Several kilometers away from the city of Hillsdale, there was a cavern partially hidden by a cliff deep in the forest. Recently, there had been several reports of individuals missing from the nearby city of Peaceville. Although the uptick was hardly noticeable in the busy streets, looking closer one may have realized that while the disappearances increased, the overall homicides had decreased, almost as though these numbers had been shifted to be classified as missing persons.
One week before the beginning of the grail war, at the entrance to the cave, some individuals had discovered scraps of clothes with blood while hiking. Being reasonably apprehensive and sensible humans, they had quickly returned to the city and filed a report to the authorities.
As a result, a squad of officers had been sent to investigate the scene. The evening hum of the forest greeted Sergeant Hickory, Corporal Robinson, Corporal Jackson, and Corporal Washington as they arrived at the entrance of the cavern. Upon arrival they immediately noted the signs of blood and tattered clothes strewn across the ground.
"Stay sharp, there might be a wild animal of sorts in the cave." Sergeant Hickory readied his AR-15, cautiously approaching the cavern. Having expected a large animal, he had decided to retrieve his long gun from his patrol car, wanting something more robust.
"I don't know Sarge, not many animals target humans." Corporal Robinson knelt, inspecting the drops of blood in the grass and bits of clothes. "If it was an animal, they would have dragged the bodies. That should have resulted in blood streaks. Instead, the blood stains indicate that they were neatly carried above ground."
"What are you insinuating, Robinson? That whoever did this was a human?" The Sergeant looked over, a hint of apprehension in his voice.
"I'm not sure. Perhaps a bear of some sort carried a body in with its jaws. But I believe we should keep in mind the possibility of a deranged killer of sorts." Corporal Robinson stood, drawing her own side arm. "Maybe we should wait for —"
Her advice was abruptly interrupted by a bloodcurdling scream that echoed from deep within the cave. The voice was tinged with despair, pain, but above all fear.
A shiver ran down the spines of all the officers present.
Swallowing his growing anxiety, Sergeant Hickory spoke into his radio. "Dispatch, this is Sergeant Hickory, we are going to investigate the cavern system northeast of Hammel Road. Requesting backup." Then, without waiting for a response, he began advancing into the gaping hole, flipping on his flashlight attachment.
The rest of his officers followed his lead. Corporal Jackson spoke up, his voice ringing with a growing fear. "Sarge, are you sure we shouldn't wait for backup?"
His sergeant continued forward, his flashlight sweeping across the darkness of the cavern. "If we wait that long, whoever is down here might be dead by then. Besides, we have more than enough firepower to put down any bears or serial killers in our way."
Corporal Robinson nodded. "We can also retreat if necessary. The cavern walls make for decent cover if we do come up against armed resistance."
Despite these words of encouragement and rationalization, none of the four-man team felt any better continuing deeper into the cavern.
After advancing for a minute that seemed like an eternity, the tunnel began to widen up.
That was when the stench hit. Sergeant Hickory stiffened up, struggling to suppress the retching from the smell. It reminded him of a case from two years ago, where he had been sent to check up on someone that had committed suicide in their tub. The deceased's body had been lying in the unconditioned room for nearly two weeks, decomposing beyond recognition. The face was sunken and falling apart, while maggots had begun writhing around all over its body. A strange fluid had leaked all over the bathroom floor. And the stench. The stench had been unbearable.
He had let it out back then, running out of the house and letting go of his lunch. Now, however, he forced it back down, remaining alert for signs of what had caused this smell. His corporals, however, were not so lucky.
Corporal Robinson gagged behind the Sergeant, her flashlight suddenly swinging erratically as she struggled to remain standing. Corporal Jackson dropped to his knees and dry heaved, his frantic chokes filing the silence of the cave. Only Corporal Washington seemed to remain unaffected, his flashlight steadily scanning the cavern.
As Sergeant Hickory continued scanning the cave, however, his despair only increased as he saw what appeared to be bodies, ripped apart by some ravenous animal. The bodies ranged from newly deceased to bare-bones skeletons.
Wait. Did that corpse just move? A pale body suddenly stood up. In the rays of the flashlight, the body seemed to be perfectly healthy, a well built young male, wearing casual clothes splattered with blood.
