URSUS, XXXX
Snow.
So much snow.
I have never seen this much snow before.
Freezing sheets of snow blanket the lands of rural Ursus. The village I woke up in is situated next to a tall taiga, a forest comprised of spruce, pine, and fir.
Speaking of, it was a small village that seemed to be going steadily. The architecture was odd, or should I say lacking, because all of the relatively simple huts and houses were constructed in the same style: dark stacked logs and windows with triangular snow-capped roofs. The dirt roads were unpaved and hardened.
Right now, I would be freezing, but the seemingly two-member family had a solution for that.
It was a large, dark trenchcoat; its age made it difficult to tell if it was once red, maroon, or simply dirty brown. Either way, it was dusty and covered in many patches of hand-sewn pieces of cloth or whatever its owner had on hand at the time. Although it was large, it seemed like it would fit the wearer no matter their gender. Curiously, close to the heart was a small missing piece of fabric. It seemed that there once was a badge or patch of some sort that had been long removed.
Either way, it somehow kept me surprisingly warm despite how thin it is.
The small family wanted me to hack at some logs that they either purchased or were gifted.
I say gifted because there is a substantial amount of wood piled up behind the family's house. The icy, unforgiving elements of Ursus somehow managed to spare most of them.
As the axe strikes the logs, cleaving them in half, my mind drifts to the events that have taken place recently.
It seems I have somehow cheated death. Despite taking two lethal shots to my body, the first crippling me and the second putting my six feet under, I am here chopping logs into firewood for the people that have, in one way or another, nursed me back to health.
A sigh escapes my mouth as I lean over and post myself up with the axe onto the tree stump that served as the base where the logs were converted into firewood.
"Damn, I wish I had one of Stacy's stamina shots," I softly mutter to myself as the back of my hand moves to wipe the bullets of sweat off of my forehead. Stacy, a fellow bounty huntress I once knew, always used to bring four golden needles filled with straight, liquid stamina. I'm pretty sure she either obtained those illegally or spent all of her bounty money to get them.
I'm pretty sure she was an addict.
…
Hmm, I could attempt to use Dark Sight, but I really don't want to go through the trouble of having these regular people accuse me of being the second coming of The Sculpture, if he's even real.
I'll simply have to push through with my Hunter training.
Back to work, then.
~⁕~
"How have you been feeling?" The girl asked me as she looked up from a book. I couldn't read it. Not a single letter or word made any sense to me. This was weird because, if I remember correctly, some letters in Russian are similar, if not the same, in English. I suppose the reason why is because it's "Ursine" or "Ursusian."
"Much better now, though I did have a small headache earlier," I replied, looking out the window at the dimming landscape of a field of snow, the sun gradually setting as its light became a sliver of orange light reflecting off the dark clouds.
"A headache, ah? Well, I hope it isn't anything bad. Perhaps we should have given you some more time to rest. The girl's eyes mirrored her emotions as she looked down at her book's dark cover.
"Don't worry your head off," I said.
…
"So, what are you reading there?" Despite the book's simple and minimalistic cover, a flat dark grey colour, the letters gleamed gold in the light.
"Oh, this? This is Мама's old journal. An old journal? I don't know about you, girl, but that "journal" doesn't look old at all.
Seeing my disbelief, the girl took to opening a random page in the book and began reading out loud. In her language.
"Hey, hey, I don't understand a single thing you're saying." Did she forget that I can't understand her language?
Realising her mistake, her face flushes in embarrassment as she quickly brings the book up to hide from my view. I don't mind her mistake, of course, but you'd think that important detail about me being unable to speak Ursusian would be remembered.
It just seems like a big oversight; nothing against her.
She clears her throat before reading out loud. In English this time.
"This year was brutal. The villagers, with no other choice other than to starve, ate leaves, bark, and pounded wood pulp mixed with husks and straw; some ate buttercups, moss, and the meat of burdenbeasts." The meat of "burdenbeasts"? The term doesn't sound familiar, but judging by the name, it doesn't sound particularly filling.
"As a result, many perished of starvation; their corpses were seen in the streets, markets, roadways, and everywhere. Mothers and fathers would always try to sell their children to the patrolmen—with little to no success, or the children were put to death." Huh. That reminds me of that whole fiasco with Samson. Except it wasn't with children—well, it could be argued that they were innocent of the bounty hunting trade—but with the hungry people who were unfortunate enough to pass through the docks.
"But that will not happen to my dear Ladislava; I guarantee it." She finished, putting the book down.
"Name's Ladislava? I just realised we haven't introduced ourselves yet."
The now-named girl, Ladislava, freezes as she stares at me like a bounty hunter who has just noticed the silhouette of a man hiding in the corner with a shotgun pointed right at them.
"I-... I'm sorry, mister, but I'm going to, er, return to my room." Ladislava stutters as her face is as red as the brilliant splatter of a thrown combat axe perfectly cleaving a hunter's head in two over 50 yards away.
As red as a successful tomahawk throw.
Well, I might as well go back to my room too.
Having retreated, my hands unclipped and removed the rigging of pouches on my torso, setting them down by the feet of the bed.
What's a bit odd is that even if the secret pouches had some ammo, the visible bullets that would be displayed on the bandolier were gone.
Huh, that's strange...
