Since the inn where Seraphine had stayed was located outside the city, she didn't have to run through back alleys, but could easily escape into the forest. And if there was one place where she felt at home, it wasn't in some dirty alleyway full of rubbish and tramps, but deep in the forest. Her hunting ground!
Skillfully, she sprinted between trees, over roots and rocks, without stumbling even once. She had been hunted through forests far too many times before by creatures a thousand times more dangerous than any human. She was fairly certain that whoever was hunting her was a member of the Order. This was rather unfortunate, as the Order was no ordinary cult of fanatics, but a fairly large organisation deeply rooted in the power structures. Despite the Church's desperate attempts to eradicate all traces of the Order from Henit, the Order's heretical ideas spread like wildfire. She hadn't expected the Order to hunt her so desperately that they would actually attack a Kaeladon in broad daylight.
For a short while, she could still hear footsteps behind her, but how could they possibly keep up with a Kaeladon? Only ten minutes later, she had completely shaken them off. Still, she kept running for a while longer. After about half an hour of full sprint, she finally stopped. She was breathing a bit heavier, but her stamina was still good. She looked around, but she had no idea where she was. She tried to get her bearings, but reading the stars had never been her strength. She had taken so many turns to confuse her pursuers that she had completely lost her sense of direction.
"If I'm not mistaken, it should be that way…" she muttered, and started walking. She took a curved path so she wouldn't run straight into her pursuers. It would take her longer that way, but it was safer.
After about an hour of walking, she was just passing a tree when she saw Jester sitting on the ground, his hat pulled low over his face. He was holding a knife in one hand, playing with it. In his other hand, he had the severed remains of a human arm. He looked up as Seraphine approached and held the arm out to her, his grin even wider than usual.
"Had your fun?" Seraphine asked him. Jester nodded as he stood up and began to follow her stride. He opened a pouch on his coat and proudly pulled out a new eye for his collection: a blue eye, still streaked with blood.
"You took an arm and an eye?"
Jester nodded excitedly, but Seraphine looked at him sternly. "You can't carry that arm around with you. What do you think people will say if a severed arm suddenly floats next to me? They will burn me as a witch without a second thought. Unless you can make it disappear into one of your pockets, you'll have to leave it here!"
Jester slumped his shoulders and lowered his head, then, after a short pause, threw the arm away. He looked at Seraphine, probably trying to pout, but without lips or eyes, it was hard to tell what mood this weirdo was in.
Seraphine rolled her eyes. "Stop sulking and be useful for once. You don't happen to know where the main road is, do you?"
Jester tilted his head to the side, thinking for a moment, then nodded and pointed east, in a direction different from the one Seraphine had been going.
She frowned. "Are you sure?" she asked.
Jester just shrugged and grinned as if to say: You'll have to find out.
She sighed, but since she had no better idea, she followed the direction he had shown her. Jester trotted alongside her, and the further they went, the wider his grin grew.
Seraphine knew better than to trust this lazy blockhead, and as it turned out, she was right to distrust him, as five minutes later a loud, inhuman cry echoed through the forest. It didn't belong to any wildlife typically found in these woods.
Seraphine grinned back, "Aha, so you probably want me to go there?" Jester nodded vigorously. Seraphine wouldn't have been surprised if he had started jumping up and down. Seraphine thought about it for a moment. She didn't believe Jester wanted to kill her; he had been following her for too long for that. But what else was up ahead that had him so excited?
"All right," she muttered, "but afterwards you'll show me the real way out of here!"
Jester nodded even harder and pressed his hands together like taking an oath.
"Fine then…" Seraphine muttered. The fighting spirit had taken hold of her; she had never been the type to run away from a fight. Especially when it might involve a monster.
Slowly, she drew her sword and crept closer to the sound. Another roar tore through the trees, followed by a strange noise. It could have been the scream of a human, but it sounded… wrong.
Seraphine's curiosity was now fully awakened as she approached further. Then finally, she could see what was happening.
A figure lay on the ground, curled up. It was bleeding heavily and seemed unconscious. Towering over the figure was a massive ape, but it wasn't a normal ape. Its eyes were the color of amber, huge tusks grew upward from its jaw, and saliva dripped from its mouth. It was muscular, and horns grew from its skull, spiraling upward like twisted branches, each at least a meter long. The creature itself stood about three meters tall. Its fur was black, but on its back she could clearly see stumps where wings must have once been.
Seraphine recognized immediately that it had to be a Pythenekteris, or for short, a Pythe. It was a creature from the Abyss, though normally they had huge bat-like wings on their backs.
"Looks like he was banished from his tribe…" Seraphine murmured as she observed the creature. When a Pythe was banished, its wings were ripped out so it could never return to its nest. That's why one usually only saw the wingless ones. The rest stayed hidden in their nests deep in the Abyss.
She drew her silver sword and stepped into the clearing. "Hey, ugly ape!" she called out and fired a crossbow bolt. The bolt struck the Pythe right in the back, sinking deep into its flesh.
The ape, who had just been about to crush the figure on the ground, roared furiously and looked around. When it spotted Seraphine, it let out another roar of rage. How dare this human interrupt his hunt?
With one massive arm, it swung at Seraphine, intending to kill her in a single blow, but she ducked under the strike, moving closer to the Pythe. She had already loaded another bolt and fired again. She had aimed for the giant's eye, but the ape raised its hand, and the bolt buried itself in its palm instead. The silver arrowhead immediately started to burn his flesh as it pierced almost completely through his hand.
