Vahe

My squad assembles around me as we face the beasts radiating an aura almost pervasive enough to disable even our abilities to move. The invisible forces of their aura’s and our elemental natures billow against each other aggressively, keeping us from their influence, keeping them from ours. The four creatures assembled before us are large brutes with natural weapons and armoured hides, no enhancements or tools visible on their persons at all, not much mana I can sense from them yet with how pervasive their auras are my senses might not be very accurate.

‘’What do you think?’’ Eaira asks no one in particular in the old tongue. Though the others where far back we all witnessed how the van Damages did against one of these beasts.

‘’We can take ‘em, easy.’’ Vehema says with confidences even as another one of the large creatures comes into the small clearing through the bushes and looks around at the situation whilst leisurely carrying a dead dire-bear across one shoulder. It grins and the large animal falls with a heavy thump onto the floor at the beast’s feet, it surveys the situation and adds its aura to the invisible struggle already taking place from the standoff. With my mana-sight I can almost see sparks and sizzling where the energies antagonise each other, no one moves.

A rough barking sound comes from one of the creatures and they slowly fan out seemingly to encircle us, which is fine as we asses them while waiting for the van Damages to get clear.

‘’I’m going to make a fur coat out of you,’’ Sawa says pointing one of his blades at one the bigger ones with a white and golden mane around its neck going down its back.

Its eyes gleam at the challenge as the meaning is clear even to these dumb stalking predators.

‘’I am glad for some action at least, I was getting tired of following the humans around.’’ Hstane says twirling his spear around watching the 3m tall bipedal beastman get down on all fours without losing any of its lethal mobility.

‘’Patience,’’ I say letting the others step forward. Each of them faces one opponent while I stand at the back as support keeping an eye on things.

‘’I was getting bored following you all this time, it’s been an interesting journey but only the Red Forrest was of any particularly interest and usefulness,’’ he says squaring off against the large beastman now looking as adept on all fours as it did on two legs.

‘’Any of you interested in talking to them?’’ I ask permeating my mana into the ground around me getting ready to in case I need to be serious.

‘’Creature, what is your purpose here?’’ Vahame sends in Universal after a second of no one responding; the things keep stalking around us. The communication doesn’t get through at all as far as I can tell, stopped either by the thing’s mental resistance, a skill that they have preventing mind to mind communication or maybe its just their crude auras, either way they need to be put down.

The grass rustles as the one on all fours launches forward leaving dirt flying in its wake. A multi layer mirror-shield forms in front of Hstane and the beast is on it a second later. I hear the crack and multiple shatters, the having slowed the creature but not stopping its charge as it opens its maw wide with canines as long as my fingers champing down. Spear horizontally thrust forward it lodges into its mouth even with all his strength Hstane is pushed back with feet digging into the grass but he roars bringing his own beastman heritage to the fore for that extra strength. The runes along the his weapon flare and with a crack the mouth of the beast is opened wide by the force field projected around the shaft of the weapon.

Faster than is reasonable the beast swipes with claws extending longer than they should, even with him pulling back he feels the sharp implements rake across his enchanted leathers. He tries to push down on the spear but the creature is too strong even for him but as it pulls back he follows so that the shaft remains lodged in its mouth. With a intimidating display of strength it stands suddenly upright throwing up its head launching him into the air. With foresight and a bit of craziness he keeps the shaft lodged on the creature’s upper canines never letting go of the weapon he flips in air pulling back hard on the thing’s head as he lands. Any other humanoid would have a broken neck but this one just flips its head back forward launching Hstane over its head shooting forward with glowing spear still in his grasp.

He flips and slides to a stop, again launches himself at his opponent spear first aiming to pierce it through the throat but the thing is fast and nimble as it again lands on its front paws dodging left then right past his quick thrusts. As momentum takes him past the beast swipes at his back meeting hastily erected shielding but the strikes sends him tumbling forward to again flip himself in the air to regain his foot. Once again facing his opponent he launches forward with spear leading not yet feeling the need to pull on his mana reserves, not yet feeling the need to pull on his elemental affinity.

