. The captain stared at me with anger in his eyes never seen a witch hunter with a scythe before, bet you're ned lemonts kid aren't you? I veered at the captain as he continued to laugh at me, he pointed when he finished laughing and his soldiers readied their spears kill the witch hunter, and then burn his witch. My mind rang with the screams of a future I knew would come if they succeeded in bringing down Sarah and the witch who carried her. it was a future that would not come if I was still alive.
The spear-men charged me, they moved swiftly and with purpose, the first one determined to impale me before his fellow warriors could do so. I rested my scythe against the ground so the sharp edge faced the sky, as the spearman closed in I lifted my leg and kicked the back part of the scythes pole. I gripped the rod tightly and allowed it to swing in a wide arc, the spear head flew into the air as the scythe's edge collided with the pole and sliced cleanly through the wood. I kicked the spear man back and caught the tip of his spear, as his comrades closed in I repeated the maneuver. Spear after spear came to be nothing more than a blunt staff in the hands of fearful men. There was a momentary pause where I was the only man in the road with an edge on my weapon. I used that to my advantage and began cutting, I pulled the back end of the scythe towards myself as it passed through their flesh so none of them would die. I paid careful attention to keep from decapitating any of them and when I had reached the end of the warriors I slammed the bottom of my spear against the ground. Injured groans rose from behind me and they fell to their stomachs in pain.
I stared down at the captain and adjusted my thin rimmed glasses captain, id love to see what youre made of, bring forth your archers and kill me. He growled under his breath and drew his sword, as he did so his archers readied their bows and released a volley of arrows upon me. As the projectiles flew towards me, the world around me stopped once again, everything went slowly and I felt a guiding hand push immense force into the lower edge of my scythe staff. I allowed the force to continue and counteracted by spinning the handle in the middle, as the blade gained speed and the wind around me began to grow distorted, time sped back and the arrows slowly made contact with the shield I had produced with inertia. I moved forward before they could knock any more arrows and began cutting, these archers were useless without their bows so I aimed for strings and hooks, slicing the bows to ribbons. As I came to the captain and I prepared one final swing, he must fall today, no matter what he cannot be allowed to fight again. I aimed to cut his hands off, it would take him a Long time to fight without hands. I brought my blade down in one final arc towards his hands but before I could make contact immense pain filled my right arm. I looked down to see the captains feet, standing 3 feet to my right of where he had just been. I looked up to see him swinging his sword upward, the blade slicing through my wrist at the bend. and severing my hand from the rest of my body.
The captain sheathed his sword and laughed once again. you live today boy, i like your skills, if you can figure out how to get them back then ill kill you, but now you must live, without your witch, without your scythe- he lifted my scythe up off the ground as I screamed in pain, he let it bounce by the blade and allowed the edge to pierce my ankle before propping it up with his hand and snapping it in half. One of his archers retrieved my Kama's from my back band and tossed them into the surrounding fires. I heard the crackle of embers as they landed on hot coals, I clenched my wrist and scream to the captain hand or not i will kill you, and without those bows youll never get to sarah in time. I smiled through the pain and spit at the captain. He mounted his horse and rode away, his pride damaged but intact. I crawled towards the fires and jammed my wounded wrist into the hot coals, the heat seared my flesh and closed my wound, keeping the blood from continuing to flow. The pain was unbearable and in the process of covering up the wound, I passed out.
I dreamt of Sarah, her beautiful ruby red eyes, her flowing orange hair in the soft fall wind. I would see her again, no matter what I had to do I would have her in my arms, even if it took me the rest of my life.

So by this point we had been walking or riding Abbey Road for literal hours and we were getting pretty tired. It wasn’t too hot since it was October, but it was still humid, and we wanted a break but we couldn’t just stop. This was a life-or-death type of deal, here, so we had to figure out another way.
We had been originally aiming to go northeast, but along the way we decided it would be a better bet if we just headed straight up to Roma- the chances that Roma is our final destination I thought were pretty high. So our travels took us up to Gaeta, which is a really pretty area about halfway between Napoli and Roma. It also has a very large port, which our new navigation route took us along.
“Do you think we can, like, taxi to Roma?” Marina asked as we walked along the small shops and cafes lining the docks. I shook my head, rubbing my legs which hurt from riding Abbey Road for so long.
“Don’t they have some sort of policy about taking minors? Besides, cars and license plates are really easy to follow. There could be users anywhere. It would be safer if we went by boat- plus I’m sure we could get a really good deal.” I said in response. As we passed by a street that led down to the docks, I felt a tug in my pocket and reached into it.
“The zipper says we go that way,” I remarked, taking out the small gold charm and holding it out in front of me like one of those dowsing rod things. We took the path down the small cobbled street and ended up in front of a couple rows of parked boats.
Marina looked out at the boats and nodded. “Great. Boats. Does that magic zipper of yours tell you, by any chance, which will get us the best deal?”
“I really appreciate your attitude, I really do. Very helpful. And to answer your question, it’s stopped moving, so no,” I fired back at her, “I think the smartest move is the easiest one- let’s just check the smaller ones closest to us and see if there’s anyone on board. And no tour boats or any of that shit- I may be rich but I’m not getting ripped off.”
Off we searched, walking up and down the docks and calling out to try and get someone to come out. The first dock was a flop, so we moved onto the dock next to it.
“Hey, is there anyone aboard?” I called out in front of a small motorboat with the words “O Fortuna” written in script on the side. To our surprise, we got a response.
“There sure is! Why, am I parked illegally?” a juvenile, raspy voice answered. A figure popped up from the side of the boat, evidently because he was bent over looking at something. The kid looked slightly older than me, with dirty blonde hair poking out from underneath a light gray gondolier’s hat that had a long red ribbon on it. His outfit was similarly gray and red themed, except his lipstick, which was oddly blue. When he saw Marina and I, confusion flashed briefly across his tan face.
I exchanged a quick look with Marina before I went “Um, no, we don’t work for the port. We were hoping to charter a boat, if you know anyone who is willing to take us.” The kid smiled awkwardly and gestured behind him.
“Well, gosh, I could take you! I’m gonna have to charge, though.”
“Do you take PayPal or Venmo or something? Also- do you have a boating license? You seem really young.” I asked, climbing aboard the boat with Marina behind me. The kid laughed and stuck out his hand.
“I’m a very experienced driver, if that’s what you mean. My name is Enzo, and yes I do take PayPal,” He said, extending his hand to me. I shook his hand.
“Bruno. And that one is Marina,” I responded. Enzo nodded and walked down the boat towards the wheel and gestured for us to sit down.
“So where are we headed?” Enzo asked.
“Roma.”
“Any particular reason?”
“Um, there’s a lot of shit in Roma, yeah? We have a few things to take care of,” was all the excuse I managed to scrounge together. That seemed to please him, and he started the engine and began to pull out of his spot along the dock.
“You two a thing or no?” was the next question. Marina visibly cringed and I laughed.
“No, she’s a bitch- and a good friend.” I couldn't help myself and got a smack from her in response. I deserved it. She snorted.
“So funny how you go anywhere with a person of the opposite sex and people immediatley assume you’re fucking. It’s 2028 people, where’s the representation?” Marina joked.
Enzo grinned at her words, leaving the port and venturing out into the open sea.
We were all silent for a few minutes before I heard Marina shout back at Enzo.
“So what is your story? You look about our age, no? How come you’re out on your own, ferrying people around Italy?”
Enzo pushed a few buttons before leaning back in his chair, one hand on his hat to keep it from flying off.
“Well, I grew up in Venezia with my father. He was a gondolier, taking tourists around and helping out the locals. I mean- he wasn’t my biological father. I was adopted. My biological parents were foreigners that left me here on purpose.”
“Damn. That’s harsh,” I said awkwardly, thinking of my mom and dad. They’d never leave me.
“No, it’s okay. Anyways, I grew up entertaining the guests that my father ferried across the canals. I just loved to hear people’s stories. He taught me how to fish, and this boat was his greatest possession.”
I thought this was a bit strange, but then again, I had lived a very strange life myself.
“Now, here’s where the story gets interesting- and sad. One day, when I was nine or ten, this group of three or four guys asked my father to take them across the canal. It was an awfully foggy day out on the water that morning, so I couldn’t really see them as they disappeared off of the bank- but then I heard a gunshot and I knew it was all over. So I took this boat and fled here, where I’ve been living out the rest of my days ferrying around lovely folks like you and playing music in the streets for cash!”
His face looked down in sorrow for a brief moment before looking back out at the sea. Marina tried to brush some of her hair out of her face.
I spoke and broke the silence. “So why do you think they did it?” I asked harmlessly. Mistake one right there. Enzo’s face got this devious yet sullen grin on it as he got ready to answer my question.
“Listen, you didn’t hear this from me, but I really think it was the mafia. Who else to carry out a hit like that than those dirty lowlifes?” He said. I furrowed my eyebrows, feeling a couple conflicting emotions.
“That’s strange, Venezia is in Passione’s territory…” I thought quietly out loud to Marina. Mistake number two. Immediately I sensed a change in Enzo’s temperament.
“What did you say?” He asked. Apparently I had spoken loud enough that he heard me. I could feel my cheeks heat up as I tried to play it off.
“I didn't say anything! Did you hear something?” I said dumbly. I could feel the boat slowing down. Marina swallowed her spit and looked out to sea.
“Do you know something about my father’s death, somehow?” Enzo pressed, slowing the boat until it was almost still.
I was like “What? You’re being ridiculous. That’s-” but he cut me off.
