CHAPTER 74: HUNT (III)

The screams were horrified and desperate. The kind that one could only hear in nightmares. It was the vocalization of a soul realizing its vessel was about to be unmade.

Ishiki paled. ’Crap... this is bad. Too bad’

This much noise would easily travel far and wide, with how silent the forest was. It was a broadcast invitation to every predator within a kilometer radius. The death party was just getting started, and the guest list was about to expand.

He activated [Ghost Blade] in full swing once more.

This time, the sensation was fundamentally different. Before, the skill had been a veil, a simple distortion of light and presence. Now, as his adrenaline spiked, the skill bloomed.

The monochrome picture in his mind sharpened into hyper-reality. It was as if he had eyes grafted onto every inch of his skin, a spherical awareness that transcended optical limitations.

He could feel the air displacement of the leaves falling fifty meters away. He could sense the heat signatures of the beasts.

At the same time, the concept of ’Ishiki’ began to fade from the world. He stopped moving. He stopped breathing. He stopped being.

Suddenly the beast’s circling him stopped and looked around in confusion. Then one of them turned towards the screams and growled. Their triple eyes swiveled away from Ishiki like he had ceased to exist entirely.

Then, they both turned toward where Bern and the other guy were fighting for their lives and sprinted away from Ishiki.

The Beasts abandoned him. Left their pursuit completely and bounded toward his companions, joining the slaughter already in progress.

Ishiki stood frozen in the center of the clearing, a ghost haunting his own life.

’Was... that it? I am safe now?’

The danger was away from him now, they were focusing on the two other humans... leaving him alone. That was... confronting? Relieving?

It was nauseating?

Ishiki didn’t know. His breath was become hoarse, and blood flowed from his shoulder and the leg wound.

But his mind was somewhere far away.

The screams filled his ears... the growls and desperate shouting of another human. They were all... something away from him.

He closed his physical eyes and let the monochrome world flood his consciousness. A black-and-white tapestry of violence unfurled in his mind, devoid of color but rich in horror.

He saw the ruthless scene unfold and looking at it made his heart heavier.

The frail guy was lying on the ground... one of his legs was ripped apart, his body was bleeding from more than a dozen wounds and half of his face was scraped, flesh hung and blood dripped off the ugly wound.

But he still held his spear in his hand and thrashed with it wildly... trying to keep the beast’s at bay.

Ishiki’s stomach revolted. But he controlled himself.

Just some distance away, Bern spun with his heavy hammer. One of his hands was gone replaced by a stream of blood and muscles that looked as if they were torn by an alligator. The stocky guy was still standing.

Besides him... corpse of the Boneworm laid in a pool of golden blood and broken hide. Its maw was utterly crushed and even the tough hide made up of bones was broken.

Only three of the four Smikewolves that attacked them remained. Just then... two more joined the assault and pressed on the two broken humans with more cunning.

Ishiki gulped hard and opened his eyes, feeling goosebumps rise through his entire body. More Withering beasts were coming soon to join the slaughter.

’Screw it!’

His legs were already moving... away from the carnage. Away from the dying men. Away from the damned forest and toward the false security of the clearing.

He gritted his teeth. ’That’s it. I need to get out of here, run and survive.’

’That’s what matters. I... I can’t save them, if i go now... i will die too.’

His face twisted into a mask of self-loathing. He was weak.

That was his truth. He wasn’t a hero or a warrior. He was a survivor, and survivors ran.

Lying to oneself was the worst sin a human could commit in this world, and he refused to do it.

He made it ten steps. Maybe twelve. When his feet stopped on their own.

Didn’t he let someone die... sometimes ago, while he watched just like that. That guy was one of his teammates too.

’For fuck’s sake... Its their fault for being so pitiful. Why do i care? They didn’t save me when I was dying... No one did.’

His eyes widened.

If no one helped him, then... then how did he survive after almost dying in the Crimson Canopy back then? How did his wounds heal?

He didn’t remember... He couldn’t remember at all.

There was a void in his memories, and filling that void was a crushing, suffocating guilt that was intensified by the shoes he wore.

Silently cursing, Ishiki turned around and burst into a sprint. He reached the scene within a mere minute, even though he was limping. That didn’t matter anymore.

