So… You Want To Hear A Story?
I woke up to the pitch black room that I called home, my house laid in a forest aside the city of vale. However, it was not too close to the walls for two vital reasons:
1) The wall would limit the areas I would be able to hunt; bad hunts mean less chance of survival.
2) The wall always had bigger Grimm near it, don't get me wrong I can handle large Grimm; it's just hard to do that when it happens every day.
I rose from my bed keeping a positive mind about the hunt that lay ahead, but I was immediately hit by how significantly cooler the room was compared to my bed. I needed to hunt to earn a living; a group of traders would head to my house every Friday a butcher looking to trade Lien for meat. I would then use that Lien to purchase different ammo, dusts, materials, food and snacks like Walnuts – I love Walnuts. For some reason I particularly liked the butcher that would come by to my house maybe because he was a Faunus, like me. He has pointed ears and quite a wide build; he was about my height and spoke with a very low yet welcoming voice. Unlike me he is happy to show his heritage to people he does not know, I only showed who I was to one family.
I left the side of my bed and headed to a chest at the end of my room. Even though the room was only lighted by a chunk of the shattered moon that could make it past the dense trees and in past my small cracked window, I could see perfectly fine. My Faunus heritage allowed me to see in the dark. Along with that I felt that I had a heightened sense of hearing and smell, this was incredibly useful when I was hunting because I could usually sense everything that was happening around me.
I reached down to the chest with my left hand whilst I looked towards my right arm. Before me lay a fine piece of craftsmanship, a robotic arm built for me by my father that was now maintained by me. He told me that he used to teach at a place called signal academy and claimed that he taught students there how to make their own weapons, My father loved robotics and smiting.
It was a warm, bright blue day that he decided to take me out hunting for the first time. He had made me a rifle and grapple, he then told me; "Son, if you are to grow up to be a powerful hunter you need to know how to defend yourself. I will watch out for you from above if anything turns for the worse." In that moment he disappeared into the day. As that day moved on I had killed 4 rabbits, a fox and probably killed a deer with a heart attack. I wanted to really show my dad that I could be self-reliant, so I decided to go for a Grimm – mainly aiming for a Boarbatusk. It took me half a day and as soon as I saw one at the top of a small, rocky cliff I raised my rifle to take a shot. I had practiced shooting with my father before that day but all that training didn't help me at all, I was trembling with so much fear and excitement. I squeezed the trigger to shoot the grazing Boarbatusk, my poor accuracy had meant that I missed the shot and hit its arse. That was the least of my worries, as I shot I startled a Boarbatusk right above me, the noise caused it to donkey kick a boulder off the edge off the cliff and onto my right arm. It was mangled beyond repair; the pain caused me to faint instantly. When I woke up I was back at home in the living room resting on an entirely cleared floor – everything was thrown aside, my father had to cut my arm off to save my limp body from the charging Boarbatusk; he said it was just flesh and clothing, my bone was all powder. I had lost a lot of blood and was bed bound for about a month so I could recover. During this time my father forged a robotic arm for me to use – it was connected to the nerves of my arm so it would act as normally as possible. There is no doubt in my mind that my father saved me that day.
I grabbed my light hunting gear; My onyx hooded balaclava, fathers' long dark brown trench coat, a generic shirt and trousers, hunting boots and my equip belt – which I had made myself. My father could of made one for me but I wanted to show him that I could do it, I failed, I was only 6 at the time; really I should of realised cardboard would not work in the rain or even to carry things that weighed more than a brick. However, now it's an essential piece of equipment that's craftsmanship rivals my fathers'.
I closed the chest to catch a glimpse of what was faintly written in front of it; "Zaynes chest of loot" was scribbled, as would be done by a 3 year old that was eager to show off his writing "talents". As I remember it I wrote that on with a piece of charcoal I had found in the fireplace, to which I immediately yet carefully placed the charcoal into my "loot" chest.