“Are you two in the mafia?” Damn. Straight to the point, eh?
Then dumbass me blurted out “Well, my father-” before I shut myself up. Mistake number three! If Uncle GioGio had heard what I’d said, oh God, I’d be fucked.
I’d been so caught up in reading Enzo’s face and mentally shaming myself for my utter stupidity that I hadn’t noticed the boat’s motor purring had become replaced with a vibration of a different kind. I locked eyes with Marina. We were both thinking the same thing: Stand.
“Whoa, man, I don’t want any trouble and I have no idea who killed your father. Just get us to Roma like you agreed,” I tried to negotiate. Enzo stepped out from behind the wheel, an orange glowing aura appearing around his body.
“I can’t believe I didn’t sense it before- he’s a Stand user!” Marina shouted, summoning her own green aura and grabbing her sketchbook out of the air. My pinkish-purple aura sprung to life as well as I got ready to summon Abbey Road and figure out how the fuck we are supposed to get off of this boat.
“So that’s what they’re called, ‘Stands’. I thought I was the only one,” Enzo said, “When I was trembling from my father’s death, I felt the Earth tremble with me. This is my power, I guess.”
Then, a figure materialized from is back. It was mostly pink with gold plating, and had red rib-like structures in a few places. It wore a gold hat with a large pink feather. Before I had any time to react, The thing emitted this...noise that made my head feel all fuzzy. The boat shook and spun around in circles as the water around it seemed to dance. The rib-like structures on the Stand rattled and hummed, being the source of the weird sound.
Marina was knocked off balance and fell to the ground, her sketchbook falling out of her hand. I was backed up against the railing of the boat, my head still kind of hurting from the noise. I took a breath to recover and clear my head before I screamed for Abbey Road.
The Stand shot out of my aura like it had been waiting its whole life to finally beat some Stand ass and reared up in front of me. It swiped at Enzo and his Stand, landing a few hits on its arms and chest before the damn thing grabbed Abbey’s front hooves and began to vibrate again. That weird sensation crawled up through my hands again and I just couldn't move no matter how much I tried. Right when I thought the vibrations were over I felt something hit my chest really fast and before I knew it I was flying through the air, sailing over the edge of the boat.
In that few moments I was flying through the air, I indicated two points in space, one just above the water and one above me, to create a loop in. I fell into the loop and essentially began to fall forever. I let myself build up a lot of speed before flipping right-side up and terminating the loop, smacking the surface of the water with my feet and with a little more help from Abbey Road, I launched myself up over the boats railing and back on deck.
When I came up over the railing, I saw Marina had Enzo’s Stand restrained with a glowing green rope, but the Stand still vibrated and was causing her visible distress.
“Call off your Stand! We just want to talk!” I screamed, landing on deck atop Abbey Road. It snorted and charged at Enzo, who was struggling while his Stand was restrained. The large horse-like creature reared up once more, knocking Enzo and his Stand to the ground and placing a hoof on top of the vibrating Stand’s chest cavity. Enzo wheezed and choked out a small “Okay! Okay!”
I withdrew Abbey Road and Marina withdrew Paint it Black as Enzo stood up, still coughing.
“Raspberry Beret, you can go now,” He said as his Stand disappeared. He looked at us with curious eyes, and I could totally tell he wanted to hear what we had to say.
“Listen to me. You want to know the real reason we are headed to Roma?” I asked, still on guard. Enzo nodded slightly, moving toward the steering compartment of the boat.
“It's my parents. They were kidnapped and I’m trying to find them before it's too late. We think we could track them down in Roma. I know how you must have felt when you lost your father. Do you want to give me that feeling?” It was a risky play, but I had to try.
Enzo shook his head. “No, I don’t. But that doesn’t change the fact that those men -your father- have done some horrible things that shouldn't be ignored.”
Marina stepped in front of me. “Hey, take this from someone who grew up in a normal family. Bruno’s father may be a gangster, but he’s the most honorable man I know. He wouldn’t ever do anything if he didn’t believe it to be right. And he is second in command of the whole operation, so if your dad really was the kind-hearted soul you say he was, those guys who killed him would have been severely punished if not killed themselves.”
That explanation seemed to satisfy the blonde kid, as he relaxed a bit as he stood. “I guess that makes sense in a way,” he mumbled before furrowing his eyebrows and snapping back up to look at me.
“Wait a minute- did you say ‘second in command’? You’re serious?” I gave Marina a small nudge for letting that one slip out.
“Yeah, it’s true. But it doesn’t matter. What matters is that he’s in danger- so are my mom and my godfather. I have to get to them,” I tried to steer away from that topic of conversation. Enzo looked at me with a determined stare.
“I’m coming with you two.”
I widened my eyes in surprise. “Hold on, what? You’re going to go with us?” Enzo nodded curtly and sat back down in his captain’s chair, revving the boat’s engine.
“Hey, if I can’t bring back my dad, helping to save someone else’s is the next best thing. You guys seem like nice people. You wouldn’t mind if I tagged along, would you?”
I looked at Marina and we both had a mental conversation as best friends are known to do, searching each other’s eyes for answers. With our minds made up, we turned back to Enzo.
“Sure, man, we would love the help,” I replied. Enzo smiled and tipped his hat.
“Perfect! Now sit down you two, or else you’re going to go flying!” He shouted, pushing the boat forward as Marina and I sat down. And with that, we were finally off toward the great city of Roma.

Working on redrafting my killing things guide. Please comment below if you think I missed something or got something wrong.
The Long Dark is a continually evolving game with the developers constantly tweaking the game thus making previous guides useless or even deadly to follow. I suspect it's partially a desire for game balance and partially because They Like F'ing with us. So do note this guide is only good as of the release of the guide and over time it will become out of date. However, I plan on making it a combination of theory and practical advice, so hopefully it will at least be of some use for quite some time to come.
We will start with Tools, then move onto the critter specific details.
Tools of the trade
In The Long Dark, all your weapons are under the item menu as "Tools" with three exceptions... sort of.
The exceptions are Torch, Flare, Marine Flare.
Now these aren't strictly "weapons" per say, but they are important so I'm going to talk about them briefly so you know about them, before we get onto the meat of this help guide. Yes, trust me. You want to know about these things.
TORCH - If you light up a torch, it might keep a wolf at bay and very rarely scares one off. Usually he'll just run up close to you, and stand there and growl. However, you are now on the clock. He won't stay there forever. Eventually he'll rush you. You will need to slowly back away. You need to know about this because torches will buy you time to set up a shot. If you back up while going sideways, you can usually skirt around a wolf and back up into a better killing area. Or you can drop a lure and hopefully he'll just bugger off so you can shoot him in the back. Note, torches go out in winds more than -16 degrees, so don't just automatically light one up. One last thing, you can throw the torch. If you smack the wolf in the nose or feet, he'll run off. Usually. I suggest you start a custom game where the wolf damage in a fight is minimum, and all the settings are at "best", then practice tossing torches at nerfed wolves, if you actually want to pick this up as a skill. (Note: this doesn't work on Timber wolves.)
Flare - A red stick that once lit cannot be put out. It burns until it is done. It's basically a torch, but it's more likely to scare off a wolf and they respect it more than a torch. It also will not go out in high winds, so it might be good to walk around with one in high wolf areas. otherwise treat it just like a torch.
Marine Flare - Burns only for 1/2 as long as the red flares, but this sucker will scare timberwolves, unlike the other two. You can use it like a normal flare, but the best use is to throw it at the ground right in front of you when attacked by a pack of Timberwolves. Then pick it back up and throw it right down again, maybe a foot or two in front of you. Repeat until the pack runs off. Don't ask me to explain it, that's just how it works. Alas, there is no real tactical way to use a marine flare to "set up a shot" when it comes to a pack of timberwolves. Timberwolves are an whole other matter entirely.
Well, now that you know how to buy yourself sometime, lets get into the meat of this.
WEAPONS
SNARE - A snare is a trap you can set up to catch rabbits. Once a rabbit is caught, the snare can be re-used if it did not break. If it breaks, it can still be harvested for one reclaimed wood. You can then craft it anew with a gut. So if you cat at least one rabbit before it breaks, you can keep reusing the same reclaimed wood indefinitely.
To use one, you need one of the rabbit runs for this. Finding one takes time because the rabbits wander so far. The actual location you can place a snare isn't that big. Drop a bunch around any area you fine rabbits until one of them starts catching. Then pick up the rest and move them to the one that caught a rabbit. The spot never moves, so if you find a rabbit run on one play through, you will always find the rabbit run there.
Only three snares can be triggered at a "check". When is a "check"? Well... usually 12 hours after you put it down, but if you put a bunch down, leave the map (go inside the building for example) then pop out, it will "check" three snares at random. but you need to wait about an hour before it will check another 3. So, in theory, you could put down 36 snares, but it would be a NIGHTMARE to keep track. Normally, you'll only get 2 rabbits on a check anyways. Sometimes 1. Every once in a while, they just break. Then you break it down and remake your snare.
A problem happens when you set up a bunch of snares and forget about it. You'd be surprised how quickly those snares get used. If you aren't planning on checking your traps on a daily basis, don't set up the snares, or you will come back to a bunch of triggered snares with despawned bunny carcasses. Or worse, a whole bunch of broken snares. I find it best to take 6 snares to any rabbit run I might spend time at and leave them there. Just dropped from my inventory. Then if I ever come back to the area, I have them already there and can just set up shop.
