Chapter VIII
A Ruinous Loss and an unpredictable meeting.
"But it is a law of life and development in history where two national civilizations meet they fight for ascendancy."
Bernhard Von Bulow.
The glow of fires raging on the borders of Hammerhal Aqsha had cast the city in crimson. Hanniver a Toll and Armand Callis picked their way through the urban jungle, weaving through a stream of haggard-looking citizens who were going about their business as best they could under the shadow of war. Callis felt as if he was trapped in some waking nightmare, so lurid and distorted did the red skies make the city appear. Bloodied faces stared out at him from doorways and windows, fear in their eyes. Screams and distant gunfire formed a constant, staccato symphony.
"Feels like the damned apocalypse is upon us," he muttered.
"Three times in my career, I've been trapped in a city besieged," said Toll. "I number them as the three worst experiences of my life."
"Any news from the front?" said Callis.
Toll's expression told the story. "You can't move for corpses. Ours and theirs. The big guns, silver shields, and the hammers of Sigmar are keeping the bulk of the reavers at bay. For now, Hammerhall Aqsha holds, but it's a damn close thing. By the god-kings grace, our little contribution might ease some pressure on the Freeguilds."
"I wouldn't call rooting out a nest of flesh-eating ghouls a minor contribution," said Callis, recalling just how close they had come to death during that last devilry."
Toll shrugged. "All things are relative when the world is on fire."
They crossed what would normally have been a busy thoroughfare but now a road choked by abandoned carts and steam carriages, the cobbles strewn with ankle-deep drifts of soot. On the far side, there was a tall gate of burnished silver, and behind it was a bizarre-looking building that appeared to all the world like a gigantic alembic. It was connected to a great bellows tower that spewed discolored gases into the sky, turning the clouds above an oily blue.
"The Guild of Arcanogeoeologists," said Toll."Hammerhal's foremost center of geomantic research. At the last estimate, the geomancer Val Petras has sent fifty-seven missives to the Grand Conclave, describing some threat to the ley patterns of the parch in increasing dramatic terms. Fifty-six is too many, given that the Conclave's been ignoring them."
"I remember Petras," said Callis. "Nervous little character with all the maps."
Tollis nodded. "I studied some of their findings. Most of it was beyond my grasp, and we had our own disasters to deal with at the time. But I told Petas we would hear what they said in person when the Kingswood crisis was dealt with."
Callis paused at the foot of the great gate. It was open. There was a thick, red smear across the bars. Looking down, he saw a single tattered glove with a hand still inside.
"Ah," said Toll. He had already drawn his pistol.
"Nothing is ever easy, is it?" muttered Callis, easing the gate open and wincing as it gave out a rusty creak.
Beyond was a soot-dusted garden lined with rocks and crystals of various fiery hues and shapes, arranged in loose spirals. Here and there, dowsing rods were thrust into the soil, connected by piping to strange cogwork mechanisms that clicked and whirred. A large double door led into the main building.
They passed through, Callis leading with a pistol held at the ready. Glass cases mounted upon the walls emitted a kaleidoscope of refracted colors, for each contained a glittering array of minerals, from pulsing firerocks to glittering Hyshian diamonds and globular Chamonic ore. The effect was surreal and headache-inducing.
A crash of breaking glass sounded from the floors above. Callis and Toll raised their guns, but the disturbance was followed by nothing but silence.
"After you," said Toll, gesturing towards the stairs.
Callis sighed and took the lead. They ascended to a narrow landing filled with cabinets on both sides. The looming cabinets were slightly too large, forcing him to turn sideways in order to squeeze his way through. At the far end of the hall was a door left ajar, splattered with more blood. Callis eased it open with the barrel of a pistol.
Beyond lay a room that looked like it had hosted a riot. Callis assumed it had once been an office because the floor was littered with charred scraps of papyrus and technical diagrams whose meaning escaped him. The rest of the space was taken up by display cases, heavy ironwood cabinets, and spherical bowls containing various liquid metals. Some of these had been knocked from their perch and now oozed their contents freely.
"By the comet, what is that?" said Callis, screwing up his nose. There was an acrid stench in this chamber, a chemical reek of sour, sulphurous corruption that caused his eyes to water. The floor was splattered with red mulch.