Sawa is all over the place with his prey, not letting it gain any power in its swings but also not getting all he could from his own. Even as the beast stands over 2.5 metres tall as wide as a dire-bear and weighing over 200kgs the damage done by the trading of blows gaining him the advantage with his superior fae physic and the spear eating away at his foe. He clearly got the runt of the litter all things considered but still the struggle is intense, new paths trampled through the woods, rock boulders fastened in their cycle to becoming soil.

They move all over the place breaking through trees throwing all their respective speed and agility at each other, powerful bodied soaking up the punishment in ways no inferior being could manage unless they specialised in physical enhancement. Maybe I was quick in my judgment of classifying the beast as ‘prey’.

It manages to chomp into his shoulder, breaking bone and doing deep tissue damage as it writhes its head, hands clawing at him savagely even penetrating his leather armour. His spear pierces through its foot lodging into the ground before splitting the foot in twain and the two tumbling together.

Vehema fairs little better, initially getting the speed advantage with her twin blades seemingly too much for the large beast. But it soon becomes evident but its wounds are minor with barely any bleeding at all with its hide and muscle tougher than a beast that is only at the second mana level of mana awakening has any right to be.

With Eaira’s area of effect ability weakening their aura I am able to sense much more from them than I was previously and I’m honestly confused by what my mana sense tells me. She twirls around the creature bashing it back with power channelled through the Staff of Anakin any time it gives her an easy opening, channelling a shield any time it gets an opening. By far she is the most decisive and ruthless in her attacks not playing with her food by using the staff to its full potential from the get go.

Like a bird she is light on her feet, sometimes even stepping on floating leaves r skidding of passing currents as she manoeuvres herself around the beast raining down blow after blow until the unmistakable crack of snapping bone makes her smile. Her teeth are sharp with her continence battle ready. Usually a fae visage is ethereally beautiful to look at, distractingly so to the younger races still obsessed with appearances and unable to look past appearances or pheromone traps, not so when we are being vicious though.

Still, with the amount of power flowing through the staff it shouldn’t have taken her so long to break this creature’s bones, especially since my senses are telling me it is only a level two mana awakened, powerful for sure but not as powerful as these creatures seem to be. There is something here I’m not seeing, something besides mana that makes them so resilient, so fast, so effective with their teeth and claws that allows them to be more than what they seem. Their auras alone are an anomaly but now they are keeping people that are themselves level 3 mana awakened capable of giving an Ancient a run of its money at bay.

H’anael is the first to finish Their opponent, screaming those unary blasts every now and again as They curve the beast into mince with his swords. A bastard and sword combination used in a unique style channelling Their air currents through them making them sharper than the sharpest edge. Spiritual weapons both and he uses them to the fullest advantage, another scream buffets his opponent before They open its throat with beauty of a swing and stabs into its heart.

Floating back with wind billowing around Them They land next to me as we wait for the rest of the beasts still raiding in the forest to make their way towards us. The is absolutely no way they have missed the fights and soon there will be more than enough challenge to go around. With a though and a push of will I pull my bastard sword Aeger from my storage item, the wooden handle feeling comfortable and right in my hand resonating with my element.

*

Conláed

I watch attentively as Avela cuts through the human corpse carefully handing off every organ to her assistant who’s hungry greed is evident even to me from a distance. I need to get a new assistant for her, I’m not sure Porku can control himself. Its best if I send him on some dangerous mission somewhere instead of disappearing him as I usually would have if one of the gang had stolen a human liver from our stores, a rare and precious resource not so long ago. I gaze at the pile of bodies Avela still has to go through and I grimace at our windfall since increasing demand and supply of these rare specimen.

As the only one besides Avela with even a modicum of alchemy knowledge Purko has his uses still, and maybe letting him steal an ingredient here and there isn’t the worst when we still have 33 more bodies to go through and not enough clients to unload them all on as of yet. That may be setting a bad president though and just a month ago a human liver so glut with mana was a rare ingredient important for a number of body cultivation pills and powders.