STONE - Stones are found everywhere. Always carry one, unless you REALLY need the weight for something else. Stones can stun rabbits so you can run up, pick them up, and snap their neck. The stones can also scare off a wolf if he isn't charging. This means DON'T AIM. You can throw a rock without aiming, but you actually need to HIT a wolf to scare him off, so if you actually hope to get good at this, again, set up a custom game with wolves on super easy and practice, practice, practice. They also lower the moral of timberwolf packs, so with them you can aim and throw, and if you hit, they get slightly less brave.
The other use for stones is if the animal has not detected you. You can then throw past a deer, rabbit, or Moose to scare him towards you. Bears, wolves, and timberwolves will instead go investigate where the rock landed. It is possible with a series of rocks to lead a wolf on a merry path, or if you are high up, to get him to come over to the bottom of the cliff you are on so you can shoot him from above. Once a predator has detected you, or is stalking you, then this doesn't work anymore.
FLARE GUN - It fires in a rather steep arc, but once you get used to it, it is a wonderful weapon to have. It only fires one shot at a time. If you miss, it often scares off the animal in question. If it hits, it sticks to the animal and the animal will run off with it. Sometimes it crits, but not often. The upside of the flare gun is that if you use it, even if you miss, it prevents you getting attacked, assuming he isn't so close the attack animation has begun.
A missed flare burns for a while like a fire, and if you stand on it, it will scare off wolves and timberwolves. Note, fires do not scare off bears or Moose. It has a horrible learning curve, but I highly recommend making an easy practice game, spawning near the ravine, climbing down and getting the flare gun that spawns there, then go practice on some wolves or bears.
Over time, flare shells slowly degrade. This isn't a big deal if you are only playing a few hundred days, but around day 500, they start to decay to the point you might start losing some. Not a big deal for most play throughs, but something to keep in mind.
REVOLVER - Weighing in at 1.5 kgs, the revolver is a nice little weapon to carry around. However, it really isn't what you expect. You have to know how to use it, to take advantage of the weapon properly. First of note is that you can use the weapon when jumped by a wolf. It is not recommended to do that when your pistol skill is low. Almost anything else would be better. However, at higher levels, you not only beat the wolf with the gun, you can sometimes fire it in the struggle, and thus scare off the wolf in the process. While cool when it happens, it doesn't happen as often as I'd like.
The revolver very rarely drops your target in a single shot. Even multiple shots are unlikely to work. I've emptied 6 shots into a wolf with Firearms 5 and it STILL got into melee with me. Hoping to kill a bear with it? DREAM ON. However, that is not what the revolver is for. The primary use for the revolver is that you can shot it without aiming. This means you scare off wolves with it. Basically, the pistol is best used as a noise maker, especially since ammunition seems to spawn all over the place.
However, it does have a secondary use. The other use for the weapon is to wound animals. Anything wounded will eventually bleed out. And if you wound an animal, then start passing time for about 1-2 hours, or start to perform some action that takes an hour or two, the wounded animal is likely to drop dead fairly close by. You can't always do this, especially when dealing with a pack, but if you are stalking a lone animal, like a deer, then this is the best use for the weapon as far as hunting is concerned.
For example, An especially useful place is at the dam. If you have the fence gate closed, and are standing near the stairs, wolves will walk along the fence to get close to you. You can shoot the wolves under then fence, pass time, then go out and harvest them. You can even use this on a bear, assuming you have some place he can't reach you. Like the barn outside of Trapper's. Just hide in there, shoot the bear through the gaps in the wall, and pass time to watch him bleed out. However, don't do this to a moose. They don't bleed. They just hate.
This is the best method of using the pistol to hunt. Shoot it EXPECTING the animal to charge you or run away. A wounded animal will always die eventually, if you can survive waiting long enough. Alas, going indoors often resets the clock. You will need to remain on the same map as the wounded animal until it dies.
HUNTING RIFLE - A rifle can get an instant kill on a wolf or deer if you hit them in the head, but bears and moose don't have any instant kill spot. There is some good news, however. Regardless of where you hit anything with the rifle, there is a flat chance of a critical, depending on your skill level. So while bears have no "specific" critical location, you might critical just by winging him, if you get lucky.
The rifle has the consistent chance of a "lucky hit", so if you want to one shot a bear or moose, you use the rifle and hope for the best. Look at the Revolver Skill sometime. I don't think it even has a critical chance. I have one shotted a bear with a revolver... once. So I suspect it might critical 1% of the time, or something, but don't quote me. Technically a bow has a higher critical chance at Archery 5 then a rifle, but doesn't have any chance to critical until archery 3. So if you re just starting out, use the rifle, but when you get around to maxing out your skills, switch to the bow.
Otherwise, just aim and shoot. It works quite the distance and if you line it up, relax the shot, then aim and shoot quickly without moving the mouse, it usually lands where you want it, while basically ignoring the whole rifle sway thing. On the upside, you can use it while crouching, so you can get much closer to your target then if you had to stand with a bow.
SURVIVAL BOW - The bow is a must at some point. At low levels it sucks, but when you get up to archery 5, it may be the best weapon in the game. The problem is, getting to Archery 5. First of all, I recommend running a custom game with everything on easy so you can get a bow and screw around with it for a while, but to get the feel of it. It lands high when aiming at close targets, so when shooting a charging X, aim for the feet. However, it arcs when you shoot it, so it'll land short on long targets. Only practice will give you the experience you need to figure out how to shoot the damn thing. Plus, there is lag time. When you shoot a pistol or rifle, the shot lands instantly. When you shoot an arrow, the target might move before it lands. Keep this in mind.
So the big question is, how do you get good with the bow? You need to hit things to get your skill points up, but since it doesn't even critical at level 1 or 2, how will you survive using the bow? Two things. One, crafting an arrow gives you a skill point. Two, read every skill book on archery you can find ASAP. And three, hunt rabbits.
I know, I know, seems like a waste of an arrow. Don't see it as a waste of an arrow. See it as level grinding Archery 5 so you don't have to waste arrows on animals that will ignore said arrows and eat your face. The best way is to walk around behind a rabbit, walk up on him (you can get really close if you are DIRECTLY behind the bunny) then aim for the tail and shoot.
Yes. I am telling you to shoot rabbits in the back.
I get it. It doesn't sound very glamorous. However, every rabbit you kill this way is one more skill point towards getting criticals with your bow. And when the arrow breaks, you can break it down and make a new one, which gets you a new skill point. However, I don't recommend that.
You see, when you nock an arrow, it selects the arrow with the lowest condition. Any arrow at below 25% will break the next time you shoot it. So, if you attack bunnies until the arrow is below 25%, you should drop that arrow and try NOT to use it on rabbits. Try to get a couple of arrows like this for when you hunt deer or wolves. You see, the arrow will break, but it will still wound. So, the deer might go running off, but it runs off WITHOUT your arrow, which will be broken on the ground where you hit it. Thus you get a wound, and don't have to go hunting all over hell's 40 acres for your arrow. If he drops dead on the stop, Bonus! But this is by far the safer method to go hunting before you get archery 5.
CRITTERS
And that's it for the weapons. So lets get into more details about your prey. Below I give more specific details about how to handle each specific creature, even if I have gone over a bunch of details above.
RABBITS - Rabbits, when found range in number from 1 to 4 in an area. The are almost blind so if you crouch down, they might hop right up to you before they see you. The definitely can't see you if you are standing directly behind them. I blame the Aurora for giving them cataracts. It is best to catch them with snares, as it seems there is no limit to how many you can catch with snares, however, there is a limit on how many you can catch by hitting them with a rock and breaking their neck. Catch enough in a specific Rabbit run and the area "dries up" for a while, depending on the difficulty level of your game.
Besides using them as target practice to up your bow hunting, rabbits have one other important use: Bait.
Wolves will try to catch rabbits and since they are so blind, a wolf can get very close to a bunny before he sprints to the attack. Once a wolf starts sprinting, he will, eventually catch up to the rabbit and kill it. While this is happening, if you approach from the back or side, chances are you can get fairly close and pop the wolf while he is munching. If you get too close, he'll detect you, turn and growl at you. If you back off, he'll return to his meal. If you aim with a weapon, he'll usually run. If you are too close, he'll charge. In this way, it makes it much easier to get a wolf.
Otherwise, they make for a supplementation for your diet as well as a source of rabbit hide for rabbit mittens and/or the rabbit skin hat. Oh, and while Flare Guns, Revolvers, and Rifles can be used on bunnies, don't. There are better ways to level up your skills. Arrows are easy to make, bullets are not.
DEER - Now, getting dear is a matter of getting the head shot. With a rifle or revolver, kneel down, get in front of him, wait for the deer to bow his head forward to... I dunno. Eat some snow? Lick the ice? Chew on some gravel? I dropped raw deer bear meat once for the mobility to snipe a deer. After backing up, the deer moved forward, walked up to the pile of bear meat and bent forward to "eat" the bear meat. There is something wrong with them deer. Just saying. Anyways...
Then aim for right between the antlers. Hitting the head or the neck seems to work, but only when his head is forward. When he's walking around with his head up, his neck is made of titanium. When he bends forward, it turns into glass.
Now, with arrows, it's a bit trickery, because you can't crouch until archery 5. So do the same thing. Get in front of him, crouch, get to a good spot. Wait for him to bend forward. Aim for the hooves, then stand up, aim and shoot. FAST. Boom. Boom. Boom. One after the other in quick succession. You can do it, but it takes practice. Otherwise, hit from a distance and hope your aim is good.
