Vansel couldn't remember much except for the beast in front of him.
He stood no chance against the towering werewolf that was now walking towards him, it's growl loud enough to even send vibrations through the soil that Vansel clearly felt. The former marine felt every last ounce of energy leave his body.
The massive scars on his chest, itching with pain, almost like something was crawling through his skin and making it's way through his body.
Vansel finally understood the warnings from both Lukas and Alex. They had tried to tell him about the unknown creatures that seemingly defended the rare herb. Now what will happen if he is dead...? What will happen to Demi? To Amy? Vansel grit his teeth, determined to summon whatever he had left to push himself up which the werewolf noticed instantly.
"You're alive...?"The beast seemed confused.
Another thump was heard as Vansel felt the shock wave. He knew his senses wouldn't lie to him, almost like another beast like creature had landed close to them. It sounded like...a second werewolf had just arrived. "An intruder? How did he find us?" The second werewolf talked more clearly than the first, his voice was still deep and beast like but...there was a hint of youth in him.
"I think he's human..."
Human...Vansel studied their words, they were describing him as human almost like they weren't familiar with that term. Vansel could feel his consciousness fading out as he began seeping into a state of complete numbness, his vision blurring and his senses, diluting. He could feel their muscular, fairly fingers grabbing him by the leg as he is forcefully lift from the ground.
Unable to fight back, Vansel gave in to the pain and exhaustion...
-
Vansel shot open his eyes, waking up in a completely unfamiliar environment.
Everything around him was dark and cooling, the lighting was minimal except for the warm orange lighting that was shining through the thin cage like windows beside him. Vansel pressed his hands down against what felt like cold smooth stone, shaking Vansel up where he felt the soreness in his chest.
Vansel looked down quickly, opening his button up shirt to see bandages wrapped around his chest, stained with dried blood. He could still feel a combination of burning and itching from the scars but for the most part, the pain has died down. "Where the hell?" Vansel studied his environment which greatly resembled a cave.
His breaths were becoming echoes, further confirming his suspicions.
"You're awake?"
Vansel looked behind him to see a cell door at outside of it, a scrawny looking teenager in plain t shirt and jeans, holding a tray of piping hot meat and a glass of milk. Vansel got up immediately, cautious about his surroundings:" Who are you? Where am I?"
"Just nice. I was just about to bring you your meal."
"Answer my question...who are you?"
The teen looked fairly unfazed as he greets Vansel:" My name is Piers...you are in Mount Diros. Now, you are clearly injured so I've brought you something to eat and drink."Piers opened a section of the door, placing the tray of food forward to the doubtful Vansel, who looked at him: "I saw...beasts...werewolves. I need answers."
"You will get them, for now just eat up. Heal yourself."
"What is this meat?"
"Roast Beef with a side of baked potato. "
Vansel took the food, knowing that Piers was right. Munching down on his new meal, Vansel found his hunger subsided enough as his desire to get answers returned to him. Piers was standing in the same spot keeping an eye on him as Vansel decided to ask:" So...how long was I out for?"
"Just a couple of hours. "Piers remarks which Vansel gladly nods knowing that he still had some time to obtain the solar leaf. "Okay, so where the hell am I? Who the hell are you and what are you like cannibals that are going to eat me or something?"
"You were attacked because you were mistaken of being a vampire. No human even attempted ascending Mount Diros since the early 90s. So naturally you being seen up here is...misunderstandings are bound to happen." Piers explains to Vansel who read into his words:" You talk like you are one of them...you are aren't you, a werewolf."
Piers nods, almost like he was regretful. "We are but...we aren't what you think we are."
Vansel placed down his tray of food, standing up and backing away from Piers who sighed:" I know...the stereotypes of the werewolves like we are some mindless beast or monster. I can assure you now...we are not, we are just a people who wants to be left alone. We have never even killed a single human being for centuries, so rest assured, we have no desire to kill you. So prove to us, that you deserve our empathy."
Vansel was speechless, unable to process the amount of worldview breaking information being handed to him at once.
"Piers, bring him out. The King wants to see him. Is he awake?" A deep female voice boomed.
A large figure was approaching their room, probably another werewolf. Vansel soon found himself looking at another werewolf who oddly had feminine features, dawning a gigantic sleeveless bronze and ruby armor and a giant bronze skirt to finish off her armoring. "Yeah he's awake." Piers opened the cell, going to grab Vansel who hostilely reacted to him: "Stay the hell back."
