Darhan had many races besides humans, much like Leon's homeland had beastmen and elves. There are many that are native to Nahul: there are the Shokan, the Centaurians, the Kytinn, the Naknada, the Osh-Tekk, the Zaterrans and of course the infamous Tarkatans. While most of these peoples were indoctrinated as soldiers after Meio conquered their homes, there are two that even he could not control.

The lesser known of the pair were the Rain Masters.

Their species possessed three distinct castes. The lowest of these became dancers and worked primarily as slaves and prostitutes, lacking the skills to become assassins. Because that's what most of them were. Assassins.

Not even Meio was willing to cross them; in fact he formed an equal alliance, making far more open and lucrative business with them than the rulers he deposed. He had a particularly close relationship with their leader, who operated at the highest social strata of their species.

At the bottom, the dancers.

Above them, the assassins.

Above all others was a supreme killer who ruled their race, who by law had no name but the name of his people.

The Rain Master.

As for the other race that Meio failed to tame, well…

They were the Shura. And today they are known to be some of Leon's most trusted allies.

Huan Strongarm: A Bartfort Folktale, by Lufas Maphaahl

"Okay," coughed Leon. "I think we lost them."

Without his superpowered senses he would have gotten hopelessly lost in the endless snowfields, his pitch black fur standing out in stark contrast to the endless white. Pietru sat between his ears, her white fur ruffling majestically in the wind.

"I realise why the cold doesn't affect me," she remarked. "You know, because I'm ice-themed now. But why are you okay?"

Leon lifted his left paw, revealing a white mark in the shape of a snowflake. "Either it's my constitution talking or this mark that Silver gave me. It's honestly hard to tell at this point."

"Silver?" It took her a moment to remember who he meant. "Oh, the Snow Witch! Yeah! I'll bet she's going to appear in a ton of your dreams if you ever sleep again!"

Leon wagged his tail self-consciously. "I actually passed out once in the Gehemene Marshes and didn't see her at all. Maybe… Maybe that's going to be the last I see of her."

His ears drooped sadly; Silver had been kind of a troll, but she had also been sweet and fun to be around. He would have liked to have seen her again, and then maybe joined her in making fun of people.

"That's a shame," said Pietru, sensing his drop in mood. "I'm sure she just… Do you smell that?"

"It's probably just those giant wolves sneaking up on us." Leon turned and barked over his shoulder, scaring the shit out of the massive white wolves camouflaged against the snow. "HEY! KNOCK THAT SHIT OFF!"

The wolves almost leapt out of their skins in fright. "Great googly moogly!" yelped their leader. He was a few sizes bulkier than the rest, and had a cool scar over one eye. "You… You can't scare us!" His voice shook slightly; the poor wolf had to crane his neck to meet his eyes, as Leon was still at his new, enhanced maximum size. "This is our territory! You… You can't…"

"Fine," said Leon flatly. "I don't want it."

The wolf just stared at him like he just shit out a chewtoy. "What?"

"I don't want it."

"What?"

"I don't want it."

"…"

"…"

"…What?"

"Really I don't."

"But… But this is the nicest territory on the mountain! We have plenty of prey, we have clean drinking water, we have… w-we have…"

"And that all sounds very nice!" Leon said quickly, suddenly worried about hurting his feelings. "But I don't… well… I don't really eat."

"Get right outta town," said one of the other wolves.

"No, really!" Leon insisted. "Here, sniff… Hang on…" He shrank to the size of a regular dog as Pietru fluttered down to his side, scaring the hell out of the wolves. "Go on, sniff my mouth. See if I'm lying."

The pack leader cautiously approached and sniffed the corner of Leon's mouth. "He's right! This guy hasn't eaten in days!"

The wolves crowded around him and sniffed him from head to toe, their tails wagging excitedly. Some of them tried sniffing the Elder Dragon as well, but it annoyed her enough that she ducked under Leon's chest for shelter. "Make them stop, Huan!"

The pack leader barked at his companions until they backed off. "My apologies. I am Mowgli, and these are my sons; Tarzan, George and Griffin. What brings you to these parts, stranger?"

"You know those bipeds in that there…" Leon nodded vaguely in the direction of the City of Nahul.

"Yeah?"

"They have some friends of ours. We were going to rescue them, but… it didn't work out."

"Ah." Mowgli nodded understandingly. "The bipeds have many weapons that we people of the forest do not understand. They shun all those who walk on four legs and have no respect for our way of life. Bipeds are racist."

"They really are," nodded Leon. "Anyway, I need to get back in there…"

"If we do that then they'll just use that weird weapon again," remarked Pietru. "We need to find a way around it."