If you want to experiment, try tossing rocks past him to get him running at you, but honestly, this never worked for me. It does for some. Experiment and find your groove. Another way to line up the shot is to chase the Deer out of his spawn area. And I mean OUT. You need to go quite the distance. Eventually he will reach a point where instead of moving randomly, he will ALWAYS turn to start walking back to the spawn point. This might make it easier to get in front of him. It also might chase him into a wolf's territory.
This might be good. The wolf might sneak up on the deer and then it's just like using a rabbit as bait. With luck, you get a twofer.
This might be bad. If the deer detects the wolf, he will run. If the wolf is in stalking, he won't sprint. The deer slows down, turns around and... sees the wolf. He runs again. The wolf, unless he gets close enough, will not sprint for the kill. Because he isn't sprinting, he will NEVER get close enough to kill the deer. In big open areas, this might result in both deer and wolf disappearing into the distance.
The only other thing to mention is the use of the flare gun. Yes, in a pinch, it will take down a deer, but what a horrible waste. Make this a weapon of last resort.
WOLVES - The New AI has messed up wolf hunting. Much more of a bitch than before, pun intended. So let's talk about how to HANDLE wolves before we talk about KILLING wolves.
Three methods:
1) Stealth - Drop everything stinky, carry a burning torch, crouch, and stick to the edge of the map. You have a sphere of detection in 360 degrees around you both equatorially and longitudinally. Being really high up makes it harder to smell you. Being up against the world wall cuts out 180 degrees of your sphere of detection. NEVER RUN. Carry a bunch of torches. Make a fire, pull torches from it. Is the torch under 40%? throw it. move. pull another. Is it over 40% Put out the torch, pull another. Have about 5 on you so you can chain the torches. Drop the torch when it's burned down to 9%. Select a new one. Light it from the one on the ground, move along. The torch keeps you safe if the wolf some how surprises you by jumping around a corner. Unfortunately, when in stealth mode, if a wolf DOES detect you, you'll have no time to defend yourself, he's THAT close. That is while you'll need a torch/flare, to buy you time.
Now, crouching all the time might be a bitch, but it does cut down your detection radius by a LOT. If you have NO SCENT, then your "sound" radius is what matters and you can keep that remarkably low by crouching. But crouching does nothing if you stink, and ANY about of meat will give you SOME level of scent. Forget those wavy lines, they lull you into a false sense of security. Two cooked pieces of meat still has a scent, just not much of one.
2) Bribery - Start harvesting meat from something, a rabbit for example, then escape out, then start harvesting again until you have a bunch of small pieces of meat. Cook them. Nibble on them by starting to eat them, then escape out of eating it until each piece is about .02 kg in weight. Load up with about 16 pieces of meat, minimum. 30 preferred. If you are going a long way... 50. Here's why you want all that meat.
You are going to bribe your way past the wolves.
Wolves will smell you a mile a way, but the wolves don't home in on you until they get at a certain range. They home in on WHERE THEY FIRST SMELLED YOU. So, if you keep moving and never stop, the wolves will go where you WERE, not where you ARE.
Problem is, after that, they will smell you again, and the process repeats. So, you need to move quickly, but you can't run. If you run, the wolves will charge. if you walk, they will stalk after you, giving you time. This means, unlike stealthing, you walk right down the middle of the map. Stealth means avoiding active areas. bribery REQUIRES YOU to walk right out in the open. You want AS MUCH OPEN SPACE AS POSSIBLE. The problem with this is if a wolf doesn't see you until it's right on top of you, it will charge. So hills are your enemy. Done properly, you can get every wolf on a map following you.
However, every now and again, the wolf will be in front of you. This is why you want so much rotting low weight meat. You see a wolf. Drop a piece of meat, and then angle around him. When a wolf eats a piece of meat, he will walk away. There is a zone around the wolf where you can follow him. Get too close, he attacks. Get too far away, he forgets the bribe. Stay in the sweet spot following him, you can follow him forever and he won't attack.
When you get multiple wolves, drop the meat one at a time, when one eats a piece, drop another. BECAREFUL. If you get too many wolves around you, they will take the bribe, but another will be right behind him. You can get stuck bribing over and over, but making no headway. So never stay still. You don't have to follow the wolf after the bribe, but you do need to MOVE. Keep pushing forward. Done right, you can just walk right up the middle of any map, tossing meat around like you are makin' it RAIN for a stripper giving you a lapdance.
3) MURDER - Carry weapons and a bunch of raw meat. Murder everything that comes at you.
Unfortunately, gone are the days where you drop a lure, the wolf walks up to it, and you casually shoot him in the face. Now the wolf moves erratically so using lures to set up shots don't work anymore. Now using a lure works like this: drop a lure, wait for him to take it and wander off, sneak up behind him, shoot him from behind, only wound the wolf, watch him go running off.
I'm afraid the best method is to just snipe them from range before they see you, or if they are charging, stand by a fire so ef you don't drop them, they will run off before the get into melee range.
When using a rifle, aim for low on the head. When using the revolver, don't aim, just fire from the hip. You are unlikely to hit him, but you will scare him off. Like I said before, the revolver is best used as a scary noise maker.
When using a bow, if you feel brave (or have archery 5) start to aim but relax immediately. This will start him to charge from wait off. It will give you a second or two to figure out his attack pattern. Pull back the bow, aim for the feet, and shoot. Best to get in this habit, incase a wolf catches you when you are tired and you can't keep the bow line taught long enough to line up the shot.
Yes, you might be able to hit a charging wolf with a flare gun, but it ain't likely. best to just use it to scare off the wolf so you can run away.
A few miscellaneous tips.
Growling: Uh-oh. The wolf is just standing there growling and not moving and not eating a deebunny? uh-oh. Look for the other wolf sneaking up on you. If you drop a lure for the wolf, the growling one will unfreeze, and pathing issues make it damn near impossible to drop multiple lures in quick succession and have them work on multiple wolves. You might have one wolf eat all the lures in one pass. So it is best to find the one stalking you and then back away from both. The growling one will remain still for quite a while. This gives you a chance to kill the active one then have time to refocus on the growling one, as it will become active as soon as you deal with the first wolf. If you have a rifle or pistol, might be best to just shoot and hope noise scatters the wolves. Then you can maneuver for a better position.
BEAR - Bears don't have insta kill areas, so if you are going to drop in one shot, you need to hope for a critical. That means rifle at low levels, and archery when you get it maxed out. Even with Archery 5, Crits are rare. So what do you do? Well, Apparently bears are afraid of heights and watching someone fall, any distance at all, brings back painful childhood memories. So, climb up on something, shoot the bear, draw the aggro, then jump. If you leave the ground even for a second, and are actually falling, not just skittering down a cliff side, that second where you are no longer in contact with the ground will break pathing, and the bear will become scared and run in a random direction. Assuming you wounded him, you just have to wait until he bleeds out.
You can pass time doing something, chopping wood for example, but if you leave the map before he dies, there is no guarantee he'll bleed out if you are off the map. Even sleeping isn't recommended. I have slept in a car, only to find the bear, with an arrow in his face, still walking around HOURS later. I dunno why, but sleeping sometimes doesn't work.
Why pass time? Because the bear runs less. You can keep the bear close by and not have to search half the map. That thing can run for HOURS if you hit him in the foot or something.
As for the revolver, Honestly, it just seems to piss him off. Still, easy to aim with the pistol. So I recommend shooting the bear and then ducking inside a car, then just wait for him to bleed out. USUALLY, he will charge you after to shoot him, then calm down after you enter the car, so when he bleeds out, he won't wander very far. Or some barns are "invisible" to the bear's pathing system, so you can safely snipe him from inside.... sometimes. Not all barns are like this. Some barns, f you are standing in the wrong spot, the bear will come through the wall and before you know it, you are experiencing surprise ursine butt sex.
That all said, over all, The rifle is your best bet for an instant kill. Just remember that even if you hit him in the face, you might only piss him off. Rumor has it he does have a very small critical area you can take him out in one shot with a rifle. I think it's the left eye. Maybe. On the upside, bears don't charge when you aim, like wolves do, so if you aim from far enough away, you have all the time in the world to line up your shot. That all said, for me, there is only one weapon for hunting bears.
The Flare Gun
If you miss, it often breaks the charge and he goes running off scared, so as long as you fire before the melee animation sequence starts, you should be safe using a flare gun. Hit a bear with the flare gun, he will run around like a big glowing ball of fire and it's fairly easy to find him. Easy to track, that glowing bear. Laugh. Laugh at its' pain as it dies so you can slake your endless hunger and desire for warm fuzzy outerwear that is both economical, yet fashionable.
But seriously. In my opinion, The flare gun isn't that useful EXCEPT for killing bears. Yes, you almost NEVER get an instant kill with a flare gun, but it is by far the SAFEST way to kill a bear. Which brings us to...
MOOSE - Goddamn Moose. Wolves wanna eat you. Bears wanna kill you. Moose want you to suffer.
Just climb a tree and shoot it. You know that movie where Arny says, "If it bleeds, we can kill it." Guess what? It don't bleed. That means it drops on a critical hit only. This also means it will rarely die from a flare gun. I shot the same moose four times with a flare gun. Never died. Ran out of flares before I ran out of moose. Others claim to have killed a moose with a flare gun. Me? I wouldn't take the risk.
