-Vol 6: Dusk Of An Era-

-Outbreak(5)-

“Seriously, what the hell are these?” Hack couldn’t help but whine after the opponent he fought with simply shrugged off his well time sword attack. Not only it was invulnerable to all kinds of attacks, its speed of attack as well as the strength behind each, but both were also extreme. It took everything he learned from his childhood to now to stay alive.

“These things are not only as strong as hell, but their invulnerability is a real pain in the ass. Thankfully magic seems to work off on them, so go and spam it with your magic only.” Standing behind him, Satoru remarked before kicking away a tentacle heading Hack’s back, as he was in the forefront fighting with two at once.

Among gathered 10 hunters, only 2 were pure magic skill users. Unfortunately, only Hack was the offensive type, while the other one only knew how to heal and dispel curses. But thanks to that woman's help, he was relatively okay even though he had been fighting with that thing for more than twenty minutes relentlessly. And with the help of other 8 hunters, his back was safe, so to speak.

“Goddammit, I am neither a princess knight or a holy priestess, why do these tentacles keep coming my way?” Hack shouted in rage before slashing away that seemed to fill with ‘malicious’ intent towards him. The two creatures didn’t come near him after eating a few mouthfuls of Hack’s energy slashes, which seemed to have some corrosive property to their gross bodies. Since it was like that, the creatures which didn’t seem like intelligent species from before, suddenly witched to long-distance fight with these tentacles as their weapons.

“Maybe you were in your past life, or maybe you are secretly a girl pretending to be a boy and got found out by the monster, lol!!” Satoru joked as he slashed away a tentacle with his knife that was glowing faint purple. By now, they had already realized physical attacks weren’t helpful, and thus they were using other methods to deal with it. Some were using their skills which have energy emission type property, some were using their WILs, and the few who didn’t have any, they were using their physical enhancement type to block or parry the tentacles.

Everyone gathered on this island were above 100, or close to it, they were all seasoned warriors. Finding the weak points of their opponent was one of the job requirements. Besides, everyone who had undergone the process of awakening, all awakened their WIL if not Intent, so they were able to put up a fight with this monster.

{ROAR!!} a loud roar which would make their hearts burst in fear sounded out every now and then, throwing their minds into disarray. Everyone covered their ears to stop their heads from spinning, and that time a shadow jumped high into the air before spinning down like a pinwheel.

Hack, who kept track of those two’s movements, immediately coated his sword with magic before slashing from left to right. He already knew he couldn’t contend with it when it comes to brute strength, but he could very well change the trajectories of its movement with his aimed and timed attacks, saving them in the process.

BOOM!!

The pinwheel struck the ground, creating a pit, then spiderweb cracks appeared as the ground couldn’t manage to contain the force. Hack struck that thing since it was within his sword’s length with a glowing sword attack. The sword stabbed into the liquid-like body unobstructed and came out the other side.

{Kaaa!!} its mouth opened, revealing no teeth only red muscles as it roared in pain perhaps to the sky, before rolling out of the way. Then it started to move on all its four limbs and backed away like a horror movie ghost.

“Everyone, alright?” after making sure that no monsters were nearby to ambush them, Hack asked loudly. then he breathed in relief, now they were in a fragile balance against those two monsters if any one of their members got hurt and lose fighting potential, that balance will crumble, and their lives would be in jeopardy.

“Yeah, no prob.” Shouted everyone before taking positions. They were to guard their fronts; that’s all they have to do. They just have to survive themselves, and everyone would survive due to that.

“Hey, what’s that?” a hunter pointed to the sky, prompting everyone to look. They all saw a bright arrow was descending upon something on the distance. The arrow lit the dark and gloomy island like a falling star from the sky, making everyone see what it was attacking, and coincidentally it happens to be the two things they were fighting.

“They were already moved that much distance? How can they be this fast?” a hunter asked in amazement.

“That’s not the question you should ask, though. More importantly, what is this arrow that’s descending upon them? And why is it so slow?” while the hunters were giving in their own inputs, the seemingly slow arrow suddenly accelerated and fell upon the two creatures, obliterating everything around with a loud boom.

BOOM!!

The explosion was so intense that its shockwaves could be heard all the wat to where they stood. Like standing at the face of a tornado storm, their clothes and hairs ruffled in the violent air generated from the explosion. As for the group, they remain standing frozen to the ground, speechless of the visual before them.

The effects of the explosion lasted for a few seconds before it vanished as the light started to dim. When the luminescence vanished completely, they finally able to see the silhouette of two men coming from the smokes and embers… quite the epic scene that was.

“Who are those two? They look cool!” some of the young chaps admired the movie-like scene of two people coming out of embers heroically after destroying a demon. The few girl hunters who were within the group(two actually) also started to daydream about the appearance of the two figures. In their minds, these two must be macho men with a lot of scars and a chest filled with chest hairs and perfect abs.

“Hmm! Isn’t that Kenshin?” Hack, who was in the front line against the monsters, instantly recognized one of the men. He had a nice long talk with him, how can he forget his walking style and body line? He had keen eyes on the body language of people.

“Really?” Satoru asked as he didn’t have keen eyes like the former to recognize people just from a glance. After glancing for a while by squinting his eyes, he finally able to see Kenshin’s face which gradually became visible, “Ah, you are right. Then, doesn’t that mean he is the one who used that skill? Wow, so he is this strong all along.”

“It might be the person beside him, although I doubt it from his body language.” Hack continued, although he didn’t let his guard down. If not in your own home, a hunter must never let his guard down. That’s the basics, especially for those high leveled hunters who hunt high-level monsters, intelligent enough to put an adult human male to shame.

“You guys are fine.” As soon as he arrived within their earshot, Kenshin said with a smile. He was extremely worried when he saw these guys were surrounded by two such monsters. Although he didn’t want to be a hero, saving them was still within his capability, he couldn’t just overlook them when they were just within his arms reach.

“Kenshin, nice that you are here. That skill was yours? What happened to those monsters?” Hack asked in worry, his concerns lay with those two seriously strong opponents.

“Hmm it was indeed me, and don’t worry, those two were already dissolved to puddles. It's still there, their remains. You can go there and see it for yourselves.” Kenshin said, pointing his finger towards his back, to the charred remains of what used to be hidden area between two ghastly trees.

“No, I don’t need to check it. If you are saying, then its probably the truth.” Saying so, Hack sheathed his sword while Satoru came to the front to talk with him.

“Wait a minute!” a man with fairly well looks and build, holding a huge ax shouted suddenly, as he came forward.

“What is it, Taka?” asked Hack, who frowned at the expression shown by the man.

“Those monsters, since you have killed it, spill what drops you have received immediately. A monster that strong must have left something good.” The man showed a smile that looked disgusting and out of place to the situation they were in. Hearing him, some frowned while others showed an understanding expression, sharing the same sentiment as him. They looked at Kenshin expectantly.

“What?” Kenshin narrowed his eyes, giving them a chilling glare.