The Human Hunter Kizzel (3)
The forest was dense. The forest of red-wood trees where Akasa had been was also dense, of course, but compared to the towering giants there, the trees here were smaller and grew so close together that their roots were tangled in a messy, sparse web. The canopy was so thick that light barely filtered through. Akasa felt a sense of suffocation from the heat that refused to dissipate.
Then, Hisoral spoke.
“Stay close to me at all times, Asdin.”
The concerns of the two elders blended together. Of course, in this context, Urnil’s words meant, ‘I am monitoring Hisoral’s direction.’
Even in the dark forest, it was still broad daylight, bright enough for the sun to shine through. That was enough. Even with such poor visibility, Hisoral unleashed his remarkable observational skills without reservation. Having tracked the difference between wolf and human trails, the two began to steer clear of the wolf tracks entirely from a certain point on. Yet, signs of them were visible everywhere.
Hisoral said in a worried tone,
“If we keep going like this, we might run into the wolves.”
“What about Kizzel’s trail?”
“It’s ambiguous. It’s becoming more sporadic. At first, it was consistent, but as we approached the forest... as we went deeper inside, it’s becoming harder to find. It’s as if he’s trying to make us lose our way on purpose...”
Suddenly, Hisoral’s complexion hardened like stone.
‘On purpose...?’
“Don’t tell me, this is a trap...!”
Awoooooooo!
As if to mock them for only just realizing it, the wolves—who had been suppressing their howls, killing even their instincts—began to sing the prelude to a funeral dirge in unison.
Deep within the darkness of the forest, glowing eyes like will-o'-the-wisps appeared. Seeing that gaze, which demanded the death of those who beheld it, Hisoral shouted urgently,
“Run, Asdin!”
“Let’s run together!”
“I will create an escape route!”
“Forget that, just hurry!”
Akasa’s movement as he retraced his steps was incredibly agile. Seeing that movement for a fleeting moment, a defiant smirk tugged at the corners of Hisoral’s mouth.
“Alright, let’s see you run!”
“Grrr!”
“You cur!”
Hisoral struck the head of a wolf that was lunging at him with his Cheom-geom (piercing sword). There was a sound of bone breaking against the thin metal. Stomping hard on the head of the wolf whose nose was dangling, Hisoral chased after Akasa.
A man was hiding in the darkness of the forest, watching the fugitives with a thick, viscous laugh.
As the man gestured lightly, a wolf appeared to his left from the shadows.
Awoooooo!
As if that were the signal. The wolves began to form a siege.
The hunt had begun.
He eats people. Kizzel always thought so. Cannibalism was enjoyable. There was no particular reason why he had come to hold such values.
Seeking higher-quality food for survival was the basic qualification of all Exiliers. On the other hand, the value of moral norms plummeted in an environment defined by wild survival. When Kizzel’s cannibalistic habits were linked to morality, morality finally devolved into something worthless.
To Kizzel, morality was merely a tool to lure children and women.
And Kizzel believed without a doubt that his own vile brain, which had utilized morality, was his greatest asset.
“Go. Wolves. Drive the prey to me.”
Kizzel said this while tapping the stick in his hand against a nearby tree. It wasn't words, but the collision sound of the wooden stick that served as the signal. That signal was saying:
‘You may kill the adult.’
The positions of hunter and prey had reversed. Kizzel felt an indescribable joy at that fact. Kizzel knew there was someone chasing him from Sobaran. No hunter tracks a cub without being wary of its parents.
To Kizzel, hunting was also a realm of such precarious aesthetics. There were renowned figures even among the Exiliers. However, even among those with excellent aesthetic sense, there were more people who did not understand his tastes.
Kizzel thought that was truly a pity.
Now, all that remained for him was the work of making the hunter the greatest of all. Hunting the beast that had entered the jaws of death to find the enemy of its cub.
That beast was none other than a human.
Kizzel never thought he would fail. It had happened occasionally, and each time, Kizzel would ruminate on his success and refine his vileness.
