The column began its march in the fading light of afternoon, shadows lengthening into bars across the forest road. At its head strode the matriarch, her posture regal and unbent, flanked by two elders whose eyes lingered often on the trees. She wore her own full plate. It wasn't gaudy and showy like the new blood liked to do with theirs. It was plain, gouches and nicks were all over it. It was armour used to war.

"The scouts are pushed wide," one said quietly. "Their signal stones reach us still and they sweep in pairs, as ordered."

The matriarch inclined her head. "And the diviners?"

"They cycle their vision sparingly. To press farther would drain them before nightfall."

The broad-shouldered elder gave a humorless chuckle. "Even sparingly, we will still miss things out there. I have long said we are missing the support elements of an army."

The matriarch's gaze swept the darkening branches. "I know Elder Brannwich but Lionheart city has made it very difficult to recruit those people, much less turn them."

From the treeline came the sound of a struggle—a sharp clash of steel, cut off by a muffled cry. Silence followed, broken by another scuffle farther off, then another. The noise traveled like a storm through the woods, carrying back to the column in ragged fragments.

The vampire scouts were no amateurs. They moved like shadows themselves, class and dao moving in conjunction with one another. Fading between trunks, leaving scarcely a footprint. Their blades struck quick and clean when they found threat. But today the tricks they knew were already read, every path anticipated.

Ferin glided through the brush, silent as breath, striking from angles the scouts never saw. Auren's arrows whispered between trunks, puncturing armor with unerring thrusts. The shadow wolf led the pack in bounding arcs, harrying stragglers until panic cracked their discipline.

The scouts adapted, laying traps of their own—tripwires strung in the undergrowth, false trails meant to draw pursuit. But each counter was unraveled, each snare turned against them. For every two scouts that slipped free, one vanished into the dark with a wolf's growl at their throat.

By the time the column advanced another mile, the results were waiting. The first corpse swung from the branches above their path, its pale face stark in the half-light. A second hung farther on, ankles bound, throat gaping open to the air. One after another, the scouts' bodies appeared along the path—gruesome warnings strung like markers for all who marched behind.

The elders slowed, tilting their heads back to study the grim display.

"Efficient," one murmured. "Cruel."

The matriarch's eyes narrowed. She did not break stride. "No," she said, voice even. "Skilled. He has hunters worth the name."

The column pressed forward. Overhead, the bodies swayed with the rhythm of the evening wind, and somewhere ahead, the sounds of wolves and men clashed again.

"Elder Brannwich, I think it's time we deployed a couple of the Barons to reinforce the scouts before we get any more openings in our screen. We should have a couple Tier 4 shadow dao users.. From your Bloodline I believe.

"Elder Brannwich, I think it's time we deployed a couple of the Barons to reinforce the scouts before we get any more openings in our screen. We should have a couple Tier Four shadow dao users, I believe. From your bloodline, if I recall."

The elder in question straightened at her words. Brannwich was a narrow man, his frame draped in silks that did nothing to hide the corded tension beneath. His eyes glimmered, not with pride but with the simmering irritation of a predator being reminded of his leash.

"They are here," he said at last, voice smooth as oil. "Two of mine. Shadow-born and hungry." He glanced sidelong at the matriarch. "They will not scatter like these lesser hunters."

"They had better not," the broader elder rumbled, tone edged with contempt. "Or they'll join the rest of our 'screen' in the trees."

Brannwich's lips thinned, but he said nothing. Instead he lifted a hand, signaling. From deeper in the column, two figures detached themselves, sliding forward with unnatural grace. Cloaks seemed to drink the dying light, faces half-concealed beneath cowls. The forest hushed at their passage, as if unwilling to mark their steps.

The matriarch's gaze followed them until they slipped into the treeline. Only then did she speak again. "The wolves hunt boldly because they believe the dusk favors them. Let us see how bold they are when true shadows answer."

