CHPT 213: The “Generals”

His senses were lit ablaze and grew like a spark of flame that was stoked into a maddening tornado of fire in response to the rise of their voices. They were getting closer. Driving him back into a perverse state of fearful madness as his body prepared him for a new wave of beatings.

He scampered through the forest, sometimes on all fours— unsure if he was human or monster in body, with itchy hot skin and a heightened level of hypersensitivity that caused him to flinch repeatedly as his newly developed ears picked up on them crunching through the damp tall grass.

There was no thought or reason, all he knew was to run when they returned. He didn't even fully comprehend what Jack had told him, he just knew Jack was here. And if he was, Dolion wasn't too far behind. The pack had returned.

He ran as hard as his scared and emancipated limbs would take him with eyes widened by fear for what was to come. In the distance he could hear the muffled grunts and growls of struggle between two forces followed by a conversation. It was distant, but he could hear it in between whatever was grunting with aggravated effort.

"Somebody retrieve the blondy, now!" Dolion commanded, silencing everything with his intimidating authority.

The silence didn't last. It never did. Merely seconds after his request, something took off. The feet of something light, yet fast as lightning, tapping repeatedly through the grass like focused rainfall heading straight for him.

Adrenaline pumped his taxed muscles, expanding his lungs and tunneling his vision while he ran faster through the forest, blowing past trees at near blurring speeds.

He continued through the forest in such a state for a while, long enough to relax even slightly. Slightly enough to take a moment longer than necessary to realize the speeding tap of footfalls was no longer behind him, it was beside him.

Slowly, while he ran for dear life, he turned his head to his left to peer deeper into the dark forest.

It didn't take him long to find his pursuer. There she was, running so fast that her legs and arms moved as a blur while her long shining black hair flowed through the wind to leave her pale skinned naked body out in the open against the cold.

He should've known it would be her coming for him just based on the speed of her movements and absolute silence that followed. No snarls or barks, only silence— yet, her piercing black eyes screamed with the intensity that her voice lacked. The one who's come for him was the one who scared him the most— other than Dolion of course.

Her name was Aiko, nicknamed The Crimson Banshee.

When Samuel wasn't being beaten or forcibly taught about how to act as a follower of Remus, he learned about the members of the pack that inhabited the space with him. Aiko was among the highest of subdivisions within the pack— functioning almost as a General over the rest, with Jack and Dier while Dolion reigned as King.

The three beneath the Alpha had almost the same amount of authoritative power, ruling over the other Lupines with an iron….claw, that they never hesitated to use. Fights happened often. And they were the best. Dolion's hitmen, if Samuel could guess. Because not only did they hunt the most, but they also had titles— hinting at their skills in an almost comical manner based on how Jack described it.

Aiko was The Crimson Banshee— only ever letting out her unique spine tingling screams at the sight or promise of spilled blood. Dier was The Beast, a giant Lupine of Remus from the Sunlands that could probably punch a hole through the best of Samuel's armor. And lastly, Jack who was titled, The Ripper.

He seemed to enjoy that name— likening it to some horror story he liked to read. He also enjoyed proving why he earned it. But Aiko was scarier to Samuel. She brought a certain kind of fear out of him.

Most of their origins were unknown to Samuel, except Aiko. The other Lupines murmured about her often and Jack attempted to goad her into fighting even more so. So he knew enough to know that she was in a few words; a boogeyman brought to life.

Hailing from The Kumataiyo Isle's or Japan of the Old World, Aiko was a prodigy level swordsman who was Reborn at the remarkable age of 14 and forced into combat against monsters— illegally, not much later.

Such a violent teenage life would have adverse effects on anyone, and maybe she would've been able to overcome or work around that adversity if she had been born anywhere else.

The Kumataiyo Isle's. Where Samuel's father was from. He never spoke much about the place, but Samuel knew that over time the violent island had receded to a style of living fairly similar to what was known as Feudal Japan. Even rebirthing the title of Samurai for their military. Only now, they weren't at the top of their caste. What took their place instead was any trained and awakened individual that could expel Kumataiyo's greatest threat.

The Akuma. More typically known in New Gloria and other similar language speaking countries as Demons.

With the Kumataiyo Isle's housing an unnaturally high amount of Volcanoes, the Akuma breached the hot liquid surface of the magma pits in droves to wreak havoc on the island below and follow one simple urge. Feed, and corrupt.

Aiko, faced that hellish havoc headfirst at the ripe age of 14 or 15. Instead of going completely insane— although Samuel believed she was, she went a different route. Instead of following the duty of the awakened to slay monsters and stop the terraformation of the earth, she developed the urge to slay weakness.

She'd seen enough death and defeat at the hands of the Akuma to realize the vast difference between man and Monster. So, she started off simply by training that much harder and consuming...only monster flesh. Some time along the way, her goal developed even further. She realized bettering herself wasn't enough. So she began to cull the weak. In her brief killing spree that lasted only a handful of months before Dolion had taken her, she'd robbed three large scale Guilds of all their Bronze and Silver Ranked Heroes. The moniker of the Crimson Banshee would've made it to her even then simply from the screams of each crying family she left in her wake after they'd find their awakened husbands, wives and brothers drenched in their own lifeblood.

