Chapter 24: Chapter 22: Mess With the Bull, Get the Horns

I leaped down from Blue's back, leaving Ivy astride him to attack with my bow from above. "Fuck," I grumbled to myself as I fell from the sky. "I didn't bring my lance."

I hit the ground in a three point landing, and it hurt worse than I thought it would, putting me at an immediate disadvantage, but I quickly righted myself and shot straight up, trying my best to look menacing. I was wearing a purple tunic and yellow tights, though, so I'm not sure I pulled it off.

Still, I think there's something to be said for standing unarmed amidst a pack of Great Wolves and facing them down without a hint of fear. That was just me bullshitting, by the way. You can bet your ass that I was freaked out.

Ivy flew roughly fifty feet overhead and immediately started volleying arrows at the wolves, hitting some of them in their backs. It was honestly barely an inconvenience, and it seemed to do little more than anger them, but with a dozen hits like that, she may bring one down or inflict enough agony to make it act rashly. It also distracted them from me, which was valuable in and of itself. Even more valuable was Blue spraying a flurry of ice shards at one of the wolves as they swooped down offensively. The wolf snapped at my dragon but missed as Blue and Ivy tore back into the sky with supreme grace.

All six wolves crowded around me a moment later, and I immediately sensed that one of them, the big one, was General Darkmaw. I had to be very careful here, I knew, because with one false move this whole encounter could go tits-up. These wolves were, on average, bigger and tougher looking than those I encountered last time--including, seemingly, the general herself.

It was time to put my newest ability to a field test. Without my lance, I had no recourse but to give it a whirl, and while I'd practiced with it a couple of times, my new feat had gone mostly untested in a combat situation.

Two wolves charged, coming from my three o'clock and six o'clock positions. I noticed the one from behind me as the wind shifted to warn me of its approach. I closed my eyes and focused.

My body twisted, expanded, and vibrated with the power of my Umbercore, the source of all my abilities, and I felt my arms and legs becoming four-hooved limbs, horns sprouting from my head, and my face going wild and bestial. Muscles rippled in my flesh as I took on the form of a Great Bull, May Belle's gift--the shifter shape that my new subclass feat granted me for marking her.

The first two wolves charged, though one hesitated as it witnessed my transformation. The one that continued blindly onward had its bloodlust rewarded with bloodshed as my twin horns gored deep into its chest, dousing me with a fresh spray of monster blood. Sprinkle would have loved it. I whipped my mighty head, bucking the wolf off of my horns and hurling its body onto the other assailant. They toppled over together, neither dead just yet, but both humiliated and hurt. The one that had been gored looked to be down for the count, at least.

But the other wolves were baying into the night, their collective howls worse than nails on a chalkboard as they readied their approach. I watched their body language with as much focus as I could muster, given the situation, and correctly predicted the next two to make their assault.

They charged, but so did I. I hoofed it at a brisk pace using Charged Thrust and Smite, which synergized deliciously with the nature of my bull form. The resulting crash shattered the skull of the great wolf I collided with, converting it into a chunky paste, but left me momentarily dizzied, as well.

In that moment of vulnerability, two other wolves--one that I'd tracked the movement of, and another from behind me that I'd failed to anticipate--leaped for me, each tearing into my sides. Their monstrous teeth and fangs sank in, making painful purchase.

I kicked with my hind feet like a huge fucking donkey, landing a hit so powerful into the wolf behind me that I felt its jaw shatter, and it was lifted off the ground, thudding hard onto its back several paces behind me.

Meanwhile, the other one was dealt with through the use of my horns. Rather than impaling the wolf, I got it tangled between them, flipping it on its back--then I skewered it straight through the chest. With a shrill cry, it died pitifully.

Another high howl rang out, but this one had a unique signature--one of authority. The surviving wolves drew back, retreating into the trees from whence they came. Ivy managed to punish them as they fled, landing a few more arrows into their lupine behinds, as she'd been doing through the entire fight.

But one wolf stayed, seated twenty paces directly in front of me. It stared into my eyes with its own monstrous glare, and I snorted a reply. It studied me cautiously, then took a single step forward. I lifted a foreleg, signalling my willingness to charge, exhaling a hostile bovine snort that left none of my intentions a mystery.

