[Ashborn-B1] 45. Hunting (Patreon)

XLV

Hunting

I waited outside the exit of the temple.

Rin joined me and tapped the back of my shoulder. “Remember, there’s no rush.”

“I know,” I nodded.

“A final nugget of information,” Akama called.

We turned back to the spirit.

“The chance is small, but you may run into someone who has also recovered a seal of our temple. Taking their seal counts as ten tokens.”

‘An entire tier.’ That wasn’t nothing.

“Thanks,” Rin said. “We’ll keep it in mind.”

Akama bowed at the waist. “I wish you a good hunt, apostles.” Slowly, shadows clouded the doorway and swallowed his visage, the curve of his lips the last thing to vanish.

“Which way do you want to go?” Rin said.

There were two paths. The way we came from and one at the rear of this chamber. The Scorn blocked the former. They may also block the rear path, but that was at least up for chance. So we took the back road.

The pillars of ice encasing the silhouettes of dead were just as numerous here. Traversing them was easier though. When we arrived, we had no way of telling where a particular path may end up. Now, every so often, we’d catch the glimpse of a particular pillar which had more room around it than others. Following such glimmers got us through the shrine of pillars three times as quick.

‘I suppose the shrine would want us to kill as soon as possible.’

What benefit a shrine could possibly receive from us collecting other peoples’s tokens was beyond me. It was bound to be nothing good, however.

The pillars soon became more scarce than regular. We reached a wide and tall tunnel within one of the walls of frost. There was another stream going through, though this one didn’t run but lied frozen.

“It’s inclining,” Rin said.

I turned an eye to our locators. Many of the signals were at least three or four strong, which meant most groups had already teamed up.

Finding the others as soon as possible was our best bet. If they weren’t being hunted down, they’d be doing the hunting themselves, and where better to gain tokens than during a skirmish?

But joining a battle was different from starting it. I wanted this choice to be cold.

I wanted this choice to be mine.

So we searched the tunnels with two of my chicks on the prowl. Our passage fed into another big chamber, where the stream was so far underground it was no longer visible. Ahead of us lied a forest interspersed with several pools. The trees were tall and densely packed, not allowing one to see much from the ground.

My chicks saw everything. Their images flicked past in my head, and from between the thick foliage, the shapes of many a disciple were made clear.

This chamber was the size of a mountain range.

We stepped onto a nearby hill. I looked up. The ceiling was high, so there was enough room.

A gate opened beside my head, from which a looming shadow stepped out.

Rin had to twist her neck at an awkward angle to see Ashwing’s head. “Was she always this big?”

“She evolved,” I said.

[Flamevern - Grade: F | Rarity: Normal | Stage: Peak]

The flamevern lowered her body for me to climb on.

“I’ll return once I finish,” I said.

“You sure?” Rin said, looking more bored than worried.

I nodded. “I need to do this myself.”

The ocean of calm that was her gaze paused on my face. “Alright.” She sunk into the lotus. “I’ll be here.”

“Thank you.”

Ashwing took to the sky.

My hair whipped back in the wind. Eyelids shut and let the sensation wash over me. Though the ice was a near replica of the real world in places, there were no clouds. Yet whipping winds carried the ionised taste of the mountaintops.

I’d wanted to keep flying that day, didn’t I?

Ashwing beat her wings. Our upwards ascent evened out. Moments later, we glided across the sky, two of my chicks soaring beside us. Beneath me, hundreds of shadows shifted like strange blobs. Ashwing tilted her head and blinked. Vision sharpened, and then I could see them as if I were right in front of me.

Blades of light in the dozens whirled through the air and wedged deep into the flesh of a set of black-cloaked disciples.

‘Fallen Immortals. Their opponents are…’

The cultists outnumbered the Weapon Empire. They charged through the volley of light-infused arts, only to clash with a line of heavy shields at the front of the Weapon Empire contingent. At the rear of the vanguard, a blond boy pulled his bow back. A great arrow shaped between his fingers and the string, which impaled two cultists as if they were apples once he loosed it.

‘Jake has grown stronger.’

I couldn’t identify him from up here, but the cultists were at least lvl. 14. It wasn’t just him either. His party may be outnumbered, but their skill made a single one of their disciples equal to two Immortals.

I searched his members.

‘Judith’s not there.’

Maybe they got split up like Rin and I.

Ashwing’s orbs whirled in her sockets and raced over the treetops. Coming from the Weapon Empire’s flank, another dozen Fallen Immortals shot through the greenery like a group of dark wraiths. And while Jake had kept some of his frontline back, it wouldn’t be enough. He’d see them too late anyhow.

One of my chicks swooped down. A few attentive disciples were quick to fire at it, but the agile summon managed to swerve between the attacks.

Jake peered at the chick for a second before he called for his army to stop firing at it. Once I had his attention, I directed the bird towards the about-to-be thorn in his side. The sharp eyes of the hunter managed to penetrate the dense bark and locate the threat. He hurriedly barked out orders.

I let a few moments pass and made sure the archer and his team would win the battle, then moved on.

Some ways away from Jake, on a hill similar to where I’d left Rin, gleaming shards of ice curved through the air and penetrated into scaled hides. Murderous cries howled through the trees to reach me all the way in the air.

