Chapter 12

Over the following weeks and months, small groups of people were being sent to the neighboring town, villages, and cities. Officially, these people were being sent to trade goods with people outside of the hunter's compound.

But I know it wasn't true.

The administrators must've received reports related to the mysterious red monster, and probably sent people out to see whether or not other settlements had witnessed the same entity.

Ever since my friends talked about this red dragon thing in hushed tone months ago, stories of a devilish-looking monster began to surface. No one was talking about it loudly, but try to go into any out-of-the-way bar or restaurant and you'd find a bunch of people sitting in a faraway corner mentioning things like 'metallic-sounding cry' and 'gleaming red eyes' without spoiling too much detail. I asked Jason the other day if he's heard anything related to it, and he just said the information was classified. Not even Will could tell me what was really happening.

Days turned to weeks, weeks turned to months, and as we moved on with our lives, we'd hear a person or two gossiping about something big and red skulking within the wilderness. I got curious and decided to investigate the matter on my own.

I thought it'd be easy to get people to talk, but in reality, they were too shy to open up about their experiences. My sources were mostly chatty old women and bar visitors. They tend to be not very trustworthy.

From what I could gather, these people would go out with some cargo to trade with the neighboring townsfolk. If they left at dawn, they might sometimes see a red creature with two black horns lurking on a rocky hill. If they left at dusk, this red creature might be seen retreating into the woods, keeping its gleaming eyes on the traveling merchants. In both cases, this thing was standing too far away for people to make out any significant detail.

The civilians were not particularly concerned by the news, but us hunters became greatly suspicious when it came to this monster.

Why would a monster kept an eye for our base when it could've invaded any human settlement in its vicinity?

The older hunters and the base's administrators, after some deliberation, agreed to organize scouting missions to the towns and villages in the hopes of gathering more data on the unidentified red creature.

At first, the scouting missions were fairly easy. The townsfolk were more interested in getting their trade routes secured. They might also request some rare materials to be procured or have pest monsters frolicking in certain areas be cleared out. I didn't join on those missions at first, preferring to help with cataloging the participants of the missions and their activities; who did what activity, when, where, and how much data they've collected, that sort of thing. A month after, Will convinced me to go out and join him.

"Ok, ok, what do you want me to do?"

"We're short on hunters for hire as of now. Care to join, Luke?"

"It depends; what are we hunting today?"

"Let's see... A few villages at the North needed our help in securing the roads leading to the big town at the West of the base."

"Anything else besides this security job, Will? Do we need to pick a flower or two?"

"No, not really. If we don't mind, the villagers also asked us to buy seeds from the big town. We won't have to pick any wildflowers."

"Sounds great. Count me in."

Well crap, I silently cussed as we went on the job the next day. On the outside, I put a big smile as a jeep convoy carried us all over the terrain as we passed through places, trying to look upbeat as I got some opportunity to find stuff for myself. Inwardly, I had grim thoughts as I surveyed whatever landscape we drove by, be it towns, villages, or wilderness.

The road we were asked to survey and clean up from monsters were no different from the average asphalt road. It had four lanes, white markings interspersed with yellow markings on certain intersections, and no street lights except on turns that led to inhabited areas. The road, if our data could be trusted was roughly 9 miles long, maybe even longer, snaking between hills and plateaus as it connected one settlement to another. Due to street lights being scarce, we had to conduct our mission as soon as the sun rose and be back at the compound once it set. The road, while far from being clean, was rarely visited by monsters as far as we could tell.

The jobs that were handed to us were simple. We would be asked to deliver some stuff to one place then go to other places to retrieve either more goods or payment. Good thing we were able to buy gas for our jeeps, otherwise we'd be in deep trouble until someone lent us a hand.

"What do you think, Luke?"

"Hunters for hire, my ass. Why the hell are we doing delivery services right now, when we could go beat a big lizard or two?"

"Relax, I'm sure something's bound to check us out for dinner soon."

My buddy wasn't wrong about that last part. Past midday, a monster that looked like Yian Kutku came and tried to loot the goods we were going to bring back to a town. This thing was definitely bigger and different than a normal Kutku, having thin feathers along its back and tail, a greenish-yellow coloration, and it spat ice balls instead of fire. My first thought as I saw it was that the monster could be a variant monster of the sort.