"Come on, don't make this harder than it needs to be."Piers went in, grabbing Vansel by the arm as the former marine struck a punch directly at Piers in the face, who stood in his place, barely fazed by the punch.
"What...?" Vansel endured the pain in his chest and tried to break free from Pier's grip.
It was almost like trying to break out of solid stone. Pier's grip didn't change in the slightest as Vansel looked at the scrawny teenager. He clearly possessed a terrifying amount of strength, does it have to do with him being a werewolf? Piers sighed, lifting Vansel with one arm with ease and moving him out of the cell.
Vansel knew he couldn't fight back as he was brought face to face to the female werewolf who growled at him.
Vansel was quickly placed in chains he couldn't possibly escape, made to follow the she wolf and Piers out of his prison. Vansel was led through several rocky walls before his environment took a drastic change. The next room he was led too had more werewolves, presumably the outside of the jail cells and like the she wolf, they had giant armors on fitting their muscular bodies, holding massive swords that suited their size perfectly.
The she wolf opened a new door, revealing the entrance towards a massive hallway.
Vansel felt his jaw drop, the hallway was way too impressive in size, spanning the length of multiple football fields with almost no end in sight, marble flooring with cherry blossom trees skillfully planted in the middle, pillars made out of smooth stone and chandlers illuminating the place up with a soothing warm atmosphere. There were people just casually walking around beside other werewolves, almost like it was a normality here along with dozens more corridors branching away to more areas.
"What the hell..." Vansel couldn't believe his eyes.
Just where was he? Is this actually Mount Diros?
A hoist that was several times larger than the normal ones, probably to allow for werewolf usage was waiting for them along one of the hallway. Piers and the she wolf led him in with Piers, pressing a button to the 1st floor. Vansel's eyes widened again as he noticed the number of floors: 11 of them including 2 basements. How big is this place?
The hoist moved them down to the first floor where Vansel was greeted by a sight he never expected to see in his lifetime.
The throne room.
The room was at least 30 meters in height, grand marble flooring and walls with giant werewolf statues at the two corners of the room, each of them acting like a fountain of sorts with water spewing out of their mouth and onto the artificial ponds below that were shaped into patterns that looked ancient and in a way...mystical.
Surrounding the throne room were balconies, multiple levels of them with each balcony occupied by dozens of werewolves with all sorts of armor variety,carrying all sorts of weapons to axes, spears, swords, even oversized snipers and crossbows.
There must be hundreds of them just alone in this room.
A massive iron throne stood in the middle end of the throne room, the height of a truck that had sharp features to it, the throne's armrests were decorated with a claw like shape and on the throne...a werewolf larger than any others in the room, dressed in full gold armor. He even gave off a different vibe, radiating power even from the distance Vansel was standing from.
There was a type of aura coming from him, one that strangely felt...easing.
There were two rows of fully red armored werewolves, armed with a glowing red spear each standing in front of the King...presumably bodyguards of sorts.
Behind the throne room, a massive glass window that showed the outside of wherever they were and from what Vansel could tell...this was indeed Mount Diros. The outside was nothing more than trees overlooking the village. It must be some sort of one way glass or he would have seen this gigantic glass panel from the outside long ago.
"King Woxlife, we have brought the intruder as requested." The she wolf announced.
"Thank you Xitraq. Commence meeting." The King, Woxlife's ancient voice boomed across the throne room, silencing everyone in an instant. Vansel looked in front of him, swallowing his saliva and reminding himself on his true purpose here. Another werewolf was to the King's right, with one of his eye glowing green and the other, faded out with a scar across his face, dawning a grey scarf around his neck and dawning an oversized robe that had symbols all over it.
"Introduce yourself intruder. Who are you?" Woxlife questioned.
"Don't even attempt lying. We can smell your intentions." The she wolf, Xitraq warned.
Vansel scanned his surroundings, trying to think about the best thing he could do now. There was no way of escaping, even if he tried to lie his way through...if what Xitraq said was right, he would probably be dead. Vansel decided to tell his story truthfully:" My name is Vansel Being. My son, Demi has been recently diagnosed with a terminal disease. I was told that there is a herb known as the Solar Leaf here...in Mount Diros that can save him."
Chatter broke out among the wolves.
"This is stupid." Vansel heard a werewolf from the upper balconies say.