Some time later another cry filtered back through the wood—quick, sharp, and suddenly silenced. But this time, it was followed by a ringing stillness, heavy enough that even the marching column seemed to sense the shift.

Brannwich's smile returned, faint but certain. "They'll find my bloodline less forgiving than the forest."

Ferin crouched low in the brush, breath slow and steady, a smear of blood drying across his cheek. The last scout's body still twitched faintly, hanging from the branch overhead.

"Too easy," he murmured.

Auren slid beside him, bow half-drawn, eyes scanning the thick lattice of trunks. "They're not breaking anymore. The forest went quiet." His tone was matter-of-fact, but the set of his jaw betrayed the tension he felt.

The Shadow Wolf padded from the dark, fur rippling like smoke as it emerged between the trees. Its ears pricked forward, muzzle lifted. A low growl built in its throat, not warning but recognition. Prey had shifted. Hunters had come.

Ferin's eyes narrowed. He touched the pommel of his blade, fingers brushing the etchings carved there. "The matriarch's no fool. She'll answer blood with blood. We've pulled someone important."

Auren's gaze flicked to the branches above, where another corpse swayed in the wind. "Then we hang Barons next."

The Shadow Wolf's pack stirred in the brush, restless. The air had changed—darker, heavier. Shadows pooled in places they had not before, lingering like a second set of eyes watching. Even the faint light of dusk seemed to recoil, thinning under an unnatural weight.

Ferin tilted his head, listening. The forest was no longer theirs. The enemy had stepped in, and with them, the balance had shifted.

"Shadow dao," he muttered. "Tier Four, at least. Two of them. Lets get to our positions."

The Shadow Wolf bared its fangs, a snarl rolling low and eager.

Ferin tilted his head, listening. The forest was no longer theirs. The enemy had stepped in, and with them, the balance had shifted.

"Shadow dao," he muttered. "Tier Four, at least. Two of them. Let's get to our positions."

The Shadow Wolf bared its fangs, a snarl rolling low and eager, before bounding forward into the brush. Its pale form slipped across the road like bait cast on a line. Ferin's lips curved in a humorless grin. "Run ahead, little hunter. Draw them to us."

They moved quickly but silent, weaving through the undergrowth toward the place chosen hours ago: a choke point where roots and stone made footing treacherous, the canopy thin enough for arrows to slip clean through. A place built for killing.

Auren knelt beside a mossy trunk, bow resting across his knees. He pulled a small case from his belt and snapped it open. Arrows lay inside, blackened heads dull against the dim light. From another pouch came a vial, its liquid thick and dark, glinting faintly like tar.

He hesitated, holding the vial in his hand. His wife's laugh rose in memory, quick and sharp like sunlight breaking through clouds. She had pressed the poison into his hand the day he left, her fingers lingering on his wrist. Don't waste it, she'd said. And don't come back in pieces.

"Smart, beautiful wives," he whispered, dipping the first arrowhead into the mixture. The viscous poison clung to the steel, oily and alive. "Best thing a man can hope for."

He set the arrow to the string, steady hands at odds with the ache in his chest. For the first time in years, he felt the promise he'd made wasn't empty. Because here, alongside Ferin, Harold, the pack—this strange gathering bound by oaths and calamity—he belonged. His wife had her forge, her work, her freedom. And he, at last, had purpose.

He smiled faintly, muttering under his breath. "Glad you got to do the things you always wanted. Glad I found mine."

The Shadow Wolf's howl ripped through the trees, close now, followed by the soft ripple of something darker giving chase. Two predators, silent as knives drawn through silk, swept after it. The forest dimmed, shadows thickening unnaturally, bending around their passage.

Ferin crouched across the road, blades gleaming faintly, eyes bright with anticipation. "They'll be here any breath now."

Auren drew, the bowstring taut, his poisoned arrow kissing his cheek. His breath slowed until the world narrowed to the gap between trees, the sound of the wolf, and the shadows sliding into their trap.