I sigh, rather get him killed than kill him myself otherwise it would be a waste of a resource. Maybe he’ll even do something useful before he goes. I grin, already the few ingredients we’ve smuggled into Arthur have given us a tidy supply of Gems and a modicum of legitimacy with the smuggling merchants in the Arthurian territories. Going from banditry to a legitimate Sect seems to involve more than just the accumulation of wealth and greasing the right paws. But I have greased enough paws to ensure that we are no longer being hunted as common criminals now that we actually have something to contribute with this fortuitous opportunity. Not sure if its just early days or starting my own Sect was too farfetched a dream sometimes though with how things are going.

‘’Bring the next one,’’ Avela growls holding bloody arms up so she can start dissecting of the next corpse placed on her slab.

Talented that one when it comes to butchering. At a glance able to catalogue whether the parts are to be food, ingredients for sale or use, whether some part needs to be stored and aged or consumed right away before it loses its potency. Nothing at all is wasted here and that will be necessary if we are to give the merchant guild its pound of flesh so they get off our backs. It seems the merchants are bitter about the many caravans and valuables we may or may not have repurposed through the years and are now making us jump through hoops like circles animals in order to satisfy their petty pride and bruised egos. My claws elongate just thinking of the Gems lost placating those greedy fucks but Eyrie still advises patience, I still trust his judgement when it comes to money.

I watch as Avela collects everything there is to collect from the unnamed dead creature on the butchering table specifically designed for these human creatures dissecting. The sieve like table ensures all blood and body fluids that leak out are collected into the capturing bowl under the table. The creature is shaved bold and bare the hairs used as ropes or to sell to the East Witches for whatever they do with human hair. The skin carefully peeled away and sold directly to the guild, fat and muscle weighed and collected depending on where it will be most useful. The intestines are cleaned and used as high grade feed for the rave hounds or other pets which just goes to show how spoilt we’ve become, some are sold to the butcher’s guild in Olando for cheap though. It’s important to have people beholden to you after all and Olando is far enough away that it isn’t direct competition to us.

The faeces is used as compost for Doc’s garden, buying him those books on growing spiritual herbs may have hurt but its a long term investment. The organs are sold as fine cuisine or ingredients for alchemy ingredients to the Alchemy Guild or to East End and the sects though Eyrie is claiming private clients are always willing to pay more for less. The bones are actually one of the most lucrative parts, I’ve never come across such chi starved beings in my life but the versatility of using ingredients without any type of chi at all is apparently vast. Not even considering how delicious these creatures are, how tender their flesh...

I grimace having found myself licking my lips greedily, I take a final look and walk away from Avela’s butcher block lest I find myself over indulging like those Sect elders are known to do. Weak beings led by their passions more than their brains, to have access to knowledge refined over centuries and enough wealth to flood their bodies in exotic ingredients and still they haven’t pushed past their bottlenecks. Pathetic.

I walk up to my chambers leisurely, having hired architect mages the cave system is much more refined and fortified than its ever been. The walls are symmetrical and clean, supports have been conjured that ensure even a titan-tier powerhouse battling outside won’t bring the whole thing crumbling down. Yet I chose not to make these caves something they aren’t, they are still caverns going deep within the rock but now they are just cleaner, with a lot more amenities. We aren’t animals after all and if someone wants to invite some lady friends to the upper chamber they can do so without embarrassment.

With an identity rune flashing I walk into my own opulent office chambers, creature comforts, nothing too over indulgent. I lounge with a sigh kicking my boots off my feet. We are still building my empire so I have kept my indulgences reasonable, not that I’ve ever let any of them become true vices. This is all just somewhere to negotiate with ‘peers’ that come calling for one reason or another. I grin, thinking about the steady supply of not just human but other chi-less creatures we are getting from the bantu leon pride.

Valeria is vast but there is a slight worry of what will happen when the bantu-jin find out about the new hunting grounds of their vassal people. If they stem our supply before we’ve secured our future properly. We haven’t directly entered the Nguni lands either but those crazy territorial fuckers may find a reason to be offended the prides trade with us at all. I’ll have Zondie start building a cache of bodies that we keep for ourselves, not just here either lest we get raided. I sigh getting to my feet and pulling my boots on as the thought comes to me, the duties of a leader never end.