CHPT 346: Never Normal....

The Pack had been called back into it's usual role as tree house defenders. A job they took very seriously if the way corpses and innards were splayed across the forest encased in ice and nature meant anything.

As a matter of fact, it did mean something. It everything. The most important job any of them had ever been given. Keeping the seedy black touch of the desert from running through their forest to reach all the treasures resting within. Many of which sat in the heart of Rollan's natural home. They could smell it-- the Demons. And they pursued it.

All while the pack to pursued the idea of protection and execution.

An idea they had been pursuing for the past thirty minutes..

***

The smell of blood hung on the air like a cloud. A cloud that billowed and shifted over the grasslands as The HellSlayers and Wolven Monsters ripped their way through the Demonic intruders.

The scent of blood should've called to the magically animal side of the HellSlayers-- It didn't. Not in the slightest. The smell was tainted, vile, rotten.....unnatural. It pulled them in a different way-- with a much more controlled and direct urge that had them ripping and slashing their way towards absolute elimination of the Demons.

Ursula cleaved and bashed her way through the Goblins and Satyr's, roaring torrents of ice and throwing her axes with impressive accuracy that resulted in a few heads falling to the cold earth below them all.

Frosty and the Phantom Wolves ran down the outsiders blending their shadowy speed with the PitWolf's mass and power until it devolved from a battle to a game of chase.

Claude and Gil took the bigger threats. The Centaurs. He had a bone to pick with the wild horsemen turned Demons.

As a result, he found himself running through the forests surrounding Rollan's home. Trees and bright green foilage passed by his peripheral vision in a blur as he climbed in speed. His clawed bare feet tore through the snow and earth below while his clawed hands swipped at the air, eager to feel the warm insides of the two Centaur's running on each side of him, firing off arrows accurately even as they ran at matching speeds with him.

They dodged and weaved through the trees around them without every looking away from him as if they knew the place like the back of their furred hands.

FWOO!...FWOOO!

Two arrows ripped through the forest towards him again. Without a moments hesitation, he dropped to all fours, just barely missing the shots.

Gil had already caught their rhythm. Moving into action as they began to reload their bows with another round of heavy poisoned arrows.

The Hound began spitting flaming barbs, purposefully missing a few shots in preparation for Claude who rose to his feet and began slashing in the direction of the Centuars running beside him.

Following his movements, random areas of the forest around the Centaurs moved with a feral intensity in the form of branches, grass and roots exploding into motion to swipe and grab at the high-speed equine monsters.

The darker furred Centaur to the right of him leaped and stomped it's way through the forest that suddenly began mocking Claude's movements. The Centaur to the left wasn't so fortunate, having it's legs tangled by the rising vines beneath it's feet, causing the rest of the forest to begin swallowing the creature hole.

Gil barked at Claude as they ran. A perfectly normal animalistic hybrid sound that fell on Claude's ears as understandable complex language.

He looked over at the eager creature-- the eager personification of his own ferocity. "Go have fun."

Immediately, Gil snarled and veered off to the left to pounce on the fallen Centaur that was currently fighting the endless hold of nature.

"One left.."

The Centaur huffed loudly, causing heavy tufts of steam to spill from it's hybrid snouted nose and mouth as it ran. In one fluid motion, it grabbed for two more arrows and loaded them into it's bow before loading it and firing.

The three arrows whistled through the forest towards him.

Before they could reach him, he leapt, sending out his Malevolence Tether to swing through the forest towards the Centaur.

The action startled the demonic hybrid, causing it to speed up immediately.

After a handful of seconds the dynamics of the battle had changed. Claude no longer ran in the sights of the creature, and now swung through the forests behind the Centaur. Flipping, pulling and bounding through the woodlands in a hybridized style of movement mixed between high-speed swinging, running and climbing.

The Centaur pushed it's muscled body to move faster and try to gain a line of sight, listening to Claude snarl and huff as he swung through the canopy above the creature.

