Hudson's POV:
I slowly emerged from the tent, each step heavy with the weight of my own transformation. Dread coiled within me like a living thing, but I forced it down, steeling myself with the cold resolve of what had to be done. The blood dripping from my fingertips felt like a physical manifestation of the darkness seeping into my soul. My gaze wandered, almost unwillingly, to the source of the commotion. My breath hitched as my eyes locked onto the twins, both battered and bruised, their garments torn in a way that sent a jolt of terror through me. The thought that someone might have taken advantage of the chaos, that they had been assaulted, made my blood run cold. All my doubt, all my regret, melted away in that moment, replaced by a burning rage that ignited every fibre of my being.
I forced myself to analyse their injuries, my mind a ruthless machine despite the storm raging inside me. I needed to ensure they could survive, to reassure myself that they were still with me, still breathing. My lips curled into a small, almost unnatural smile, a futile attempt to offer them courage when I had none left for myself.
But there was no time for hesitation, no time to process the horror that had been inflicted upon them. I threw back my head and unleashed a deafening roar, a primal cry that shattered the night and made the crowd slowly turn their heads towards me. With a devilish grin twisting my features, I charged into what could very well be my final battle.
Predatorial Vision was a marvel, a cruel gift that slowed time to a crawl, forcing me to witness every grotesque detail of the slaughter. As I plunged into the enemy ranks, the world around me seemed to warp, each movement hyper-focused, each strike a calculated effort to stay alive. But my fighting style wasn't about survival, it was about destruction. Most sought the most effective victory; I craved the quickest, the most brutal. My movements were like a deranged dance on a tightrope, where one misstep would send me plummeting into the abyss. The enemies were weak, but their numbers were overwhelming, a tide of bodies that threatened to drown me.
Parrying blows would waste precious time, so I let the minor strike land, each cut a reminder of my humanity, of the fragility I despised. Every swing of my blade brought down another foe, the resistance of flesh against steel barely registering anymore. I was relieved that the army focused on me, a perverse gratitude that allowed Rebecca to pick off the enemies with little difficulty. But for every enemy slain, two more took their place.
The battle was endless, a suffocating nightmare of blood and screams, and the excitement I once felt slowly gave way to a deep, gnawing despair. I was drowning in the blood of my enemies, and the realisation twisted something inside me. But I knew, I knew, these people were in the same predicament. Nothing is more terrifying than a single being capable of slaughtering dozens of men. I needed help. I needed support.
As if by some cruel miracle, my final party member entered the fray, flanking the army from the east. The enemy forces split, but it didn't bring the relief I so desperately needed. Vultures circled above, their presence a grim omen of death, a reminder of the end that awaited me. I wanted to give in, to let the abyss swallow me whole. My muscles screamed with every swing, my eyes burned with every passing second, and the manic grin that had once felt natural now began to falter, cracking under the weight of reality. The pain was almost unbearable. Then, as if by divine intervention, the pain suddenly vanished.
Beep!
You have been blessed by a Healer.
Another miracle, another thread of hope in the darkness. The pain was gone, but the fatigue remained, a leaden weight dragging me down. With every passing moment, my body slowed, each movement becoming more laborious, more strained. I had no choice, I risked everything, fueling myself with instinct, temporarily forgetting who I was. "17…18…19" I counted, the words a lifeline in the chaos, the only thing keeping me from spiralling into complete madness.
A laugh escaped my lips, a hollow, bitter sound. With every swing, I descended further into madness, a downward spiral of destruction.
Beep!
I ignored the message, its importance drowned out by the overpowering need to destroy, to kill. The only thing that mattered now was the annihilation of anything that moved. I didn't care who, anyone alive was a threat, a target for the wrath that consumed me. I saw everything. The deeper I plunged into their ranks, the stronger the enemies became. To think I had struggled with mere pawns, how laughable. I was better than this. I was better than all of them!
My madness consumed me, sharpening my vision until the world around me crystallised into a grotesque clarity. It was as if my mind had transcended the frailties of the flesh, granting me a sinister understanding of the battlefield's rhythm.
Every breath, every slight shift in the air, every twitch of muscle fibre became a vivid prelude to the inevitable strike. They thought their feints could deceive me, but I saw through them as if they were moving through treacle, their intentions laid bare like an open book. I anticipated their every move, my perception slicing through the fog of war with razor precision.
I could see the fear in their eyes, masked behind bravado. How laughable it was, their futile attempts to best me, to corner me, to defeat the man I had become. A low chuckle escaped my lips, tinged with a madness that echoed in my skull like a deranged symphony. How dare they think they could stop me? Me? I am Hudson Mitchell, being far superior to them, an apex predator among feeble prey. I revelled in the carnage, the chaos, in the way their blades sang past me, unable to touch what they could no longer understand.
But with each victorious strike, with each laugh that echoed from my blood-streaked mouth, something twisted deeper within me. My madness, so potent, so exhilarating, began to metastasize, warping the very essence of my being. The clarity that had once been my weapon now fractured, splintering into a thousand shards of discordant thought. The battlefield around me became a shifting nightmare, figures distorting into grotesque spectres. My enemies no longer had faces, only grinning skulls that mocked me with every swing of their swords.
I should have known. I should have seen that in my delusion of grandeur, in my belief in my own invincibility, I had sealed my fate. Their swords, once slow and predictable, now moved with the speed of nightmares. They struck from every direction, piercing through my defences, drawing blood, but it felt like they were slicing through something far more profound than flesh. Each wound was not just a physical pain, but a tear in the fabric of my sanity, a reminder that I was not invincible, that my mind was a labyrinth from which I could no longer escape.