"I'll come back," he whispered to the memory of her kiss.

And then the forest broke.

The forest erupted in violence.

One of the Barons dropped from the canopy like a blade loosed from the sky. His impact crushed a wolf beneath him with a sickening crack, blood spraying across the roots. Shadow knives fanned outward from his hands in the same breath, black arcs cutting down another wolf before its snarl became a cry.

The Shadow Wolf lunged, pale fur flashing in the gloom. The Baron's blades hissed past its flank as it twisted, rolling through the undergrowth with predatory grace. The second vampire was already gone, dissolving into shadow itself, flowing after the wolf like living smoke.

Auren's breath caught. Then he drew.

Wind gathered at his fingertips, invisible but sharp, coiling along the bowstring. His Dao roared in silence, a storm compressed into the space of a heartbeat. Power Draw bent the bow beyond its natural limit, the string creaking under mana's weight. As he loosed, another skill flared—Double Bow, Double Arrow. The arrow in flight split, mirrored in motion and mana, both heads glistening with the same dark life poison.

The shafts screamed forward faster than sound, so swift that even Tier Fours had no time to turn. The Baron chasing the Shadow Wolf twisted instinctively, shadows rippling to shield him, but the arrows pierced through—one spearing shoulder, the other ripping across his flank. Black poison burned through flesh, veins erupting in angry welts as his movements faltered.

Ferin's arrow followed a breath later. He wasn't Auren. His Dao lacked the sheer force of Wind, the artistry of skills honed over years. But his Hunt Dao was sharpened by obsession. He saw the target—felt its line of escape, the twitch of muscle before the leap—and loosed. The shaft flew straight, guided as if the world itself bent to place it.

It buried deep in the Baron's thigh, twisting him mid-stride, breaking his pursuit. The poison surged through him, congealing in his veins, dragging down strength that had towered above knights.

The vampire roared, stumbling as he tore at the arrows jutting from his body. Shadows writhed around him, desperate to smother the toxin, but the life poison gnawed deeper, clinging like fire.

The other Baron landed silently among the roots, eyes narrowing. His knives shimmered, hungry for more wolves. But now his partner bled black fire in the dirt, and across the path, Auren and Ferin stepped from cover with bows drawn again.

Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

The hunters had found worthy prey.

The poisoned Baron staggered, shadows leaking from his wounds as the toxin gnawed through him. The Shadow Wolf darted back, teeth flashing, snapping at his ankles before vanishing into the brush. Every time he tried to steady himself, the wolf struck again, relentless.

But the other Baron came on like a storm. He hit the earth between Auren and Ferin with a blur of motion, knives already slashing outward. The wolves darted to meet him, but his blades cut arcs too quick to follow—fangs cracked against steel, and two wolves tumbled back yelping, blood streaking their pale coats.

Ferin cursed under his breath, dropping his bow and drawing steel. A long knife in his left, a short sword in his right. His stance was practiced, but stiff—skill there, muscle memory too, yet lacking the polish of someone who had lived with two blades as extensions of his soul.

The Baron laughed, low and mocking. "So these are the hunters?" He stepped in, knives dancing, forcing Ferin back with each exchange. "Your master bleeds our scouts and thinks that will matter? He will die. This calamity will die. And the reward—" his blade flicked across Ferin's shoulder, shallow but searing—"will be ours."

Ferin growled, teeth bared, pushing back with a flurry of strikes. His Hunt Dao flared, guiding his movements, forcing precision where his practice faltered. But the Baron was stronger, faster, his shadows weaving around him like armor. He batted aside Ferin's knife, forced him back against a root, then slipped past the sword to cut across his thigh.

"Plaything," the Baron sneered, eyes glinting red. "You fight like one who wants to be Tier Four but has yet to bleed for it."

Auren's arrow hissed past, Wind Dao lashing it forward. The Baron twisted, the shaft grazing his arm instead of piercing his heart. He snarled, shadows thickening around him as he flicked a knife back at Auren. It cut across the archer's bow arm, shallow but enough to stagger him.

