Rain.
It began pouring when the night sky set in.
Vansel walked down the street of Lexington, walking out of the town with blood dripping down from his arms mixed with the rainwater that drenched him. His clothes were torn, his shirt completely ripped apart and his pants, barely hanging on.
There was an itching sensation in his wounds as he looked down at the cuts on his hands and arm, noticing that the bleeding was slowly stopping and the scars, seemingly getting smaller by the second. Despite that...his body was still sore, his feet in constant pain as he walked down the bitumen road away from the town, hoping that no one would recognize him out of wolf form.
Is there a way...? Anyway to contact the other wolves?
He didn't have their phone numbers, assuming they had phones in the first place.
He couldn't survive out here alone, the warnings from Piers, Xitraq and the other wolves. If they were supposed to be hunting the Blood Knight down, why was he the one who encountered her? Does this mean that the other Blood Knights have been active as well? Too many questions yet again, things that he knew couldn't be answered right now as he continued walking, hoping to eventually get a ride from someone back to the mountain.
"Yo man you alright?" A voice called out.
Vansel turned around, blinded by the headlights of a truck that was heading his direction. "Oh my god...Vansel? What happened to you were you caught up in that accident in the town just now?" Alex was the driver, who recognized Vansel.
"Yeah...yeah I need help." Vansel lied.
"I'm heading back to the village, it's quite late now so most clinics should be closed. There's a doctor in the neighborhood though I can knock on his door-" Vansel stopped Alex before he could continue:" No, no it's okay. I...I just need a ride back to the village."
"I have some spare clothes at the trunk, get yourself something to wear." Alex tells the grateful Vansel who hopped into the back seat.
"What happened man?" Alex asks.
"Hard to explain. What time is it now?" Vansel's adrenaline was running wild, he had goosebumps, something felt wrong. There was a light burning sensation at his scalp, almost like he was being warned of something bad that was going to happen soon. Alex checked his watch, aware of Vansel's worried state:" It's 9pm. Are you alright?"
"I...yeah just keep driving. How long will it take before we reach the mountain?"
"About twenty minutes, we'll be driving past another town soon if you wanna get a drink or something to calm yourself down." Alex tells him. Vansel shook his head:" No, no just keep going." The ex marine looked out the window, his heart pumping rapidly and true enough, his gut feeling was right as he observed the trees beside the road, rustling violently.
"Shit...go faster! Something's following us!" Vansel roared.
"What?" Alex didn't wanna argue, stepping on the accelerator when the two men heard a beast like voice yell at them:" Vansel? Vansel is that you? It's me Huntus!" Vansel sat straight up, getting an extremely confused Alex to stop the truck, turning towards the trees to see Huntus, reverting back into his human form and walking up to them.
"What the hell is that?!" Alex screamed, catching a brief look at Huntus' werewolf form.
"No no it's okay, he...I know him. He won't hurt us." Vansel calmed him down.
"Huntus? " Vansel opened the door of the truck, greeting the werewolf. "How did you find me here?" Vansel asks the werewolf whose oversized sniper rifle transformed, becoming the size of an ordinary human sized hunting rifle and slung it over his shoulder. "Grandyll was supposed to get a report from Rex and Alicia upon finishing your trip at the bank. He didn't get it and thus, sent me to look for you...you know using our sense of smell, we can do those things. Anyway, I have orders to bring you back safely, Grandyll and five more Red Claws are on their way as well."
"Okay...that's great. I have something to report as well. I was attacked...by a Blood Knight."
"Blood Knight?! Wait...so Alicia and Rex..."
"I'm sorry. I tried to help them." Vansel revealed to Huntus who took a moment to grief. "Werewolves...you guys are real. I knew it, my grandparents have told me about a kingdom of werewolves who have been protecting the population of North Carolina for three generations. Is that all true as well?" Alex muttered.
"Yes." Vansel answered.
"How did you escape?" Huntus asks Vansel who recalled the events:" I forced myself to transform. I managed to barely win but...I did suffer pretty bad damage. Now I know what you guys mean by how powerful the Blood Knights are." Vansel tells Huntus who raised an eyebrow:" You defeated...a Blood Knight?"
"I know...it sounds absurd but...I got lucky. That was all."
"Did you kill the Knight?" Huntus seemed extremely concerned. "I...I hope so. Things were very blurry but I did the best I could to control my wolf. I did land many devastating punches on her and she stopped moving so...I guess so."
"No...no she's not dead. That's not how it works."
"What do you mean that's not how it works?" Vansel noticed Huntus' tone.
