Chapter 10 Hate

After Mary's party returned to the city, they went back to the guild to report that their quest is (almost) complete and the farmers will not have to worry about any more missing sheep and the chance of being kidnapped. Once they got paid, Mary went back to her traveling companions while Edward, Sarah, Mark, and Frank stayed with the Guild Master to talk about Mary's disturbing actions.

"So, she left that one werewolf alive to send a message to any monster that shows up about what she did?" Guild Master was in slight disbelief as the four told him about the entire encounter. "And there is no one else she left alive?"

"No, and Mark checked the one-room Carla was in and he confirms it was empty," Edward explains.

"There should be some very young monsters at least in that cave." The Guild Master is not completely convinced about Carla leaving survivors as he walks back to his desk and drinks a mug of ale that was sitting on top of it.

Mark speaks up, "The only thing that could be considered young was the teen werewolf we slew."

The Guild Master just grumbles as he finishes his drink, puts the mug back down on the desk, and walks to the only window in the room. He stands there silently until Marks asks, "So what now? Does Carla pass or something?"

"Pass!?" Sarah exclaims and quickly adds, "Mark, have you forgotten what she did and said!? How she threaten Edward when he was about to end that one werewolf that she purposely left alive? The way she conducted herself threw out the entire confrontation which she clearly enjoyed killing them with such disturbing glee. Frankly, she acted more of a monster than the actual monsters, and she…"

Sarah took a quick sharp breath her entire body briefly shuddering as if she got cold all of a sudden then she finishes in a more hush tone, "And she scares me."

Edward steps up and says, "I have to agree with Sarah, Carla was clearly in delight as she fought the majority of that pack despite not being a blessed hero. Her actions and manners showed her to be somewhat of a madman or borderline sadistic. I don't how I feel about her to be perfectly honest. She is powerful but extremely frightening if you chose to oppose her in any way."

"Shouldn't we consider her aid to be a blessing in disguise?" Everyone looks at Frank as he comments, "That quest she could have easily taken on by herself due to her display prowess in battle."

Mark quickly cuts off Frank as he asks, "But weren't you concerned at all when she threaten Edward?"

Frank looks at Mark and says, "I was and I knew I had no chance to stop her so I obeyed her wishes."

Edward looks back at the Guild Master and asks, "What do you think Arnold?"

The Guild Master contemplates for a moment, turns to them then says, "I'll let Carla help out the guild and the city until she does something that'll threaten us or our stability. Any monsters she kills are ones won't have to worry about later even if she leaves one or two alive. They'll spread ill news to anything that thinks about attacking us or this city. You're all dismissed but do keep an eye on her, she doesn't seem quite right." The four adventurers nod to the Guild Master's request and exit through the door.

He turns back to the window, and places his right hand on his chin, "Carla, whose attention are you trying to get?"

Back near the cave, in the sky flies an owl mage looking for any lost travelers or heroes who could be a possible mate for her. As she gets closer to the cave, she starts to smell taints of blood, the closer she gets, the stronger the smell becomes.

'Someone is seriously hurt, I better go check it out.' She thinks to herself as she dives to the source of the smell. Once she gets below the tree line, she sees bodies lying all over a single area, the scene sickens her. She lands next to Anna's body and sees her ribcage has been crushed inward and a small pool of blood around her head.

'She did not die well.' The owl mage then looks at the over bodies and sees Midnight and Sunshine had small holes on their bodies, 'Arrows.', finally at the last werewolf and sees a massive black and blue mark on her forehead. 'Head broke.' She looks around a bit more until she notices a line on the ground going up to the mouth of the cave. 'Looks like a survivor dragged themself to there.'

She cautiously walks to the cave as the ones who did this could still be around, as she gets closer until she picks up a different scent in the air. Her eyes widen when she realizes it's human blood of two or maybe three people. She quickens her pace, by a few meters left before entering the cave she hears a noise. She moves ever so slowly inch by inch, ready to fly away if in danger, she hugs the wall as she creeps her head into the cave opening. The noise she has been hearing starts to sound like crying and gets to confirm it when she sees a single werewolf sobbing over a dead human male. Seeing and hearing only the two of them here, the owl mage decides to introduce her presence.