"So you come here, expecting us to hand over the herb and let you go?" Woxlife asks which Vansel nods:" I don't want to expect anything. But I'm not...I wouldn't want to be here in the first place if it wasn't for my son. I don't know what is the deal with your mountain or werewolves and honestly, I couldn't care less. I just need the Solar Leafs and I will be on my way."
"You aren't even supposed to be here in the first place. A deal had been made with the previous mayor to stop anyone from climbing up the mountain." Xitraq adds.
"He must have already been warned. The fact that he still did it shows how desperate he is."The scarred wolf beside Woxlife said.
"Why should we just hand over the Solar Leaf to you. We know nothing about you. For all we know you might be some human threatened by the vampires as a spy to infiltrate us." Xitraq brings up which Vansel confusedly responded to:" Vampire? What the hell are you talking about. You said you will know if I'm lying, you should know I ain't then."
Woxlife rose from his throne, stepping down from it and marched towards Vansel.
The massive werewolf began...transforming. His muscles, shrinking and his fur almost like they were fading away right in front of his eyes. Woxlife's claws retracted, his body getting more and more humanoid by the second until he became the shape of a human. Even his massive oversized armor somehow began transforming by itself, it's parts and pieces shifting and clanking to fit Woxlife perfectly, who now simply looks like an ordinary man around his 60s.
Vansel couldn't even believe he was looking at the same being.
Human Woxlife looks...tired. He had scars all over his face, his beard and long ragged hair despite mostly black had strains of grey on them. It told a story...he clearly had been through hell and back, something an ex marine like Vansel himself could understand.
"Did you know what happened to the last man who came here?Uninvited?"Woxlife came close, whispering.
"Do I want to?" Vansel answered.
"It was a woman, a daughter trying to save her mother from this disease. But make no mistake Mr Being...what your son suffers from is no disease. It is a curse, inflicted to the random population of the human world from a vampire." Woxlife tells Vansel who paused him:" A vampire curse? I was told that it was a virus of sorts."
"It was. Or it still technically is. Nobody truly knows what the vampire infection is. As much as we can explain them with science, there are certain abilities that belong more on the mystical side of things despite it originating from nothing more than a condition that makes one thirst for blood." Woxlife replies Vansel who went back to the original topic:" So...what happened to that girl?"
"She betrayed us. The story of her mother doesn't exist, her mother had been dead for years. She almost brought the Solar Leaf to the vampires and we were lucky to stop her on time."
"Okay...so I'm assuming something very bad will happen if these leafs get into vampire hands."
"What do you know about vampires Mr Being?" Woxlife questions.Vansel felt strangely relaxed around the King of Werewolves, there was no hostility, no threatening vibes, just simply an old man trying to ask real questions about him. "Vampires...blood sucking zombie like monsters. They fear...sunlight, killed if pierced through the heart with wood."
"Precisely Mr Being...giving them Solar Leafs...is basically giving them full immunity to the sun."
Xitraq stepped in, going over to Woxlife:" King Woxlife, there is no need to give a stranger this much information. Even if he doesn't sell us out to the vampires, there's no telling about what he will do with the information he has learned today. What if he tells the human world about us, they might deploy their military on us."
"Why would I do that?" Vansel looks at her.
"Who knows you humans. Ungrateful egotistical pieces of shit." Xitraq remarks.
Woxlife raised his hand, a signal for Xitraq to stop herself. "Vampires feed on you humans in order to survive. There have been enough stories in the human world for you to know that. In recent times vampires attacks have been getting more and more frequent and if they end up getting their hands on the Solar Leafs. They are...basically almost invincible. That would pose a threat to my kingdom."
"Then why not destroy them?" Vansel brings up.
"Because it makes us immune to silver. Without solar leafs vampires can use all sorts of silver weapons against us, making us unable to fight back. We ourselves need the leafs themselves in order to stand a chance." The scarred werewolf speaks.
Vansel found Woxlife looking at him, almost like he was recognized in some way.
"He isn't lying as far as I can tell. Very well Mr Being. I will take your case into consideration before deciding what to do with you." Woxlife tells Vansel before signalling for the guards to take him away. Vansel stopped, remembering that he had very limited time." Wait...no stop! My son only has two weeks left! I'm sorry but I need it now!"
"I'm sorry too Mr Being. I cannot just hand over the fate of my kingdom to a stranger just like that." Woxlife tells him.
"Come on, let's go." A werewolf grabbed him as Vansel turned around, recognizing the guard. The same one who attacked him yesterday. "You...you're the one who attacked me."
