Chapter 9: 009

The path spread out widely before Henry. The trees here grew far apart from each other. The grace of the sun was splendidly welcome here. For once, he wouldn’t scrape the trunks or bushes if he veered a little from the path. The trees around the cave where he was residing were narrowly close to one another. He didn’t fully realise it until now that he had grown a size bigger. It didn’t affect his daily activities much but it did greatly hinder any large movements from him. He thought about moving here but that remained a fantasy of his whim as there were no places that could properly accommodate his size. The caves large enough were already occupied. No doubt he could forcefully evict the current tenants but he wasn’t that heartless. 

Henry was currently tracking down the mysterious figure he had caught a glimpse of from afar just this morning. It was a human, Henry was sure of. Humans' scent was peculiar. He couldn’t properly explain what was peculiar or how it was peculiar. It just was. The closest way he could explain was that while beasts or animals smelled like untainted raw flesh, humans smelled like processed fine meat. Even though the human stalking him had long where they had watched him from, their scent lingered. Henry immediately caught it when he reached the spot. A deep footprint of the figure was left behind under a tree. It was undoubtedly that of a human. Using the footprints as a measurement, Henry estimated himself to be around the size of a large dog but not as large as a Great Dane. From there, he followed the scent west, or so he presumed as that was the direction the sun was setting.

Irony met him halfway. At a glance, the scenery was more mellow and amiable than the area he resided in but what was unseen by the eyes was felt by his other senses. The air became fouler. The breeze was chilly. The winds tasted sour. He no longer heard any sounds or noises of the small animals dawdling about. Not even a chirp from a bird. He didn’t even see any large beasts in the distance as if every animal had steered clear of the area. This only told Henry that he was on the right path and affirmed his suspicions. The human had something to do with the demonic bear. 

The trees became sparse as he trod closer to the scent. Not only the trees, but the leaves on the trees themselves were becoming sparse. The trees became paler the further he went until there was nothing but dead trees with thin dry branches, painting one large ominous picture. He would be lying if he said he didn’t have any second thoughts but he could not leave it alone. He knew if he left the mysterious figure be, something more terrible than the bear would happen. This was how the plot often went and not without good reasons. It was the most logical development. As if to strengthen his speculation, he started to feel repulsed by the atmosphere like something was telling him to not take another step.

Henry snorted and continued in his steps. Soon, that feeling disappeared.

The trees eventually faded from view as Henry stepped into a clearing, an artificially-made one. The field was razed but not by fire. He looked up to the sky and saw a thick cloud of fog, cutting him off from the sun’s grace. Though the fog was thick, the air was dry, as if something had sucked away all the humidity. The ground was cracking from the dry air. In the middle of the withered field, there was a ruin of some kind of building. Upon approaching for a closer look, the building began to look like it had once been a chapel. There was no cross but the architecture gave off the feeling of a chapel. The ruined chapel was missing a roof. The four walls were still present but one had a large hole, large enough to fit two of him. Outside of that hole, he noticed a bunch of footprints strewn about. He took a sniff at the footprints and they smelled exactly like the ones he found under the tree. The scent was even stronger from within the ruined chapel. He swallowed a lump in his throat and proceeded inside the chapel.

“What in the name…?” a voice gasped. It was deep and hoarse.

Henry turned to his right, following the voice. He saw a haggard and quivering man in ragged robes, crouching on the altar with arrays of sinister-looking items surrounding him. Henry could swear that one of the items was a decayed hand of a human. There were even dubious runes inscribed around the man. He and his backdrop looked like a template of a demon worshipper or a dark arts practitioner.

The man stood up in a panic as his gaze latched onto Henry. “This cannot be… Has the repellant already started to lose its potency?”

Henry could understand the man’s speech despite him not speaking the language spoken by the tribal people. He started to wonder if all languages were automatically installed into his brain.

“What to do… what to do…” the man kept muttering to himself, biting his thumb.

Henry growled and began walking towards the man.

The man shrieked and fell. He clambered, knocking away the items as he dragged himself away from Henry. “L-look… I’m sorry for disturbing your nest… I—I…”

So he knows. He remembers who I am and what he has done to earn my ire. Good. Saves me the trouble of reminding him since I can’t talk.

Though the man looked regretful and repentant, his swimming gaze said otherwise. He was looking at the items scattered on the altar, wondering which could get him out of the predicament. Ultimately, his eyes rested on a large piece of black stone shard with a sharp edge.

Henry snarled a warning to the man but he went for the shard regardless. Henry sensed a premonition and acted on his instinct, lunging at the man. But the shadows of the benches erupted from the floorboards and coiled themselves around Henry. He tried tearing himself free but the elasticity of the shadow tendrils made it impossible.

“Stupid beast!” The man guffawed. “Guess I expect too much from a mindless beast.” He continued to laugh.