Aurille hovered in the sky. The lances of ice just now came from her subordinates, David among them. Aurille herself didn’t fire. Instead, cloying mist circled around her like she was the centre of a storm. Where it touched reality, the world froze, the frost almost a deeper shade of blue than the ice of the chamber itself. The cold climbed up draconic limbs until the creatures were fully encased in ice. The result was a prison which made me think Aurille had taken inspiration from the Black Temple.

But hers wasn’t a piece of art to last. Gouts of flame poured from the mouths of other drakes and freed their kinsmen. The Bronze Dragonflight roared their freedom and continued their charge up the hill.

The desire to swoop down was there. Wiping out that entire contingent would be easy if I joined. And the benefits Skul would receive…

Yet I soared on. More drakes would do the balekin good, but killing them wouldn’t help digest the rock in my stomach. I needed something…more human. Something more isolated.

Ashwing struck the sky. A certain distance removed from Aurille, at the bottom of a set of rolling hills, was a pool shining brighter than any I’d encountered before. Blue vines of some plant sprouted from the body of water. Resting on the island, in the centre of the mystical lake, was a boy with wild hair in nothing but some pants.

Neither Ashwing nor I were channelling any essence, yet Gaje the Accursed looked up at the shadow passing overhead and met my eyes.

I didn’t look away from the throbbing light burning within them.

He was isolated. He was human. And with my powers as they were now, I thought had a decent shot at taking him down…but just like when a lion miraculously crossed paths with a tiger, a shiver passed over my skin.

Even an apex predator had to offer another hunter respect, and unless I was willing to lay down my life, his was a path better left uncrossed.

Flaming wings darted on.

There were more groups of a few dozen disciples. But taking on dozens at the same time wasn’t preferred. Just when I was reaching the end of the chamber and thought of heading back, nine shadows flicking across the ground caught my eye.

Two of the nine shadows were spirit beasts. Wolves with dark fur. They took orders from a boy covered in tattoos wearing a tanktop and trousers that were cut off at the knee (the Black Fang resistance to cold continued to amaze me). He, and two more Black Fangs, chased four monks through the woods. The monks yelled something—my money was on curses or pleas—and a Black Fang wielding two axes cackled in response. Lightning shot up his arm as he threw his axe, and the weapon whirled ahead like a bolt.

A female monk at the rear of the escaping party wove a sign, which warped into a pagoda that hovered over her head. Light burst from the structure’s windows into the shape of a kite, and threads of thunder broke and arced on the barrier.

Though the shield shuddered, it remained whole.

But casting had slowed the girl down. Already, the beasts were gaining on her. Her black hair whipped as she glanced back at her companions. One of her companions must’ve read the plan forming in her head in her eyes, for he screamed at the top of his lungs.

Too late.

The girl veered away from her friends towards another edge of the woods.

The gaze of the tattooed Black Fang narrowed. A split second was all it took for him to divert his spirit beasts. His two clanmates changed targets as well, leaving the remaining three monks to flee, the air behind them glittering in their wake. Ashwing angled her head, revealing the glitters to be light refracting through droplets of water. Within their reflections, the escaping visage of the girl twisted, trapped between instants, until the droplets fell to the floor and shattered.

They chased the girl to a frozen stream, beyond which lied a hill too steep to climb. The only other path was cut off by a crevice, leaving her with no option but to fight.

Her pagoda flared again. Light flung from her fingertips, crashing into spirit beast and Black Fang alike.

The third of the Black Fangs, a boy with a huge cleaver on his back, shrugged it off and bulldozed ahead. His blade carved through her shield like it was butter and slammed into her middle. She wasn’t cleaved in half like I expected but was thrown towards the crevice as breath was forcefully expelled from her lungs.

Not an instant later, one of the wolves was on her. Fangs ripped through her robes and sank into her flesh. Only they couldn’t find purchase as the girl’s skin was toughened from years of physical cultivation.

An elbow slammed down on the wolf’s head, and the spirit beast released her with a yelp.

Now the girl backpedalled, putting a mere few steps between her and the void. It was no true void—a mere recess in the ice which stretched so far down it gave the impression of one. The landing would kill her all the same.

Spirit beasts and Black Fangs circled her position. One of the boys chuckled and said something, which made the girl glance between the group and the depths. Her face set.

Then she jumped.

One of the wolves lunged after her and barely stopped itself from flying over the edge. Its master approached and leaned over the crevice.

The girl was hanging from the cliffside by a hairpin. She’d infused the ornament with essence, so it wasn’t at risk of breaking…until she ran out of essence. Her muscles would give out long before that though.

After some talking, the three Black Fang disciples plopped down beside a nearby tree, intent on waiting out the fate of the girl, who’d either tumble to her death or climb on land for them to kill her. They pulled out a set of sticks, and after the one wielding a cleaver drew the short end, he began creating a fire with some tools in his satchel.

I glanced back at the girl. Her face was buried in the ice. Blood had mixed with sweat, pasting her hair to her forehead. She was gnashing her teeth, tears streaming down her face while she did so.

Ashwing turned back to the Black Fangs. From the efficiency and lackadaisical attitude, this was far from the first time this had been attempted.

I circled Ashwing around. The natural lighting of the Maze receded and made way for shadows.

Night was almost upon this world, and soon, the wicked would need their rest.