Except for the wolves that had run off, a wolf with a broken nose and upper jaw approached, whimpering. Kizzel watched it with emotionless eyes before casually striking the wolf’s head with his stick.
“Yelp! Yelp!”
The wolf, overcome with pain, collapsed, shivered once, and then went limp. Kizzel, who pushed the motionless wolf away with his foot, slowly followed the tracks of the two pieces of prey.
The prey he was chasing this time was that precious, rare Cellabrisian. Kizzel’s eyes, which never wanted to lose his prey, shone viciously.
[Run! Akasa!]
Akasa ran without rest, gasping for air. Inappropriately for such a situation, Akasa’s head was filled with the thought that he was being chased by all sorts of things in his life.
‘Soldiers, fish, Exiliers. And now wolves...!’
“Woof! Woof! Woof!”
The wolves followed, barking loudly. It felt like they would leap from behind at any moment to take the slender boy’s neck. But there was a reason the wolves couldn't do so.
“Get lost!”
Hisoral had jumped in, swinging his Cheom-geom fiercely. The former Branch Head, a martial priest who had spent his whole life training in the temple’s martial arts, guarded the boy’s back.
Even while protecting Akasa, who was running with a body whose Essence had been activated by Urnil’s help, he never fell more than a certain distance away, keeping Akasa safe.
In his eyes, one could even glimpse burning rage and tenacity.
“Back off! You filthy beasts!”
Hisoral shouted savagely and swung his Cheom-geom. It was a voice imbued with the power of Essence, however faint. While the wolves flinched for a brief moment, Hisoral struck one of the wolf’s ears. Despite having no blade, the fierce sword strike left one of the nearby wolf’s ears tattered.
“Yelp!”
One retreated like that, but three others stepped forward, baring their sharp teeth.
Hisoral thought,
‘One second. I just need to buy one more second.’
His goal was revenge. But now, in such a desperate situation, he was thinking about how to keep the boy alive.
He had seen a stranger in a forest where even an adult would struggle to survive, but it was a boy who wielded a staff, not a sword. In Hisoral’s eyes, Asdin overlapped with the boy he had once lost.
“Child, I will never let you die!”
Hisoral burned with desperate will and threw his body forward. He drew upon the faint, meager Essence he had when needed. It was a very delicate, and therefore very difficult, task.
When a wolf lunged, Hisoral narrowly dodged it and put his sword into the rotation of his body. The wolf’s flank, caught by the tip of the sword, was torn open.
Leaving the wolf writhing in pain behind him, Hisoral checked Akasa’s position out of the corner of his eye and followed. Half a beat late, the wolves pursued closely. At that very moment, Hisoral jumped to the left, passing a tree as big as himself.
A blind spot suddenly appeared. The wolf that had been lunging for his neck, contrary to its original intent, inevitably had to reveal itself on Hisoral’s right flank.
Not missing that gap, Hisoral thrust his sword. True to the name Cheom-geom (piercing sword), the wolf was skewered from its eye to its chest.
Hisoral pulled out his sword and ran again. There were two left.
During those few short seconds, Hisoral was burning his life as fuel, pouring in the resentment of the past few years.
Then, Hisoral felt a chilling sensation. It was a feeling he had felt once before. The terrible sense of loss that had plunged his heart into the abyss. Death was approaching.
It was not aimed at him, but once again at what he was trying to protect.
“Child!”
One wolf was racing fiercely toward Akasa. While he was dealing with the one that had appeared from beside the tree, the other had already run ahead through the dense shrubs on the left.
The boy’s speed was fast for his age thanks to the artifact. But he could never match the wolf’s main force.
Hisoral knew he was at an important crossroads.
‘Is my revenge important? Even if the child dies for it?’
No choice was needed. The answer was already decided.
In less than a split second, Hisoral was already holding his Cheom-geom backward.
Above his head, over his shoulder, the muscles of his trained arm, pulled back to the limit, swelled taut. It was the posture of a javelin throw, not a sword throw. To him, who had made the sword his calling, throwing a sword was by no means a familiar method.
But it was the only way now.
