A fair distance away from the two men and a wolf, in the midst of the mist filled forest a large group of people marched in orderly fashion, each person was on edge with their eyes darting and observing every inch of their surroundings.
There were a total of 40 people walking in an arrowhead formation, the ones in the centre had equipment the others didn't like an almost gun like shaft and heavier armour that provided more protection, these were the people who were capable of casting spells and were the core support of the group whenever a battle started.
On the outside of this formation were a large amount of ghost wolves, amount to 40 in total as well, they stayed within the vicinity of the large party while weaving between the trees and twitching their ears, they were picking up each and every sound that echoed in the forest and reacted to any form of threat by hunting in packs, they were the outer formation of this group.
At the spearhead of the formation was a large man with an almost giant like stature, his face donned a blonde beard while the rest was covered by a helmet, his eyes were sharp as he looked ahead while keeping his ears up for anything that sounded off, Angus Knight was leading this group.
"Can't believe we haven't found a single trace yet, it's like the darned thing has disappeared of the face of the earth!" A beer bellied man complained just behind Angus, it was William the man who was overly joyful over his child's birth just last night.
"Be patient, this thing is obviously a devious thing since it didn't leave a single trace at the incident before, we're only half-way through the patrol anyway, there's bound to be a sighting sooner or later" Another man chimed in next to the two, they hadn't found a single trace of the creature they're hunting even after nearly half a day of marching, though they weren't at the point of impatience some people still felt the need to complain a little.
"Hey captain, what do you think this thing we're hunting is? Surely you have a guess or two, right?" yet another person decided to jump in on the conversation and asked Angus something he was curious about.
"Tch, if he knew what it was, we probably wouldn't be having such a hard time finding it" Will spoke in a slightly annoyed tone.
"Yeah yeah, don't snap just because you're missing your dear child already William" The man retorted while waving away Will with his hand.
"Wha- I'm just sick of your stupid questions, isn't this the fifth time you've started spouting random crap now?" Will felt he had been exposed too easily so he panicked 'Was it that obvious?' he asked himself.
"It's not like anything is happening at the moment, with all the people we have here and all the wolves I doubt even a behemoth could escape" The man smirked proudly, the large group of people they had gathered made him incredibly confident in this hunt.
"Will you two shut up?!" Angus spoke with a loud but cold tone that immediately quieted down the two men that were bickering.
He looked at the man that was just boasting and spoke: "Don't get cocky, if that thing could take down Redric it isn't to be underestimated!"
"Yeah but… isn't it just one animal? Surely we'll be able to deal with it right?" The man replied, slight sweat crawling down his spine.
"Normally that should be the case, but me and the others in the village council think otherwise…" Angus' eyes flashed with a grim light, his thoughts floated to the scene of the massacre that covered Redric's home.
"As far as we know, not a single creature in this forest could kill Redric and his pack without leaving a single trace of themselves, it's likely there wasn't even a struggle, the only thing that could do it is a mutation yet even that is a stretch… it's likely an aberration, or maybe something worse"
Mutations were animals that had features or abilities that differed from their birth parents at the point of their birth, aberrations on the other hand were creatures that had been influenced by their environment post-birth and experienced earth-shattering changes, one of the most extreme examples of an aberration was a behemoth.
"Something worse than an aberration, something worse than a behemoth?" The man gulped as his mind wondered, he hadn't ever seen either of those things but at least they were fairly general knowledge, on the other hand some rumours passed by his mind that made his mind spin as he denied the possibility.
"Hah, don't go scaring the little man Angus he's shaking in his boots" Will chuckled from the side.
"Fuck you Will! Aren't you too relaxed anyway!" The man yelled back.
"What's the point of being scared, whether it's some beyond-belief monster or not, it won't make a difference if we're scared or not when we're between its jaws!" Will replied with a serious expression, one would judge him as a typical amiable beer-bellied old man, but he was one of the squad leaders, he had a fairly large amount of experience due to his age and when it came down to a fight he shouldn't be underestimated.
"William is right, it doesn't matter what it is, all we need to do is decapitate it's damned head!" Angus said with conviction, as the captain of the guard he wouldn't let this thing take any more victims.
"Right, sorry…" The man backed off when he was getting double teamed and returned to being silent.
All of a sudden from the front of the formation a white wolf came charging towards Angus.
"Bark!" after barking loudly it turned around, barking once more with its head angled and eyes fixed on the captain.
"Found something?" He asked
"Rawrrr" The wolf nodded and replied with a low toned growl, evidently what it found wasn't good.
"Everyone, march faster, we've found traces!" Angus yelled at the top of his voice; the entire groups movement became hurried as they followed the wolf towards the location.
When they reached their destination, their eyes took in an awfully familiar sight, at least to those that saw the previous 'incident'.
Blood covered four small areas without a trace of what it dripped from, all that remained were shattered pieces of metal that looked like they'd been crushed and chewed to pieces.
Angus' face darkened, he immediately worked out where they were from the count of the bloodstained spots.
"We've reached the place the night patrol was attacked" Angus quickly ordered the group to change formation and spread about to protect the area, he and a few others then went to the remains to see if they could find anything.
Unlike Redric who didn't usually wear armour, the guardsmen that were attacked were fully equipped and that left a clue as to what they were dealing with, though when they saw it they were without a doubt given a reason to sweat.
They picked up the scattered pieces of metal, if they were pieces together, they would definitely form the protective gear used by the guard, but what was important was the large marks that seemed to have caused their destruction.
"Such large fangs…" One of the men blurted out, he couldn't help it, based on the size of some of the holes in these pieces one could estimate that they were twice as thick as a man's arm, almost as thick as a thigh and they were obviously stronger than iron, maybe even steel.
"This thing really is a monster…" Another commented, no one here could stay quiet when they saw the scene and a few quiet whispers went from one person to another.
Angus looked at the four bloodstains, he gripped the battle-axe he had roped to his back and his other hand tightened to a fist, cracking sounds could almost be heard from the pressure he was exerting on his bones.
"The message said that they lost four from the start, there's only four remnants here so the others must be elsewhere." Angus spoke with rage filled clarity, he didn't even give himself the chance to believe the others were still alive, seeing such a scene again had wiped out his hopeful mindset.
A silent consensus spread throughout the group, they banded together and were getting ready to set off once more once the wolves caught the scent left behind by the other guards when something else happened.
"Huh, what's that?" One of the men in the back of the formation asked the person next to him, his friend looked over in the direction he was looking and also tried to figure out what he was looking at.
It seemed almost like a mirage, a shadow suddenly covering an area in the forest as if the sun had eclipsed but only limited to a small area.
They couldn't make it out, but more and more people began questioning it while others became on guard.
Angus heard the frenzied speech coming from the back of the group and yelled to ask: "What is it? Is there something wrong?!"
But he didn't get a reply, because soon after another loud sound filled the air.
"""AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA"""
Multiple voices sounded like a siren, screaming in pain at the top of their voices, some were cut off shortly after, but some remained like a fire-alarm alerting the rest of the group.
They had been observing the weird shadow as it was in the distance, but the next thing they knew it was upon them, all they knew next was pain, something seemed to tear in their bodies as limbs flew in the air like rag dolls and blood spurted like rain.