• As the winds pick up and the clouds slide away to allow the crimson tinted moon to cast its light in small patches though the leaves of the trees, the loud, piercing cry resounds through the area. Wincing at the redoubtable wail, he readies his crossbow and moves slowly along. The trail he has been following slowly becomes more and more visible: blood stained trails and severed limbs and other such gore hanging from trees and scattered on the ground is almost a sickening sight. These crass infractions are why he was summoned. It is his job to put an end to the creature's nightly pillages of nearby townships.

    As he walks, the sound of a twig snapping echoes throughout the area, followed by that same piercing cry. It's closer. Hearing rustling in the bushes ahead, he pulls up his crossbow to fire, but it stops. He then hears it behind him. He spins around, but it stops again. This thing is fast! It's in front of him! Behind him again! To the left! Now the right! He becomes unsure of his target.

    Now, just for a moment, time seems to slow to a crawl as the hideously grotesque creature jumps from behind him and strikes his back. His hesitation had left him vulnerable to an attack. He lets out a blood curdling scream. As he falls, he musters enough strength to turn and fire before he hits the ground. The creature lets out a cry that seems to make the wind stop blowing. It turns and runs.

    After a brief moment of lying on the ground, the stalwart sits up slowly. Though he is in excruciating pain, he's been through worse. He reaches back to retrieve another arrow for his crossbow only to find that his quiver is gone! The creature must have snagged it. There will be restitution for this.

    After another moment, he stands up slowly, reproving himself for letting down his guard. Clipping the crossbow back in its holster on his belt, he removes from his shoulder his modified rifle and checks his ammunition. There are only six shells. He searches his packs and finds the problem: his ammo pack has a hole in it. He sighs and loads the six shots into his gun, and then slowly makes his way off in the direction he thinks the creature fled in.

    He finally finds an obvious trail. Aside from the countless body parts and gore strewn about, there are drops of blood on the ground. Strange...these drops are a much brighter hue than that of a human. It is wounded. From the slightly staggered footsteps, it appears as though it is in the leg. This should slow it down, at least a little bit...he hopes.

    The hunter follows the trail of blood to the mouth of a large cave. It seems this creature has a home. He slowly steps inside and realizes that this cave could and most likely is catacomb-like, with many different ways to get back to the exit. The creatures could find their way around him and back out to ravage the country. Quickly, he devises a plan...

    He takes his gun and leans it against a wall for the moment, and takes off his pack. Taking out numerous gadgets and trinkets, he sets them all out separately. Working rather swiftly, and paying much attention to the details, the punctilious hunter sets his trap. He quickly concocts a mechanism that will utilize the small flame thrower he carries as well as his flares to create a fire wall to keep the creature in with him.

    He turns and grabs his gun and pops his neck. The time to be beneficent is over. The deeper he descends into the caverns, the darker it gets. He reaches up and flicks on the light located conveniently on the side of his headband. The light floods the cavern, showing every inconsequential night crawler on the cool cave floor. As he continues, he distinctly hears the creature, in its own tongue, prating with...itself? No...there are more than one! That explains the scene in the forest earlier! The creatures were working together in an attempt to disconcert him! As he deciphers this, he feels only slightly better about being taken down by two instead of one.

    After a while, he enters a massive, grandiose sanctum, with what appears to be some form of ancient ruins. As he investigates these ruins, he comes across what appears to be an alter to the local god. Upon this alter are the remains of what appears to have been a complete feast for these monsters. The now bloodstained and bone covered alter had been desecrated by these fowl creatures. The hunter debases the beasts in his mind: what little respect he had for their hunting prowess is now gone.

    His attitude gets steadily more austere as he walks away from the alter covered with cadaverous remains. There is no chance of mitigating his wrath now.

    He can hear the random growling and roaring from the creatures. He follows the sounds to find that there are four gathered outside of a building that is surprisingly well in tact. These must be guards.

    One breaks off to patrol, sending the hunter to roll behind a ruin. As the creature turns the corner, the loud shot and the smell of gunpowder fill the caverns. The four creatures at the entrance of the building tense up and immediately separate in perfect tactics to spread out and find the intruder.

    As he steps out from behind the building, one spots him and begins screeching. It charges him and leaps seven feet into the air for an attack. He reacts quickly and aims and fires. The creature's head explodesin a spray of ooz, sending it into a back flip. It lands a few feet away with a thud.

    His shotgun, which holds ten shots, now only has four shots left. He walks slowly towards the building they had been guarding as the other three rush him. First one jumps at him, then another. With two shots, he brings them both down.

    Now there is only one left, and it stands between him and his goal. This one may be the head of the group, being bigger than the rest were. He notices a piece of an arrow sticking out of its foot. This is the one that attacked him before. It rushes him and he fires. With surprising agility, it move to the side, dodging a majority of the spread, although still getting hit by some. This causes it to slow down a bit...but its speed overall is unaltered.

    The hunter, wanting to save his last shot for a more opportune moment, runs up and proceeds to engage in melee attacks with the beast. After the creature dodges his initial attack, he dodges its reaction attack, only to be sliced across his left shoulder by a follow up attack. Just after this attack, the creature lets its guard down. He takes advantage of this opportunity to crack the beast in the base of its skull with the butt of the gun. At this, the beast falls to the ground, still squirming...

    He walks up to the squirming creature and looks down upon it as it twitches. He takes his gun and uses his last shot to put the creature down. Slinging the gun back over his shoulder, he makes his way into the building.

    The building, which seems to be some sort of temple, is surprisingly empty...what were they guarding? Upon a close inspection of the one-roomed building, he finds a passage hidden behind a slab in the back wall. Setting his gun and crossbow down, he steadies his nerves. He enters the passage. The deeper he goes, the louder the sounds of the gathered creatures ahead of him gets.

    Just as he comes to the end of the passage, he finds himself in a large sanctum completely filled with these heinous creatures. With a new fear, he reaches down and unsheathes his last resort...his blade...

    The creatures, which number well over an estimated ten thousand, are immediately alerted to his presence. As they charge him, the slaughter ensues. He uses his blade to put them down, one by one. As he takes down his fiftieth enemy, he notices a change in the air. With a cough, he feels his bones shifting slightly. He hunches over from pain and drops his sword.

    The creatures fall back to give him room, as if they know something he does nott. His body gets bigger, his skin changes hues, and his breathing gets heavier. He stands and lets out a yell that almost does nott sound human. In a rage, he continues his attack, this time ripping into them with merely his bare hands, tearing them limb from limb, his sword still where it had fallen, and the creature simply stood watching as their ranks get smaller...

    After taking down over a fourth of the populous, he stops his attack and stands still, breathing in the smoky, dark green air. The creatures stand silently and watch as the man simply known as the "Hunter" breathes his last breath...

    This is as far as the legend goes. Some say he simply died and try to think no more of it. However, some say he lost his humanity and became a demon, wiping out the last of the creatures' race, and then continued on seeking to appease his thirst for destruction on the surrounding townships. Still others say that with each beast he killed, a type of parasite was released into the air that, when inhaled, slowly began to infect him, robbing him of his humanity, and turning him to the likes of the creatures. They even go as far as to say that he became their leader and led them in an attack on the humans of the area. Then, after taking out most of the humans in that area, proceeded to go back underground and expand their empire by tunneling, that their colony still exists and is highly active right under our feet, just waiting...Well, any way one looks at it...maybe some mysteries are better left unsolved...