Hisoral didn't usually pray much to the founder of the temple he served. But at this moment, he prayed to Toncel, the great monkey who had awakened the wind through Essence.
That his sword would accurately pierce the targeted enemy.
“Master of the Wind!”
A faint handful of Essence exploded from his hand. And Hisoral wore a smile full of ecstasy. His sword accurately pierced the target. The boy was moving away.
Crunch!
And through the other shape that still remained, death arrived.
“Mister—!”
Hearing the boy’s desperate scream, Hisoral felt his consciousness fading. Strangely enough, it was a very comfortable feeling.
Akasa’s jaw trembled in disbelief at the situation. The moment he thought the sound of the wolf’s footsteps was getting closer from behind, he heard the sound of a giant lump of meat hitting the ground. In Akasa’s eyes, looking back in surprise, he saw something familiar piercing the fallen wolf.
Beyond the coarse fur of the corpse, he saw the adult who had been laughing heartily until just a moment ago falling with a face that was no different from then.
“Mister—!”
The remaining wolf was mercilessly biting into Hisoral’s neck. He had been living only to avoid his own death. In the eyes of such a boy, there was the figure of a person who had died protecting him.
Akasa, who had braked his running, stopped to go back. But his feet were trembling and wouldn't move. The moment his gaze fixed on Hisoral again, Akasa’s mind went blank.
[Akasa!]
There was no response. Urnil poured out Essence to shake the boy’s mind. The boy’s eyes, streaming with tears, widened.
“Ur, Urnil?”
[We must go! Hurry!]
“But! Hisoral, the mister...!”
Akasa stopped running and turned back. That gaze was by no means the gaze of someone calmly judging the situation. His pupils were dilated.
“I have to save him. I have to take the sword. He can still live!”
Once again, Urnil poured out Essence to shake the boy’s brain.
[Get a grip! It’s already too late!]
The boy’s eyes turned toward the bracelet.
“Urnil...?”
[It is to keep you alive! If you really think of him, move!]
Akasa bit his lip until his thin cheeks hardened, turned back, and began to run again. The Essence Urnil bestowed allowed him to run without rest, even though he was running so hard and crying at the same time.
So Akasa cried while running.
“I’m sorry, mister. I’m sorry...”
When he was a prince, he had taken it for granted without even being conscious of it. The escort of soldiers for royalty. There was no injustice in receiving their service.
[Cross the valley! If you cross where the water is deep, the wolves won't be able to follow you right away!]
But at this moment, Akasa realized how desperate such sacrifices, how desperate their duties were. The death of an adult who had come closest to the boy left an indelible scar on him.
However, there was no time to be sad about it.
The hunter had not yet given up on his prey.
Akasa crossed the valley, entrusting himself to Urnil’s cold advice, which ruthlessly crushed his own will.
Kizzel watched the boy running away in the distance, smacking his lips. Kizzel thought about hitting his stick to give an order to the one remaining wolf, but he soon remembered that he had kept the wolves starving for quite a long time. Kizzel tore off a tattered piece of flesh from the neck of the mangled martial priest and chewed on it. Eating the meat of the prey is the hunter’s right. Kizzel drew a satisfied smile.
“As expected, it gives me strength.”
Kizzel captured the outline of the boy running away in the distance with his even more enhanced vision. And he took the scent into his nose, and the stride and breathing into his ears.
This was the reason he could never quit his cannibalistic acts. Human meat played the role of temporarily boosting his abilities as a hunter, at least for Kizzel. And that duration was more than enough time to track the targeted prey.
“It’s tougher than children or women’s meat. But not bad.”
However, Kizzel capriciously spat out the piece of flesh he had been chewing.
“Still, it’s a bit tough. As expected, children or women are better.”
Kizzel turned his gaze from the scenery of the forest spread out in the distance to the wolf.
“You nasty hunting dog. Your companions are all dead, yet you eat your fill alone.”
That was an insult, but also a compliment. Wasn't he also using these wolves as bait to hunt and eat people? Kizzel, laughing as if scratching his throat, let his eyes shine.
“I’ll come catch you soon.”
The sun was setting.