"Most vampires can be killed by us werewolves normally yes, but for the Blood Knights, they are...in a sense almost immortal. They can endlessly regenerate and heal when under the night, the only way to kill them completely is to bring them into the sun, let the sunlight burn them completely into ash." Huntus tells him. "Anyway, which one did you fight?"
"What do you mean which one?"
"Which Blood Knight did you face?" Huntus questions Vansel who recalled the red glowing V tattoo on the vampire's arm. "Blood Knight Five I believe. She called herself Lyca." Huntus nods, accepting his answer as he pointed to Alex:" Okay, you two need to follow me, including you stranger. No one is safe now, Lyca is not the only Blood Knight active tonight. There's reports from Xitraq and Woxlife, they are engaged in battle with other Blood Knights as we speak."
"Okay, I'll follow you."
Woxlife felt it.
The outskirts of Orcacoke Town.
A vision, flashed through his mind. A werewolf, a big and strong one smashing his fists into the face of Blood Knight Five, Lyca, pummeling her to the ground in the middle of a town. The vision disappeared as Woxlife collapsed onto the ground, his head felt like it was spinning out of control as Xitraq quickly noticed her king on the ground.
"Woxlife!" Xitraq jumped at him, grabbing him out of the way as a pile of rocks smashed into the ground where he just were.
"Cover us!" Xitraq roared as several Red Claws raised their shields above the two wolves, blocking a range of projectiles.
"Woxlife!" Xitraq yelled, slapping Woxlife across his cheek and instantly bringing him back to reality:" What's going on? Another vision?" Woxlife was sweating profusely even in his wolf form, his eyes clearly startled from something as he nodded:" It's him...Vansel is the next successor, I'm sure of it now. We need to find him. Make sure he's okay."
"He- what did you see?"
"Lyca has been defeated. By him. Alone. I've seen this vision before but...it was so much more clear this time. "
"He soloed a Blood Knight? That's...okay...okay we can talk about this shit later." Xitraq says when the ground beneath them ripped apart, bats, thousands of them began swarming them and the legion of Red Claws from every direction. Their armor was denting, cuts and slashes were appearing all over their bodies as each bat attacked them.
"Archers! Shoot in every direction!" Woxlife commands as the archers followed his command.
The arrows were shot, each oversized arrow slicing through dozens of bats among the huge swarm of them but yet, it wasn't enough. "We gotta do something, we're sitting ducks here!" Mika, one of the Red Claws called out.
"Fall back! If we can't find the main body we can't do much! Focus on your senses and call out any hint of his whereabouts!" Xitraq yelled. Woxlife took in a deep breath, his troops retreating him as the King of Werewolves unleashed a powerful howl, firing a sonic boom that dispersed the bats in front of him over a large area, disintegrating many of them and buying time for the other wolves to gain distance.
"In your prime you would have been a big threat. I guess the rumors are true. This is your end." A hollow deep voice echoed from somewhere in the forest.
Woxlife readied himself, extending his claws as the true body of Blood Knight Six, Shriek walked out of the trees...
At the same time,
Grandyll's party managed to find Vansel, who was led to them safely by Huntus. Vansel looked around nervously at the five Red Claws following Grandyll while Huntus caught Grandyll up to date with Lyca's defeat and the deaths of Alicia and Rex. "So it's true..." Grandyll mumbled to himself, remembering the warnings that Woxlife had told him.
When the time comes, the successor will defeat a Blood Knight. That will be the beginning of the end. Those were the exact words of Woxlife that Grandyll recalled.
Grandyll understood what was at stake here. "Okay...here's what we need to do. We have two more trucks that can help transport us, our goal is to get Vansel back to Mount Diros. Once we reach back we will deploy the Red Claws as reinforcements to aid Woxlife, lock the entire mountain down and place every last warrior we have on guard." Grandyll commands.
"We don't have time to lose then. Let's go." Huntus suggests.
"Mountain?" Alex sounded worried.
"Mount Diros...it's not what you expect. It's basically a cozy community with food, shelter, farms, all that good shit. I'm just as new so...don't worry about it. They aren't gonna eat us. I can vouch for them." Vansel tells Alex who nods:" I mean I hope not. I don't even know what's going on."
"Trust me, I don't either."
The squad boarded their respective trucks, driving back towards Mount Diros.
Grandyll sat with Vansel and Alex while Huntus drove, all of them transforming back into their human forms while the two trucks of Red Claws drove beside them. "I want you to listen to me very carefully Vansel, this is something that I've prayed would have never come true, but nevertheless it is something that is completely out of our control."
"What?" Vansel asks.