The jeeps carrying trade goods were commanded to keeping driving away as the last two jeeps, with me in one of them, pulled over and tried to take on the Ice Kutku. It was a good thing that there were six so us; me with my steel sword, Will with his big Jagras gun, and four other hunters brandishing various weaponry. The Ice Kutku was alone and looked intimidated, but held its ground.

The monster spat an icy glob at a female hunter among us. She blocked it with her shield as I rushed past her. I raised my sword high and brought it down hard on the monster's head. What a mistake! The Ice Kutku's head was well armored and all I did was pissing it off.

I turned around and ran. In my panic to get away from the damn thing, Will and another person with hunting guns showered the monster's gaping maw with piercing pellets, staggering it long enough for me to get away to safety.

The beast was not done, however. It took to the sky and made several clawing gestures to knock us down. The female hunter got hit once, while her friend got briefly disarmed by the attack.

I fished around in my pocket to try and find something to stop the Ice Kutku from clawing madly through the air. My fingers brushed past a metallic object, which I identified as a flash grenade. Damn, how stupid of me! Of course, a couple of days ago, I purchased that flash grenade in the hopes that I'd never have to use it. Screw it, I thought, now's possibly the best time to use the thing.

"Fire in the hole!" I shouted while gesturing to the other hunters to seek cover immediately.

I pulled the trigger, lobbed the grenade straight to the Ice Kutku's face, and covered my ears and shut my eyes tight as the item exploded in a brilliant flash of light followed by a ringing sound.

When I opened my eyes and ears, the beast had fallen to the ground, writhing drunkenly as it desperately tried to regain its footing. I glanced at my fellow hunters to find them recovering from the flash grenade's effect faster than the monster. Seeing a window of opportunity to counterattack, the hunters charged back at the still-dazed monster, hacking away at its tail or firing pellets after pellets at its head. Will, strangely, decided to just unload a pellet or two before running in my direction.

"You ok, pal?!"

"I've been better. Sorry I didn't warn you."

"That's fine. By the way, do you mind if I lampshade a few things here?"

"What are you talking about?"

Shrieks of pain accompanied by a big splatter of blood caught our attention. One of our fellow hunters managed to sever the monster's tail and had secured it before continuing the assault.

"Isn't it weird that we have an ice-breathing Kutku coming right at us from nowhere?!"

"I know, right? Where does this thing come from? How is it even breathing ice instead of fire?"

"Call me paranoid, but..."

"You're assuming this Ice Kutku to be connected to the strange red monster people talked about, am I right?"

Will nodded gravely at my words. We turned around just in time to see the female hunter being blasted away by a powerful ice blast. We glanced at each other again, shaking our heads, before we came into assistance to our hunting partners.

I jumped directly at the beast's face. Once again, I tried to carve a deep wound or two at the monster's head, but my sword simply ricocheted when making contact with its armored head. Except when the tip of my sword carved a thin line on the monster's brow...

It worked! The monster became staggered! I then seek other means of incapacitating the Ice Kutku as it regained balanced and blocked a partner's hatchet with its beak. The monster threw him off and began beating its wings to try and claw at us from midair again. That's when I stabbed its wing membrane. Oops.

I did not intend to strike the monster by its flapping wing, but when my sword impaled its wing membrane, I realized I could use this to my advantage.

I pulled the sword down as hard as I could, and...

"Good work, buddy!"

"The Kutku's wing is damaged! It can't fly away from us now!"

"Now's the chance, charge!"

I fell to the ground a bit hard. The Kutku fell even harder and judging from the sound of ripping I made with my sword, the monster's wing must be severely damaged, preventing it from flying again. I rolled out of the way as my partners all jumped at the chance to finish off the beast for good. Good thing, too, as the beast was as annoying as the Yian Garuga from the games' older generation. We all spent a quarter an hour as we relentlessly deployed whatever attacks and weaponized objects we had at the thing until it fell unmoving.

Mission accomplished, lady and gentlemen! One dead Ice Kutku would be ready to bring back home!

We all fell sitting on the ground, catching our breathing and laughing at our unprecedented success. For some reason, we all thought this encounter to be a High-Rank mission or something. We were then contemplating on how we should load the monster's carcass into our jeeps when the rest of the convoy from before came back. Whoa, they actually came back to pick us up!

I laughed a little harder. Will did too, apparently realizing what the convoy's expression might be when they saw us taking down a big monster. They'd most likely complain about the smell, though.