Three figures were sprinting through the thick forest, branches whipping their faces as they struggled to breathe. The one taking up the lead boasted a slender figure that was hard to see underneath a full suit of plate armor. Her armor was scarred with gashes and dried blood, her face was pale and covered in sweat, and she was missing her left arm.
The second figure was slightly shorter than the first, her long blonde hair was matted with dried mud and had small twigs sticking out in all directions. The once pearly white dress she was wearing was now a kaleidoscope of browns, greens, and dark reds. Snow white skin peeked out from several rips in the fabric, capable of driving any man mad with lust.
The last person was a tall man also wearing full plate armor, his shoulders wider than the two women's put together. His armor was in much worse shape than the first's, deep wounds still slowly oozing dark blood, staining the dried leaves on the ground as they ran. He was the only one armed, holding a long sword in both his gloved hands.
The sound of crunching leaves and breaking branches were only overpowered by the sound of their labored breathing, and the snarls coming from behind them. Even heavily injured, the female knight was able to nimbly dodge a fallen tree barring their path. The second woman tried to clear the obstacle but fell headfirst onto the ground when the hem of her dress caught on the dead tree. Her face slammed into the ground, bloodying her nose, and scratching up her delicate features.
Stopping and hurrying back, the female knight bent over to help her up. "Princess, we must hurry, those things are almost upon us."
Princess Alessandria hurried to her feet, her dress still caught on the tree, ripping it even further. She struggled to tear the dress free but was unable to. "Lilly... it's stuck! I can't get it!"
Without a word, the male knight brandished his sword, cutting the fabric free of the tree. Deep howls could be heard bounding behind them, constantly closing the distance. "Lilly, run! Take the Princess with you! Don't look back, I'll buy you time!"
The man's voice was pleasant to the ears and his features matched it. Although his face was caked in dried blood, his chiseled jaw and gentle features exuded grace and masculine beauty. His ice-colored eyes burned with determination as he turned to face what was stalking them.
"Raphael, no, you can't!" Princess Alessandria reached out to him from behind the fallen tree, missing him as he took a few steps forward, bringing his sword up in front of him. Tears were streaming down her face, mixing with her own blood from her broken nose.
"Lilly! Take her now!" Raphael bellowed, causing Alessandria to jump, that was the first time she had heard him speak that way.
Raphael Corozal had been the commander of the Royal Select for five years now. He was only a few years older than the Princess at twenty-eight years of age. He was the youngest commander in the history of the Kingdom of Morgania, he was also the most skilled. He had been undefeated in battle, never so much as suffering a major injury. This, along with a beautiful tactical mind accelerated him to the top position, coveted by many, and only achieved by a few. He was fiercely loyal to the crown, never questioning his orders or faltering in his execution.
Now, he was the sole survivor of the one-hundred and one strong Royal Select. Soon, he would die as well. He was prepared to die, every time he stepped out into the battlefield he was prepared. What he wasn't ready for was to allow Princess Alessandria to follow him into death. It was his duty to do everything in his power to keep that from happening, and he would give his life in order to fulfill it.
Lilly, with her only arm, grabbed Princess Alessandria and yanked her in the opposite direction. Alessandria started to struggle, not wanting to see her friend die, not another one. "Princess don't let him die in vain. We must go." Lilly said sternly as she overpowered her and dragged her by the arm. Giving in, Alessandria looked one last time at Raphael's broad back, before turning and running away.
That is all they had been doing for the last several hours, running. She thought that they were safe once they had escaped into the forest, and for a little while they were. There were five of them that had evaded the monsters; Her, Lilly, Raphael, and two of the Royal Select. They walked along quietly, avoiding making any light or too much noise, but soon, they began to be hunted by a different kind of monster.
They couldn't see them, only hear them as they ran through the woods, snarling. They had been caught off guard, allowing whatever was making the awful noise to get much too close to them. Raphael ordered the two Royal Select soldiers to distract them, allowing the three of them to escape. It might have seemed cold, but it was necessary. Princess Alessandria's safety was their duty, and they carried their duty out to the fullest.