After I had securely strapped and clipped everything on, I headed back to my bed and knelt down. I reached under my bead and grabbed a large, dense metallic case. This case cared for my life, soul, protection and means of survival. As I unclipped the steel case I gazed towards my weapon; Soul Reaper. I currently looked at it in whilst it was in its sniper form, it was very bulky and rather long, in fact it was as tall as I was ,6" – 1.83m, although most of that length was just barrel – I love accuracy, as my father said "accuracy is more deadly than power". Not to say Soul Reaper was a weak sniper, I could hit targets that were a little bit under a mile away though Soul Reaper could easily reach further – I just had no means of measuring. Another thing I loved about Soul Reaper is that I could load a two-dust bullet into it which would allow me to combine the powers of up to two different types of dust into one bullet allowing me to gain significant advantages in the field. Soul Reaper could also turn into a two handed long sword, that had a similar width to a shield, 4" 11' long and 2" wide – 1.5m long and 0.61m wide, when in this form it could still fire bullets but it only really did significant damage if Soul Reaper was already stabbed into something.
I retracted the barrel of Soul Reaper so it was a lot shorter and then clipped it onto my back as I headed out of my room. I was immediately confronted by my living space, this was the place I relaxed, cooked and socialised - if you could call it that. The one family I was open to about being a Faunus was a family my father knew. They had a daughter my age named Alexandria but I called her Alex. As she was the only person I knew that was my age, we became quick friends, she told me her dreams of becoming a huntress and that's what ultimately made me who I am today, we learned all we could together. Father would teach us about hunting, her dad would teach us about how to cook meat and how to prepare other foods, and her mother would teach us literature and math. Her family also lived in a cabin, about 10 minutes away from where I was. Back in the day my father and her parents would occasionally get together at her place and just talk about the adventures they had been on as they also used to be a hunter/huntress couple. Me and Alex would sneak to my house during this time so we could be as loud as we wanted – now that I looked back at that I realise how stupid it was of us to do that but, we are both still alive.
I snapped out of my phased state of contemplation and realised that I needed to eat, I rushed over to the fire place and lighted the wood that I had already set out. The Grimm don't seem to notice light or heat too well, or at least I don't think so, maybe my father infused this house with dust to hide signs of inhabitation. I then continued towards the cupboard where I got some bread and salt this bought time for the fire to pick up momentum and heat up my soup, which lay above the open flames in a pot. I strolled back to the fire place and lifted the lid on the cooking pot, as I lifted it a waft of broccoli soup rushed into my nose. I love soup, it is so easy to make and store, it also holds its flavour for a long time. I grabbed the ladle that rested besides the fire and tasted the soup. "I guess it doesn't need any more salt from yesterday" I murmured to myself.
As I waited for the soup to warm up I checked the outside of my house to see if any Grimm had been nearby. As I carefully opened the creaky door I look down at the pair of graves that lay about ten strides away from my house.
My parent's final resting place, the grave on the left read: Theodore Phantos died as a hero protecting his beloved son Zayne. The grave on the right read: Hannah Phantos died learning what the beauty of new life meant. I got to choose what it said on my father's grave, as he did with my mothers. I used to shed a tear when I looked on at these but, now I'm a hardened hunter that understands what costs come with life.
No Grimm were spotted. I gently closed the door behind me, I remembered the day we buried my father, Alex's family were there and a few of father's friends which I assumed he knew from signal and his expeditions. I was only eleven which was why Alex's family took me in, I only returned to the house when I neared twelve, about seven months after that day.
I snapped out of my recurring flashbacks to check on my soup. I checked the temperature of the soup by dipping my pinkie finger into it, to which I find that it was just above body temperature, just right. I resided to the settee so I could drink down two bowls of the grass coloured soup, and then I sponged out the last of it with the bread I grabbed earlier. As I finished my final mouthful, I heard a familiar knock on the door; I rested the bowl on the dining table, next to my pouch of walnuts, on the way towards the door. I opened the door.
Alex stood there; she wore a similar outfit to me, only she didn't have my father's trench coat and her colour scheme was a bit more camouflage like than mine.
"Hello phantom" she greeted, she called me that because of my semblance; it would allow me to turn invisible, as if I were a phantom. It also helped that my surname was Phantos...
"Welcome to my humble abode" I swiftly replied, a phrase of mine that was really was getting old. She enters my warm hut as she swept her deep red hair behind her right ear.
Alex had dark crimson hair that had a pink highlight that ran down the left side of her hair. Her hair would easily reach her hips but she would always have her hair in plats so, it actually didn't reach that low. Her face had a cute nose, a pair of slightly defined cheek bones and deep blue eyes. You couldn't say that she was pale because of the time she would spend out hunting. I really couldn't describe her voice as it would change throughout the day, down to what was going on.