The tattoos glowed in response to Henry’s rising fury. 

The man stopped laughing as he saw the glow. “W-what the… It’s not a Salamander or a Drake…? Impossible.”

That’s not even the biggest surprise.

Still bound by the shadow tendrils, Henry chuckled and opened his mouth. A blaze surging up from his throat, illuminating the cavity of his mouth.

The man was still sporting a dumbfounded expression.

Fire spewed out Henry’s mouth. The man finally snapped out of his daze and dove aside, but the flames still caught him by his right shoulder. The man screamed and bawled as he tried to douse the flames but to no avail. The shadow tendrils weakened and Henry felt it. With a huff of strength, Henry tore his right frontal limb free from the tendrils. Immediately, another tendril of shadow wrapped around her limb and bound her back into place.

The man was still trying to put out the flames but nothing he did was working. The fire was spreading and it had already engulfed his whole right arm. In the end, the man conjured up a sharpened shadow tendril and sliced his right arm off. He bit his lips to muffle his agonizing cries. The shadow tendrils disappeared right then. Henry was free. He rushed towards the man without stalling. The man cut himself on his chest with the black stone shard. He then threw the stone shard at Henry. Before Henry could swat it aside, shadows burst out from the stone shard, moulding into the shape of some quadrupedal beast. A hound, Henry presumed. A Shadow Hound, he dubbed it.

“Kill that wretched beast!” the man shouted and scampered out of the chapel, leaving a trail of blood behind him. 

Henry tried giving chase but the Shadow Hound stood in his path. The beast of shadows was bigger than him by a size but Henry wasn’t fazed by his foe’s advantage. Henry went around the Hound but it stopped him from chasing its master by unleashing tendrils of shadows at him. Henry widened his eyes in surprise but he dodged the attack. The Hound spewed out a bolt of darkness from his mouth. Henry sidestepped the bolt and it pierced through a praying statue made of stone behind him. He didn’t think the bolt of darkness could pierce him but it would sure as hell hurt even if it didn’t pierce.

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Henry flung the benches and other furnishings he could get his claws on in order to defend himself against the attacks of the Shadow Hound. He thought it would be a brawl but it became a battle of range and magic, which Henry knew extremely little of. He had his fire breath and the aura blades of his claws but neither was faster than the Hound’s shadow magic. 

Damn it… The man’s getting away.

Most likely, he had already gotten away but Henry could still smell his blood even amidst the battle. So all was not lost for Henry. Meanwhile, the Hound was unleashing a barrage of magic attacks at him, giving him no chance to retaliate. He could only dodge or flung objects at the shadow-moulded projectiles. Just when he thought to make a run for it and simply braved the attacks from the Hound, the magic stopped coming. 

The Shadow Hound was still there but its shadows seemed weak and fading. It had exhausted its fuel, Henry assumed. He was sceptical of the Hound’s enfeebled state initially but he came to the conclusion that the Hound wasn’t meant to actually kill him but to merely stall him. It was good enough of a time to retaliate. He unleashed his blazing roar. The Shadow Hound yelped and ran for its life. It scaled up the wall and ran across the ceiling. Henry followed the Hound with his fire breath until he ran out of breath, literally. The Hound saw its chance and pounced, but Henry surprised it with his claws. Aura blades struck the Hound and it went bouncing across the floor. Black liquid was splattered in its wake, presumably its blood. The Hound got back to its feet and its shadows were back to their former vigour. Henry saw it and quickly unleashed his fire breath. The Hound unleashed his shadow tendrils too. The two clashed in a magnificent storm of darkness and light. At first, the shadows were winning but as Henry’s tattoos glowed and the shadows weakened, the darkness was pushed back. Knowing the futility of its resistance, the Shadow Hound undid the shadow tendrils and opted to dodge the fire instead. It ran straight at him.

Henry realized the Shadow Hound was rushing towards him in an attempt to conclude this in a melee. Henry frowned at first but he smiled after seeing the desperation in the Hound’s eyes. The Hound knew its own limits and it knew a close quarter brawl would not be favourable but it had no choice. As a summoned Familiar, it couldn’t disobey its summoner’s order. It could only die trying to heed its summoner’s command. The Hound swung its paw and hit Henry square in the face but it felt like a gentle tap to him. With a backhand, Henry smacked the Hound to the ground. The Hound tried to get up but Henry pinned it down with his fore limbs and incinerated it with his fire breath. There was no growl or any cries of sorts. The Hound simply struggled vainly until the flames dissolved it into nothing.

Henry spared and wasted not a moment and dashed out of the chapel, following the scent of the haggard man’s blood. The scent was still strong. The man had yet to get far. Henry could even see the man limping in the distance. Henry saw the man had somehow stopped his bleeding but it didn’t change his predicament. Henry caught up to the man in no time at all.