Now, Raphael was doing the same as the two soldiers had done, sacrificing his life for hers. He stood there as steady as a rock. He stabbed his sword into the forest floor, his breathing steady. Undoing the leather straps holding his plate armor onto his body, Raphael kept his eyes trained on the tree line before him. He was sacrificing protection for ease of movement, either way, he was going to die; he only wished to take as many of them with him as possible.
Now bereft of his heavy armor, he pulled his sword out of the soil. The polished blade began to emanate a pale-yellow color, small runes engraved into the hilt radiating the brightest. It was an enchanted sword given the name 'Grief' by the blacksmith that had made it hundreds of years ago. Every commander of the Royal Select had carried this weapon. Its enchantment allowed it to grow sharper with the amount of mana that one poured into it, the only limit to how sharp it could be was determined by the wielder themselves.
Exploding out of the trees, what looked like a mutated wolf covered in mange, bounded toward him. Standing upright the wolf's head came up to his shoulders, its body was easily ten feet long. The areas of its bulky frame not covered in patches of bristly red fur, was equally red dried-up skin. Yellow teeth could be seen glistening with saliva because of the jowls looking as if they had been peeled off.
Seeing its prey stopped before it, the large canine accelerated. Only twenty feet away, it leapt into the air, launching its six-hundred-pound frame directly at Raphael. He narrowed his eyes, focusing on the creature, all of his senses honed. At the last possible second, he lowered his body, bracing his right foot into the soft soil and dove forward.
The wolf overshot its target, landing some six feet behind him. Already on his feet, Raphael swung his sword over his head and brought it down onto the wolf's exposed neck as it was turning to face him. Hot blood sprayed into the air, covering the front of his body. He winced from the pain, the blood was so hot it was scalding, blisters already appearing on his unprotected skin.
AHHHH! He let out an involuntary cry of pain as he was flung from where he stood, and into the trunk of a nearby tree. Another mutated wolf had his blood on its muzzle, it approached him with its head lowered, staring into his eyes with its black irises. Shocked, Raphael struggled to his feet, searing pain shooting up his leg making him sick to his stomach. Deep puncture wounds dotted his calf, his leg wasn't broken but putting any weight on it was still difficult.
He didn't know how the wolf was able to sneak up on him, but he was paying the price for his ignorance. The only saving grace was that he had managed to hang onto his sword. Pumping as much mana as he could into his weapon, Raphael took a few shaky steps in the direction of the beast. Chanting under his breath, he cast healing magic, helping to close up the bleeding wounds on his leg.
Seconds later, more noise sounded to his left. Out of the forest came eight more wolves, dashing between the trees and jumping over the undergrowth. One wolf peeled off, joining the one that had thrown him into the tree trunk, the other seven continuing on deeper into the forest. "Fuck!" He thundered, the fear and frustration tightening his chest.
It was only a matter of time before the pack would catch up with Lilly and the Princess, tearing them apart when they did so. There was absolutely nothing he could do, no, that wasn't completely true, he could pray to the gods to spare her, and for the first time in years that is what he did. "Thesan, goddess of the dawn, I beseech you to protect your children from the encroaching night. To help them brave the cold darkness, shielding them from all the evil in the world. I implore you to give me strength, strength enough to defeat my foes and the foes of all mankind." He paused, gripping Grief with both hands as the muscles in his arms and core bulged.
The wolves were on either side, trapping him between them. With his skill, he would be able to kill one of them but never two. His eyes were wide and bloodshot, he had nearly drained all of his mana. Grief hummed with more magical energy than it had ever held before, the pale-yellow light now almost as bright as the morning sun.
"Give me the power..." The wolves converged, cutting his battle cry short. He didn't mind, he met one wolf head on, swinging Grief with all his might. Grief bit into the mutated wolf, ignoring its thick hide and strong muscles. Steaming innards spilled onto the ground, the smell was nauseating. His movements didn't stop, in one fluid motion he began to pivot on his heel, continuing his swing.
Large jaws wrapped around his neck, teeth the size of a man's finger sunk into his flesh, separating the vertebrae. All at once, Grief slipped from his hands falling to the forest floor and his body went limp. Raphael was now paralyzed from the neck down and could only move his eyes as he watched the ground beneath move back and forth while the wolf brutally shook his powerless body.