"Stay moving!" Auren barked, teeth clenched as he ripped the knife free and readied another arrow. Wind gathered, circling him, pulling leaves into spirals as he loosed. The Baron snapped a shadow up to block, the arrow piercing through but slowed just enough to thud into his ribs instead of burying deep.

"Poison," Auren muttered under his breath, fumbling for the vial. But he hesitated—every arrow dipped cost him time, every breath he wasted gave the Baron another opening. "Ferin, hold him!"

Ferin grunted as the vampire's knife slashed across his side, forcing him to his knees. Blood soaked into the dirt. He staggered up again, swinging both blades with raw fury now, less precision, more desperation. The Hunt Dao sharpened his instincts, letting him track the Baron's movements, but he could feel the widening gulf.

The Baron grinned, circling him, blades catching the faint light. "Your master cannot save you. None of you can stop what is coming. Every corpse you leave hanging in the trees will join you soon enough. And the one who ends this calamity—" he lunged, driving Ferin back another step—"will be rewarded beyond your small imaginings."

Ferin spat blood, knives crossing in a desperate parry. His arms trembled. Every strike told him the same truth: the Baron wasn't fighting to kill him. Not yet. He was being toyed with.

The knowledge burned hotter than the wounds.

"Enough," Ferin growled, forcing his blades outward. "Stop playing with me."

The Baron only laughed, shadows surging like waves as he pressed the assault.

The Baron's knives pressed down, shadows wrapping Ferin's arms like chains. His strength bled away, knees threatening to give.

"You'll break like the rest," the vampire hissed. "Your Calamity next. The reward will be mine."

Ferin's vision swam, but a memory struck through the haze like a spear.

You've circled for decades, Ferin, Harold had told him that morning by the gate. There is a legend, more myth than fact. About the Lord of the Hunt.

It had gnawed at him ever since. The missing piece. The path he had sought and never found. And now, standing in the jaws of death, he understood.

Ferin tore himself free, blood streaking his side. He raised the horn—plain, battered, carried for years but never used.

He blew his qi infusing the horn in a way that he had never done before.

The sound rolled through the forest like thunder, deep and primal, not music but decree.

The Hunt is Called.

The world shifted.

System Notification:

The Hunt has begun. Hunters Gather. Prey is Chosen. The Hunt does not end until the prey lies still, or you do.

The forest came alive. Wolves threw back their heads in unison, howls weaving into a single, resonant chorus. The Shadow Wolf answered with a snarl that rattled bark from the trees. Every hound, every wolf, every ally bound to Ferin felt it — exhaustion washed away, limbs lightened, strength and speed surging like a second heartbeat.

The Hunt gathered around its Lord.

Ferin's Dao burned brighter than ever before. The trapping of the Lord of Hunt sheathed him. A cloak of furs covered him, the proof of a successful hunt from his past.

The Hunt Dao wasn't just precision now — it was inevitability. The Baron's every twitch, every breath, every shadow-step was already mapped in Ferin's vision. There would be no escape.

Auren felt it too. The wind whipped around him, bowstring singing as if eager. His lungs no longer burned, his wounds forgotten. He drew, arrow gleaming with poison and wind, eyes locking onto the Baron with perfect clarity.

The Baron froze mid-motion, sensing it. Shadows hissed around him, faltering. For the first time, his confidence cracked.

Ferin stepped forward, blades steady, eyes burning with something far older than fear. "The Hunt gathers," he said, voice ringing like the horn itself.

The wolves and hounds surged in, jaws snapping. Auren loosed, wind shrieking. Ferin drove forward, every strike guided unerringly to the vampire's flesh.

The Baron staggered back, eyes wide, shadows unraveling beneath the weight of inevitability.

The Hunt was on.

