—Orion—

  It was mid-morning by the time Aylin fell asleep again thanks to the… help of Icaro's herbs. I felt guilty for giving her the drug, but it seemed that both Icaro and Sally agreed that this was the better option. The Medicine-Man had reassured me that it would be safer for her to be asleep and alone in the campsite rather than awake and walking around without supervision. I couldn't help but worry that something would go wrong, but the Medicine-Man had told me that the campsite is safe from both the mysterious dangers of the forest and its creatures.

  "What do you use in the incense to ward off the predators?" I asked, curious as to what he uses that's so effective that he would feel safe leaving Aylin alone and asleep.

  "Trying to steal my secrets, are you?" Icaro questioned, raising an eyebrow as well—did my question annoy him?

  "No! I was just curious-" "-relax child! I had thought that my jests were blunt, but the way you fall for each joke makes them seem like masterful ruses." He interrupted my explanation with a laugh, revealing his true intentions. Sally giggled as well, my enjoyment from hearing his inhuman chirping laughter soured by the fact he was laughing at my obliviousness.

  The way Icaro talked made me feel lost and alone when I was around him—it reminded me of being in the Party again. I was unsure if the uncomfortable sensations were from being unable to keep up with what Icaro insisted were basic jokes, or from my socially ineptitude being exposed right in front of Sally.

  "If you truly wish to know, a mix of bark shavings and leafy herbs. They range from commonplace to very rare, and it would take me months to teach you how to identify each one from the nigh-identical doppelganger species.

  “It was first discovered by a Witch-Doctor a long, long time ago. She figured out a blend that would release a strange smell when burnt, that would trick the senses of predators and cause them ignore and avoid it anything near it. And in the age since the stitching, its been refined through trial and error by dozens of my predecessors, to the point where none of us truly knows how it works." Icaro explained wonderfully. While I was curious as to the individual ingredients—knowing such a useful recipe would be life changing—I did not wish to burden Icaro with what sounded like a rigorous amount of teaching.

  Only a few seconds later, we arrived at the village. It only took a few minutes to walk back, as we were only ever just out of hearing range of the settlement. Thankfully the town looked the same as when we left, and it hadn't been destroyed in the night we were away. For some unexplainable reason, I had been half-expecting the village to look like it did in [The Hunter's Anathema].

  "Wait a moment." Icaro called out as we reached the edge of town. He knelt on the stone pavers and brought out the silver ball and chain he had earlier, opening it and leaving it on the ground as he then took out what looked like a tinderbox.

  "Try this." I suggested as he fiddled with the kindling and flint, handing him my plastic lighter.

  He frowned at the colourful contraption, and eventually found the button he needed, but struggled to make it work.

  "You need to-" "-Let me figure this out boy." He stopped me, and I did. The man had been talking in a way that reminded me enough of my Father that I wanted to stop listening to him anyway. It took him a few minutes and a lightly burnt finger to make it work, but he managed to ignite the shavings inside the hollow metal ball. He let the lighter’s flame burn the oily wax for a few moments before he blew out the flame, and the smouldering paste began to let out a thick smoke that slowly sunk downwards.

  "Clever tool, I'm guessing there's some oil in there and pressing the button strikes some flint while opening the lid. Am I correct?" Icaro asked as he passed back my BIC lighter, and I almost nodded as he closed the contraption. I was trying to be careful and not to dislodge Sally with an accidental head movement again.

  "… Yes." I answered after realising that correcting him on the small details would just waste time.

  Icaro let out a chuckle and smiled as he stood back up. The chain of the censer was wrapped around his fist, the smoking ball at the end of it had coated the ground beneath it with a heavy, thick smog. It finally clicked that it was a device made to spread the smoke of burning medicine as he swung it back and forth. The lazy arcs the sphere swayed in when tugged sent plumes of orange-tinted smoke cascading over the street-stones around us.

  As I thought about the censer’s inches thick outer layer and tapered reinforcements around the chain joint, I struggled to understand why it was so heavily reinforced. Thuribles were mostly ceremonial devices that did not need to be thick enough to survive being thrown around and heavy impacts.

  "Now, I wish to see what has happened to my town. And purge it of a devil if necessary." Icaro calmly stated, and walked towards the centre of town. His censer swung widely, and spread an ankle-high layer of smoke that coated the street from door to door. The incense was thick enough to completely obscure every stone paver it covered.