"No human is supposed to be up here. For the past few years we have been facing vampire attack after vampire attack, trying our best to cover our tracks in order to prevent those monsters from finding our sanctuary here. It is a mistake that I mistook you as one of them, but I do hope you can see why." The werewolf replies.
"No need to explain yourself to him Huntus. Just bring him back into the cells." Xitraq ordered.
-
Hours have passed since Vansel was brought back into his cell.
Woxlife was in his quarters, flashes of memories that weren't his going through his head...something was strange about that man, that intruder. He looked familiar, almost like he had seen him somewhere before. The werewolf King laid back in his quarters, looking out of his room one sided glass window which overlooked the mountains and villages in North Carolina.
"My ancestors...what are you trying to show me?"
Three knocks were heard against the entrance to his room as Xitraq's voice seeped through:" My King, you requested to meet us?"
"Come in." Woxlife says as the door opened, Xitraq and the scarred wolf, Grandyll both entering in their wolf forms. "At ease. You can return to your human forms." Woxlife tells the two who both obeyed him, returning to their human forms. Xitraq was now a woman in her mid 30s, with caramel-blonde hair tied back and her armor, clanking down to fit her human form.
Grandyll, now an old man in his late 60s retaining his scarred right eye from his werewolf form, a well kept beard and short hair with the scarf around his werewolf neck now being used as a robe of sorts.
"We need to talk about Vansel." Woxlife began.
"Honestly I don't know why you guys just don't execute him on the spot right there and then. He poses too much of a risk to us." Xitraq says, taking a seat on a nearby couch while Grandyll answered to her:" We haven't executed anybody in a generation Xitraq. Like what we all heard just now he is just a father who wants to save his son. I didn't detect any lie from him. Did you?"
"I understand your concerns Xitraq. But... something feels off about him."Woxlife says.
"Is it those visions again?" Xitraq asks.
"Maybe. But something tells me he is...crucial to what's going to happen soon. That's just a feeling I have." Woxlife reveals to the two werewolves. "Your visions has always came true so far. Did you get any more hints about the future? Maybe those can clear out some of our current doubts." Grandyll suggests.
"I wish I could old friend."
"So what are we gonna do with him now?" Xitraq cut back to their original topic.
"For now...I intend to help him. Allowing him to take the Solar Leafs is way too deadly for that. Probably we'll get a few Red Claws to accompany him. Bring his son to us. If my feelings are wrong, we'll heal his son and let them go or if he betrays us, we'll kill him. But if my feelings are right...his arrival yesterday may change everything as we know it." Woxlife informs the two.
Night fell.
Vansel sat in his cell, frustrated and hopeless. He had never felt so restless his entire life. Another day had passed and he made no progress in obtaining the leafs he needed. What if Demi's condition worsened overnight? This disease is something nobody knew anything about, so many unstable and unpredictable factors...Vansel looked towards the door, peeking out and finding Piers in the distance.
"Hey Piers right? Please let me talk to the King. My son doesn't have long."
"I'm sorry but the King will only speak to you tomorrow. It's getting to midnight soon. He has other matters to attend to...but if you are hungry I can bring you something to eat." Piers offered Vansel who slammed his fist against the gates, his voice turning more aggressive out of the blue, shocking the relaxed Piers who was still in his human form.
"COME ON!" Vansel roared, punching the concrete wall in front of him and to his surprise, landing a hole against it as cracks formed around where his punch landed.
"Dude...you gotta calm down."Piers begged.
Vansel began growling to himself: "How can I possibly be calm when I'm trapped here, leaving my son to nothing more than the mercy of god?"
A strange itching sensation was starting to spread through Vansel who began feeling an uncontrollable urge to move himself around, a weird swelling pain lurking through his limbs and a strange rage within him that could not be quelled.
"Let me out...please..."Vansel collapsed onto his knees, saliva dripping out of his mouth rapidly.
"Dude...someone get a medic in!"Piers called out to the other werewolf guards. Vansel couldn't even feel in control of his body now, almost like another entity was in control as he felt his fingernails extend out into claws, his teeth literally sharpening by themselves and fur, sprouting all over his body. He could feel his nose extending out into a snout like shape, his ears pointing outwards and his muscles overgrowing till a painful extent.
His vision reddened, his inner rage completely taking over his emotions.
"What the hell?"Piers took a step back, watching as the transformed Vansel growl hungrily, looking at him the eyes of a rage fueled monster.
Next Chapter- The Hunger of Rage