The frail guy was on the ground... still and cold. Three Smikewolves were ripping apart his flesh, spilling blood and organs out.

He was dead.

Bern was still fighting against two of the beasts. Barely standing. The brute was swaying, balanced on the precipice of collapse. It was a miracle of physiology that he could still lift that hammer with one arm, blood pumping out of the stump of the other.

He slammed the weapon into a Smikewolf, crushing its ribs, but the momentum threw him off balance.

The other beast circled behind him, preparing to strike while he was vulnerable.

Ishiki’s legs moved before conscious decision was made. He activated [Ghost Blade] again, pushing the skill harder than before—past comfortable limits, that made his head pound.

The Beast preparing to strike from behind didn’t even knew what happened, it didn’t even sensed any threats before its head left its neck and rolled on the ground.

[You have Slain a Rank 3, Infested Smikewolf]

[You have received 300 Data Fragments]

Bern turned uncomfortably and looked at Ishiki. A pale smile appeared on his bloody face. "Th...anks, Huff Ishiki."

Ishiki only nodded. The big guy’s knees buckled, and he dropped his weapon, slumping to the ground in a heap of exhaustion and blood loss.

Four Beasts remained. And Ishiki stood alone between them and Bern.

Ishiki felt his heart race with anger, and his face twisted in a furious expression as he looked at the beasts devouring his companions body. It filled his heart with cold dread and burning fury at the same time.

"You Damned dirty dogs." Ishiki spoke.

The beasts suddenly turned and twelve red eyes fixed on the lone human who dared to interrupt their feast. Low growls rumbled in their chests.

Ishiki gritted his teeth. "Look at me," he snapped. "Remember this face with the deepest clarity you can muster."

He raised the pale blade and then declared. "Because I am the last thing you will ever see."

The beast’s growled and charged as one...

He met them with [Ghost Blade] active at maximum intensity, and suddenly it wasn’t a fight anymore.

It turned into a heartless execution.

They couldn’t perceive him properly. They Couldn’t even track his movements through whatever sensory organs they used.

The human appeared and vanished like a ghost. Their triple eyes saw him in twelve places at once, impossible to focus on any single position.

He moved between them like smoke.

The [Curved Bone] attacked throats, eyes, joints or wherever the pale blade touched. Beasts died without understanding what killed them.

Within mere seconds, three corpses lay lifeless on the ground.

When it was over, Ishiki stood alone in a field of bodies. Golden blood soaked his clothes until the fabric clung to his skin. His arms shook with exhaustion.

[You have slain a Rank 3, Infested Smikewolf]

[You have slain a Rank 3, Infested Smikewolf]

[You have slain a Rank 3, Infested Smikewolf]

The system notifications blurred into each other.

But he wasn’t done yet.

The last Beast, was trying to flee. Limping on an injured leg. Wounded from a serious wound, but it had somehow managed to live through Ishiki’s carnage.

It was larger than the others too, maybe their leader.

Ishiki caught it easily. Suddenly appearing besides it.

"Where do you think you are going?"

He drove his blade into its spine.

Once.

The beast shrieked.

Twice.

The shriek was cut off.

Then again. And again. And again.

[You have slain a Rank 4, Infested Smikewolf]

[You have received 500 Data Fragments]

He didn’t stop. He kept stabbing long after the notification faded. Even after the beast stopped twitching. He drove the blade into dead, cooling flesh, venting a rage that had no name, a frustration that had no outlet.

He was stabbing the damned forest. Stabbing the damned System. Stabbing his own weakness.

Finally his arms gave out completely. He collapsed to his knees beside the corpse, gasping and trembling.

[You have received a Vestige]

He ignored it.

His gaze drifted to the side.

The frail guy’s body lay a few feet away. A ruin of a human being. His eyes were wide open, staring up at the canopy that had claimed him.

’His name...’

Ishiki’s mind groped for it.

’It started with R... didn’t it?’

He gently closed the dead boy’s eyelids. A simple dignity. A final kindness that nobody else would provide in this hell.

His fingers lingered on the cooling skin of the boy’s forehead.

’Rest... well.’

’Your Scenerio is completed.’

The thought was involuntary.

Suddenly, a notification blazed across his vision. The letters seemed to burn with a platinum fire, searing themselves into his retinas.

[Soul Archive activated]