"Woxlife, being the King of Werewolves, he has the ability to see into the memories of the past Kings, as well as glimpses of the future King's. It is a mystical ability only Kings can access. In the past few years Woxlife has been getting visions of the future through the eyes of the next King and recently, these visions have been coming true. We have reason to believe that those visions...are through your eyes."
Mine...huh?
"What are you saying? That I'm the next King?"
"It seems to be your fate, whether you like it or not. Every King throughout our history, none of them had willingly become King. In fact no one really within the entire Kingdom wants to be King. The amount of pressure, the overwhelming power thrust onto one's shoulders is simply too much, but time and time again these men had risen up, shouldering the responsibility of that role. I'm not asking you to be King, Vansel. None of us has that right, but as the official advisor for these Kings, it is my duty to tell you, about your fate." Grandyll revealed.
"I can't...not with my son still sick. I have too many things to fix, I left my family broken, I have to take responsibility for them first." Vansel rejected.
"I'm not asking you to leave your family. In fact I don't wish to ask you for anything. As history has proven time and time again, I don't have to say anything. If fate really wants you to be King, there is little you can do, little any of us can do. The pieces will fill in together by itself." Grandyll tells Vansel when Huntus roared:" GRANDYLL!"
Grandyll quickly turned around to see the truck heading straight into a portal of sorts.
A smokey circle of darkness, a never ending void right in front of them. Huntus had already braked as the truck swerved, uncontrollably tumbling into the portal and the next thing they knew, they were in somewhere completely different, the truck stopping in the nick of time just inches away from slamming into a tree. "What happened?!" Alex yelled.
"Magic....that's the work of a Blood Knight. We need to figure out where we are." Grandyll quickly made a plan as Huntus pointed to their north, several Red Claws engaged in battle with a swarm of bats as well as dozens of vampires and alongside them, Piers.
"Something led us here. They wanted us to be grouped up." Vansel observed.
"Okay. We need to-" Huntus couldn't even finish his sentence when a force struck him, sending Huntus flying straight into the tree behind them, smashing it's bark as the injured Huntus collapsed onto the ground, spewing out a mouthful of blood.
Grandyll didn't hesitate, transforming into his wolf form and swung wildly into the air. Vansel quickly shoved Alex aside, his reflexes kicking in as the ex marine raised his forearms just in time for another invisible force blast right into him, sending him tumbling towards the ground in pain.
"Get into the truck human." Grandyll tells Alex who didn't bother arguing, doing as he was told.
"Okalus. Show yourself you coward." Grandyll growled.
Vansel watched as a skinny vampire, almost as skinny as Piers himself with messy sharp hair, long ears and his eyes, glowing gold under the heavy rainy weather. Just like Lyca, he also had a glowing tattoo on his tricep, a bright red IV. Roman numeral four.
"Blood Knight 4...?" Vansel pushed himself up.
The vampire was fast, faster than he could catch with his eyes. All he managed to see was a blur, the vampire moving at super sonic speeds. How could he defeat an enemy he can't even see?
"You seriously think you managed to defeat us all those years ago? We have merely been regrouping, gathering more forces to take you all down once and for all." Okalus hissed when an entire tree was ripped out of the group, Huntus tossing at the vampire at high speeds but Okalus was faster, speeding under the thrown tree and smacking Huntus in the jaw right before appearing in front of Grandyll, throwing a punch that the veteran wolf caught in his palm.
"We have been preparing too." Grandyll says, tightening his grip around Okalus' arm and punching him away, ripping his arm right out of his torso in the process.
"Vansel, take Alex and get away from here as far away as you can. Huntus, draw your weapons. "Grandyll calmly spoke as Huntus did as he was told, transforming into his wolf form as well, deploying the oversized sniper from his back and taking aim at Okalus, firing.
The ground exploded, Huntus' bullet leaving the crater in the ground and Okalus, no where to be seen.
"Come on, let's go!" Vansel ran towards the truck in which Alex pulled out a revolver.
"Do you think this will do shit?" Alex asks.
Vansel looked at Okalus who reappeared behind Huntus, knocking the werewolf to the ground. The vampire's smiled as veins and muscle sprouted out of the hole where his arm used to be, growing out a fresh arm that made him look like he had just taken no damage.
"No...but it can probably buy us seconds of time." Vansel tells Alex. The two men took off, running out of the forest and into Orcacoke Town where the nearby civilians had already evacuated, most of them running either out of town or towards the center of it where most evacuation shelters of towns were located.
Elderly, children and others, going through the rainy night completely drenched as the roars and screams of the vampires and werewolves in the forest echoed across the town.