  I followed after him, my bow readied in one hand, an arrow in the other, and Sally secured to my head. With all four of his talons wrapped tightly around my hair, he was nestled well enough that I felt confident he wouldn't fall off again, even with his increased weight.

  It did not take us long to reach the centre of town, and for me to become perturbed by the complete lack of people. Everywhere I looked, there were plenty of remaining traces of human habitation—empty food bowls and bottles, traces of what must've been last night's feast—but not a single person. Somehow the lack of bodies or blood only made me feel more worried about what must've happened to them.

  "ARE YOU STILL ALIVE OLD FRIEND?" Icaro shouted at the front door of the Old Chief's home, the entrance to the cottage left wide open and swinging with the breeze. The Medicine-Man was standing confidently as he stared into the inky black of the building with his stance spread wide. His back was rigidly upright with feet shoulder-width apart, his confident posture was practically inviting anyone to take advantage of his defensive openings.

  Icaro waited patiently for a response, idly continuing to spread the pool of smoke around his feet with rhythmic flicks of his wrist. Much of the courtyard was now covered by a puffy rug of fumes, the sun overhead barely able to pierce through the dense layer of mist.

  "Oh? Hello. Say hello to our—very-late—Medicine-Man, Chester." I heard the Old Chief growl, the elder's strangely guttural voice echoing from somewhere inside the house. It was a sickly voice, his voice wet and gargling with what sounded like phlegm, the choked noises he made reminded me of pneumonia.

  Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.

  "If you are still alive, then I am not too late." Icaro calmly stated, his voice calm and even as he moved closer to the house—his steps slow and cautious.

  "Noo-oo-o… ah-ha… Much, much too late." A warbling drawl answered Icaro. A large hand emerged from the darkness and gripped the door-frame, wood creaking under its grip. The fist's skin was pallid and grey, and had nails that would have been long enough to be claws if they weren't cracked and broken.

  "My Grandson, has already shown me ano-*aghck*, another way." The Old Chief coughed as he stepped into the shade of the balcony, revealing his twisted body. It reminded me of the Wendigo's body in the early stages of its growth—the overly tall, too thin body and slightly inhuman proportions.

  "He fed us a fe-aast, and then… then he told us where he had gotten the delicious food." The elder continued. I nocked my arrow onto my bowstring as I saw its face.

  It was wrong. Twisted into a shape that could only remind me of a gutter-mutt mix of dog species.

  The Old Chief's skull had been melted into an incestuous shape, the bottom jaw pulled out until it gave him an under-bite that you could fit a two or three fingers between. His skin was even looser than before, his cheeks drooping further than his small beard—which was now missing a few patches—and sagged far enough that his eyelids could barely function. The lower lids had been pulled down far enough that there were two large red half-moons of exposed under-eye, the crimson undulating flesh twitched from is exposure to the cold open air.

  "He sho-*cough*-wed us a… new Path! The Path" The elder growled as it lifted up its other hand, and showed the human femur clutched in its fist.

  "You have fallen far—" Icaro began to say, but was interrupted by the loud crunching from the monster as it chomped down on the bone, shattering it between its twisted teeth. It reminded me of an elderly mutt snacking on left-over bones.

  But my attention was drawn away from the monster as I heard a faint groaning from deep inside the house.

  "My boy, boy didn't explain why to me, but he was saving a snack for when you arrived." Old Chief chuckled, black saliva dripping from its mouth as it glanced behind itself.

  I heard some grunting, and a half-strangled scream, before I saw 'Chester'.

  It was the Wendigo we'd been hunting this whole time, its body matured into what I assumed would be its final shape. The monster’s head was a skeletal mockery of wolf's skull, its skin pulled so taught that it looked like it was painful to move. Its frame was large and imposing as it stayed hidden inside the house, the metres long limbs pressed against its body by its tight outer rind. I couldn't see the full extent of its growth, as the parts of its I could see was the small section of it in the light of the doorway. It no longer wore any clothes apart from its ragged old cloak, which could no longer his its desiccated, and unnaturally stretched body.

  Though my attention was more focused on the body in its mouth rather than the monster itself. There was a person held by the wendigo’s jaws like a cat with an unfinished mouse, the prey still weakly struggling against a predator which knows its meal is finished. The man’s head was inside the monster's mouth, the line of the wendigo's jaw traced the man's collarbone and sternum.

  I tried to—I did really try to stop it from happening—but by the time I raised my bow the Wendigo Walker had bitten down.

