Chapter 30: Chapter 15 – Slaughter and Invasion

I glided over the snow, jumping over the thick layer of snow beneath me, clearing dozens of meters with each hop.

Around me, the rest of the tribe kept pace, with mother at the forefront. It was extremely rare for everyone to go out like this, especially considering we'd only left behind a single member to guard the camp, and a pregnant one at that.

However, today, the temptation was simply too strong, and the opportunity too big to miss. Besides, Arias was under clear instructions to flee should the camp be attacked, something that had practically never happened before anyways. Camps could be rebuilt, after all.

Mother suddenly stopped, causing everyone else to also do the same. Sniffing at the ground, she grabbed a handful of pure-white snow, and then shoved it into her mouth.

Chewing on it with a focused look on her face for a few seconds, she then spat it out. "They are close." She said, a grin growing on her face as she did. "Let us continue."

And so we did. For the next four hours, we ran through snowy hills, plains, and forests, chasing after the trail left behind by the elves.

Although it sounded like a long time, compared to hunting other apex predators like the 3-meter long snow leopards, or the massive bears that lived in these lands, this was actually a pretty short hunt.

Granted, most of the time, I personally tended to prefer hunting for big game herbivores, who tended to live in big, easy-to-find packs. Those ones were very easy to find if you knew how to look for them.

Still, by the time the sun was starting to go down, we finally found them. The entire tribe stopped dead in its tracks as our sensitive ears suddenly caught onto a faint, distant noise, remarkably similar to chatter.

Then, all eyes turned to mother, who was grabbing her chin while glaring at the noise's direction. "Let's split up and surround them. When I give the signal, we'll attack together." She finally said after a moment's thought.

This was a common hunting strategy, so we all knew exactly what to do. Bounding away, I silently started circling around where the noises came from. Besides me, Leiran and Wiss followed, the former stopping only a short distance away from where we'd split up, while the latter followed me for a bit longer before also stopping.

Personally, this was one of my favorite hunting strategies whenever we were in a group, as it was one of the most effective ones I knew of.

Imagine the prey as being at the center of a circle. Depending on how many hunters there were, usually somewhere around four whenever it was employed, they would position themselves along the four major axises, slowly closing in on the target.

Today, however, there were more than just four people, and thus, I was positioned around the 120 degrees mark. Slowly, carefully, I inched my way towards the source of the noise, hugging the ground as I did so in order to make myself even harder to see.

Ten minutes later, I saw them. Huddled around a small campfire, with a few skinned corpses of deer right next to them, there they were, the elves.

Surprisingly, however, it seemed as though mother had gotten it wrong, for once. There weren't three elves, no. There were four.

Now, had this been just me versus them, I'd have just fled. I was confident in fighting one-on-one against an elf, especially a youngster as these guys seemed to be judging from their youthful looks, but even against just two at once, my chances of victory would fall dramatically.

It was a good thing, then, that I was far from alone. Mother herself could probably take on three at once and win easily, to be honest. With the rest of us here, it was just overkill, which was my favorite kind of kill.

I examined the four elves from my hiding spot. They were young, as I'd already known they'd be, but it was still surprising to see. They were two females and two males, all of them with slim bodies, their muscles lean and compact. Just like us, they had long hair, although compared to our copper-red, theirs was more of a snowy white, to match with their species name.

All in all, they looked... delicious.

I crawled closer, dipping directly into the thick layer of snow as I tunneled forward. Once I was only about a hundred or so meters away from them, I stopped.

Then, I waited, listening for the signal. My whole body was tense as a spring, and yet, I remained completely still, my breathing slow and silent.

Then, it came. My ears twitched as I heard a, to my ears, loud clap.

I began counting. One, two, three, four...

For almost a whole minute, I remained still. Then, at the sixtieth second's mark, I acted.

Exploding forward from my hiding spot, I threw myself as fast as I could towards the still-unaware elves, clearing dozens of meters within only a few seconds.

Fortunately for the elves, they didn't remain unaware for long. Shooting to their feet, they all dropped whatever it was that they were doing, shooting up to their feet as eight hungry fox-people barreled down upon them.

I targeted the one closest to me. With a quick check, I saw one of my fellow tribeswomen, Wiss, charging towards the same elf I was.

She saw me as well, giving me a quick nod before pointing with her eyes behind the elf. Getting the hint, having long since gotten used to these sort of quick battlefield decisions, I circled around the elf, even as he was attacked directly by Wiss.

Naturally, the elf wouldn't go down so easily. Utilizing their species' signature ability, the elf let out a warcry, even as icy daggers swiftly formed within his hands, seemingly out of nowhere, which he used to block Wiss' clawed slash.

Almost immediately, ice began to spread from the dagger onto Wiss' hands. However, unfortunately for the elf, Wiss wasn't bothered, as she simply hopped back, shook her hand a bit to cast off the small layer of ice on it, and then attacked again.

The elf tried to counter her, but was forced to dodge as I came barreling in from behind, swiping at his neck with a ferocious snarl.

I missed, but Wiss didn't. The elf let out a pained cry as my fellow fox-woman carved a deep furrow into his belly, piercing through the poorly-made leather armor covering it with ease. Blood spilled out, but the elf fought on, throwing himself back and away from us even as he pointed his palms at us.