"Where is everyone?" he said.
"We're standing on them," said Toll grimly, looking down at the slimy paste sticking to his boots.
He was right, Callis saw. There were fragments of bone amidst the goo. Here, a pair of shattered spectacles. There, a pocket chronometer, still ticking.
"What in Sigmar's name happened here?" muttered Callis.
A slight ruffling sound issued from a wooden cabinet to his left. Toll met his eyes and nodded, leveling his wheelock. Callis reached down for the handle and gave it a sharp pull.
A thunderous crack and a flash of flame sent him tumbling on his back, his ears ringing. The bitter tang of blastpowder invaded his nostrils, momentarily banishing the room's foul aroma. He looked up. There, crouching in a corner of the empty cabinet, clutching a double-barrelled scattergun almost as large as they were, was Val Petras. Callis recognized the slight arcanogeologist immediately, though they looked somewhat worse for wear than the last time they had met. Petra's eyes were wide and bleary, and their clothes were caked with dried gore.
Toll stepped forward and grabbed the absurdly oversized handcannon, twisting it easily from Petras's grasp.
"Finally!" Petras squaked. "Do you know how long I've been hiding in here? Two bloody days now. Is this how long it takes the order to respond to a summons for aid? No wonder the city's gone to the pits."
"Do you want to apologize at all?" asked Callis as he staggered to his feet. "For very nearly blasting my damned head off?"
"Warning shot," Petras said, with a dismissive wave of a hand. "Well, you got here at last in any case. I assume that means our little vermin problem is dealt with."
Toll helped the scientist out of the cabinet. "And what problem would that be?"
Petras blinked at him, furrowing their thin eyebrows.
"The cursed rats!" the arcanogeologist hissed. "Fat, bloated things that swept through here like a flood, devouring all of my colleagues—worse than that—nibbling their way through several years of painstakingly assembled notes on the theoretical applications of pressurized emberstone gas."
"Rats?" said Callis, who had a soldier's hatred for those particular creatures—those invaders of trenches and spreaders of plague. "Fantastic."
"Speak quickly!" snapped Toll. "Tell me exactly what happened here."
"Well, it started with a horrible, horrible sound," said Petras. "A sort of scuttling, scampering, squeaking sound that quite disturbed us."
As if their mere words had summoned something foul from the aether, the eerie silence of the guild of arcanogeologists was broken by a sort of scuttling, squeaking sound.
"Like that?" said Callis.
"Yes, that's the one. Oh dear."
It was in the walls and in the ceiling all around them, growing in intensity by the moment. Toll grabbed Petras, and they ran, stumbling through the corridor of teetering lockers and coming to a skidding halt upon the landing. Directly opposite them, the wall bulged weirdly, plaster cracking as something forced its way loose.
"Move!" yelled Toll, and they sprinted down towards the front door. Halfway down the stairs, the plasterwork wall gave way, and vermin gushed forth like blood from a wound.
Surging towards them came a wave of gray-brown fur and thrashing tails. Callis cried out in horror and leapt over the bannister, landing awkwardly. Rats spilled over the side of the stairs, and he fired both pistols wildly as he backed away. Some of the hateful things exploded in puffs of pink mist, but he might as well have tried to shoot down a tidal wave.
"Climb, fool!" came Toll's voice, and Callis saw the witch hunter had hauled himself up onto one of the display cases on the ground floor. Petras had found their own perch, balancing precariously on a marble statue of a furious-looking arcanist and still clutching that teetering pile of parchments.
Callis scrambled into the nearest glass cabinet as dozens of tiny fangs snapped at his heels. He leapt to the next, then the next. Glass crackled and creaked, threatening to send him tumbling down to the floor, which writhed with obscene motion as the rats circled and clambered over each other. All that kept them from surging up the sides of the cabinet were its smooth, metal legs, which offered no obvious claw holds. But the vermin continued to try, getting closer and closer every time, their little eyes blazing with insane determination.
"Solutions, anyone?" shouted Callis.
"None springs to mind," said Toll, still wearing a maddeningly calm expression as his eyes scanned the chamber. "All I have on me is a flask of flash oil and about twenty bullets."