Some people say it has hit points. I've scum saved to murder the same moose a hundred times and I have killed him in one shot, and I have killed him in 8. Rifle shots. That thing is the goddamn terminator of Bear Island. Crushed ribs suck ass. Maybe just go to HRV and look for the signal fire. There should be a moose satchel there. Sometimes a dead moose spawns on the ledge below it. Save yourself 120 hours of suffering. Or shoot it from inside a barn. Which works, until it figures out how to path to you in the barn because you stepped on JUST THE WRONG SNOWFLAKE, and charges through a wall. G'damn bullshit if you ask me.
Plain and simple, the moose is a pain in the butt. So the advice is simple. Sit in an unpathable spot, use whatever attack you got that has the highest chance of a critical, and shoot it repeatedly until it drops.
There... is one thing...
I have seem this trick where you shoot from behind a tree and get him to charge the tree. Back up a bit. Figure out which side of the tree he is going to go around. Dash to the other side of the tree. The moose takes time to turn around. While he is making another pass, dash behind another tree, take another shot, then dodge again. I saw a video where someone did this over and over and over. Once you get the pattern, it seems quite easy.
However... that learning curve... that's a mighty steep curve, let me tell you. And last but not least...
TIMBERWOLVES - Found only in Bleak Inlet, Timberwolves are a serious pain. The best bet I have found is build a fire, stand near it, shoot the damn things over and over, or throw marine flares, or throw rocks. Eventually the pack morale goes to zero and they run off. For some reason, only one of the wolves will usually die. I've wounded all four wolves in a pack, and only one dropped dead nearby. Then I had to fend of three, then two, then one. For some reason, while they have high morale, they become somewhat bulletproof.
However, once to break a pack, they stay broken. So if a pack respawns, only one wolf responds and he is a coward. This makes it easy to snipe him, most likely with a revolver, considering they seem immune to criticals, and then he bleeds out somewhere else. That said, some people swear they one shotted timberwolves with arrows, but I haven't had that luck. I've heard they can't get you inside a snow shelter, and you can shoot out of it. Never did it myself. Let me know how that works out for you.
Otherwise, treat them like wolves, once you whittle down their morale.
And that about wraps it up. I hope this was of use to you. Please comment below if you think I missed anything.

I've been adding a fair bit to the Australia of the world created by u/Sparkmane in the last little while (with their permission), and I've mentioned a period called “the Great Drying” a few times. I figured I should explain what that is, to give an idea how it shaped the species that I've presented so far. I'll also talk about a particular species that somewhat exemplifies the faunal changes wrought by the Great Drying: the bushgoat!
Anyone who was paying attention to the news in November and December of 2019 would have seen the massive bush fires that charred eastern Australia to ash. (I was lucky enough to not be directly affected by the fires, though the smoke got really bad at times). Although it got some coverage, the fires themselves took the spotlight away from the cause of those fires; the worst Australian drought in living memory. Note: it's still not over, though we got some rain in January and February that helped a lot.
When humans disappeared, the climate didn't suddenly go “Yeah, got 'em” and instantly return to normal. The processes of climate change have become runaway feedback loop by that point, and for thousands of years after humans buggered off, cycles of drought and monsoon bashed eastern and southern Australia into near oblivion. Forests and grasslands died off in the droughts, and when the rains did come, they came as torrential monsoons and would take much of the remaining topsoil with them. Vast herds of hard-hoofed herbivores, introduced by Europeans, tore up the soil in their wanderings (an actual problem even today) and ate what little vegetation there was to the roots before starving to death. Nearly all of eastern and southern Australia became desert; only the biggest river valleys retained any forest cover or consistent water, and even that was unreliable. The rainforests basically vanished; sorry, Ferngully, magic couldn't save you here. Maybe hire some actual Australian voice actors next time.
The hoofed livestock animals introduced by Europeans nearly all went extinct in these areas. Cattle are terribly inefficient with water consumption, and without humans to move fresh water around for them, they drank the streams and ponds dry and died of thirst shortly after. Sheep generally need good grass to live on, and there just wasn't enough of it to sustain them during the droughts. Feral horses, long established in good mountain meadows even before humans disappeared, lost their habitat and could not survive in the spreading deserts. Alpacas, perhaps better suited to harsh conditions, were not common enough to establish viable populations, and fell to inbreeding and disease. All of these species were locally extinct within a few decades or a few centuries of humanity's disappearance.
Marsupials herbivores, being more food- and water-efficient, were better able to soldier on. Having soft paws instead of hooves, they also didn't tear up the soil and vegetation when walking or hopping around; they thus caused less erosion and dust-bowl formation. As the deserts spread to the eastern and southern coasts, macropods familiar to these areas were displaced and largely went extinct, but desert species were able to move in. Grey kangaroos were replaced by reds, swamp wallabies by agile wallabies, etc. In theatrical terms, the actors changed but the dramatis personae remained the same.
This was not true for marsupial carnivores. Introduced predators like dogs, foxes, and cats, were just too good at what they did. It was only human pest control holding back the tide, and then just barely; with humans out of the picture, the ferals wiped out their competition. The quolls, dunnarts, and bandicoots, along with many familiar large snake and lizard species, are now extinct. Only the cacodemon remains of the truly native mammalian predators, a giant Tasmanian devil that ironically does not live on Tasmania any more. Omnivorous possums still exist, but there are far fewer species alive in the future than in modern times.
Eventually the climate stabilized, and things returned to a semblance of normalcy. Rainfall became more predictable and less punishing, allowing soil to build up, grasslands to spread, and eventually for forest to return. Now, the landscape is superficially similar to what Australia looked like before Europeans arrived, but plant and animal diversity is far, far lower. The New Daintree Rainforest, for example, has only 8 species of tree making up its canopy, all descended from eucalypts or other dry-region species.
Not all of the continent dried out completely during the Great Drying. Much of the Northern Territory became exponentially wetter, in fact, becoming a vast wetland bigger than Brazil's Pantanal. Increased cyclone frequency from the Indian Ocean meant a crap-ton more water dropping on the NT, crating vast inter-connected swamps and marshes. Some hoofed animals did better here than elsewhere; for example, while domestic cattle have still gone locally extinct (crocodiles...), their water buffalo cousins did very well, and have become the largest animals to live in Australia since the dinosaurs.
The central deserts remained largely unchanged, and the flora and fauna would be mostly familiar to anyone who's visited before. Camels are the only hoofed animals that survive in the deep desert; they have now diverged into Ayr camels, who prefer harsh sand deserts and salt flats, and the smaller Kimberley's camels, who prefer the rockier deserts and dry mountain ranges to the north and west. Without human hunting pressure, some desert and scrubland species have become giants again; gemus are flightless birds larger than moa, and several species of giant kangaroo and wallaby can be found here as well.
Western Australia was the least impacted by the Great Drying, with modest but continual supplies of moisture from the Indian Ocean keeping the droughts from getting too severe. WA is now mostly grassland and scrubland, with the vast central deserts cutting these savannahs off from the rest of the continent. Here, most of the hoofed animals introduced by humans can still be found in abundance, naturalized and a stable part of the ecosystem.
Indeed, all of the remaining species introduced by Europeans have naturalized by this point. Dogs, cats, and foxes are the main land-based predators, rabbits have become a vital prey species for many hunters, and even the infamous cane toad isn't quite the menace it once was (and yes, I've called them “chazzwozzas”).
Not all hoofed animals in the east and south were wiped out by the Great Drying. Pigs can survive anything, and while the Great Drying took its toll, pigs came out of it in several interesting new forms. Feral donkeys required less water and food than their horse cousins, better adapted to desert conditions, and are now a major mid-sized herbivore of the drier regions. And of course, there were the goats...
Goats will happily eat plants that their sheepy cousins won't, are better at water efficiency than cattle, and are small enough that their hooves make less of an impact on the soil than horses and cows do. As the grasslands and forests shrank, though, the goats had less and less habitat to survive in. So what was a goat to do? Shrink with the habitat, of course.
Insular dwarfism is a well-studied phenomenon. As the remnant scrublands and forests effectively became islands in a vast sandy desert, the goats evolved like island species do. An adult bushgoat is the size of a older lamb, about 6 kg; a newborn bushgoat kid is the size of a kitten. Bushgoats tend to have brown-coloured fur on their backs and heads, with white or creamy bellies and muzzles, but sometimes more exotic patterns reminiscent of their domesticated goatly past appear.
The bushgoat's small size not only allows them to live on far less food and water, but also allows them to hide in small shrubs and bushes. They need to hide, because their small size makes them tempting targets for just about anything that eats meat. One cat species, the burnoom cat, is a pack hunter no bigger than a tabby; it specializes on hunting bushgoats, like a lion pride in miniature.
Bushgoats live in flocks, and the denser the local undergrowth, the larger a flock tends to be. More food and more cover usually means more mini-goats. They largely tolerate each other, and any sex-ratio is possible, although flocks tend toward a female bias.
Bushgoat billies have (relatively) huge horns that stick upwards in a v-shape, rather than curling, and are so long that they often double the billy's height. The horns are black at the base, but turn lighter towards the tip, until the top half is the pale grey-white colour of dead eucalypt branches; this probably helps them blend in when hiding in a bush. No goat here, just a pair of broken branches. Nannies have short, sharp horns with a slight curl, allowing them to protect themselves better (although they're still usually fucked if a predator manages to grab them).