"What do we do?" Alex asks:" That guy said you were some king or whatever?"
"Look, I'm just as confused as you." Vansel says when he noticed two vampires spotting them, charging their direction. Vansel took off his shirt, exposing the scar on his chest to the rain, his arms still hurting as he readied himself to transform when a werewolf jumped in front of him, wielding two wrist blades each a meter long, greeting the two charging vampires in battle.
"Vansel, you need to find Woxlife, he's been looking for you!" Piers tells him.
"Where is he?" Vansel asks as Piers kicked one of the closest vampire aside.
"North east from the church!" Piers said as he began fighting.
"Okay you know what, not gonna lie even if we steal a vehicle or something to get out of here, this entire place is a war zone. The entire town is basically screwed." Alex concluded to which Vansel easily agreed with:" Church...there should be a shelter there, go ahead, hide with those people. You have a gun, you can at least try and defend them." Vansel suggested to Alex.
"What about you?"
"Don't worry about me...I've unwillingly become one of them already, but that also gives me the power to fight back." Vansel tells Alex as he allowed his emotions to take over himself once more, this time remembering every advice he had heard from the other wolves combining them with the experience of transforming before...
Vansel opened his eyes this time as the werewolf...more in control than ever.
His could still feel the rage burning in his heart, his vision bright red but now, able to see hints of blue in the surrounding, almost like he was seeing through the lens of a temperature scanner. He could hear everything, the sound claws and the fangs of vampire clashing, his sense of smell, being able to differentiate the difference between man, vampire and wolf.
Humans had a warm meaty smell, wolves had a stronger smokey yet hot smell while vampires had a cold like scent, reeking of blood and almost like the frozen section of a freezer.
"Go." Vansel muttered as Alex ran the other direction.
Vansel cleared his head, determined to get as much control over the wolf as possible in which to his relief, the body was responding to his thoughts successfully. Vansel leapt into the air, the power surging through his leg muscles shooting him high up into the air and several times the height of the nearest houses at insane speeds, the werewolf quickly jumping towards the nearest fight where Xitraq was facing several vampires.
Vansel landed, crushing one vampire underneath his weight before striking another down with his insane strength, his fist bursting through the vampire's torso almost like he was punching through a sandcastle, turning around quickly and raising his claw to slash apart yet another vampire which fell apart in his claws.
Xitraq was holding her own as well, violently swinging her battle axe like an extension of her own body, each swing powerfully yet accurately going in the perfect angles she needed for a successful attack, slicing apart two more vampires on her own as the duo managed to buy themselves a moment to catch their breaths.
"Why the hell are you here?" Xitraq turned to Vansel.
"Blood Knight...Portal...Explain. Later." Vansel managed to get his wolf to talk.
An earth shattering blast was heard in the distance as the ground shook from the vibration, Xitraq and Vansel turning around to see a massive explosion erupting from one of Orcacoke Town's buildings, flames and smoke going up in the air.
"Okay, just remember what I told you. Keep your mind as clear as you can for as long as possible, contain your emotions if you wanna maintain your control. Nod if you can understand me." Xitraq tells Vansel commanded his wolf body to nod. "Alright, let's go. Follow me."
The sky was strange, almost like it was a living creature itself.
The rain was drowning out the sound and roar of the battles, Xitraq using her enhanced senses to try and locate Woxlife. An ear piercing scream shot through the air, temporarily forcing Xitraq and Vansel both to stop in their tracks as their ears rung in pain. "There!" Xitraq ran towards her right only to see Woxlife being flung aside like a rag doll, smashing into the side of a house and collapsing it's walls under his weight.
"Woxlife!" Xitraq ran towards him only for a man to land in front of Woxlife. He was two meters in height with muscular build, his skin white as snow, his hair long and tied back into a ponytail covered with black iron spartan armor that had spikes as well as chains across his body. A bright red VI, tattooed into his tricep just like the others.
"Shriek." Xitraq noticed the Sixth Blood Knight.
Woxlife got up, dodging one of Shriek's punches and returned it with his own, blasting Shriek right in the rib with devastating power, sending waves upon waves of shock waves from the impact that created fissures across the ground and yet, the vampire only took a couple of steps back before smiling, blood leaking down from his teeth.
"You're done for now that you're past your prime." Shriek muttered.
Xitraq and Vansel attacked, both of them going in to defend Woxlife when Shriek opened his palm, a fury of hundreds of bats flying right out and using their sheer numbers to stop both werewolf's charge, getting blown away by the overwhelming number of bats. Woxlife goes in, attacking with strike after strike that Shriek caught up with, the vampire and werewolf king both exchanging powerful blows that were destroying the environment around them.