"Flash-oil!" said Petras, clicking their fingers. The arcanogeologist jabbed a skinny finger back towards the stairway, at the spherical glass orb that protruded from the wall. It contained what looked like a fist-sized chunk of white stone, veined with crimson streaks.
"Ignic sulphurite," Petras grinned, as if either of their companions had the faintest clue what that meant.
"Come again?" said Callis, teetering wildly.
"Shoot the glass!" Screamed Petras.
Callis did not hesitate. His pistol bucked in his hand and the display case shattered, the force of the gunshot sending its rocky contents clattering down amidst the surging votex of rats. Toll reached into his pocket for the vial filled with flash oil and hurled it at the white rock. Callis saw the ruby-red liquid already bubbling within its container as it whirled through the air.
It struck the ground and shattered, unleashing a sudden flash of heat and light that briefly illuminated the chamber like a Hyshian dawn. For a moment, Callis thought that was it, but then the ignic sulphurite caught fire.
Callis had once seen a stray drakebreath round set a munitions cart alight, in a million to one stroke of ill fortune. The resulting eruption had wreathed everything within a dozen meters in fire, including two-score freeguilders and an artillery battery. Toll's makeshift effort was only slightly less destructive. Sheets of flame rushed across the hall, turning hundreds of rabid vermin into living torches. By some Sigmar-granted miracle, neither Callis, Toll, nor Petras were knocked from their perches by the rush of scalding air that followed; the left side of Callis's face was scorched raw, and Toll was forced to swipe desperately at his greatcoat as its hem caught fire.
The smell of roasting rat flesh forced its way into Callis's nostrils, and he fought the urge to vomit. The floor of the chamber was a smoldering carpet of rodent corpses, piled ankle-deep. A few stragglers who had somehow escaped the incineration squeaked and skittered into cover, their appetite for human flesh temporarily absent.
"That was even more effective than I hoped," said Petras, rubbing their soot-blackened chin thoughtfully. "One can only contemplate the military applications."
"Can we contemplate them later?" said Callis. "If I know anything about rats, it's that there are always more."
"Of course!" cried Petras, leaping down from their perch into the pile of curled-up rat corpses. "I quite forgot the very reason that I summoned you. Follow me to the cartographium, would you please?"
And so they waded across the blackened chamber towards the corridor on the western side. There were more half-eaten bodies beyond. Toll stooped to examine one that was popped up against an Azyrite timepiece, his legs nibbling away at ragged stumps. The arcanogeologist had died with an expression of mild surprise on his face.
"This one was slain before they started to eat him," Toll replied.
He indicated a deep stab wound in the man's chest, right through the heart. The actual cut was astonishingly precise and thin, as if made by an oversized needle. Yet around the scar, the man's flesh blackened horribly, spiderwebs of foul corruption spreading across the torso.
"Poison," said Toll. "Not needed in this case, of course. The poor devil was dead before he hit the ground."
"Further proof that this was done by someone who knew their business," nodded Callis. "Whoever it was hit this place hard and fast and left the rats to clean up the mess."
"Come along," said Petras, hauling open a door ahead of them.
The corridor opened out into a large, vaulted hall, its walls covered in maps and diagrams depicting the known realms. There were chamonic metal etchings, tapestries of Lethisian cloth, and crystalline models that displayed the fractal continents of the Realm of Light in exquisite detail. Petras passed these by, heading for a strange device mounted on the blank wall at the far end of the cartographium. It looked to Callis like a giant beehive of hexagonal bricks, connected by a tangle of cogwork machinery to a lens directed at the wall. Some kind of image projector, he supposed.
Petras began to pull out the hexagonal blocks one by one, frowning and cursing under his breath.
"Where are they?" Petras hissed. "Where are they?"
"Where are what?" said Callis.
"This archive contained every acrano-tectonic survey ever carried out by the guild. Readings of the deepest levels of Hammerhall Aqsha and an exhaustive recording of every ley line, nexus, and front of Arcana in the Great Parch. Not to mention similarly thorough readings from our colleagues in Ghyran, Ghur, and the Chamonic heartlands. And all of it... it's all just... gone."
"I think we know what our mysterious assassins were after," said Toll.
"All this death for a bunch of maps?" said Callis.