That simple knowledge of her past combined with the veil of mystery shrouding her like a cloak terrified him. It did so in a way that he couldn't fully explain, only feel. And he felt it right now.

That absolute unknowingness and unsettling nature of her emotionless face. It was like two pairs of intense eyes looking at him through a mask. A mask that went from a blank face to one of pure anger with the high speed change of a flexing muscle. Before he could fully take in the grotesque scrunching of her face, she exploded in a cloud of steam.

Dread. His heart sank as the cloud housing Aiko continued to run beside him. His heart sank, weighed down by his own dread because of the steam. Because of what it meant.

With a blood freezing scream coming from the throat of something monstrous, Aiko leapt towards him. She sailed through the air above the trees flipping as the white spirals of smoke blew away. Revealing her true form beneath. Being smaller than other Lupines, she made up for it with insane levels of speed and needle-like raking claws that had already fallen on Samuel's skin a number of times.

Samuel's previous choice between fight or flight changed in that moment and he turned to send a purple blast of fire in her direction in response to his lizard brain switching from, "flight.", to, "fight!"

"Get back! You FREAK!"

FWOOOooooSH!

The fire brightened the dark forest in a haunting shade of purple, igniting the leaves and eating away at the bark of trees he hit.

Before the blast could come into contact with Aiko, she grabbed ahold of one of the nearby tree branches she was falling beside and swung herself out of the way.

In a flash, she landed on the bark of another and used it as a boost to propel herself at Samuel in a black blur of fur and white teeth.

WOOSH!

"RAAAAGH!"

She crashed into his side before he could react, causing them both to roll and tumble through the grass only ever slightly departing to snap or claw at one another.

They rolled for another few seconds before splitting abruptly, now both facing eachother as fully transformed Lupines.

Samuel snarled, no longer in direct control of himself but still aware of the much smaller threat in front of him.

Aiko regarded him on all fours with her light green eyes that coldly focused on the golden Lupine.

Woo!

Samuel dashed blindly at her with his claws raised high. At this level, his attempted attack against her was akin to an average man swinging at a Dragon.

With little to no effort, Aiko sidestepped and leapt to push him into a tree with her feet.

Woo!

They flew in opposite directions with Samuel rolling through the dirt like a tumbleweed while Aiko bounded away with a number of well executed backflips before landing back on all fours.

Samuel clumsily got back to his feet, just in time to watch Aiko's maw stretch open like a yawning snake and let out an earsplitting high pitched beastial scream that sent rolling guts of wind straight into Samuel's chest.

WOOO!

Crack!

His spine wrapped around the tree behind him, knocking him unconscious before he even had a chance to realize what happened.

The raging wind storm erupting from Aiko's jaws disappeared as her mouth closed and she reverted back to her human form to pick up the heap of muscle and golden fur that was meant to be delivered to Dolion.

She couldn't help but notice her usual urge to remove the weak wasn't present. The whole reason she couldn't really spar with the other Lupines other than Jack, Dier and Dolion is because she'd kill everyone she beat. But not this one. She didn't feel that natural trauma response that told her in an aching scream, "Weak equals death!"

"Interesting…."

****

Jack waited in the clearing, sitting atop the large Night Runner's shoulders with his elbows rested on his balding head as if he didn't have a care in the world.

Dolion watched from afar with his usual brooding expression while Dier stood behind Jack and used his element of Earth to hold the Night Runners body in a case of dirtied rock that wouldn't budge without his say so. His bored expression contrasted greatly with the look of excitement on Jack's face. They functioned as polar opposites often.

The contrast spread further when Aiko emerged from the forest bare chested with Samuel held by the neck in one hand.

"Ah! I see you've still got a soft spot for the blondy. I half thought you would've killed him in there…koko…hehehe..what's different?" Jack yelled to her with a knowing grin.

Aiko did what she normally did whenever Jack spoke to her, which was ignoring him and avoiding eye contact. His verbal pokes and prods usually didn't bother her, but she too was stumped on why she didn't want to cull this exact weakness. It made her wonder what Jack was so sure about when it came to Samuel. Why didn't she want to kill him? That was something she'd have to find out on her own time. Jack wouldn't give her answers. Despite his title, she always thought he enjoyed mind games more than murder, he was a slimeball like that.

She cleared the distance between them in the following seconds, returning any stares from the other surrounding Lupines until they dropped their eyes and were reminded of her position.

Thump!

With zero effort, she threw Samuel at the Night Runners feet and headed over to where Dolion sat to watch it all unfold.

Jack eyed the unconscious teenager with superb delight.

"PERFECT! Our next test begins….we may be going about this backwards but who gives a fuck? I'm no teacher. And I know you'll pass…because your like me pretty boy…." He spoke while he leaned over the Night Runners head as if he was an odd shaped piece of furniture instead of a crying and grunting human.

"You're like me…so you'll pass this test that only yields two results. Life. Or death! We'll repeat this until you no longer care for either when it comes to humans. You'll be the reaper I see you as Sammy boy!"

The Night Runner screamed in terror as his release of fear caused the surrounding Lupines to transform. Jack continued to smile sadistically even as the smoke rose with the heated change from simply being a man, to the Ripper.