A survivor? Sergeant Hickory kept his targets sighted on the individual, suspicious but confused. Other than being surprisingly pale, he seemed to be a normal individual. Logically speaking, even with tools he could not have possibly been the cause of this carnage. Still, it was suspicious that he was unharmed when all around him was nothing but death. Moreover, his gut feeling was screaming danger. Suppressing it, he shouted, "Peaceville PD! Identify yourself!"
"Who dares interrupt our feast?" Another voice, this one female, rang through the cavern, originating from the immediate right of the Sergeant.
"Oh, just some toads." Another voice sounded, next to the initial male.
"Hihihi, some dead toads." A fourth voice giggled in the back of the cave.
The Sergeant's voice frantically swepts around the cavern, illuminating various stalagmites and stalagmites, casting sharp shadows around the walls. Amongst these shadows, he saw the figure in the back burying his teeth into a struggling woman in hiking attire.
That was all it took for him to begin opening fire. Before the rounds left the chamber, however, the figure crouching over the body had already disappeared. The sound of rounds pinging off the walls echoed through the cavern.
This seemed to trigger the three other pale bodies into moving, all of whom flashed forwards, faster than humanly possible. Sergeant Hickory ignored the impossibility of the situation and immediately turned his barrel towards his right and opened fire in the direction of the voice he had heard earlier. A splatter of 5.56 rounds burst straight into her chest, and she stumbled as they tore through her at over nine hundred meters a second.
The other three, however, descended upon the group without hesitation. Corporal Robinson struggled to aim, still reeling from the earlier stench and sudden battle. Opening fire, the figures turned into a blur in the dark cavern, easily dodging her haphazard shots.
Suddenly, the initial male that had stood up was in front of her. Before she could even react, his right arm flashed forward, with an inhuman speed. She died instantly, her brain utterly crushed.
Dead Apostles. These were beings that had once been human, but through one way or another, had abandoned their humanity, becoming monsters that preyed on those that still lived. Originally created as a failsafe for even more ancient beings, they now became a category of the aforementioned inhuman creatures. Gifted with immortality and enhanced physical abilities, they paid for these newfound abilities with a hunger for flesh. With these powers, humans seemed fragile and insignificant in their eyes.
But humans were resilient. They fought back. Executors from the church, Mages from the Association, and other special forces throughout history warred against such terrors. Corporal Washington was one such individual.
In the brief span that the Dead Apostle had focused on killing Corporal Robinson, Corporal Washington had taken the opportunity to press his sidearm against the vampire's temple.
It had a moment of realization before a nine millimeter round ripped through his skull, ricocheting around, shredding his brain matter. Although Dead Apostles had greater durability than an average human, technology had evolved to the point that it could rival magecraft.
The dead apostle collapsed, his central control system obliterated. The other dead apostle near the group had just ripped his hand through Corporal Jackson's throat, who collapsed, gurgling in his own blood. Seeing his ally fall however, made him fall back into the depths of the cavern in a blur, too fast for Corporal Washington to get a good shot off. The other apostles who had witnessed this ordeal had similarly backed off, cautious about their next move.
Sergeant Hickory noticed this and retreated back to Corporal Washington's position, pointing his rifle at the entrance the entire time. He struggled to suppress his growing fear. Taking the moment to breath, he forced himself to suck in the rancid air, while he took stock of the situation. Two corporals have been killed. The woman I shot earlier has suddenly stood back up, her chest wounds healed. What is going on?! None of this should be possible!
He heard a Corporal Washington's voice beside him, calm and level headed, sharply contrasting the rising panic he felt. "Sergeant, listen very carefully. Don't do anything stupid, help is on the way. Conserve the rest of your magazine, bullets will slow them down until reinforcements arrive."
His flashlight attachment would not stop shaking as he continued peering into the cavern, the pale bodies long since disappeared into the shadows. "What the hell is going on?"
"An entity that defies human logic." The remaining corporal replied, his pistol firmly pointed towards the entrance of the cavern. "Even so, they have to pass through that entrance to attack us. Slowly move back, while keeping your finger on the trigger. The moment one of their bodies enters that doorway, open fire."
"What? But I pumped that, that thing full of lead earlier and she just got right back up!" The Sergeant slowly began moving back, his rifle's barrel still pointing towards the entrance.