My hand moves to feel for my revolver, but its absence is a clear fact. I can't help but feel naked without the six-shooter.
Just always feel too light, like something's wrong or missing.
It's a good thing that one didn't need to worry about abiding by bar rules when on the job, searching through abandoned farms, churches, and prisons. It was always by my side, given how important they were to the trade.
Anyway, wracked with exhaustion, my body seems to automatically move to cement itself under the covers of the sheets, which warm up quickly as my eyes begin to close.
…
~⁕~
"HAVE TO KEEP RUNNING HAVE TO KEEP GOING. MUST KEEP RUNNING, MUST KEEP GOING—" I trip and immediately push myself up, my muscles burning in soreness and protest as the manic euphoria of countless stamina shots diminishes. The world around me blurs as dozens of dark figures rush out at me, their sudden, unexpected speed causing me to trip again. This time, I don't even bother getting up. Instead, I break out into a crawl forwards. My hands dug into the starch-white, ground covered in blooming white flowers, fertilised by the blood and soul of hundreds.
"SHOOT, KILL, LOOT. SHOOT, KILL, LOOT—" My fingers break, a sabre pierces my heart, a crossbow bolt pierces my skull, followed by two others, a shotgun shell blows out my hip, my joints rip out of their sockets, and hundreds of teeth bite into my body. My broken hands lay beaten in front of my bleeding eyes, showing my fingernails pulled from their roots as my skin boiled and charred.
KILL BANISH EXTRACT KILL BANISH EXTRACT KILL BANISH EXTRACT KILL—" Blinding blobs of blue begin barraging my being as I look up to see a blindingly bright world of wreckage, warped, writhing, and wailing in a cacophony comprised of the countless condemned.
In front of me, there were two dark, inky silhouettes of a shotgun and a revolver. My guns. I reach out in desperation, but as soon as a finger brushes against their surface, they dissipate in a cloud of smoke as if to taunt me.
No… No, no, no! I need them! I need them back—!
Hundreds of hands erupt around me, ripping my clothes off, snapping my bandolier in half, and spilling a pool of my extra, hidden bullets all over the… ground. I try to pick everything up, but the hands begin greedily tearing pieces and chunks of my flesh. My arms, my hands, my eyes, my skin.
I scream for it to stop, my vision shaky as the sky storms above, thunder and lightning arcing across the clouds. A shadowy figure appears, looming over my prone form, with voices violently whispering out of it. I look up to see a hideous face smiling at me. Its smile revealed toothless gums and empty eye sockets. A tar-like liquid leaks out of every orifice it has. The muzzle of the Nitro Express rifle that it wielded approached, filling up my vision with two circular voids until it felt like they were in my head.
And then…
"DIE."
Explosions rocked my world. The sounds of frag grenades, bundles of dynamite and their fuses arcing across the sky, molotovs with lit matches engulfing me in hellfire, completely demolishing my already melting, peeling skin. A choir of tortured angels wails in perfect harmony, betraying the agonising pain they feel. The sounds of both a roll-fed self-playing piano being smashed and a gramophone's horn being torn off its sound box continuously blast my eardrums.
The land around me becomes corrupted, plagued, twisted, and ravished beyond human comprehension.
At that moment, time went by in an instant and stood still for eternity.
And suddenly, it all stopped.
…
The smell of sulphur permeates the air as a soft, almost calming, ringing or droning sound emanates from somewhere outside of my vision. I believe the ringing was caused by the explosions, but as I move my head around, the ringing becomes louder, and the sounds of a constantly burning match are added to the dark void.
It's cold. The ground I'm standing on feels like it's crumbling.
Glancing to my left, I see a luminous blue hole on the floor of the void, reminiscent of a fissure or rift. Streaks and wisps of light rise from a pitch-black void, the edges simmering in a blue light, and the sounds of wind flow out. Past the edges, a ring of black crystal jutted out in a spiral pattern, covered in glowing blue etchings.
Ambling over, my legs give out to a crawl as I plunge head-first into nothing.
~⁕~
"Need my guns back, now."
Waking up, the first thing that was on my mind was my guns—just realised that my words came first before the thought.
It was dark outside; the twin moons shined into my face, making it evident that it was late into the night.
Getting out of bed, I noticed that my body moved as if it were at full strength, the sensation was almost the same as one of those weak stamina shots that Stacy sometimes packed whenever she was on a budget.
At least that's what she told us.
No matter; I needed to get my weapons back. The signs are too obvious. Somebody definitely stole some of my things. Bullets from the exposed bandolier but not the hidden ones; the guns for obvious reasons; and the fact that Ladislava could speak almost decent English, albeit with an accent.
I have good reason to believe that either this family or the entire village set me up. Granted, I don't have enough information for the latter.
Slipping my rigging of pouches over me, I leave the room to find the rest of the house devoid of Ladislava and her mother. Something's definitely going on here.
As I walked out the door, I felt a cold breeze brush against my skin, and my hand moved to pull my blue bandana up. Making my way over to the tree stump where I chopped the firewood, my eyes land on the axe lodged in it, and I pull it out with ease.
As I felt the wood of the axe's handle, my mind thought back to Ladislava's words.
"…How well can you use an axe?"
Well, despite my primary use of guns, I think she'll be surprised to see me effectively rending flesh apart.
Written by Alvuint.
Edited by Eidolic.