The leader of the Great Wolves stopped and planted her butt on the ground with a plop and started panting like a happy dog in the sun. I was clueless as to the meaning of this gesture. Soon, she started frolicking, jumping around like a puppy as it chased a butterfly, eyes on me, and I was even more confused. Was this a fucking game to her?

And then she charged, lurching forward with supernatural grace. I tried to catch her with my horns, but she stopped and bounded out of their path at the last minute, then flipped over my head. I reared up, hoping to catch her in her aerial somersault, but I failed, and I was left with my back to her.

She nipped at my hide, but it was far from a killing blow. Her teeth barely drew blood.

I kicked her hard in the face, but her jaw did not snap as easily as her subordinate's. I pivoted around to face her in haste as she recoiled from the pain of my hoofed strike, shaking her head, disoriented.

But Ivy swooped back in at this point, landing a choice arrow right in her neck that planted itself delightfully deep. "Good girl," I muttered, thankful for the assist. Ivy had apparently used a spell as well. Brambles sprouted from the arrow, wrapping themselves around the General's throat, making her situation look even worse.

That moment of weakness was all I needed, and I bounded forward with another Charged Thrust and Smite combination, hitting the general with the bludgeoning force of my cranium for maximum Smite damage. The impact was satisfyingly solid, and she flew more than a dozen paces backward and slammed against a tree, toppling it over.

She scrambled painfully to her feet and looked at me, her wolfy expression imperceptible, but gone was the playful mood that she had shown me before, that much was certain. Now there was a more serious look that seemed to say, 'Alright, enough of this.'

She turned her back to me and stumbled into the trees. I snorted, not ready to let her escape so easily, but in this form I could not pursue her efficiently. I thought about taking on the minotaur-like form that my marking of Daisy granted me, but it was too broad of shoulder for this thicket and would be at a heavy disadvantage. The unicorn form was far too unexplored as I tended to lose myself to bloodlust when I tried it out previously.

I'd have to do this as Bucky--but that was suicide. Still, I couldn't let her walk away unchallenged. I shifted back, feeling my body shrink and compress back into my human form. I was still wearing my clothes as though nothing happened. Don't ask me how. Magic, I guess.

"Hey!" I shouted. "General Darkmaw!"

The wolf's head whipped back and she regarded me with curiosity, but she didn't take her own humanoid form.

"You can run if you want. I will find you, and I will bring you to justice for what you did to Silver Moon."

She eyed me carefully, probably trying to decide whether I was going to follow her right now.

"If you have any courage or honor, let's finish this here and now. If you want to be hunted like a wild dog, then by all means, walk away."

She growled, and then I saw her body shift and change just as mine had until she was in her own humanoid form, naked just like last time, incredibly beautiful with olive dark skin and black hair and lupine features. A feral look was still glinting in her eyes like polished steel.

"You know nothing," she said. "Bucky Drake. Apex Hero. Level 16. May Belle, Daisy, Autumn, Ivy, Etherea, Scalia, Heather. Tater Town. The Sanctuary." She grinned as she listed off everything she knew, saying little about each item, confident in that the naming of them would be enough to intimidate me. She was right. "If I wanted your girls dead, they would be. If I really cared about conquering Tater Town, I'd do it. Maybe some other day. That is not the Goblin Queen's design. She doesn't want control. Not really, anyway. She wants chaos. Fear. And, for the record, I wasn't trying to be stealthy tonight."

"Then why were you here?" I asked, suddenly shaking, hoping that she didn't detect my nerves.

"Because I wanted to play with you," she grinned. "And I had fun. Let's play again sometime soon, Apex Hero. You're certainly worthy of my attention."

And with that, she left me dumbfounded as she turned her back, showing her shapely ass as she tried to limp into the tree-line.

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But Ivy had other ideas, firing an arrow right into her shoulder.

I winced at the sight, though I wasn't sure why. Maybe the shock of it? Probably just the sight of someone so beautiful being hurt, but I needed to find a way to be okay with that when it came to the enemy. She was decidedly a threat.

But the general just reached back, breaking the arrow off, leaving part of it in her body, and kept walking into the forest until she disappeared from view.