We immediately split up once more, preemptively dodging. It was a good thing we did, as dozens of shards of ice suddenly shot out from his palm, each one as sharp as a knife. One of them grazed my leg as I dodged, cutting a shallow wound upon it, which then immediately froze over.

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I let out a muffled grunt of pain but didn't let it stop me. Charging from the side, while Wiss did the same from the other, we struck the accursed elf at the same time.

He tried to block us as we struck with our claws, again and again, desperately parrying and dodging even as we forced him away from the rest of his compatriots, who were in just as dire straits as he was, if not worse.

Then, inevitably, the elf blundered. Striking at once, he threw both daggers at us, one for me and one for Wiss. I jumped up to dodge, pirouetting mid-air until my back was to him. Seeing this as a moment of weakness, he surged forth, new ice weapons forming in his hands.

Unfortunately for him, I wasn't defenseless, as my tails both slammed right into his face just as he approached, striking with enough force to put dents into the tough trees of the north.

His jaw shattered, and he was thrown back, senseless. And, just like that, it was practically over. Wiss rushed forward, a gleeful expression on her face as she slammed one of her clawed hands into his throat, and with the other, she ripped his head right off.

I landed gracefully, nodding approvingly at Wiss, who nodded right back with a shark-like grin. Then, the two of us turned to check how the rest of the battle was going on.

Unsurprisingly, the elves had been butchered. Only one was still alive, and that seemed to be only because mother was toying with her, while the others watched, surrounding him from all sides.

Mother's grin was like that of a cat playing with a mouse, as she casually dodged every single desperate strike from the clearly outmatched elf, occasionally striking with her palm or tails to send the elf sprawling, only to wait for her to get up and continue fighting.

It was unnecessarily cruel, in my opinion, but I didn't care enough to do anything about it. Mother usually didn't play with her prey, preferring to simply kill them and be done with it, but perhaps she was feeling a bit playful today?

I joined my fellow fox-tribesmen in the encirclement, watching the show play out for a few seconds before turning my gaze to my leg.

I'd only gone out with a simple large furry shirt today, so I, fortunately, didn't ruin one of the few pants that I had. Already, the wound had scabbed over, and at a pace visible to the naked eye, it was already healing. Unfortunately, it itched like hell.

Scratching a bit at it, I turned back to face the fight. The elf was on her last legs, glaring at mother even as she struggled to get back to her feet. Bruised, battered, and exhausted, it was perfectly clear that the elf was a dead woman walking, but still, she struggled on.

It was admirable, in a way. And yet, not admirable enough to save her, as mother finally got bored.

At speeds that far outmatched anything I could do, mother practically teleported next to the elf with how quickly she moved, and with a single clawed slash, the elf was no more, as mother ripped through her jugular.

The elf fell to her knees, weakly holding a hand to her throat while letting out what were probably curses in her language at us before finally falling forward, dead.

There was a moment of silence, as the entire tribe looked at each other. Then, the smiling began. And with the smiles, came the laughter.

"Four elves! Damn, we'll be feasting tomorrow." Wiss said next to me, patting me on the back as everyone started congratulating each other, especially mother, as the one who'd found and organized the hunt.

"Indeed. I can't wait." I said wistfully, my eyes flickering over to the downed corpse of the elf woman that had just died.

There was a small ember of guilt within me at the sight. However, it was only an ember compared to the blazing fire that was my hunger. "They look so delicious... Do you think the males taste better than their females?" I asked Wiss even as we made out way over to our own kill.

"Hm." Wiss pondered for a moment while grabbing the main body of the corpse and throwing it over her shoulder while tossing the head at me, which I easily caught with one hand. "I haven't eaten a lot of elves, mind you, but I personally prefer their males. They've got a more potent taste, and their penis is surprisingly tasty." She said, winking at me.

I made a face at her words, and she giggled. Wasting food was the no-no of the tribe, but it still felt awkward talking about eating penises and whatnot.

Ugh. Sometimes, I hated having leftover morals, they made me feel awkward. Sighing, I shook my head with a small, amused smile. "Pervert." I accused her.

Wiss snorted but said nothing else as we gathered with the rest of the tribe, with everyone carrying their kills. Mother ran her eyes over the entire group for a moment before nodding.

"Let us hurry back. I do not wish to leave Arias alone for longer than necessary." She said, and then bounded off.

Naturally, we followed. For over three hours, we ran along the snow, chatting and laughing all the while. Morale was as high as it ever was, with such a successful hunt.

It was unfortunate, then, that when we arrived at the camp, we heard noises. Foreign noises.

I immediately stopped my chattering with Leiran, even as everyone else fell silent as well. Then, we sped up even more, rushing towards our camp.

Once we got there, what I saw set my heart aflame.

Humans. Dozens of them, well-armored and well-equipped, rooting through our camp, upturning our tents, and dragging out our stored kills from their storage.

There was a moment of silence. The kind of silence that comes before the storm.

Then, mother spoke, her tone one that could cause little children nightmares for years. "Kill them. Kill them all."

And we obeyed.

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