To a bushgoat, stealth is life. Bushgoat flocks are unusually quiet, as no one wants to attract attention; only if a bushgoat is hopelessly lost, or a kid cannot find its mother, are they likely to call out for help. Duelling billies will wave their horns at each other without making contact, and only in a perfectly even match will they actually clash; horns hitting each other makes too much racket. At the first sign of danger, all of the goats dive into the nearest bush and pray to the Goat God that the predator finds someone else first. A discovered goat will run, but their little legs can't carry them very quickly, so they prefer to dodge and jink around until they tire the predator out, or get them to chase another goat; there's very little loyalty within the flock.
Bushgoats breed year-round; nannies will produce a litter of 6-10 kids per birth. She invests very little in each one, but can produce enough milk to sustain them all for a few weeks. Inevitably, the litter will be whittled down in numbers, and she can then invest more and more in each survivor. A bushgoat mother's protective instincts increase as her brood's size decreases; a mother with 10 kids will barely give a single shit about their safety, and will run if a predator attacks her, letting the chips fall where they may. If there's only 1 or 2 kids left, she becomes Sarah-fucking-Connor when it comes to protecting her babies, and she will put those stubby little horns of hers to good use.
Within a month, the kids are weaned, and within another month, they're on their own and the nanny can come into heat again. Small adult size means less growth needed to reach adult size. This is also partly why the billies aren't that interested in pressing fights over females; chances are the loser of a contest will have another shot soon enough, so there's no point making a ruckus and attracting unwanted attention.
This lifestyle is absolutely the product of the Great Drying. The mini-goats' ancestors needed to put out a lot of babies and hope that some survive, which is not a common strategy among larger mammals. (“Larger” as in bigger than a rat). Usually, size changes in offspring lag behind size changes in their mothers, but the goats shrank so rapidly (in evolutionary terms) that only those with smaller and more numerous babies survived the birthing process, producing what is effectively an r-selected goat.
By the time that the climate stabilized and the Great Drying ended, the goats had settled into a fairly workable niche, and have been slow to change; average adult size has increased a bit since the height of the Great Drying, but better times has mostly translated into bigger flocks instead. The good times also means that flocks are spreading out into new patches fairly rapidly, and the species is now common through most of the forests and scrublands in eastern and southern Australia; bushgoats are even common in the rainforests, and are a major prey species there. However, competition with rabbits is becoming a problem for them in places, and bushgoats may be at risk in the near future.
While nowhere near as widespread or as severe an impact as the Great Dying from 250 million years ago, the Great Drying re-shaped Australia's future. Both the lack of and overabundance of water have made the continent into something barely recognizable for the humans that return. Bushgoats will be a common food source for us, either hunted or domesticated, but will be bloody hard to find. Snares will be the best bet, and chances are the first that we become aware of the bushgoats' existence is when someone catches one in a rabbit snare. There's not much meat on them, but quantity has a quality all it's own.

Part 1
As I sat there, in Fernando’s shirt, handcuffed, I did my very best to figure a way out of my predicament. There was no time to rearrange the crime scene. If I claimed that Fernando was attacking Sasha and me, and I subdued him, that had obvious flaws from the get-go.
The most damning evidence was the blood covering Fernando while I had him tied up, and the splatter matching what was on the sheets.
I could claim self-defense. An angry wife comes home to find her husband fucking another woman? In a rage, she grabs the kitchen knife and attacks me. In a struggle, I get the knife from her, and as she attacks, I slash at her throat.
The question would be if I slashed at her throat, why was there so little blood on me? Perhaps she spun away from me, facing Fernando? Maybe. That’s my only true defense, to be honest.
With a well-practiced effort, I worked up some tears. “Thank goodness you arrived…” I pleaded to the police, “I was so scared.”
Both officers looked to one another and to me in confusion. At least I thought I was getting somewhere with them. That was until the priest, Father Thomas, came down the staircase.
He had an iron-clad bible under his arm and wore thick leather gloves.
A shiver ran down my spine as I heard Arioch’s screams from upstairs. I could tell those inhuman cries were of anger. It was difficult to place whether he was furious at me or the priest. I hoped it was the priest, granted I could still feel the heat of his seed inside of me. Whenever he roared, said heat seemed to intensify.
Father Thomas looked to the officers, “Gentlemen if you can restrain the victim upstairs, that would be most appreciated.”
To my surprise, the officers left me with Father Thomas while they went up to restrain Arioch.
I tried to plead with him, “Father, I know that adultery is wrong but-” he cut me off, preventing me from spinning my lie.
“What did you do to him?” Father Thomas demanded, his eyes fixed on me.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I tried to continue playing dumb, but his eyes were boring into mine, searching me for any falsehoods. It made lying difficult, not impossible, but difficult to say the least.
“Sasha and Fernando had been coming to me for counseling for weeks. When you arrived, telling Sasha that he was being unfaithful, she came to me, and told me of your plan to trap him in a lie,” Father Thomas shook his head, “had I known you were a witch, I would have stopped this. But you’re a clever one.” he accused.
I scoffed, “I’m not a witch! A home-wrecker, fine! That is all that I am!”
Father Thomas shook his head, showing me his phone. On it was a text message from Sasha: she killme
He then pressed another button, playing a video of her phone tumbling to the ground, her eyes growing distant as I could be seen behind her, climbing onto the bed.
“I give you a child and we’re all square, right?” my voice played on the phone.
“Your debt paid… tenfold,” Arioch replied*.*
“Good, then let's do this.”
I clenched my jaw tight. That bitch made a video call to Father Thomas? She was smarter than I thought.
Father Thomas produced another object from his pocket, placing his phone down. A fine felt cloth wrapped tightly around it. As Father Thomas unwrapped the object, I saw it was a sizable silver cross, “Do you know what this is, witch?” he interrogated.
“It’s a cross,” I pointed out, looking it over. It was silver, and ornate, “It’s a very nice cross,” I said, thinking nothing of the object in Father Thomas’s hands.
Father Thomas nodded, “that it is. A pure cross, made of pure silver, anointed in blessed oils and holy water.”
I smiled, crosses were funny things. Every priest I’ve come across talked big about their ‘holy crosses’, but the thing is it doesn’t matter who blessed what. The Pope could have pissed on this cross to bless it, it wouldn’t count for shit if the bearer of the cross isn’t pure themselves, “It sounds powerful, Father. If I hold it will that prove I’m no ‘demonic servant’?”
Father Thomas took the cross, holding it over my hand, “No, you may not hold it. But I ask, once more: What have you done to Fernando?”
“Well…” I began to explain, “First, I sucked him off, after that, I tied him to the bed, and climbed on top of him-” I would have continued my lewd description of what I had done to the poor bastard but then Father Thomas pressed the cross to the back of my hand.
A searing pain gripped me as if my hand was on a stove. Even worse was the pain that rippled out of my abdomen, a similar heat, as if the contact with the cross was burning Arioch’s seed out of me!
I screamed, recoiling, or trying to, from the accursed thing.
Father Thomas pulled the cross back, looking to it, and then to me, “... what have you done?”
I spit on Father Thomas, catching my breath. Sweat covered my brow from the pain and heat that passed through me, “fuck you!” I shouted.
“This cross purifies,” he explained, “it only burns those who sin, and even then it never leaves a mark!” Father Thomas exclaimed, “yet with you…”
I looked to my hand, a burn in the cross's shape etched into my skin, “Oh my…” I narrowed my eyes, “Why did you…? Who gave you the right to brand me with that!”
Hatred filled me, and I saw red as the priest threatened to further sear the mark of God into my hand.
“Don’t you dare try that again priest!” I screamed, “I swear I’ll rip your tongue out!”
Still, he threatened me with the cross, “What have you done to him, what pact have you made with that demon?” Father Thomas interrogated.
I attempted to rip my hand from his grasp but he held firm, “Nothing! I’ve done nothing!”
Father Thomas leaned closer to me, his breath uncomfortably close to my skin, “You are not the first witch whom I have met who made pacts with demons. The rewards seem enticing, I know, but they take far more than they give. You will not receive something for nothing,” he explained.
I growled at him, “Of course they don’t give something for nothing you pervert!” I tried to pull away, “Get away from me!”
Father Thomas sat back slightly, “what did you do to Fernando?”
“I sent that cheating playboy to hell!” I screamed, finally pulling my hand free from Father Thomas’s grip.
Father Thomas’s face fell, and he glanced to the floor, “My God, how could you?” He shook his head. “You are heartless.”
I fixed Father Thomas with a hateful gaze, “God is heartless. I just rid the world of his less faithful children, if it benefits me, so be it!”
Father Thomas faced me, pity in his eyes, “Who hurt you, Bella? Who was it who did such harm to you for you to lose your faith?”
I spit in his face, “Don’t you dare pity me! I do not need God, He sure as shit didn’t need me!”
Father Thomas wiped the spit from his face, “God needs all of His children, and loves all of them. Even you, Bella, who oppose Him. He would welcome you with open arms and take you into His protection if you asked forgiveness for these sins.”
I felt heat rush to my face as my rage boiled over, “Protection?” I seethed. “When I needed protection God abandoned me and my mother! A mother, who I’ll add, was faithful until her dying breath!” my voice hitched as I recalled her dying next to me, “Even as they fucked her to death, she was asking God to save her! But did He?” I waited for Father Thomas to offer me an answer.
“Wicked men will do wicked acts,” he resolved.
I laughed in his face, “Oh what a cop-out!” I accused, “You can’t even justify it yourself! Why would God let my faithful, dutiful mother, succumb to such ‘wicked men’?” I shook my head, “God left us a long time ago preacher! But Arioch? He came to me! He was too late to shield me, but he gave me the next best thing,” I smirked to Father Thomas wickedly, staring him down, “He gave me vengeance.”
