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Most of my money was digital. For Neo and I both that was true. That was a problem in place like this and with the CCT down. It left me rather cash poor but a huntsman always had assets to sell that most people didn't have. My labor had high value. So while I expected to have landed near Vale by now and hadn't withdrawn money in Atlas I could easily find work. I didn't have enough money, however. Not enough for inns and horses and other things that I now needed to get by.

I walked into the warden's office. It was an arched concrete building with a red roof of tile plates. Inside there was a clerk behind a desk and several back rooms I could sort of see into behind the clerk at the desk.

"Good day," the clerk greeted me. She was wispy girl with blue hair and bright green eyes. "What can I do for you, sir?"

"I'm looking for work. I'm a huntsman and I figure you probably have some problems that only a hunter can take care of," I informed her casually. A place like this on the outskirts of civilization always had the need for the labor of a huntsman.

"So I see," she looked up at the long red handle over my head and the broad weapon on my back. "Just a moment."

She reached down under her desk and rummaged through some files. She found what she was looking for and withdrew several paper protectors and files and laid them out in front of me.

"I have some search and destroy. A Grimm has been terrorizing farmers at night. A Geist by the looks of things. And there are bandits in the hills near by raiding the farmers. It's a good thing you came along. So which will it be?"

"Both. I'll take care of both of them." I dragged the files towards me and leafed through them. A Geist. Fairly standard affair. It would be no match for me now. Bandits could be trouble however. I wasn't exactly looking forward to killing some more. But it was the job. Sometimes as a hunter you had to kill people. I just hoped that they would all be deserving bandits for the rest of my life. One could hope, even if one didn't believe.

"There's just one problem. We're low on funds here and I can't pay you to take care of both," the clerk looked at me anxiously. I was quick to put her at ease. Protecting people was also part of the job. One I should take to much more gladly than the killing aspects.

"No problem. Just pay me for one and I'll take care of both anyway," I dissuaded her. She looked relieved at my words.

"Truly? If that's the case the town will be in your debt sir huntsman."

"It's nothing. I'll take care of it. Bandits and Grimm are the job. I won't leave you undefended."

"Thank you."

"Like I said, it's nothing." I still tried to be a good person to the best of my ability. It was simply good of me to overcome my own inner evil nature. Doing little things like this here and there wouldn't save me- they wouldn't change what I was, but it was good. Being is doing I suppose.

I walked out of the warden's office building and down narrow streets. Neo followed me close behind and was willing to help out in making some cash. It would be no problem for the two of us to handle the monsters and men which troubled the city.

Hunting monsters and hunting people really weren't so different. They both left their share of tracks behind and they both had the places where they nested. It was really only that monsters didn't leave bodies behind which separated the two. People left something behind every time. Some kind of legacy. Monsters only left destruction without purpose in their wake. But well and truly it wasn't so different when one got down to the brass tacks of the act of slaying either.

With that I set out from the town with the intent to kill. Murder, once it had entered into my heart, never left, in all reality. It stayed with me like a psychic scar. I wondered for a moment how scarred Neo was in such a way. She had certainly killed before she met me and she even got off on the pain of others. No one normal and sane was like that. Could I save her? Was I in a position to do so when I couldn't even save myself? Should I try, even? I felt in no small way responsible for her. She couldn't look after herself in many ways. Well just one big way really but it affected her whole life. I felt like looking after her and watching over her.

I wanted to keep her in line but that was as much about keeping myself in check as it was regulating her own impulses. I was a monster too. I killed, maimed, and tortured when I hit my lowest point. That was who I was at rock bottom. That meant at my core I was like that. I did this, that, and the other thing because it had suited me and because no one could stop me. I did those things. I was responsible.

"Looks like we have people to kill, Neo. Should be the usual business," I told my silent companion. I knew I would never get a real response and that made her uniquely easy to talk to. Or talk at, I suppose.

Neo clapped her hands in excitement. There was a wide grin on her face that I couldn't help but reflect back even if it was slightly broken. I didn't exactly share all her enthusiasm. Or I didn't want to want to. It was complicated.

"Yes, yes blood for the blood queen. You know I worry about you Neo."

She gave me a quizzical look.

"Ah but it's nothing. Just the usual. I worry about you the same way I worry about myself. 'How far have I fallen?' 'Oh woe is me, what am I now?' That kind of thing. Except over you instead."

She made a stabbing gesture.

"We're still going to kill them. I think the thing is that I don't want to like it this time. You feel me?"

She shook her head.

"I just… I don't know. I don't want to enjoy killing people. I just kind of do. I like the power. Most people can't make it happen as easily as I can, though. That's what makes it concerning. But you indulge yourself, Neo. Don't worry about me. This is really one of those times you can let yourself go so you may as well. I just want more from life than bloodshed. Now do you get me?"

She put a finger on her chin and dimpled the smooth pale skin there. She was deep in consideration. Then she gave me a slow nod.

"And what am I going to do with you once we get to Vale? You're a wanted woman there."

She pointed at me.

"Me? I won't abandon you if that's what you're wondering. I'll figure something out, though. You have your disguise which is nice. Still I want to look out for you and spend more time together than we did in Atlas. Oh, but listen to me prattle. Come along. There is murder afoot."

She skipped along beside me to keep up with my long stride on the cobblestone streets where the tall houses seemed to lean away from us with small gardens and vines climbing up the walls and over small fences. Like spiders crawling away from me they grew upwards on little structures.

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We waited at night near where the Geist had been coming out of the hills to hunt the farmers surrounding the settlement. The buildings were widely set apart from one another with acres of crop land between them. Fruit trees grew in wide orchards and vineyards stretched on without end over rolling hills. The sun fell from the sky and one of the moons, the shattered one, shone down from over our heads. It was more than bright enough for two hunters to see with enhanced senses.