The Baron roared, shadows bursting from him in writhing arcs as he lashed out. His knives flickered like black lightning, cutting wolves out of the air, scoring lines of fire across Ferin's arms and chest. He was faster, stronger—Tier Four to their lesser power.

But the Hunt did not falter.

Each wolf he struck down staggered back, blood soaking fur—then rose again. Their wounds closed as qi flowed into them, strength refilling as if they had never bled. Auren loosed arrow after arrow, Wind Dao screaming through the trees. One shaft pierced the Baron's thigh, another grazed his cheek, each blow pushing him back a step. And Ferin—Ferin was always there, his blades unerring, the Hunt Dao guiding every strike.

The Baron's face twisted with fury. "You think your Calamity gives you victory? You think this curse makes you strong?!" His knives whipped outward, driving Ferin back, then snapped toward a hound lunging low at his flank.

Steel bit fur. The hound yelped, legs buckling.

"No!" Ferin's roar split the night. The Hunt flared around him, qi surging, exhaustion gone as if it had never touched his body. He moved faster than he ever had before, both blades flashing in perfect tandem.

The Baron turned to finish the hound—

—and Ferin struck.

His knife sank into the vampire's ribs. His sword swept across the throat in the same breath. The Hunt Dao made it inevitable: a double strike.

The Baron's shadows shrieked as his body convulsed. His knives fell, dissolving into smoke as blood poured down his chest. He tried to speak, lips forming some final curse, but only a wet gurgle came.

Ferin yanked his blades free and stepped back as the vampire collapsed to the dirt. His hound rose again beside him, whole, as though the Baron's strike had been nothing but a bad dream.

System Notification:

Prey has fallen. The Hunt concludes. The Lord of the Hunt advances.

The forest fell quiet, save for the ragged breath of wolves and men. The Hunt's power ebbed, strength lingering like an echo before fading back into their bones. Ferin stood tall, blades dripping, chest heaving—but unbroken. And meeting the requirements to advance to Tier 4.

Across the path, the Shadow Wolf snarled, circling the poisoned Baron. The Tier Four staggered, flesh blackening where the toxin had sunk deep. He locked eyes with Ferin for a heartbeat—rage, fear, and something like recognition flashing there.

Then he dissolved into shadow, dragging himself into the dark, slipping between roots and trees until even the wolves lost his scent.

Ferin lowered his blades, breath burning in his chest. "One down," he rasped. "One left."

The horn's note rolled through the trees, low and terrible, reverberating in marrow.

The column faltered. Even the elders stilled, listening.

It was no soldier's horn, no signal they had ever trained to answer. It was primal—something that clawed at instinct buried in their blood, echoing back to when the world had been raw and unshaped.

The matriarch's gaze narrowed, unblinking. "That sound… it hearkens to older nights. Before courts, before cities. A thing that belongs to the primal days."

Elder Brannwich's lips curled, though no amusement touched his eyes. "It is more than a sound. It strikes memory. Makes the blood answer whether you will it or not." His head tilted, ears sharp. "And it is not alone. Listen."

They all heard it then. Beneath the wolves' chorus came other notes—subtler, layered, easy for mortal ears to miss but clear as day to them. The thrum of many feet moving in rhythm. Breaths drawn not in panic, but in unity. The forest itself seemed to shift with it, branches rattling as if stirred by more than mere wind.

"They gather," murmured the broad-shouldered elder, his voice quiet but edged with awe. "Hunters answering their lord."

The matriarch did not move, though her robes whispered in the still air. "To gather them so swiftly… no mortal could. He binds them to him with that call."

"Dangerous," Brannwich said. His jaw tightened, listening still. The clash of steel, distant but sharp, carried across the miles. The cries of wolves, not scattered, not wild, but ordered—woven into the rhythm of the Hunt.

The matriarch's eyes lingered on the dark treeline. "Dangerous," she agreed softly. Then, after a pause: "But prey all the same."