"Maps?" squeaked Petras. "We are talking about the most exhaustive surveys of magical phenomena and reclam-wide energy fluctuations in any Sigmarite archive. We are talking about reams of priceless knowledge that it will take decades, perhaps a century or more, to replace."
"Calm down," said Toll. "You summoned us here because you had something important to tell us. Get to it."
"I had something important to show you," corrected Petras,"Arcanothermic readings taken within the last season indicating extraordinary levels of geomagical disturbance across the Great Patch, indicating a continent-wide, perhaps even realm-wide, trauma. The ley lines are on fire, Master Toll. Everywhere and all at once. I've never seen or read about the likes of it before."
Callis felt a familiar sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach.
"And someone had just slaughtered your entire guild to keep that fact a secret," he said.
Toll dragged a palm across his weary face and exhaled slowly.
"Right," he said. "The order will send a clean-up team to go over every speck of dust in this place and see if there is anything of note that our intruders missed. Meanwhile, you, Petras, are coming with us."
"Where?"
"To speak with the Conclave. I hope you have some of that knowledge stored in your head, because they need to know the scale of what we're talking about here."
I'm really getting tired of this shit, Zhou Cao thought angrily as he went across Long Island's woodlands.
This was hardly his first mission requiring wilderness travel, and it most definitely wasn't the worst—that of the forests of Lustria or the assignment leading their team into a Hammerhall sewer. Even though the others found it funny that he and his friends looked like they had just come out of a dumpster, he wasn't amused. He had to find these animals quickly because it was getting late. Either way, time was running out, so he had to find these beastmen fast.
His signature green coat, replete with silver buttons embroidered with dragons and peacock feathers, was worn over a black muscle shirt and a sleeveless, zip-up green hoodie that had been sewn together. A brown leather rope draped over both of his shoulders on his back, although its exact purpose was unclear to people who were ignorant.
Wearing a brown belt with a copper buckle, the dragonblooded wore blue jeans that were tucked into brown boots while some straps were strung around his calves and thighs. Lastly, slung across his shoulder was a large soft guitar case that rattled somewhat through the thick woods.
Right now, the kid with the brownish-black hair was searching for a beastmen encampment that one of their ally operatives had either noticed or at least reported. But all he knew was that the mission had come from the agent alone, and even Eloce seemed doubtful about the assignment's specifics.
I wonder what Heron was doing. thought Zhou as he stepped through the woods, leaves crunching under his boots. I guess it doesn't really matter where he is right now.
Zhou let out a huff through his nose as he continued through the forest. He was still not enthusiastic about the prospect of searching for an adversary that may or may not exist. Furthermore, this was beginning to resemble a wild goose chase for some pampered brats hoping to momentarily become well-known on the internet.
"Damn it all," he swore under his breath as he continued through the woods, snapping a tree branch when he stepped on it. When he arrived in the forest, or woods, as they are called, he didn't expect to find much of anything; still, he hasn't yet discovered anything significant.
There was no sign of beastmen activity—just the location, a few damaged sections, and some strange debris thrown about—or any other hint or clue. Slowly He walked to a tree and, bored of waiting, placed the guitar case close to the roots, with the dragon-blooded one sitting at the bottom. Taking his phone from his coat pocket with his left hand, he decided to examine what information Anatoly had gathered before coming here.
Quickly putting in the number, Zhou waited as the phone rang. As the other end rang, the wind started to blow through the trees, causing the leaves to rustle a bit. Glancing up, the son of the jade dragon made sure to keep his attention all around him, as beastmen had a tendency to strike when you least expected it.
"Elodi here," said a feminine voice from the speaker of Zhou's phone, bringing the teen's attention back to what he was doing.
"Elodi, I didn't think you'd be back yet." greeted Zhou as he figured that she was still healing in Azyr when he was given this mission. "I thought you'd still be in Azyr."
"I just got back a couple of days ago, Zhou," said Elodi, who had been away for a few days when the lord commander assigned him and Anatoly this task. "The Lord Celestant put me in charge of this mission until Heron got back."
"I figured a lot, and it was not surprising that you were picked to be squad leader," he stated. "In any case, I just wanted to talk to Anatoly. The informant seemed to be letting his imagination run wild. A few objects were smashed, but nothing suggested it was a beastman—or a bunch of them. I will, however, continue to search the region for anything. Have you gotten any new information on your end?"