Ivy came down from the sky with Blue, landing beside me. "Are you alright?" she asked, her voice airy with concern.

"I'm alright," I said. "She's worse off."

"Yes, she is, but she was toying with you. She didn't take it seriously."

"I know," I said, cringing. "What the hell was that?"

Ivy surveyed the scene. The bodies of the defeated wolves still littered the plains. "Great Wolves. General Darkmaw is their Alpha. She must have dozens like this at her disposal, at least. It almost seems like an infinite number. I'm surprised she got this many through the forest."

"Are they all monster girls?" I asked, suddenly worried I'd just murdered a bunch of women.

"No," she said, placing her hand on my forearm. "Your conscience is clear for now. Her Great Wolves are wolves like any other. She merely has the power to shift into one of them and control them."

I nodded, my shoulders relaxing. That made me feel better.

We flew back with haste and reported what happened to everyone else. They listened, mouths agape, as Ivy and I retold every single detail, including the fact that General Darkmaw somehow knew seemingly everything about us.

"That doesn't bode well," Autumn noted with a shiver.

"What does it mean?" Daisy asked nervously. She was biting her nails, something I'd never seen her do before.

"One of two things," Autumn shrugged. "Either they are way sneakier than we ever imagined, which is a possibility, or--"

"Or there's a spy in Tater Town," Ivy added. After a pause, she added, "I'll let Etherea know the possibility in the morning."

I nodded. "Right. Good thinking. She can do some digging, too."

Rainbow Sprinkle alone looked totally perplexed and even more stressed out than the rest of us. "What is going on?" she asked, whining. "I can't keep up."

May Belle, almost as a reflex, started brushing Sprinkle's hair and humming something to her to soothe her as the rest of us just stared blankly at each other, searching for words but fumbling to find any.

"Well, standing around isn't going to do anything," Ivy said, and she was right. "Let's get some rest. I'll keep watch tonight, you all sleep. In the morning, when you lot get up, I can sleep."

"Deal," May Belle said. "Don't worry everyone, I'm sure everything will be fine in the end. Just be careful."

Her sister didn't look nearly so confident, though. Neither did I, I was sure. I needed to begin taking the fight to them. I couldn't have General Darkmaw and her wolves threatening my girls, my home. No man would abide that. As far as I was concerned, my quest had officially begun.

"Before we retire for the evening, Bucky," Autumn started, rubbing her hands together like a praying mantis, "How much XP did you get from the great wolves."

I chuckled at the predictability of her question. "Let me see," I grunted, and I smacked my hands together to bring up the HUD, and it appeared, but something was off.

I studied the HUD in silence, staring at the strange notice beneath XP. My eyes looked over at Daisy, who was looking up at me expectantly, just like the rest of the girls.

"Autumn," I said slowly. "We need to talk privately first."

She looked puzzled and disappointed all at once. "What? Just tell me the num--"

"There’s something here we need to discuss,” I said. “I don’t quite know what I’m looking at, and I need your help, and I don’t want to single anyone out or say anything rash until I have a better idea what this means.”

Her face betrayed her sudden worry. "O-okay," she stammered. "Sure, Bucky. That’s fine." The room got suddenly very tense.

"What's going on?" Sprinkle asked, anxiously. "Everyone's face is so stiff and weird. What's wrong?!" The pink blob that was Gumi pooled around her feet as though to comfort her.

Everyone looked at me with expressions that ranged from suspicious to concerned. They weren't dumb. In fact, they were all far from it. And I couldn't have been clearer that something was off about the HUD. "I promise, as soon as I speak with Autumn, and I understand what's going on, I'll let you know if there's anything to worry about. For now, let's not stress over it. It's been a long day. Everyone else get some rest. Autumn, you're with me."

They all nodded and went to bed after finishing their evening rituals, but I knew after everything that had just transpired no one would really be sleeping all that soundly. Still, I didn't want to risk singling out one of my girls in front of the others, especially when I was uncertain what the cause of the notice in my HUD was, so until I fully comprehended what was going on, or at least had some idea, asking them to get some shut-eye was the best I could do.

"Autumn," I said, sighing sadly. "We need to talk about Daisy."

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