Father Thomas’s pity disappeared as he got to his feet. He returned the cross to his pocket. “Thank you, Bella,” he announced as he strode up the stairs.
The way he appeared so sure of himself unnerved me to no end, “Thank you?”
Father Thomas nodded and left without speaking another word.
“For what?” I urged.
Father Thomas said nothing more to me as he vanished up the stairs.
Father Thomas’s behavior perplexed me. What, exactly, was Father Thomas thanking me for?
I could hear Father Thomas chanting and speaking words from the bible as he did before.
The bed slammed against the floor; the headboard cracked against the wall with a thunderous crash. Glass shattered, items fell from the walls and tumbled to the floor. The very walls around me shook as Father Thomas’s chanting grew louder to rise over the cacophony coming from upstairs.
A sinking feeling crept over me as I tried to reason out what I had said that was so helpful to him.
Arioch’s angered roar provided me my answer. The boom of his voice shook my entire body as it vibrated through the floor and into my bones, “Bella, you stupid whore!”
My blood ran cold at the harsh words, to hear my Master calling me out after Father Thomas had thanked me did not bode well. What had I done?
“You turned over my name you pathetic tramp!” Arioch’s screams answered my unsaid question, “How dare you give my name to a priest?”
My stomach plummeted to my feet. I couldn’t comprehend what I had done!
Father Thomas goaded me, tricked me into revealing which demon I had summoned. Oh no I thought to myself, if the priest can send him back, he won’t have his vessel in Fernando!
My free hand rested on my midriff as I felt the warmth rise inside sharply. Arioch’s seed was still inside, maybe it would still take? Maybe I could still carry his child.
“I curse you, miserable wench!” Arioch’s words carried intensity and power now, and as they struck my ears, pain overtook me.
I couldn’t keep quiet as the most painful menstrual cramps ripped through me. Doubled over in pain, I could only gasp and claw at my skin as it felt like a hot poker was searing the inside of my womb. Fingernails cracked and snapped in the carpet as I reached out for something to hold on to as I felt horrific cramping and sharp hot pain wracking my body.
In a moment of abject horror, I felt the heat burst out of my body, between my legs. A torrent of blood flowed out of me! It rushed out so heavily, I could only compare it to a year’s worth of menstruation, striking me all at once. Both in pain and in the volume rushing from my body.
The room spun as I realized the blood loss was making me dizzy, as another horrific contraction wracked my body, I screamed out, “Help! I’m dying!” before blissfully passing out from the pain.
…
My eyes opened to a white ceiling and harsh fluorescent lights glaring in my face.
I was in a sterile hospital bed, that much I could tell. My throat was sore, likely from the screaming, but my whole body ached. From my fingernails down to my hips, everything felt as if I had just run a marathon.
With a grunt, I tried to sit up, only to find my hands, both of them, secured to the side of the bed. I panicked, it reminded me too much of the traffickers. I tugged hard at the zip ties on my wrists, to where I was certain they were cutting into my flesh.
Soon another priest and Father Thomas rushed over.
The second priest had an English accent. “My God Father Thomas! What’s wrong with her?”
Father Thomas looked down at me, “You’re protected, Bella! Stop hurting yourself! Calm down!”
Two priests, no doctors, I wasn’t in a normal hospital.
“Sister Catharine, can you assist us, please?” the English Priest requested.
A nun rushed into the room to help.
“Where am I!?” I demanded to know.
Sister Catharine answered me, “You’re in the Vatican.”
My eyes widened, “W-What?! Why?” I demanded.
“You’re a witch, we couldn’t place you in a normal prison, you’d likely sacrifice someone else’s soul and escape…” Father Thomas explained, “So you are being held, and treated at a specialized Vatican facility.”
“Treated?” I screamed, “for what?!”
Sister Catharine answered, “Ma’am, you… well, your pact with the demon came with a cost.”
I narrowed my eyes on her, “It would only cost me having his child!”
“Well,” the nun explained, “you won’t need to worry about that ever again.”
The weight of what she said hit me harder than I thought it would. The pain I felt, was Arioch’s wrath for me giving his name to the priest. Now I’d never be able to repay the debt the way we had agreed to. Now I’d need to find souls to feed him, and that wasn’t likely if they trapped me in the Vatican.
I started to laugh; these holy bastards had screwed me over worse than any demon could have. If not for this priest and his merry little band, I’d be in the clear! But no, once again, God fucked me over!
The priests had stepped away from me, I realized, as I was laughing hysterically.
I locked eyes with the English priest and forced myself to laugh harder in his face. Tears were streaming down my face but I couldn’t stop the laughter as I laid there in the hospital bed.
“Has she gone mad?” the English priest asked.
Father Thomas concurred, “she may have.”
Maybe that was my best bet, making them think I had lost my mind, so I continued to play the part. Laughing as hard as I could until they left the room.
When they had finally left, I closed my eyes, squeezing out my tears. A deep steady breath settled me and got me to clear my mind.
Arioch was mad, yes, who wouldn’t be? But I doubt he forgot our debt. I made a mistake, and while demons aren’t the forgiving sort, as long as I paid my debt to him, then I could get myself back into his good graces.
Solve the problem, that’s where I was now. The problem was: I’m in the Vatican. Hallowed ground? This was the mother of all hallowed ground. No matter where I stepped, so I had to figure out how to do this with none of the powers my pacts had granted me.
I opened my eyes, looking to the zip-ties. I could try to break the ties but I was more likely to rip the skin off of my hands, considering how tight these things were. Maybe if I broke my thumb, maybe slide my hand out of the tie.
Before I could think of something, Sister Catharine arrived and began to wheel my bed out of the room.
I couldn’t let her see me lucid, she’d likely tell someone.
I examined her, pushing my head up against the pillow to tilt my face upwards enough to get a good look at her. She was of middle eastern descent, with a fairly dark complexion. I decided the best course of action was to offend her by attacking her race.
“If you release me… I’ll buy you a goat!” I teased.
She glanced down at me briefly before turning her eyes forward once more, ignoring me.
“Where are you taking me, you fucking camel jockey!” I shouted.
She ignored me as best she could, but I could see I was pushing her buttons.
I grinned, “Hey, what’s a camel say to the nun?”
Finally, she glanced down at me, just in time for me to give her a good glob of spit, right in her eyes.
She stopped pushing the bed and began to wipe the spit from her face.
I burst out laughing, shrieking in joy at her misery.
The sad little nun was on the verge of tears!
Try as I might, however, I couldn’t break myself free, even with her distracted.
“Fatima?” Father Thomas walked over to her with a towel. I really got a good shot at her. It confused me, however, to hear Father Thomas call her Fatima. I thought her name was Sister Catharine.
“F-Father Thomas I’m sorry,” she sighed.
Father Thomas shook his head, “No Sister, it’s fine,” he glared down at me, “The unclean will do much to sully those who follow God.”
I sneered at him and gave him a good hiss before the pair began pushing me down several hallways again, pulling me into an elevator that was going down.
“Throwing me to hell? I’ll dance with the devil! We’re friends!” I shouted, hoping to further my insanity illusion.
“Father Thomas, what happened to her?” Sister Catharine, or Fatima, whatever her name was, asked.
Father Thomas sighed, “She made a pact with a demon. An attempt to have his child in some trade for unholy power, more than likely.”
“Where’s my husband?” I shouted, wondering what became of Arioch. If they imprisoned him with me, then perhaps we could work together.
“He’s with Fernando,” Father Thomas blanched.
Father Thomas exorcised him?!
“How could you? I loved him!” I screamed and thrashed.
Father Thomas scoffed as he stared at the doors, “Demons do not love.”
My Thrashing began to get Sister Catharine’s attention, only for Father Thomas to motion to her and make her turn from me.
“Ignore the unclean,” Father Thomas said as the elevator doors opened.
More white hallways, this time, they wheeled me into a room surrounded by glass.
Father Thomas cut my restraints, and I was pushed out of the bed.
I tumbled to the floor, a bit stunned. Before I could react, they rolled the bed out of the room and a glass door closed.
By the time I rose to my feet, they locked me inside the glass prison. I examined the room, there are a few prisons, most empty.
“Most,” Father Thomas explained from outside my cell, “need not be held here. But you, Bella? You fit the criteria.”
“Maybe you can fit into my criteria?” I alluded to Father Thomas.
Without even giving me a second look, Father Thomas was wheeling the now empty bed away from my cell.
“Faggot!” I shouted after him.
I was alone. Imprisoned and alone. It wasn’t the first time, but it was the first time in a long time.
It would remain that way for weeks.
…
The food was terrible. There was a small toilet in the corner made of steel, had the seat welded tight to it, and the button to flush? That was outside my cell. I had to ask the guard to flush.
I tried to stage a protest of not asking, but when the stench grew too great, well, he flushed it anyway.
To my dismay, the toilet did not clog. I had hoped it would, so I could stage an escape.
Unlike other prisons, I could not roam around anywhere. They confined me to the four walls of the prison cell. My only company the guards who brought food to me, and the occasional clean linens.
Every day, Father Hammond would come by and ask me the same question: “Will you repent?”
I think my spit was building up on the inside of the cell. No one came to clean the walls.
I had come up with the most disgusting of escape plans, which involved smearing my feces over the clear glass sides to block their view of me. My goal was to force them to come inside and clean the walls.
My first attempt at this earned me a blast from a fire hose. From the ceiling.
I realized no one knew of this place; it violated many of my human rights. That being said, I’m certain the Vatican did not consider me human, or worth saving.