"I found a few promising leads but nothing concrete," replied the young woman. "We're heading to the secondary reporting sighting right now."
"Sounds like you found more than what I'm doing," said Zhou disdainfully. "Anyway, we should be back by tomorrow afternoon."
"Agreed, better find a place to turn in for the night before continuing the search," suggested Elodi.
"I want to stay for a few more hours before coming back. It'll save us the trouble in covering more ground." quipped Zhou as he stood up.
"At least you're doing something most dragons of Cathay would never do: breathing in fresh air." teased Elodi.
See you back at the hotel," finished the teen as she did the same before hanging up. With the call ended, Zhou shoved the phone into his coat and grabbed his suit case. Glancing up at the sky, he could see that it was clearly getting late as the stars were shining a bit brighter now.
Zhou mumbled, "Better get moving." He'd get a decent night's sleep and resume the hunt tomorrow.
It has been a complete waste of time thus far on this endeavor.
Yet when a voice from behind him abruptly boomed, it appeared as though he was in for something quite different—far from bestial.
"Stay where you are, boy," ordered an aggressive and feminine voice.
Zhou stopped in his tracks and turned to see a very strange sight: an adolescent girl dressed entirely in silver stood directly in front of him. Boots, pants, and a silver leather jacket. But what truly caught his eye was the silver-tipped arrow, which drew back and notched like a bow. The girl herself appeared to be rather tall, with a copper-colored complexion, a slightly twisted nose, and dark brown eyes. She appeared to be in her late teens, making her a few years older than Zhou.
Zhou heard the sound of rustling leaves and turned to find more young girls approaching him with silver bows and arrows, all dressed in similar attire. With anger written as plain as day on their faces, they were all staring at the dragon-blooded. But Zhou, far from concerned, sneered and turned around in spite of the girl's admonition.
"Children. I'm surrounded by children. Children think they're the followers of Ártemis," mocked Zhou as he adjusted his hold of the guitar case. "I have no love for the moon goddess, but this is just bad comedy."
The girls seemed to bristle at the name-calling, however the girl he saw first spoke up," Why art thou here boy?" She said spitting out the word 'boy' like it was an insult.
Zhou arched an eyebrow, somewhat fascinated by the usage of archaic English. However, some Amish people did use such dialects in their speech. However, the Amish were moving away from it in favor of more contemporary English, so it was unlikely that he would meet someone from there in the near future.
"Why are you talking like an actor in a Shakespeare play?" retorted Zhou, before changing to Greek, "Tin teleftaía forá pou élenxa, oi ánthropoi to antállassan me sýnchrona angliká. Dokimáste to, ísos boréso na sas katalávo kalýtera."
The girl appeared surprised by the direct and impolite reply, but much more so when he began speaking in ancient Greek. She soon covered it up, though, by wearing an irate or furious expression. "«Próseche tous trópous sou, agóri»"
"I'll mind them when you and your sister stand down," he shot back without hesitation. The girl seemed to get more agitated with is responses, but before she could answer, Zhou spoke up, "But since it looks like your going to throw a tantrum like a child, I'll do you favor and answer your question. I'm here on a job for someone."
"What is that job you were given," demanded the girl.
"Can't tell you, sadly" he answered.
"You will tell us what it was you were hired to do," snapped the girl as she drew the arrow a bit further.
"A mouse cannot dictate order to a dragon, child," said Zhou as he frowned, "Besides, I've wasted enough time here."
With that said, he walked away from the girl and towards the edge of the circle. It was then that his instincts flared, and Zhou suddenly dove to the side. The other girls started to shoot their arrows at him; however, he proved to be more agile as he rolled across the ground, carefully flipping over the case before flipping into the air to avoid several other arrows.
Upon flipping back to his feet, Zhou leaned his head to the right just as an arrow was fired at his face. The bolt flew right by his head, missing him by millimeters as he heard the rush of air by his ear.
"So much of simple diplomacy," quipped the cathyan as he stood at the edge of the circle while the girls notched new arrows. "
With that said, Zhou dropped the case onto the ground while he reached into his coat. Upon doing so, he drew a shuriken. It was decorated with dragons and branches, its edges sharpened to well it could cut through steel.