I hadn't noticed the improvement in my senses at first. It had been something slow. But the same way hearing and touch blended together or could blend together, that sixth sense all hunters had blurred into something more and combined for better eyesight and hearing. It was almost extrasensory but not quite.

The Geist came out of the hills in the form of a lumbering giant of rock and with a left arm made from a tree and a right leg also made of wood. Grimm were so weird. They seemed to be without end and could somehow be intelligent and thoughtless. Cunning and mindless. I suppose that's what made them monsters.

I crushed a dust crystal and burned the leg and arm away to nothing. It silently reeled as it burned but it didn't care about the fire. It was so alien in its thoughts it did nothing but attack as the fire blazed. Neo leapt and slash it across the face and when it swiped at her she shattered into nothingness, untouched. Her powers were wicked. Only Ruby really stood out in Neo's league. And perhaps myself but I didn't count. I cheated. Magic and all that rot.

And speaking of cheating I hoveres right up to it and I Octa slashed the monster and sent it stumbling back and falling. I cast a blade-beam at its face which burned the monster in the stone and made it wail.

It's body was collapsing around it under my assault and large stone limbs crushed parts of the vineyard. A large boulder fell and crushed part of the vine supports. It trampled the wood which splintered under the creature's massive added weight. It was still inside the main chunk of rock hiding from us. But we would break it out. Force it to run.

I approached with a long back-flip which made me land right in front of where the monster had fallen. Then I started to cut into the rock next to its face.

That's when one arm came up and grabbed me and threw me like a baseball off of it. I landed with a smash in a cliff face near where the orchard trees started to bloom their flowery blossoms. The smell was pleasant and I noted it contentedly and without worry. This was in the bag.

That was when the monster made to flee from it's destroyed body. The wisp of a creature made to run for the hills with a backwards glance at me.

Neo teleported right in front of it and stabbed it with her stiletto through the chest and ripped upwards through its body. It turned to dust and smoke after that.

"That's one down. And it was fun I suppose. We made it look easy." I walked up to Neo and stabbed my sword into the ground and leaned on it. I was unhurt and so was Neo. The farmers might complain about the destroyed lattices for the grapes and some crushed trees but that would have to be dealt with by someone else.

They should be thankful that the monster was dead and that they wouldn't have to fear for their lives anymore but I knew that wasn't how people worked. They only saw what they had and didn't have. And they always wanted more. To be sure I was no exception and the destroyed trellises were a sign that I could have handled things better by a touch.

"And now for the real deal. The bandits," I muttered mostly to myself but also partially to Neo. She rested her umbrella back against her shoulder.

Fighting people came with complications because people could be just as weird as the Grimm. They had semblances and their own weapons and they had unique motivations and goals. It often made them even harder to predict than the Grimm which had often single-minded purpose. They only cared about destruction and once you understood that you could predict what Grimm was going to do pretty easily. At least I could but I wasn't sure if that had to do with the nature of my connection to the Grimm. People were harder. What did they want? Each person was different such that no universal principle or goal could be stated. Not everybody wanted to live. Not everybody was afraid of death. Those were just the big ones. There were lots of little ones too. Every Grimm was wary of dying lest they be unable to destroy but the Grimm did not have fear. They were all the same. Every battle with a person became a mystery and a chance to grow and learn. The Grimm were a riddle long solved. People remained an unasked question. As soon as you uttered it, it would change and challenge itself. I think that's part of why I liked hunting people. I was even blessed with a knack for it. Or a curse. Depending on how one looked at it.

I enjoyed the intrigue and the mystery and I wanted to pit myself against them. That was the end goal. Killing them was merely a side effect of that goal. Though I did also take pleasure in that as well. The toe of my boot on another person's head was satisfying. It was tasty, oh, how could I describe it? To win and be victorious was a separate reward to the delicious flavor the act of conquest held. It was in the journey I suppose. And it was also in the destination.

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We set out early in the morning to find the local bandits and kill them. I think that I might not kill all of them but I may as well act like it. It was what I was setting out to do and I could feel the flavor of it already. My mouth watered and I smoked on my pipe. The salty and dank flavor of the greens was delightful.

It filled my mouth and my face and made me bilious in a pleasant fashion. When I walked through town I stepped in a puddle of water in a pothole in the street. The water got into my boot a little and the cold throbbed pleasantly. I relished my pain. The intensity of the feeling turned every discomfort into a massage as my nerve endings twitched and quivered in pain. There was some pleasure to be had in discomfort. Maybe my mind was warped by my Mother but I found that I liked it. In a masochistic way I enjoyed the feeling of cold and wet like a nail in my foot. It felt like it was a stake pinning me into reality by the toe.

It grounded me. It made me focus. We set off and away.

Bandits had ransacked a farmhouse east of the city. We started our search there. Broken windows and stolen goods and a family killed for the sake of loot. An easy target. It could have happened to anyone out here.

I stared at boot prints in the mud. I walked through the house with the door torn off the hinges and dusty footprints every which way inside. I scoured the house first and Neo waited patiently outside near a broken window of the low farm house.

I walked out of the building and beside her. I found the footprints that left the house and went into a deep forest near the river. Without a word I started walking in that direction. Neo followed me at my heels.

I didn't care how much noise I made as I pushed my way along the trail. Let them know. Let them know that I have come. And I am bringing death with me on my back. I carry their lives in my pockets.

I tracked my quarry for miles.

I found their campsite. They milled about unaware of what loomed in their wake like a shark.

Some drew their weapons when they saw me. Some shouted questions and barked orders. Some, I think, once it started, fled.

I killed all within my sight. It was delectable.

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-WG