“Useless mutt!” the man cursed out loud, his breath rugging, as he noticed Henry right behind him. Though he had stopped the bleeding, it didn’t change the fact that he had already lost quite a lot of blood. “So it has come to that…” The man ceased running and fell to his knees.

Henry stopped a few feet away. Henry could tell the man was coming up with another scheme or trick and Henry had no intention to find out. He drew in a deep breath, preparing to unleash his blazing roar.

The man stabbed the stone shard deep into his stump and muttered an incantation.

Henry unleashed his blazing roar just as darkness poured out from the man’s stump. The large patch of darkness blocked the flames and saved the man from becoming cinders. Henry’s first thought was to ram through the burning patch of darkness but he calmed his mind down before he acted on it. He didn’t know what the darkness was. Acting recklessly like before would only get him into another sticky situation.

The large patch of darkness eventually disappeared along with the flames it was burning up in. What was revealed to Henry was the man now had a new right arm but four times the size of his body and a dozen times more grotesque than his appearance. The man’s breathing was even more rugged than before. Henry retreated in his steps instinctually. The black grotesque thing that seemed to be the man’s arm darted towards Henry. He hopped back and the massive black arm carved right into the ground.

“A mere beast should know its place,” the man grumbled, clutching his shoulder. Sweat was pouring incessantly from his forehead.

The black arm did not give Henry a moment of respite as it immediately swung its size across the ground. Henry leapt to the air and the black arm swept the ground under him. As he fell back to the ground, Henry launched aura blades at the man. Instead of protecting the man, the black arm slithered to Henry. The man clicked his tongue and was forced to conjure a magic barrier using a talisman. The hand on the massive black arm morphed into the head of a viper, baring its mouth. Henry fended the arm-turned-viper off with his fire breath but it immediately returned to the offensive.

“God damn it!” the man screamed as his “arm” dragged him along with its assault. He tumbled into the ground and was towed through the dry soil.

Henry chuckled at the man’s blunder but only for a moment. The viper was relentless with its assault. It attacked like a viper, striking with its giant fangs. Though Henry’s hide protected him, the sheer strength of the viper was enough to hurt him with the blunt force alone.

“Fuck this!” the man shouted and dug his fingers into the arm. After a short incantation, he pried the arm off of his shoulder. The viper fell to the ground and writhed like a fish on dry land as the other end of its body, the part where it was connected to the man, slowly morphed into the tail of a viper. The man’s stump was not bleeding but some black goo was trickling as if he was bleeding. Separated from his conjuration, the man snuck away into the woods.

Henry tried to pursue but the viper didn’t let him. It was coiling itself around Henry, attempting to constrict him but Henry’s superior strength allowed him to easily tear the viper off of him but it was persistent. Henry’s fire breath and aura blades were useless as the viper moved too fast for any of those to hit. Unlike the Hound, the viper was more ferocious and smarter. It fought with feints and ruses. Henry fell for it too many times and nearly got himself entangled but his strength and tough hide saved him from a dark fate.

This fucking annoying snake!

Henry found himself slowly inching towards the end of his wits due to the viper’s craftiness. None of his attacks hit or touched the viper. At best, he grazed the viper lightly but that amounted to nothing. If he tried to escape, the viper would block his path and force him to step back or risk getting tangled in its body. The viper wasn’t exactly doing much damage to him either. It hurt when the viper attacked but that was it. Henry had yet to receive any wounds from the viper’s attack. It was a frustrating stalemate for the two but ultimately, it was Henry’s loss as his aim was the man, not to fight the viper.

The viper whipped its tail and hit Henry in his left eye. It wasn’t a heavy wound but it knocked a lot out of him. He heard the viper sniggering at its minor triumph.

That does it!

Henry unleashed fire breath, not at the viper but at the field. He drew a ring of fire with his breath that enclosed him and the viper both inside. It was Henry’s turn to snigger and the viper frowned. It seemed so surreal to see the viper frowning as it couldn’t even be said to be alive. The fire grew and spread at a quick pace due to the dry soil. The viper tried charging through the fire but it recoiled in a shriek at even the slightest contact with the fire.

Henry couldn’t resist howling into the air, signifying his victory. The fire had spread to the centre and started engulfing Henry and the viper. Even at its end, the viper was committed to stall Henry from his pursuit of the man. The viper was screeching in pain as the flames ate away its shadowy flesh. Even in that state, the viper still had enough strength to hinder Henry’s movements. Henry was only able to free himself from the bind when the viper was reduced to nothing but the flames. By then, the man had escaped. Henry followed the scent but it led him to a withered tree where he picked up a completely different scent that scattered in every direction. 

Henry roared into the woods, shouting out his frustration. 

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