They soaked my clothing and by association everything in my cell. For a good day and a half everything was still wet. The bed still stunk of mildew ever since.
These conditions were, to be honest, deplorable. I started to lose my mind for real.
Then he arrived.
The moron.
I was resting in my dry, but musty, bed when I heard lots of shouting and overt protests from a young man, maybe in his twenties or late thirties.
I sat up to see a man in black robes being led into the neighboring cell I was in. I would find out later that this man was Immunda.
Immunda wore black robes, had tattoos of various occult symbols on his hands and face, and sported a rather long black beard. It was very unkempt.
To be honest, him even sitting in the neighboring cell gave off a stink that I would describe to this day as rough. It seemed bathing wasn’t his strong suit. He must be French.
Immunda shouted, “If anyone can do what you ask, it is I! The grand summoner! Immunda! Now give me back my Sanguine Amber!”
It piqued my interest, it’s one thing to summon a demon into someone’s body. The demon treats the human body like a finger puppet but it limits them to the abilities of the vessel.
If a possession lasts long enough, or the demon is powerful enough, it might gain the ability to perform some next-level magic. Moving objects, levitating their body, they might gain the ability to whisper things into people’s minds. But, mostly, they cannot perform with the same level of magical potency they would otherwise.
So just summoning up a demon was an interesting one. When the guards left him, I did my best to get his attention.
“Hey, you…” I tapped on the glass.
He sat on his bed, which was on the far wall. He scoffed at me.
I frowned, “You plan to summon a demon?”
This seemed to get him talking. “Yes!” He grinned to me, “Soon… these fools will all burn! They are creating a room for which I can pull forth a demon from hell! They think they can interrogate it and make it tell them it’s secrets!” he chuckled.
Well, no. If he just chuckled that would be one thing. He cackled. He cackled like an evil villain revealing his master-stroke to the hero when there was nothing that could be done to stop him.
Immunda continued, despite my silence, “But I plan to summon a powerful demon!” he grinned, “this demon shall burn them all and serve me!”
My face fell. Tying a demon down was hard. You could, in theory, get an imp or some other dark little spirit to follow you around. Maybe, if you were a powerful Summoner, and knew what you were doing, you could get a lesser demon to come forth. But to do so, you would need a powerful artifact.
“What will you give the demon, in return?” I ask. Lacking a powerful artifact, you needed a suitable sacrifice.
“I will serve it!” Immunda grinned, “For I shall summon the demon Lord Asmodai!”
He had fully piqued my interest. Asmodai was the boss of all things hateful. That meant Arioch was his subordinate. If somehow, I could serve Asmodai, he may make Arioch forgive my debt.
That was my plan, anyway. Immunda planning to summon forth such a powerful demon, however, seemed unlikely.
A pair of bishops walked by and placed an object under glass outside of either of our cells.
When they left, I looked to see a small red disk no bigger than a silver dollar.
But I felt the power inside of it. Oh, it was intense! I plastered myself against the side of my cell, trying to get a better look at it.
It was beautiful, and it filled me with heat as I had never felt.
“What is it?” I asked to no one in particular.
Immunda answered, “I found it while using my divination techniques! In a small town in New Hampshire. I found a house that had burned down, and in the garage, under the wreckage, I found it.”
“And,” annoyance crept into my voice, “it is?”
“Sanguine Amber,” he smiled widely, “Angel blood. Angel blood spilled by force, not given, but taken.”
I turned to the object. No wonder it had such power, such incredible spiritual energy.
From the corridor, I heard a familiar voice echo, “New Hampshire? He found an object that could allow him to summon a demon?”
Father Thomas was speaking to someone and coming closer to our cells.
With him was a bishop. “It could do far more, we are still studying it. It contains an incredible spiritual power the likes of which we have never seen before,” the Bishop explained.
It was clear they were talking about the Amber, there wasn’t anything else here that was powerful in and of its own right.
I spotted Father Thomas, and to further sell my madness act I screamed at him. “Hypocrite! You destroyed the sanctity of my marriage!” I spat against the glass of my cell.
Father Thomas ignored me and continued to Immunda’s cell. Outside of it he gave a critical appraisal of Immunda’s appearance, “He is young.”
The Bishop clarified, “You are wrong, Father. This man is almost eighty-five years of age.”
I turned to Immunda, surprised. If the fool could remove the years from himself without some pact on his soul, which I didn’t detect, then that Amber was the real thing.
The Bishop continued to explain, “The object he obtained, he claims, rejuvenated him.”
The pair then walked to the dais that held the Amber under glass.
“That same object is what he plans to use to summon the demon,” The Bishop explained.
Father Thomas examined the Amber under glass, “He found this in the United States?”
"He claims he found it via divination, that its power called him to a burned down house where he found it in a garage, of all places. The family of that home cannot be found." The Bishop motions to the amber again, "It is concentrated Angel Blood."
“Angel Blood?” Father Thomas said, shocked.
I remained quiet as a mouse, eavesdropping on their conversation, taking in all of it.
“He calls it Sanguine Amber,” The Bishop confirmed.
“So we took this from him when he summoned the demon?” Father Thomas asked.
I grinned. Oh, when Father Thomas discovered what his own church was planning, he would be so disappointed!
“No Father,” the Bishop began, “he says he can use it to summon forth a demon.”
“So then,” Father Thomas tried to reason, “We have stopped him, and we plan to purify this object?”
Denial is an ugly thing to most, but for me? It was glorious.
The Bishop gives Father Thomas a rather penetrating glare, “No Father Thomas, the Vatican fully intends to summon forth a demon.”
The look on Father Thomas’s face is priceless. Not only is it a face of shock, but behind his eyes, I can see a betrayal he did not expect. Anger takes him as he objects to the Bishop.
“Bishop Ricci, you cannot be serious!” Father Thomas bellowed, “The demons which I cast out have only echoes of their power!” he frantically looked to the Amber.
I feared for a moment he might try to break it or otherwise make off with it to prevent them from following through with their plan.
“But this?” Father Thomas lamented, “To pull a demon from the pit? Why would the Church risk it?”
I drank in Father Thomas’s dismay, even as Bishop Ricci began to justify their behavior.
“Father Thomas, you yourself know the increase in demonic activity as of late. You’ve seen it firsthand! Your reports have shown statements that are most concerning!” Bishop Ricci explained. “Mostly regarding the coming of a ‘Destroyer’.”
Father Thomas was livid! I watched as he clenched his fist.
Oh, I wish he would have punched Bishop Ricci but alas; Father Thomas composed himself.
“Bishop Ricci, I have said before that those statements can be from the demon or from the possessed and could be the demon pleading to remain inside the victim!” Father Thomas countered.
To his credit, Father Thomas isn’t wrong. Demons will say just about anything to avoid getting kicked out of a vessel. You’re considered weak if you possess someone and get sent back to hell by a mortal.
Immunda then interrupted my train of thought, “The Demons shall consume your church!” He said it in Latin. As if those in the Vatican wouldn’t understand Latin.
Idiot, I thought, you will get them on to your plan, you fool!
Much to my dismay Father Thomas and Bishop Ricci then moved well out of earshot of the both of us.
A pair of priests walked by my cell, escorted by a pair of guards. The priests continued forward as the guards unlocked Immunda’s cell.
“Come along, they need you,” the first guard said.
Immunda grinned as they slapped cuffs on him, “Yes, they do.”
Moron. I thought to myself.
As Immunda is lead down the hall, I heard Father Thomas shouting.
"I have to protest this insanity!"
I grinned wide at hearing him in disarray with his own church.
"A Demon to be summoned, here, will be a disaster to say the least!" Father Thomas pointed out..
That was the last I heard from the hallway, at least until I felt it.
A familiar heat, and a powerful one. I smelled sulfur pass through the air and I rushed to the front of my cell to see what was happening.
After some amounts of struggling and unclear sounds, I heard Immunda shouting, “Haborym Fire!”
I flinched. Haborym was a powerful demon, but he didn’t lend his power out willingly. The best you could do if you had no pact with him was a fire that couldn’t burn anything.
As expected, a few moments later, Immunda was screaming in pain.
After a few minutes, the guards haul Immunda into his cell and tossed him inside. I notice his head has a burn mark of the cross.
I scoffed, “He got you too, huh?”
The sound of hooves clopping against the concrete floor grabbed my attention.
Walking between three priests and the Bishop, chained in silver, was a succubus.
A real, live, succubus!
She stood taller than those around her, and her body just screamed of all the lusty intentions a woman’s body could. A dark purple corset adorned her chest, her legs ended in red-furred goat's feet.
She had long dark-red hair and purple bat-like wings. Massive wings, beautiful leathery wings with claws peeking out of each wing-bone. Her tail was thin, long, and had a spade tip. Her green eyes glowed, though she looked disheartened.
On top of her head, she had a pair of wonderful large goat's horns, beautiful horns.
I pressed myself to the glass, shouting, “You’re beautiful!”
She turned to face me and I quivered as I felt the power within her.
She was not a normal succubus, no. There was a deep power of hate inside of her that rivaled even Arioch.
Immunda must have failed to summon forth Asmodai, but maybe this was his concubine? If she was, she had to be powerful. I felt it as her eyes met mine.
As they did, everything in my life came into place. I knew what I had to do, exactly what I had to do.
“Yeah, I know,” the succubus said as she walked by, “get me out of here!”
I had to serve her, and her Master. There was no other course of action. I had to become an acolyte of Asmodai.
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Part 3