My laughter grew shrill, a cackle that clawed its way out of my throat, uncontrollable, hysterical. I was slashed, stabbed, torn apart piece by piece, but I could not stop. I could not surrender to the reality that had slipped from my grasp. Every movement became a grotesque dance of futility, my body moving as if on strings pulled by some cruel, unseen puppeteer. The madness that had once been my strength now drove me into the abyss, and yet, even as I felt the life drain from me, I continued to fight. I continued to laugh.
For in the end, it wasn't the swords that killed me. It was the madness, the very madness that had granted me vision, that had stripped away the illusions of normalcy, only to replace them with a darker, more terrifying truth. A truth that devoured me whole, leaving nothing behind but a hollow shell, still clinging to the delusion that it had ever been superior to anything at all.
And then, as if the storm had passed, a bitter clarity returned, washing over me like icy water. The battle raged on, but I was no longer the unstoppable force I had believed myself to be. I was angry, not at the settlement, not at the enemies that now encircled me like vultures, but at myself. How could I have been so arrogant? How could I have forgotten the most fundamental truth of all,how could I forget that I, too, could die?
In that moment, I made a decision; a desperate, final grasp at sanity. I decided to retreat, to step back from the chaos, if only for a breath, for a single moment to regain my composure. I needed to breathe. The madness had consumed me, but now I needed to find something solid, something real, to hold onto. As I stepped back, the bigger picture came into focus, and what I saw horrified me. I had forgotten the very reason I had entered this battlefield. I had come here with a purpose, a mission, but somewhere in the depths of my insanity, that purpose had been swallowed whole.
I glanced at my party, the comrades who had fought alongside me, who had trusted me. Regret hit me like a physical blow. How could I have been so blinded by my own ego, my own madness? I had never once thought to support them, to fight for them as they had fought for me. What kind of monster was I becoming?
The battlefield, once teeming with enemies, now held fewer than ten. But the sight of them no longer filled me with the thrill of the hunt. Instead, I felt a weakness envelop my body, my knees buckling as I collapsed to the ground. A bitter laugh escaped me, a hollow echo of the manic cackles that had once filled the air. I laughed at myself, wondering how I had let it get this bad, how I had lost sight of everything, how I had let the madness consume me so completely.
It hadn't been this low even against the Chimaera, a foe I had faced with courage, with purpose. Now, I was a shadow of the warrior I had been, brought low not by the swords of my enemies, but by the madness that had once been my weapon. The madness that had become my downfall.
The pain washed over me in an agonising wave, crashing through me like a relentless tide. I couldn't comprehend what my body was going through. It was as if I was bathing in the fiery river of Phlegethon, each drop searing my flesh, burning me from the inside out. I felt the acid in my stomach creeping out of its walls, burning my intestines. My bones shook, my vision blurred, and it felt like the weight of the world was pressing on my eyelids. I saw my comrades rushing towards me, worry etched across their faces. They were only halfway to me when I finally succumbed to the darkness.
When I awoke, the world felt distant, muffled as if I were submerged underwater. I was told I had been out for 20 minutes. Twenty minutes, long enough for my reality to shatter, to reform in ways I couldn't yet understand. I looked around and saw a horde of corpses surrounding me. The stench of death was suffocating, a sickening reminder of the madness that had claimed me. A glowing light emanated from near my chest. I looked up at the tear-streaked face it belonged to.
"Thank you, Anna," I said, my voice barely a whisper. "It's okay now."
"They're dead hudson. Of course it's ok now" anna said flatly "why even bother... Why do all this? what for?" she asked indifferently as she healed.
"What are you talking about? We're a team, we did this to survive, for all of us to survive," he said trying to convince himself more than us "And look!" he said pointing to the spoils. handing them out. "This is our life now, we have to survive... we have to."
Anna just nodded slightly to Shawn's remark, still silent, her thoughts a thousand miles away. Rebecca, on the other hand, stared at us with a mix of both anger and acknowledgment. At that moment, I realised I had never truly understood the twins. There was a lot hiding behind those eyes. We were only alive out of necessity for them. I had to remind myself not to get too personal with them. A sound from the system pulled me from my darkening thoughts.
Beep!
Hidden mission successful!
[Eliminated all 124 enemies]
Contribution:
Hudson Mitchell: 60%
Rebecca Harris: 22%
Anna Harris: 10%
Shawn Adams: 8%
Allocating rewards...
Congratulations! A certain god wants to be your new potential patron.
2 skills levelled up.
Skill unlocked: Chaotic Battle Instinct.
The warrior taps into a primal, chaotic state of mind, where reason and fear are overwhelmed by a flood of instinctual combat prowess. While in this frenzied state, the warrior's tactical acumen sharpens unpredictably, allowing them to anticipate enemy movements with uncanny precision and react with brutal efficiency. However, this comes at a cost,rational thought becomes distorted, and the warrior's actions may become increasingly erratic and unpredictable, making them a double-edged sword on the battlefield. This skill increases attack speed, critical strike chance, and grants a chance to counter enemy tactics with unorthodox manoeuvres.
Gained armour: Savage spaulders
some spiky shoulder pads made of dark metal or something. Covered in weird carvings that might mean something, but probably don't. Straps? Yeah, they're red. Padding? Sure. They give +3% Vitality and +4% Dexterity because... magic, I guess. Legend says baby Deimos gnawed on these during a tantrum, then threw them at a goat. Now they're legendary. Great if you like not dying and looking kinda cool.
The description is still a bit shitty, but a win is a win. I then checked my status for progress.
Name: Hudson Mitchell
Rank: Mortal (F)
Class: Light Warrior
Patron #1: N/A
Patron #2: N/A
Patron #3: N/A
Skills:
Identify Level 1 [A], Low Pain Resistance Level 8 [P], Predatorial Vision Level 4 [A], Chaotic Battle Instinct Level 1 [A]