"Hello?"

"AHHhh, please leave m…" Gin turns her head quickly in fear to see Carla but instead sees someone else that somewhat confuses her down a bit. The owl mage startled by Gin's fearful outburst quickly speaks, "Please don't worry I'm not here to hurt you. I only came here because I smelled blood." Gin simply nods and looks away from the newcomer and back to her slain husband.

The owl looks around with sadden eyes and asks, "What happened here? Is there anyone else here?"

Gin angrily replies, "No, SHE killed everyone I've loved"

The owl mage noticed a hint of rage when she said 'she' so she asks another question, "Who's she?"

Gin answers that almost sounds like she is shouting, "CARLA JOHNSON!"

The owl mage steps back from Gin's sudden volume increase and before she can ask anything else, she notices out the corner of her eye a flash of pinkish light. 'What was that?' she mentally asks herself. Her focus shifts back to Gin for she says, "I'm the only one left of my pack and she made sure of that." Sniffs and signs come from the werewolf as she shows clear signs of exhaustion.

"Anna, Lily, Gin? Are you there?" a small quiet voice speaks out as both the owl mage and werewolf look at each other then Gin yells out, "Peach is that you?"

A small head pokes out from the room from the noise coming from and two small eyes scan the room until they landed on Gin.

"GIN!" then a trio of small wolf pups rushes out of the room and dog pile Gin unfortunately for her back injury, "GRAHH!" The three step away as Gin puts her right hand on her back to massage it and says to them, "Please don't touch my back, please." The two nod while the baby is stretching out her little arms to Gin.

Gin happily says, "I'm so glad you three were able to hide away safely from them."

The oldest one Peach speaks up quickly, "The lady in the black clothing found us and She said, 'Don't make me come after you like with your pack.' Then she rolled a pink marble to me. There was a big pink flash and when I opened my eyes, she and the others are gone except for you and her."

Gin quickly asks once the oldest seems to be done telling her story, "Was the lady carrying a big mace?"

"What's a mace?" Peach titles her head.

"It's a big hammer." Gin answered.

"Yeah, she had one." Peach confirms, Gin couldn't believe it that it was the same woman who butchered her pack, saying all those things about killing every mamono here but yet spared these three.

The owl mage speaks up, "There is a hidden village near here that I can take you all there."

Gin asks, "Please can you take these three with you, I... I... I can no longer walk anymore. Please..."

"Oh, my name is Mia." The owl mage does a light bow to Gin, "And yes I can fly these three there then come back for you."

"Thank you, Thank you, Mia. Cherry and Peach go with Miss Mia, she'll take you somewhere safe, alright?" The children complied with Gin's request and they gather around Mia as she thinks about how she'll carry them all. An idea comes to Mia; Cherry will be hugging Mia's back like a backpack while Mia will grab Peach with her talons gently and Peach will hold the baby the whole way. Once they are all outside, they went along with her plan, and soon enough all four of them flew to that hidden village Mia mentioned.

Gin was again alone but this time wear a small smile as there was a future for her remaining packmates. However, she still feels hatred for her even though she did spare her pups, what she did to her fellow sister and her pack leader was unforgivable.

"If I ever recover Carla, I'll hunt you down and tear out your heart before your very eyes." Gin speaks to herself. She hears the snapping of twigs and looks over to her fallen packmates and sees a small group of Lamias slithering into the area. One of the lamias spots Gin and points to her for the others to see. They all look at Gin then they go to her.

Later on, in the night Mia flew back for Gin but the owl mage spots a good size crowd around Gin. She sees a wide variety of mamonos from slimes to another owl mage, as they all listen to Gin's tale with a wide variety of emotions of sorrow, anger, and fear. They mumble to themselves of a human who isn't a hero but still manages to put down almost an entire pack of werewolves.

Mia slips through the crowd until she was face to face with Gin, "Gin, I'm back."

Gin looks up to Mia and says in a dry, hoarse voice, "Let's go."