The wolf stopped thrashing its prey and with a sickening crunch, killed the man between its jaws. Dropping the corpse onto the ground, the wolf pointed its head up into the air sniffing a few times before placing its nose onto the ground and repeating the process. Finding the trail it had been following for the last several hours, it bounded away, and deeper into the forest.
…..
The dimness of the forest was lessening, the spaces between the trees opening up and allowing the two women to run more freely. The haunting sounds behind them only briefly ceasing caused Alessandria's stomach to drop. Not only from the fear, but also from the knowledge that Raphael had thrown his life away to only postpone the inevitable by a few minutes.
Lilly was only a few steps ahead of her, her bloody stump causing her body to move awkwardly and unbalanced. An improvised tourniquet prevented her from bleeding out but done nothing for the pain each jarring step caused her. Her lungs burned from the cold dry air; she knew that exhaustion would soon force her to stop. She glanced back at the princess she was sworn to protect, seeing on her face that the fear of death was the only thing that kept her from collapsing as well.
"Keep…... running.... Princess." Lilly said between labored breaths. "There's a... clearing."
There was no response, only an arduous grunt. Lilly took that as that the Princess had heard her. They ran a little further, the last tree disappearing behind them and an open field with the main road cutting it in half before them. The tall grass came up to their waists, actually slowing them down as their feet had to fight the tangled stalks. A long howl resonated from the forest behind them, it sounded incredibly close, she didn't dare look back.
"Look... up ahead!" Princess Alessandria panted.
Sitting on the road seventy-five yards ahead of them were a large group of people. Hope swelled up in Lilly's chest, hope that was killed off as fast as it had been born. The people looked as if they were vagrants moving between towns. All of them were filthy, covered in black silt and other unknown stains. Some were even without proper footwear, let alone weapons. There was not a chance that they would be able to help them, at least not in the conventional way.
"Don't stop, no matter what!" Lilly shouted behind her, using what little breath she had left. Alessandria was slightly confused, but trusted Lilly with her life. As they approached the filth covered people, they all looked at the two women with confused looks on their faces that quickly morphed into ones of terror as they spotted what it was they were running from.
Screams and crying spread through the crowd like waves as they all got to their feet and started running in every direction. Alessandria could see small children being scooped up by their parents as they wailed. A man dressed in a plain black robe and holding an ugly black walking stick in one hand, was inspecting them as they ran through the parting crowd, a large smile on his face, guffawing. His reaction almost caused Lilly and her to stumble, it was entirely inappropriate for the situation. Alessandria thought for a moment that he had gone mad from fear, and the words that he shouted as they passed only confounded her even more.
"Will you look at that! It's happening again! You must be a shit magnet boy! Bahahaha!"
Ignoring the man's manic cackling, they crested the road and soon began pumping their legs through the tall grass once again. Only a few steps into the open field opposite the road, Lilly disappeared from her view. It happened much too quickly for her to react, she barreled forward soon stepping on the spot where she had disappeared. Her stomach rose up into her throat as she fell into the earth, only stopping once she was submerged up to her neck.
The sudden stop caused her head to violently whip back and forth, her vision darkening for but a breath. Panicked, she tried to struggle, what little muscle she had strained but couldn't break her free. Howls, and screams from the poor souls behind them filled her head and her heart with dread. She squeezed her eyes shut, hoping beyond hope that this was all but a terrifying nightmare.
She felt a rumble in the ground she was trapped in, the grass that now blotted out the sky whipping her in the face. She opened her eyes into slits, curiosity winning out over the urge to shut everything out. She watched in abject horror as the road that her and Lilly had just passed was rushing towards her. She screamed as she realized that she was the one moving towards the road, towards the beasts that had killed so many of her people.
She continued to scream as the ground around her moved as if it were liquid, dragging her along until her head was in the center of the road. She stopped once she noticed another head right next to hers, it was Lilly who was also planted into the ground, much like her namesake.
"What's going on? What's happening?" Alessandria questioned her friend, only being able to see the side of her face. The only reply Lilly gave her was a scream as her eyes went wide and her head lashed back and forth as she struggled against the earth. Alessandria turned her head forward as well, and soon, she was screaming once again.