And she turned, the column marching once more, while the echoes of the Hunt bled through the forest around them.

The echoes lingered long after the horn fell silent. The wolves' howls, the clash of steel, the layered rhythm of hunters gathering — all of it pressed against the column's heightened senses until even the youngest among them shifted uneasily.

A ripple moved through the ranks. Whispers, sharp breaths, shoulders tensing as if some old instinct warned them to flee. Fear spread like smoke, subtle but poisonous.

The matriarch's eyes narrowed. She lifted one pale hand, the gesture smooth and deliberate. Power stirred around her, not loud, not violent, but inexorable. It seeped out like mist, threading between the ranks, into the marrow of her people.

It was her will, distilled and cold. Fear drained away in its presence, bled from their veins as though drawn out by invisible needles. Their shoulders straightened. Their steps steadied. The whispers stilled.

When she lowered her hand, silence reigned once more save for the measured tread of marching feet.

"Enough," she said, voice calm but carrying like iron through the column. "The forest may remember its old days. But we are not bound to them. We march."

The column's tread resumed, steady once more, fear bled out by the matriarch's hand. For a moment, the road was silent but for the rhythm of boots on earth, the whisper of cloaks against armor.

Then a disturbance rippled along the flank. Shadows thickened at the treeline, folding inward, and a figure staggered free. One of the Barons — pale, unsteady, his flesh mottled black where the poison burned through his veins.

He dropped to one knee before Elder Brannwich, blood dripping from his lips, his breath ragged.

"Bloodfather," he rasped, eyes wild with pain. "Help me. They struck with venom — it burns the life from me. I can't—" His body convulsed, shadows leaking uncontrolled across the dirt. "Purge it. Please."

The column slowed again, the youngest vampires staring wide-eyed at the sight of a Baron begging. The matriarch's expression did not change, but the faintest downward curve of her lips betrayed something colder than pity.

The elder bent, his hand hovering over his blood-son's shoulder, crimson light gathering at his fingertips.

Brannwich's hand pressed to his blood-son's chest, crimson light spilling from his palm in steady waves. The Baron arched, choking, blackened veins bulging beneath his pale skin.

The elder's lips curled back in frustration. "It clings… it eats deeper with every breath. My blood cannot scour it."

His power flared again, harsher, but the poison only hissed, dark lines spreading wider across his son's throat.

A murmur ran through the column. Whispers sharpened to disbelief. A Baron on his knees, an elder failing.

Brannwich's jaw clenched. Slowly, he turned his head toward the matriarch. The words tasted like ash on his tongue. "Matriarch. I must ask—lend your hand. For my line."

She regarded him for a long moment, unreadable, then stepped forward. Her robes whispered against the dirt as she extended a hand over the kneeling vampire. Power welled—her blood surging with an older, colder depth than Brannwich's. It poured into the Baron, flooding him with crimson radiance.

For a heartbeat, it seemed to work. The black veins receded, writhing under the force of her will. The Baron's back arched, his body straining to obey.

But then the poison burned back through, as though it had only been waiting, veins darkening again, stronger, deeper.

The matriarch's eyes narrowed. "A life poison… even elder blood cannot cleanse it."

She drew back her hand, then raised it again, sharper this time. The air itself tightened. Her voice cut across the silence like a blade.

"You swore an oath to this family. You will not fall yet. Rise—do your duty and be clean!"

Her Honor Dao surged, heavy as iron. Oaths bound tighter, chains of duty and loyalty wrapping the broken Baron. For a moment the poison shuddered, retreating under the weight of the vow. His veins lightened, his body stilled.

He gasped, forcing himself to one knee. The column watched, breath held.

But then his strength buckled. His eyes rolled back, and he collapsed into the dirt, body convulsing, poison creeping black once more.

The matriarch's expression did not flicker, but unease rippled through the ranks. A life poison that even she could not banish—only suppress for a moment.

The silence that followed was heavier than the horn's echo.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.