  I froze as the loud crunch echoed loudly, the man's body spasmed for a millisecond before it went limp, the wendigo's jaw methodically crushing through his chest. I couldn't bring myself to move any further as it's mouth shut, the remaining neckless, headless body tumbling to the ground as the wendigo licked its lips with a long snaky tongue.

  [You have failed: [[Quest]: Hunt it! Before you become its prey!]]

  I ignored the ping of the system as all three of us watched the Wendigo Walker finish its meal. Its mouth unfurled well past ninety degrees as it grabbed the half-eaten body and shoved it down, the whole body fitting and slipping down its metre long throat.

  "Now it's time. Hide and Seek! But now… I’m not hiding!" It wailed cheerfully. I watched as two horns began to bud around its temples, the brown growths bursting through the thin layer of skin with a splatter of black blood. The pair of antlers looked normal, and would be typical for a maturing buck—that normality made them seem all the more disturbing.

  [[Wendigo Walker] has used its skill: [Winter’s Sun-Veil]]

  I glanced upwards, and saw a layer of clouds form extremely quickly, the low layer of clouds thick and an unhealthy grey colour. It only took a few seconds for them to grow thick enough to block the sun and cast a heavy shadow over us and the rest of the town. With its arrival, I could begin to hear an extremely quiet ticking, barely hearable with my empowered hearing. I ignored the distraction.

  The Old Chief took a walked forward, and raised its hand out from the cover of the front porch. After it wasn't burnt for a few seconds under the cloudy sky, the corrupted elder stepped into the dulled light.

  [Using [Appraisal] – Lvl 1] on: [Gestating Wendigo]]

  [[Where's Wolfie?] upgrades the level of [Appraisal – Lvl 1] when facing an aberration!]

  [Using [Appraisal – Lvl 2] on: [Gestating Wendigo]]

  [Gestating Wendigo – Level 6 Aberration]

  [What a horrible night for a curse]

  [When the Wendigo Walker first wandered the world, it was a wraith, a terrible horrific curse, but a singular entity.

  However, one night, years after the first tales of the Wendigo had been told, it fled one of its hunts without eating everyone. It spared the few remaining survivors of a village, leaving the dozen or so starving people to fend for themselves in the middle of winter. A starved hunter had managed to cut the aberration's flesh, but when the black-blood covered man returned home without it returning, he assumed he'd scared it off.

  By the time the snow melted, there were no survivors of the wendigo fever, and the [Wendigo Walker] no longer stalked the wintery nights alone.]

  Ah… The wendigo fever is spread through its blood.

  The Wendigo Walker followed its grandfather outside, stepping out of the house and revealing its body in full. Unlike the Old Chief, the original wendigo was no longer bipedal, its back legs twisted into equine, digitigrade shape, which made it unable to walk without using its long front arms to walk. It mildly reminded me of a great ape using its knuckles to move, but this was more like a deer that'd been given hands instead of hooves.

  With its body now exposed, I raised my bow and took the shot before it had a chance to attack, as I was unwilling to let it move any closer without making it struggle. With a swift movement, I loosened my arrow and sent the projectile flying towards it, the projectile landing in its shoulder as it jerked out of the way at the last moment, sparing my original target—its head—from the same fate.

  [Conditions met! Activating [Archery Mastery]]

  [[Strength] Increased by 24%! 28 -> 35]

  [[Dexterity] Increased by 24%! 24 -> 30]

  [Strike dealt to [Wendigo Walker]!]

  [Damage: 12]

  [Damage reduced by [Pierce Resistance], 66%]

  [Damage: 12 -> 4]

  [[Wendigo Walker] [HP: 120/120 -> 116/120]]

  As I watched the Wendigo Walker shrug off my arrow with barely any damage taken, I realised that I would not be able to do much against the monster without [Power Shot]. I would only have two shots at damaging it though, as I would not have enough mana for a third armour-penetrating shot.

  I reached into my quiver for another arrow, keeping a careful eye on the Wendigo Walker as it sauntered into the layer of mist on the ground. From its lack of distress while in contact with the smoke, it might not have any discernable effects on wendigos.

  As I kept a close eye on the wolf-headed wendigo slowly stalking around the edge of the courtyard, I noticed that the other wendigo, the elder, was just as focused on Icaro as the Wendigo Walker was towards me.

  I came up with a plan—most of one really—when I saw how their attention was split between us.

  As the first small flakes of what looked like snow began to fall, I began to whisper my plan to Sally.