Zhou fixed his sights on the female who was shooting at him and tossed one. The first knife was thrown, and the females scurried as the swish of the blade cut through the night air. The dragon-blooded attacked two young girls, but he quickly whirled around and unleashed two shurikens, shutting them down with ease. He acknowledged that the girls were swift, but he wasn't sure if they could respond to a supersonic shuriken. Consequently, their bows broke in two, but the platinum survived.
Two down, thought Zhou as he focused on the others, leaping back to dodge another arrow. The Asian teen retaliated by throwing a shuriken at the offender, disarming her as well. The girl he first met and the others formed a group of about thirteen, which only ten more girls to disarm.
Zhou performed a spin in the air by leaping up, dodging three arrows that were shot at him. Landing back down on the ground, he leaped into the air once more, jumping up to a tree where he leaned against the trunk and threw a shuriken at one girl. Hearing the snap of the bow let him know that she had been disarmed. Jumping away, he narrowly avoided being shot again.
During his decent, he threw another knife at a girl he spotted with an unbroken bow and quickly fixed that by taking out hers with a well-placed shot. Zhou made the decision to limit his losses after landing on the woodland floor in a roll. He and his crew were supposed to hunt down beastmen, not a group of females. He moved over to the case he had dropped, picked it up, and slung it over his shoulder after dodging another arrow by bending to the side.
"Don't think I enjoyed this little fight, because it really hasn't," drawled Zhou as he spoke to the girls. "I'm not here to fight with children. So I'll see myself out."
Turning on his heel, he sprinted away from the group. He ducked as his instincts flared again and let an arrow shoot past him. Running into the forest, heading deeper, he decided to change things up by running up the side of the tree before leaping off and towards a tree branch. Leaping from branch to branch, Zhou figured these girls weren't normal so using his dragon biology wouldn't be that big of a deal. Also, he had no intention of running into them again.
Jumping down from the trees, Zhou sprinted across the ground, over trees, and through some bushes. He felt he had put some good distance between him and his offenders. That's when another arrow hit a tree beside him.
Not bad, thought Zhou as he picked up the pace, I need to lose them.
Looking around for anything he could use, he spotted a large cliff face near his position. Breaking off in that direction, Zhou ran full pelt towards the rock wall. He had a plan, he just wasn't sure how smart it was. He knew, from where he was, his motorcycle wasn't that far away and he figured that he was fast enough to avoid being crushed by his pretty crazy plan.
Leaping out of the bushes, Zhou ran towards the cliff face. He paused a few feet to the side, whirled around, and channeled the elemental winds into his could feel the sacred energies that define the nature of the mortal world, all around him, even in the approaching girls. The unmistakable silver-clad females emerged from the trees, all with angry looks; those with broken weapons carried knives, while the others leveled their bows at him.
"Bout time you showed up, I was thinking that
"There is nowhere, you can run, boy," snapped the girl he spoke with as she aimed her bow at Zhou.
"A Hunter should always be aware of ones surroundings. For he, would in turn, be the hunted. " Zhou said ominously, clenching his fist. He channeled the elemental energies from the winds of magic into his right hand. His eyes flickered with pure raw magic within his palm for a split second before he tightened his fist.
The end outcome was that the entire cliff face crumbled.
A large amount of debris began to descend towards the group. The females all backed off while Zhou remained in position.
The debris that fell around him emitted a dense plume of dust into the air, which served as an optimal cover for him to flee. Zhou launched himself into the air, using his increased strength and reflexes to launch himself from boulder-sized rock fragments and start climbing. Even though it just took a moment, he had plenty of time to get away from the females and reach the edge of the cliff. Zhou turned to find he had enough cover to flee as the heavy cloud of dust blanketed much of the area.
"May we never meet again, young huntress."
Zoe was far from happy as she and her sisters recovered from the cliff collapse. To summarize what just happened, not only had a male managed to escape them, he also disarmed nearly half of herself with throwing knives. The fact that a male had bested them in two aspects was unacceptable, but he also seemed to know he was better than her as well. She could not allow this. She could not allow a man to be better than her.
When she told them to search the area, the other hunteresses did so, looking for anything, even his body among the rubble. But they found nothing, and the dust cloud blocked any tracks they could have used to find him.