"I might know a way," offered Griffin. "They have a structure deeper into the forest. I see flying things go in and out, night and day." He paused awkwardly. "Would… Would that help?"

"It's better than anything we've come up with," shrugged Leon. "Can you show us where it is?"

There was something magical about running with the pack, something that harkened back to childhood dreams and the parodic masculinity of deodorant commercials. A refreshing wind ruffled Leon's fur as he loped across the snow, the wolf pack at his side and the Toa Tesukatora flying overhead. There was something primal in the experience. Something powerful.

They ran across the snowfields and leapt across the frozen rocks; soon a steel facility came into view, a constant stream of air traffic flying in and out. It was built into the side of a cliff, and apart from the road leading to the main entrance was surrounded by snow-covered evergreen trees. They hunkered down under an outcrop of stone, where Leon black fur would be less visible. "These guys are industrious, aren't they? Do they even sleep?"

"Never," woofed George. "Not even when all the predators are asleep."

"What's the plan?" Pietru asked. "I… I'm not sure what we're hoping to accomplish here…"

Leon had been thinking about it on the run over. "I'm thinking we should destroy as many of these facilities as we can: if they think we're outside the city it should make it easier to sneak in."

"So your plan is to…"

"Rampage, yes." Leon turned to the scarred wolf that had led them there. "Thank you. I appreciate this."

"Not at all," panted Mowgli graciously. "If you are not a foe, then you are a friend. Such is the way of the wolves."

The wolves began padding away before shit could get real. "Good luck out there," offered Tarzan. "I hope you find your friend."

Leon waited until he could no longer hear them, then grew to his maximum size; with an enthusiastic woof he charged at the facility, obliterating its front door with ease… only to be confronted with a giant mechanical gorilla on the other side.

"What the-" The gorilla took advantage of his confusion and punched him in the face; it did absolutely no damage, but succeeded in pissing him off. "Gah! You bitch!"

The wolfdog tore the robot to pieces, decimating it with ease. Identical machines were lifted into the hangar - because they appeared to be in a hangar - by huge cargo elevators, piling onto him in an attempt to overwhelm him with numbers.

"Woah!" Pietru squawked, narrowly dodging a severed head. "There's not much room in here!"

"Split up!" Leon barked, barely making himself heard over the cacophony. "I'll find you later!"

The Elder Dragon flew into a narrow shaft that led into the cliff itself; almost immediately she was attacked by tiny maintenance drones clinging to the walls, each one armed with whirling blades. Although she destroyed a few with her ice breath there was a constant stream of reinforcements pouring out of the walls, forcing her to flee.

She soon found herself in a large room filled with massive gears and moving platforms loaded with equipment she didn't recognise, while Nahul soldiers operated the machinery and opened fire as soon as they spotted her. With a shriek she took cover behind a metal beam, eventually escaping into an open ceiling vent.

"Freedom!" Pietru gasped, finally escaping into the open air. "At last, I-"

She was cut off with a shriek as a knife stabbed into the knife ground beside her. "Greetings, little cub. Allow me to introduce myself." The newcomer had an astonishingly deep and impressive voice with an eloquence to match; most of his body was covered by a voluminous purple cloak with a villainously high collar, and his hair was a gravity defying black mane. He had a gaunt, pointed face with skin like pale honey, and his ears were pointed like an elf. "I am the Rain Master, mightiest assassin under heaven. I am here to kill your friend."

The ground at his feet exploded as the God Hound's massive jaws ripped though the mountain beneath him, but the Rain Master danced away at the last second. "Yo," grunted Leon, heaving himself up onto the mountaintop. "Still breathing?"

"Barely," she wheezed. "That guy startled me a bit."

He cried out as more Rain Masters appeared at his sides, cutting into him with razor sharp blades. Leon began snapping and biting at them but their speed and agility were like nothing he had ever seen, leaving actual afterimages in their wake. "A formidable creature," their leader admitted. "But no match for us. It is no wonder Mikiel and Strobaya lost so easily."

"Asshole!" Leon spat, his wounds closing in seconds. "Your face looks AI-generated!"

"See how it barks?" Rain Master scoffed, clearly not understanding the language of beasts. "Pitiful. I wonder how long until its regeneration reaches its limit?"

"That depends," the wolfdog muttered. "How long will you last without a sense of balance?"

Leon unleashed one of his special barks, shattering the eardrums of every assassin on the mountain. Blood spurted from Rain Master's ears as he fell to his knees, his vision swimming dizzily. "What… the…" Rather than pressing the advantage, Leon chose to flee at top speeds down the mountainside as the Toa Tesukatora followed from the air. "Coward! Come back and face me!"