In a panic, the Centaur began spitting balls of HellFire into the woodlands and attempted to spin and shoot Claude down to fall in it's growing pit of flames.

Before it could, he abandoned swinging and sent his chain to wrap around the throat of the creature.

FWWOO!!

SHHHH!!!

"AAAAAHHH!!" The Centaur screamed a very tortured sound once the flaming chain came in contact with it's demonized skin. It's flesh sizzled, cracked and ripped apart as Claude yanked the chain and pulled himself towards the creature, landing on it's back as if he were attempting to ride the horse-demon.

For a while he did. Slashing and punching at it's back while it ran and flailed it's arms in an attempt to get him off it's back.

It only lasted seconds. The assault was quickly interrupted by the Centaur willingly smashing it's body into an oak tree.

Like a carriage gone array, the two crashed and departed, flipping and tumbling through the forest after being clipped by the massive tree.

Claude rolled and rolled until gaining his groundings and sinking his claws into the snowy grounds. Skidding to a hold on all fours just in time to see the Centaur had risen to it's feet, aiming it's eerie red eyes and horned face at him like a bull ready to charge. The Monster huffed in challenge.

A snarl escaped his lips in response, followed by a burst of green electrical sparks and a blanket of flaming energy coating his arms with the activation of his Spell, (Second Frenzy).

It coated his muscles and extended his claws with an ethereal glow.

The Centaur moved to charge and failed, almost tripping on the dozens of vines that held it's equine legs in place. Before it could look back up at Claude he was already moving.

SWSHHSWSH!

He closed the distance in seconds and swiped at the Centaur's exposed side with his left hand. He felt his claws rip through tough cold flesh. A flowing green afterimage of his arm followed the direction of his attack, repeating the damage to add to the already grave injury-- transforming it from a chunk of skin being removed to it's actual insides being brutalized.

"ACK!" The Centaur screamed a waterfall of black blood following the attack and stumbled off to the side.

Claude slid to a stop beside the creature, kicking up snow and dirt before bringing up his right arm along with a snaking spike of wood flowing behind him.

The Centaur tried to run out of the way but failed as his fist collided with it's lower horse-like torso with a loud thud that came twice due to the effect of his spell. Immediately after, the wooden spike followed, punching through the creature and emerging from the other side soaked in black blood.

Claude continued moving, flowing in the signature loose yet forceful style of Wood-Weaving Druidic Arts, causing the wooden spike to turn and charge straight into the back of the Centaur's head with a loud tearing sound.

FWOO!

SPLSHK!

"AAA!...."

[+180 EXP]

DING

[You have Leveled Up! You are now Level 26!]

[12 Stat Points Available!]

Claude stood in silence for a few seconds, feeling the beads of sweat and blood trail down his shirtless frame and drip from his claws.

The Centaur-Demon corpse stood in front of him, run through and tied up in a spike of wood that had continued to slowly move through the creature's corpse like a snake as it fed of the final remnants of Wild Magic.

"[Hm. I remember when you could barely Wood-Weave with one hand. Now look at you....properly gutting and drilling Demons into unholy paste.]"

"Arne...."

"[Oh really? You can't handle vulgar speech but you can play a game of kickball with Demon kidneys?]"

"Yes....exactly." Claude replied with a matching level of spice before turning and leaving the corpse to find the others. Something that wasn't all that hard considering how well he could hear them ripping things to shreds in the distance.

As if what he heard before wasn't enough, the sounds suddenly spiked, followed by words that weren't his own firing off in his mind.

"--ere's more....two..." The thought came in choppy before returning, clearer than before. "Two more...they smell like...musky fur and piss....kind of like the Centaurs..."

"Satyr's...." Claude replied through the Bond calmly as he began jogging to catch up to her chase.

"...--lled three of them....oh shit..."

Claude's spine went rigid, "What?"

"--It killed a few of them....they were chasing it...."

"The HellBred Satyr killed three of it's own...?"

"[That's not normal...]"

"Never is with us..." Claude replied flatly before taking off as fast as he could.