The use of his magic and his raw, incredible power led her to believe that the boy was a son of Hecate, but that did not suit the case he carried with him. Also, his facial features were all wrong, as he did not appear to be a child of Hecate. His eyes were wood brown, and his skin was soft white. Not to mention his hair was flame-red.
With nothing more to do, she had only one option, and that was to return to camp and inform Lady Artemis of this child's escape.
If this half-blood was unaware of his heritage, then he would be wondering around, attracting monsters left and right.
Zoe found Artemis in her tent, cleaning her weapons. The goddess looked up at her lieutenant.
"Yes, Zoe, what is it?" she said, standing up.
Zoe began to explain all that happened with the boy she encountered and her theories behind the boy.
"How old did this boy look?" Artemis said this after Zoe was done with her recount.
"He stood over six feet tall—early teens, I could say," she answered.
Artemis thought it over in her head. "If he started attracting monsters at twelve like normal half-bloods, then he has been serving on his own for at least years. It is a shame he is not a girl; he might have made an excellent hunter."
"What are we going to do, Lady Artemis?" Zoe asked, shifting her weight.
"You said he escaped when he brought down the cliff. That would cover all tracks and his scent, but you said he was doing a mission, so that must mean he is still in the area in order to complete it before leaving."
Artemis then looks at Zoe and says, "Tell the others we are moving and that we have a boy to track down. We will drag him to camp half-blood if we have to."
"I'd just had this jacket cleaned this morning," muttered Zhou bitterly as he trudged through the forest once more, this time heading back to his motorcycle.
When he hauled down the section of the cliff, he was totally coated in dust; in retrospect, he was focusing more on escaping the pissed-off girls than being clean. However, at the moment, he looked more like a Tilean art piece, so he was brushing dirt off his coat, face, and hair.
He and his team still had work to do, even though the fake hunters may have slowed him down. Plus, he was too proud to fail just because of a few ladies, being a dragon and all. He had a feeling that the beastmen were still in the area. He figured he'd pick up the trail tomorrow, as it was around midnight. He's wasted enough time as it is; he didn't need to put it off for longer.
However, it seemed like fate had other ideas.
Upon reaching the parking lot where he had his motorcycle parked, Zhou stopped in his tracks as he felt his senses screaming at him that something dangerous was coming. He had a strong suspicion that there were some beastmen still around. It looks like he was right. Glancing at the edge of the park, the Cathayan spotted three women approaching him with hungry looks in their eyes.
"Can I help you three lovely ladies?" addressed Zhou as he narrowed his eyes.
"So a demigod decided that it was safe to wander away from your little camp and not run into any trouble," the woman in the middle said, an older lady with black hair and a green dress on.
"Demigod?" repeated Zhou as he raised an eyebrow, having never heard that one before. Are they talking about his dragon half? If so, then how di-ah of course?
"You three are not humans, are you?"
"Just because one of your parents is a god does not mean you now own the place," the one beside her hissed; this one was in a red dress.
"I never claimed my family members to own these lands," said Zhou. "And who said that my parent is a god?"
"Why are we bothering with talking to him? Let's just eat him; he barely smells like one. I bet he's just a descendant of one," the last one said, this one in a blue dress.
Zhou said nothing, knowing they were talking amongst themselves rather than him when they didn't address what he was saying. However, he knew better than to think these ladies were anything but human. That much was proven when the women suddenly started to transform.
The parts of their bodies shifted and transformed into serpent-like tails, while the upper part remained somewhat the same. However, their tongues flicked out, similar to actual snakes, tasting the air. Their scales were of similar colors to the dresses they wore, as was their hair.
While they may look intimidating to a normal person, Zhou only raised an eyebrow as he gave them a once-over.
"That all?" asked Zhou, clearly unimpressed.
"Perhaps you should come closer and find out," hissed one of the snakes.
"Well then," smirked Zhou as he reached over his shoulder to the suitcase. Unzipping the top, he reached in and withdrew three swords while the case fell to the ground. "Let's get down to business."
He held a Tang Dao sword in his hands, which looked a lot like a katana, a Japanese sword used by samurai. But his weapons were a cross between a Dao and a Jian; they were single-edged, straight swords that worked well in both mounted and foot combat. But the most prominent feature was the Chinese carvings etched in pure jade into the blade, which looked similar to a roaring dragon.