"UGH!" Xitraq yelled in frustration, leaping into the air and out of the swarm of bats, aiming for Shriek and swinging her axe right down, determined to decapitate the vampire who caught her weapon by the blade with his bare palm, crushing it like an empty can.
"Xitraq! Get back!" Woxlife begged when more bats emerged from the vampire.
Woxlife quickly jumped towards her, grabbing Xitraq and making a mad dash away from Shriek, gaining some distance between them. "This entire place is a shit show, we can't stay here, we need to regroup and fast!" Xitraq tells the King.
Woxlife spotted Vansel in the distance, surprisingly keeping up with the bats and slashing apart the attacking creatures by the dozen using just the wind power he was generating with his swings. "We have to keep Vansel alive. He is the one. Assemble the remaining wolves, tell them to regroup with me. Go!" Woxlife tells Xitraq who took off, Woxlife himself making a beeline for Vansel.
The King jumped to Vansel's aid, pushing him out of the swarm of bats.
"Vansel? Can you see or hear me? Are you in control?" Woxlife quickly asks in which Vansel nodded. "Blood Knights...why here?" Vansel managed.
"No idea. But all you need to know is this, our motive is to keep the people of this town out of harm's way. Can you do that?" Woxlife tells Vansel who growled:" Yes."
Shriek's shadow loomed over them as the Blood Knight spread his arms, hissing creepily and pouring out a swarm of bats into the sky, a literal tsunami of bats that were about to converge on them when Woxlife stomped his feet into the ground, taking in a deep breath, spreading his jaws and releasing an earth shaking blast.
A sonic howl, one that was way more destructive than the last, acting like a literal wave of death as it's power ripped through the swarm of bats, the sheer destructive power of the howl breaking apart each vampire bat into dust. The ground was shaking violently like an earthquake from the roar itself which caused Vansel's ears to become completely numb, leaving only a ringing sensation left to his sense of hearing.
The blast hit Shriek who managed to hold his arms up in defense only for the wave of destructive to blast him off his feet, sending the vampire tumbling across the street and collapsing into a garden yard, crushing every plant and fence in his path.
"Come on, he won't stay down for long." Woxlife got Vansel to follow him and in front of them, the remaining Red Claws, only a dozen of them left in comparison to the twenty five that the battle started out with led by Xitraq towards the King.
"The residents?" Woxlife asks.
"Most of them successfully made it out of the town or the church. I commanded the archers to position themselves as humans there." Xitraq tells Woxlife who looked at her:" The ten archers? How many of them are still alive?"
"Only five but...they'll have to do." Xitraq answered.
"Huntus? Where is he?! The Blood Knights should want him dead." Mika the Red Claw asks Xitraq who closed her eyes, trying to use her hearing to find him when she shot her eyes open:" Not far, Grandyll is with him, they barely held off Okalus."
Vansel spotted Grandyll and Huntus, covered in blood several streets away, trying to reach them.
"Go help them. Go." Xitraq tells the Red Claws as a few of them moved towards the two injured wolves. "Something's not right. It's too quiet too fast." Xitraq looked around when a chilling cold breeze swept past them, the full moon in the sky, like a glaring eye looming above them, watching their every move.
"Vansel. Whatever happens next, I want you to listen to Xitraq. Do not fight with me." Woxlife tells the ex marine.
Vansel watched through the wolf's eyes as the empty, cold town surrounding him suddenly felt...populated by an unwelcome presence. He could spot Okalus and Shriek, Okalus at the top of a building's roof and Shriek, walking down the street right in front of the wolves, gloating and blatantly mocking the squad of werewolves who at this point barely did anything to them. All their wounds had healed.
There was dozens...no...hundreds of silhouettes walking out of the shadows, completely surrounding the werewolves who all drew their weapons, ready for the biggest fight of their lives. A shiver was sent down Vansel's spine as an overwhelming stench of blood filled his nose, causing him to quickly look towards the direction of the scent.
A hulking figure with gigantic bat like wings soared through the air at blinding speeds, landing in front of the army of vampires across the street in front of them, his entire shape shifting into the size of a regular human.
"He...he's here." Grandyll muttered.
Vansel looked closely to see a well dressed man, in a full blown tuxedo, polished shoes, well combed hair and a sinister smile streaking across his pale yet oddly creepy but charismatic face. He had black pupils, with hints of red in them.
The Blood Lord himself, Dracula.
Next Chapter- A King's Armageddon