"Had something to eat?" she enquired after I closed my door.
"Yeah, the usual soup, did you grab something at your place or would you like to eat here?" I replied, I tried to seem open to her taking time out of hunting to eat.
"No I already ate at home" she murmured as I sigh in relief. She always ate at home after the time I kept going on about how we wither time away waiting for her to eat, instead of hunting.
"Oh, how's the hidden blade? Is it working again?" she enquired.
I had a hidden blade and shooting blade adaption for my robotic arm. When we were hunting last time I had fallen into a pit that was full of fine mud, which sequentially stopped my hidden blade from firing or extending blades.
"Oh it wasn't too bad, I just had to clean it out and re-lubricate the blade slide" I noted aloud although I knew she only asked to make sure I could protect myself if I was disarmed.
"Good let's get going" she replied.
We left the house after we put out the fire, took the pouch of walnuts and locked the door. The night was still deep black, since Alex couldn't see in the night I lead her to where we were going. She always managed to reach my house though; maybe she just knew the route off by heart, granted we had been hunting together for about 5 years now.
When we reached our hunting den she asked me quite an odd question: "Do you ever see us leaving each other?"
"Wha… what? Why would we need to and we live so close to each other it would be hard to ignore each other" I replied shocked "also we are practically an unstoppable team… I really like you so if we were to lose each other id stop at nothing to get you back".
My reply left Alex with a comforted smile on her face.
As the irregularity of the past rally subsided the night blossomed into the fiery orange - red day. Now was the perfect time to start our hunting venture, even though I knew the temperature wouldn't raise much higher than it was now for at least a couple of hours and most of our time hunting was actually spent waiting, I wasn't worried for myself it's just I knew Alex didn't exactly like the cold weather. When it came to hunting it was mainly taking out small animals, with basic weapons and traps that we would set up, nevertheless bringing Soul Reaper is still useful.
Alex tended to use a crossbow like weapon; really it just had the looks of a crossbow. It could have the spread of a shotgun and the range of a rifle – it still maintained high accuracy with the central bolt. The amount she could fire per shot was just a matter of how many magazines were connected to its underside. The best bit however was when she shot a bolt she could pull a pump which would ready the gun for the next shot. She could fire rounds that would propel themselves to the direction of fire and if she invested enough money into the rounds they could also be barbed, track or explode on contact spraying shrapnel into the target(s). The crossbow could also morph into a one handed short sword, roughly like my weapon, which she would commonly wield in reverse.
It was now midday and Alex was definitely restless, we waited in a tree that's dead brown leaves covered us from being spotted of which she kept leaping from branch to branch causing our cover to slowly dissipate. She also made so much noise that she was probably the reason we hadn't had anything to do for the past hour, all of my attempts at stopping her from making noise were replied with a low pitched moan and a total lack for the suggestion. To be honest I knew animals were avoiding us because of her. As we continued to be the only source of sound in the forest, I started to notice something... big. I waited to see if my speculation was true.
Suddenly we heard a bellowing roar, more specifically the bellowing roar of an Ursa. I knew an Ursas roar by heart, it was an Ursa that unnecessarily killed my father; I watched it just leave his impaled, dead body in front of the bush line that he told me to hide in. It was as if it had done it just for show.
Alex stopped dead in her tracks and looked straight at me, she knew what Ursas meant to me; "It didn't sound too big... you want to take it on?"
I knew it wasn't big, it didn't smell like an adult one. An adult smells like an incredibly wet dog that had the body Oder of a man that didn't know what bathing was.
"Definitely" I replied after my pause.
I loaded Soul Reaper with an air blast round and shot at the branch beneath me – causing it to snap the branch and launch me into the sky. Alex quickly followed me, only on the ground. The Ursa was easy to spot from the sky as it had spines that would reach well above the canopy of the forest – its back was just below the tree tops. I prepared for landing, whilst I also spotted Alex through the trees heading right to the Ursa. I hoped I would make it there before her; I always enjoyed the first hit on Grimm. We wouldn't usually jump straight into a battle against a Grimm but, this was an Ursa. However, our rushed assault meant we didn't work out its actual age; it was older than we had originally thought.
"Must've have had a bath" I thought to myself aloud, as I whipped through the sky.