The snakes seemed to be tense at the weapons, which was all Zhou needed to really get inside their heads. Flipping the sword, I planted the tip in the ground. "If you snakes want your prey, then you have to work for it."
To add emphasis, he gripped the handle. From the small carvings on the flat end of the sword, a glow shot out of the blade, dosing the wielder in an eerily green glow briefly. This was one of Zhou's signature swords: his right fang. The snakes seemed to gawk at the revelation of such a weapon. However, they quickly hid their surprise under a veil of arrogance.
"Do you think that mortal weapon can harm us?" challenged the blue snake.
"Let's put that to the test, shall we?" said Zhou ominously.
Faster than the snakes could blink, he lunged right at them by surprise. The snake that challenged him first was the first, having her head sliced right off when Zhou swung his fangs at her. The lifeless body fell to the ground as he passed and landed a few yards away.
Spinning around, he lunged at the red snake, which was just barely able to slither out of the way when he brought his sword down. The bladed weapon, slicing into the asphalt of the parking lot, surprised the snake by cracking it. However, Zhou didn't let up, as he chased after his prey like a bloodhound. Zhou raised his fangs again and severed the snake's tail with both hands, removing a significant portion of it.
The snake cried out in anguish, but Zhou swiftly silenced it by piercing her back with his sword. Her carcass, like the last snake's, dropped dead onto the ground. After dealing with the first two dangers, Zhou moved on to the final issue. He smirked maliciously at the snake and softly placed his fang on his shoulder.
The green snake looked afraid and sought to leave, but Zhou jumped after her and sank her tail into the earth before she could go very far. The blade pierced her tail, and she screamed in agony. After ripping the blade, Zhou walked up to the snake. When Zhou swung his sword with one hand, she whirled around and raised her left hand, only to see it severed. The snake yelled out in despair, clutching the stub of her right hand.
Zhou then kicked her over and pinned the snake under his foot as he raised his fang to finish her off.
"No! Please!" begged the creature.
Then Zhou says, "How many times did you show mercy to the people who begged for their lives?"
The snake woman halted briefly, frightened. She tried frantically to recall all the humans and demigods she had murdered throughout the years, but couldn't think of a single one she had spared, so she said, "Never." And with a lightning-fast gesture, Zhou cuts her head from her body.
And like that, the fight was over; silence shrouded the entire parking lot. The only sound is his own labored breaths. Pulling out his smart phone from his coat, Zhou punched the numbers for a clean-up crew. The last thing he wanted was for anyone to discover the bodies of three sliced-up 'innocent' women on the five-clock news.
Surprisingly, though, these snakes were easy to slay. It was a bit disappointing, to say the least.
Autopsy is going to have a field day with these three. Hopefully, the Great Library of Sigmaron's archivists will be able to identify these beasts's origins.
But what was the snake referring to him as? A demigod? No. He wasn't one of the Stormcast eternals, according to his most recent check. He was not dead. His father, on the other hand, is a dragon from Grand Cathay. However, this does not explain why she called him a demigod.
So the snake woman may have confused him for someone else, didn't she?
The teen was silent for a moment: first he ran into a brigade of female archers that seemed to have a very distant dislike of men, then he ran into a monster from Achron. So far, this mission has given him more questions than answers, and none of them relate to the beastmen he and his team were responsible for finding and destroying.
Then Zhou shook his head, irritated by his thoughts. He has a goal to finish, not to solve puzzles.
"What in the Dragon Emperor is going on in this realm?"
IvanFabulous: Yes Hades sent the Minotaur however the bolt of lighting is from Zeus as to why I have no idea. As for the Soulbound Sadly their not soulboud sadly, I want to tell ya but I don't want any spoilers.
Sunwolf27: The Boltstorm pistol is a a crossbow bolt but shoots crackling missiles.
TalkativeLurker: It's a pistol and crossbow mashed together.
The Disgusting one: I saw the problems fixing them right know.
Here's a translation to what Zhou and Zoe said to each other.
"Last time I checked, people these days traded that out for modern english. Try it, I might be able to understand you better."
"Mind your manners, boy."