Now deaf, Rain Master's only warning was the vibrations in the ground; the extraordinary bark had triggered an avalanche, the cascade of snow sweeping the assassins away as it pursued the wolfdog down the mountain. The Rain Masters had left countless mines to prevent his escape, but Leon was moving so fast that he was long gone by the time they exploded.

At the very bottom was a deep chasm, which devoured the avalanche behind him as he leapt across. Leon's claws scrabbled for purchase as he dragged himself up the other side, finding himself outside yet another Nahul facility; he shouldered the door open and hurried inside, only waiting long enough for Pietru to flutter through.

The inside was a network of electrified machinery, which cliche dictated must mean they were in a power plant. "Okay," Leon admitted grudgingly. "Maybe I shouldn't be fighting these smaller opponents at full size."

"You!" They both shrieked in fright as the voice rang out behind them; Rain Master stumbled through the open door, blood still leaking from his ears. He was smeared from head to toe in snow, and his hair was even more of a mess than usual. "I'm going to kill you," he snarled. "You may be durable, but not even gods can withstand my secret… What is that?"

They followed his gaze; small devices with blinking red lights had been fastened to important points all throughout the structure, the blinks getting closer together with each passing second. "Bombs!" Leon screamed, throwing himself protectively over the startled Elder Dragon. "Get down!"

Back in Nahul, Meio scowled as the light abruptly winked out. "Motherfu-"

Three women watched as the power plant exploded, the building obliterated by ugly orange flames that belched upward in a mushroom cloud. They stood on a huge bronze airship that floated in the sky overhead, watching the destruction and laughing. Countless smaller craft hovered below, each containing small platoons of soldiers.

"Pitiful Rain Master," one of them scoffed. "His status as the Grandmaster's favourite bounty hunter could only protect him for so long."

Leon leapt upward through the blaze with Pietru close behind, scaring the life out of them. He began hopping between the smaller craft, eventually leaping all the way up to the main airship and staring the three women down.

"No goddamn way," he whispered. The three of them were very clearly Kitana, Mileena and Jade from Mortal Kombat, and were even wearing the infamous stripper clothes from the ninth game; while Leon appreciated a buxom, scantily clad women as much as the next man, the designs from Mortal Kombat One were his personal favourites. "Working for Meio? For shame, ninja ladies, for shame."

He shrank himself down as the three women rushed him, only to abruptly grow in size at the last moment and knock all three of them off the side of the ship. Pietru watched judgmentally as they fell screaming to the snowy peaks below. "That was mean."

"But funny."

"But funny," she allowed. "But mean."

Leon pricked his ears as something approached through the clouds: a massive vessel too big to be an airship - an airfortress - emerged from the thick clouds. It was bigger than the entire Bartfort territory, with countless guns and cannons protruding from every surface. Countless smaller airships were flooding from its sides, and were very obviously heading their way.

"Damn," said Leon respectfully. "That's a big boat."

Pietru responded in a low whisper, her voice breathy with awe. "Yeah…"

"We should smash it."

"Yeah…"

Far below, Rain Master pulled himself from the wreckage of the power station. His robe was ruined, and his entire body was covered with horrific burns. He glared at the gigantic wolfdog as he began hopping between airships, making a beeline for the floating fortress.

He howled at the sky in furious, impotent rage.

He would have his revenge.

Boss: Bounty Hunters

Summary: this chapter is equivalent to Stage 2 of the original Strider, which was set in Siberia. Google tells me that Siberia encompasses basically all of Northern Asia, and that Stage 2 specifically occurs in the Tian Shan mountain range; it turns out the Tian Shan straddle the border of Kazakhstan, where Meio supposedly had his seat of power. So that's fun.

Fun Fact: in the PC Engine port, between here and St Petersburg is a stage set in a desert oil field. The Tian Shan mountains aren't far from the Taklamakan Desert and the Tarim Basin, so maybe that's where that's supposed to happen. Who knows. I have no idea if they have oil fields there and googling it feels like too much effort.

The main bosses of this stage (apart from the gorilla, who is apparently named Mecha Pon) are Solo and the Kuniang, who act as Meio's bounty hunters. Solo is played by the Rain Master from Iron Ladies, who first appears in Chapter 253. The Kuniang (an alternate spelling of Gūniáng, which means Girl) are played by Kitana, Mileena and Jade from Mortal Kombat.

While Moon Slayer and Iron Ladies were used for mook bosses throughout Darhan (like Contra and Riddick were for Holfort) Strider and Mortal Kombat were used as the main building blocks for Nahul. You can expect other Kombatants to appear in the future.