The creature did not find this amusing at all and roared with rage as he began to fall into a frenzy. It swung again at Seraphine, who skillfully jumped to the side, dodging the blow.
Seraphine leapt to her feet and started running. She let the crossbow drop back onto its strap. The Pythe growled and struck again, but she rolled aside. The blow hit the ground hard, and when it saw that Seraphine had dodged again, it turned its whole body and began smashing wildly with both hands. Like an annoying insect, Seraphine slipped past every strike with swift movements.
Finally, she reached the creature's side. She swung her silver sword, cutting a deep line into the beast's flesh, but she didn't stop moving. Instead, she kept running along its side. Blood sprayed from the wound. Seraphine tried to avoid being splattered while cutting wound after wound into the massive body. The creature desperately tried to crush her, but like almost all dark beings, Seraphine's silver blade caused terrible injuries that smoked and burned upon contact.
Finally, it dawned on Pythe's slow brain that Seraphine might not be a normal human being. The longer the fight went on, the more wounds formed on Pythe's skin, while Seraphine skilfully dodged every blow. She dodged the next blow, rolled under Pythe, a nd stabbed him in the back of the knee with her sword. Then she jumped back up immediately, but she had been a little too slow. The Pythe's hand only grazed Seraphine lightly, but the blow was powerful enough to catapult her almost across the entire clearing.
Seraphine spat blood, a burning pain spreading through her stomach. Seraphine had made only one mistake, but it had almost cost her her life. That was the frightening truth of fighting creatures of darkness.
Nevertheless, she got up without showing any emotion. She picked up her sword from the ground and looked at the pythe with cold black eyes. He felt an incredible fear of death. In fact, to Seraphine's surprise, the oversized ape turned around and fled! He actually fled!
'Fuck!'
Seraphine cursed angrily as she ran after him, but luckily for her, the Pythe was now badly injured. She could never catch up with an uninjured Pythe, but this one was limping.
She easily caught up. She leapt onto its back and grabbed hold of its horns.
Seraphine jumped and grabbed one of the horns growing out of the monkey's back. She pulled herself up with ease and began to climb the Pythe.
The Pythe noticed her now. He began shaking violently, trying to get rid of her, but Seraphine rammed her sword into its spine, wedging it between the horns to hold herself steady. The Pythe let out a pitiful screech. It began spinning wildly around its own axis, lashing out at Seraphine. But its own horns prevented it from reaching her.
She used her sword as a springboard as she jumped to the next horn, and then the next, and the next. Seraphine took the long silver chain from her belt pouch when she finally reached the neck. She swung back, threw the chain around the neck like a lasso, and pulled. She pulled hard, the silver burning where it touched the creature's skin.
Seraphine held on with all her strength as the beast began to choke. The Pythe stumbled forward, desperately trying to grab her.
But in the end, it wasn't Seraphine who defeated the creature; it was the rising sun. As the first rays spread across the forest, piercing through the canopy, they touched the Pythe's fur, and it began to burn instantly.
Seraphine grabbed her chain. She pulled it back and deftly jumped towards her sword. The pythe staggered forward, its entire fur burning. She violently ripped her sword out of its back, jumping to the ground in the process. She cautiously distanced herself from the Pythe and watched as the monkey struggled in its death throes.
It let out a deafening scream, nothing like its proud roar. The light of Deius caused this creature the greatest pain. Less than a minute later, the Pythe fell lifeless onto its back, lifted up by its own horns like pillars.
The Pythe gave one last pitiful cry before finally dying. Black smoke billowed as the remains slowly burned. Seraphine acted fast.
She sprinted to the head of the Pythe and looked him in the eyes.
She could clearly see shock in his eyes, as if something had surprised him. But Seraphine didn't think about it; instead, she drove her sword into the monster's eye socket. Seraphine cut the eyeball free and carefully placed it in a leather pouch. That was her trophy.
She smiled with satisfaction. It was clearly a young Pythe, but even those were worth at least seventeen silver coins. She turned around and saw her good old, very own house ghoul kneeling by the figure on the ground, poking it with one finger. She rolled her eyes as she sheathed her sword, adjusted her crossbow properly, and started walking back through the ruined path.
She looked up at the rising sun. A frown creased her brow. She hadn't realised it was so early already.
"Why was the Pythe still outside its den so close to sunrise?" she muttered to herself. Pythe weren't particularly intelligent among Abyssal creatures, but they were still smarter than ordinary animals. They usually realised how dangerous the sun was for them and had a very good sense of time. That was why most of these creatures only appeared at night, except for a few strange mutations, like the Metamorphs, or as they are called in common parlance: shape-shifters.
Seraphine's thoughts were interrupted when she reached Jester. He was still kneeling beside the person on the ground.
"You knew about the Pythe, didn't you?"
Jester only shrugged and feigned innocence, but Seraphine had been followed by the creature for quite some time now. Jester knew exactly what was going on, so why had he wanted her to save this person? Seraphine didn't believe he had suddenly turned kind-hearted; that would be too absurd, even for this strange creature. But Jester was an exception himself. Every ghoul she had encountered before burned at the slightest touch of the sun, but Jester never seemed to care about the golden light.
"What are you?" she asked, more to herself than to Jester, who only grinned wider, as always giving no answer.
But she couldn't probe further, because her attention was abruptly drawn to the person on the ground, who began to move. And faster than Seraphine had expected. One second it was lying motionless on the ground, the next second the figure jumped up and shouted something. It was a word that Seraphine's mind couldn't comprehend.
Immediately, the world around her began to darken and spin. Magic!