"Yes. Body wounds are rapidly healed by their abilities. Hollow point rounds to the skull at point blank are a different story, however. Destroy enough of their central control, and the rest of the system collapses, including their repair system. Though that only holds true for the weaker Apostles. For now though, just focus on anything you can hit; it will slow them down regardless." Corporal Washington continued slowly inching back, his voice never breaking its calm tone.
"Understoo—kuhhh!" The tip of a stalagmite embedded itself into the Sergeant's chest, doubling him over. Corporal Washington kept his eyes on the entrance and quickly ducked behind a niche in the tunnel as another chunk of sharp rock whizzed past him with the speed of an arrow. Are they trying to kill me with these stone projectiles? The wall I'm currently in should be more than enough—wait… they've stopped. Listening closely, Washington heard the silent swish as the Dead Apostles approached his position. In seconds, they would be upon him.
Silently, he whispered the words that would trigger his magecraft. "Trigger, set." An image of a revolver being cocked flooded Washington's mind, as his magic circuits suddenly boosted with power. His form began to blur, then separate, like a perfect copy of himself.
This copy quickly stepped out from cover, and was greeted by the female dead apostle, who easily dodged his initial burst, now on guard against his attacks. Closing the distance, she suddenly lept the remaining six meters, and tackled the copy to the ground, tearing into his neck. The copy grunted in pain, as his veins, arteries, windpipe, and nerves were torn asunder. Pushing through the unbelievable agony, he pulled his hand out from his vest, revealing a ring type pin laced around his index finger.
The Dead Apostle felt something against her chest, and took a moment to see the fragmentation grenade without its safety lever nestled there. In a panic, she tried to stand up, but the copy suddenly lashed himself tightly against her, with the fervor of a dead man. Although she flailed desperately for a moment, the blood made her slip and unable to break free, while the copy's grip only tightened. In another instant, the M67 grenade blasted her body to smithereens, ripping through her enhanced flesh along with the copy, who disappeared into orbs of mana, dissipating into nothingness.
Meanwhile, Washington turned around, coming face to face with another dead apostle, this one the male that had been feasting on the hiker earlier. Bringing up his pistol, he fired several shots, but this dead apostle was much faster, swaying underneath the shots, and grabbing his arm, throwing him back into the open cavern like a ragdoll.
Washington gasped as he smashed into a stalagmite, the impact knocking out the wind in his lungs. His body bent back over the rounded object, as he felt his spine give way. The only reason he still had a spine was thanks to the trauma plate, but he had felt it break during the impact.
Coughing up blood, he correctly deduced that the impact had also destroyed his ribs, feeling sharp pains as he struggled to stand. The Dead Apostle that threw him took this opportunity to lunge in for the kill.
Suddenly, it felt its right leg catch something, followed by a tearing sound. Though his foot broke free of whatever had snagged it, the impact had forced him to go tumbling into a wall, cracking his head against the stone tunnel.
Looking back, the Dead Apostle saw Sergeant Hickory lying on the ground, his right arm nearly torn out of its socket, gasping for life. Thanks to his bulletproof vest and trauma plate, he had survived the stone shrapnel to the chest, albeit barely. "*Cough Cough*. Damn you, monster." The sergeant choked out his final words before passing out from the trauma.
The Dead Apostle looked back, annoyed at the interference from the lowly human, "Pathetic, so fragile." Changing his target, he dashed towards the unconscious Sergeant.
A stone pillar. That was what the Dead Apostle thought it had run into, when a hand grabbed his neck, just as he was about to devour the sergeant. The dead apostle, who easily weighed seventy kilos, was lifted into the air, choking as the hand slowly crushed his throat.
The other remaining apostle, who was preparing to finish off Corporal Washington looked over, "Wha—?" The world hardly left his mouth, when a round sliced through the air, obliterating his head in an instant. The smoking barrel that had fired the round belonged to an enormous anti material that another newcomer was holding, dressed in military armor and dark camouflage.
The final vampire looked down at the man holding him, a giant of an individual, dressed in military fatigues, with a heavy sidearm holstered to his right hip. "Khhh, how can this be? We were given immortality! Meat like you—" The Dead Apostle choked the words out, unable to understand how everything had gone wrong. They were perfected beings.
None of that mattered, as the man slammed the Dead Apostle into the stone ground, cracking the floor. The vampire, dazed, stopped struggling, as the man drew his sidearm, and fired a final round into his head, killing him for good.
"Sir…" Corporal Washington struggled to stand, his body barely held together at the end of this ordeal.
"Rest, that's an order Master Sergeant." The Colonel's voice boomed with authority as he turned towards his subordinate, a look of relief in his eyes. "Corporal Rockwell, get in here once you're done with the officer in the tunnel."
An individual who had been busy inspecting Sergeant Hickory hurried over. "The officer is stable, sir." Corporal Rockwell, who stood much shorter than his superior, quickly checked the vitals of the unconscious Washington, before nodding. "He'll be fine. A few broken bones and torn muscles, nothing I can't fix with some time. I'll cast a quick spell to stop the bleeding."
Taking off the torn vest and opening up his uniform, Rockwell took several pieces of paper with inscriptions from a medical kit he was carrying and placed them on Washington's bare chest. Upon doing so, he began to mutter his incantations, as mana flowed into Washington's broken body, sealing up severed vessels and lacerated muscles.
Satisfied the Colonel turned to the man that held the anti-material rifle. "Good shooting Lieutenant Tanner."
The Lieutenant instantly straightened his posture, "Thank you sir."
"Colonel, I have a message from Overlord." A female voice called from behind Tanner. "We have orders to begin preparations for the upcoming Holy Grail War."
The Colonel nodded, "Understood. Tell them we acknowledge and have already prepared a catalyst."
"Yes sir."
"Are we really going to war on American soil, sir?" The Lieutenant approached his Colonel.
"Yes. We have orders to obtain the grail at all costs. We can't afford to let it fall into the wrong hands."
"Sir, what about these servants that we will be summoning? How are we meant to fight these heroes of history who can supposedly dominate an entire battlefield?"
The Colonel thought for a moment, remembering a certain individual. "I met someone during one of my tours in the Middle East who had defeated the so-called 'King of Heroes' in a previous grail war. A man determined to become a Hero of Justice." The Colonel shook his head saying the words out loud. "He managed to defeat a genuine servant, although he had help from a fellow mage. But the key is that like Dead Apostles, these entities that are much stronger than any human can still be defeated if you know how. And besides, we won't be fighting alone." The Colonel took out a small glass case, the inside of which were several pinches of salt mixed with some sort of dried dirt.
The Lieutenant nodded, "Still, is it wise to leave, when there seems to be a spike in Dead Apostle cases?" In recent months it had not simply been Peaceville that had experienced an increase in Apostle presence, but many of the other cities in the area. It seemed that only Hillsdale had been unaffected by new Apostles.
The Colonel pocketed his case. "We'll leave the remainder to Faldeus's division. Considering what we've seen so far, divisions without magecraft should be more than capable of handling new sightings. These Apostles are nothing like the monsters I encountered back in Syria."
"Yes Sir. I concur, it's almost like they were mass-produced, cheap copies of the concept of a Dead Apostle."
"Yeah, that's how I would put it." The Colonel turned around, heading back to his transports waiting outside the cavern. Still why would the number increase so much leading up to the holy grail war? Is someone going around mass-producing Apostles like the Lieutenant mentioned? Perhaps I should have kept one of them alive for interrogation. The Colonel clicked his tongue in annoyance, before looking over the scene of carnage that lay before him, counting at least a dozen bodies in various stages of dismemberment, a hot rage growing in his stomach at the senseless death. No, this is for the best.
Walking through the entrance of the tunnel, he passed one of his soldiers busily treating the Sergeant with a stone fragment lodged in his chest, his right arm nearly ripped clean off trying to grab a vampire's leg. Despite his terrible condition, color was returning to his face. The general Colonel cracked a small smile, remembering the actions of the Sergeant.
"Sergeant First Class Lancel, when he wakes up, ask him if he wants a new job."
"Understood sir. Have you taken a liking to him?"
The Colonel chuckled, continuing out of the tunnel. "Perhaps."
Brushing past the S.W.A.T. team waiting outside, he climbed into a Humvee, before taking his box with the salt back out. "Well then, I suppose it's time for me to go back to war."