However, he couldn't deter the hunter, who had his prey right in his hands. All he had to do was take the final step.
With his other hand, Arwin touched the battle markings that had manifested over his body and face. He smiled and then aimed the stake right at his face.
Abel tried his best to try and just get up or even knock the stake away, but he was growing too weak. His body was still sizzling, and his body was receiving serious damage by the second.
"I can't wait to see how my tattoo grows after I kill you!"
Whoosh!
Pulling the stake back, he smiled before driving it forward.
WHAM!
Out of nowhere, somebody kicked Arwin right in his face, launching him into a tree beside them. Cracks scurried up the thick trunk and the tree fell into a slight slant upon taking the collision.
Arwin had dropped his stake, and Abel slowly looked up to see who this person was.
"Why is this guy trying to kill somebody like you." Otto monotonously questioned, while staring the being down.
He threw a healing pill toward him, without even giving him a glance.
"Who the hell are you?! You can't be a demon, why are you helping them?!" He asked, holding his burning chest in agony.
"I could ask you the same thing!" He said back, while Abel crunched on the healing pill that he gave him.
The sizzling came to a stop, and his healing factor had been accelerated. His skin sealed up, and he took a sigh of relief upon feeling the pain slowly subsiding.
"Seriously, Otto, I can't thank you enough."
"I didn't come here just to save you. I was just put off from all the noise and couldn't properly cultivate."
Arwin surveyed his surroundings, thinking of fleeing. However, he made his choice and rushed away into the distance, without even battling the blonde warrior.
"What a weakling. Oh well." He bluntly commented, before leaving without even giving Abel a glance.
The hybrid just fell onto his bottom with his hands on the ground to keep his torso up. His breathing was still intense from the adrenaline flowing through his veins. It was getting hard to comprehend how frequently he had been on death's door.
"I'm supposed to be dead by now. I'm honestly so lucky."
*****
In a forest, there was a dense collection of dark-barked trees that were more than 50 metres tall. Their large, green leaves swayed in the breeze and under this sheltering foliage was a settlement.
There were a few wooden homes, along with several scarecrows and wooden mannequins that had been ripped apart and heavily damaged.
What surrounded this settlement was a line of wooden walls, which were manned with several men with black battle markings across their body wielding several different weapons.
Along with that, there were bleeidng and gravely injured people, who had been practically stripped naked and were tied up to wooden structures. They were held down with heavy chains onto wooden beams that kept them totally restrained.
Many would shout, cry and grunt in pain as they were utterly suffering. Their eyes looked hollow and weak, while the parts of their skin not covered in their own blood looked pale.
In this settlement stood several shirtless fighters, that had muscular, athletic physiques. What was striking about all of them were the unique battle markings across their skin. Some were more similar than others but all the designs were unique to each person.
Many wielded wooden stakes, and they were conversing with parchments of maps on tables ahead of them.
Arwin arrived at this area, nodding at one of the hunters stood at the gate of the wall.
"Welcome back, Arwin." One hunter stated, opening the gate to the settlement.
"It's a pleasure to see you once again, Fyodor."
As he stepped into the settlement, the group of people rushed over to him to check if he was okay.
"Did you get them then?" A hunter asked.
He had dark brown skin that gleamed under the moonlight, with dreadlocks that drooped down to the lower part of his head.
There was silent from Arwin, who just scoffed in response.
"I told you that he needed help! How is he going to take out a hybrid and an Abryssian on his own?" The hunter replied, clearly displeased.
"There's no way we could've done anything anyway. They're surrounded by a bunch of academy elders and strong cultivators. We can't fight off the energy of humans so they could easily defeat us."
"Just expose them as the beastly demons that they are so they can let us take them out. If they don't intervene, those demons can't run forever." He suggested.
Some of the hunters seemed to be in accordance with this proposition and were pleased with it.
"That's foolish, humans would not just believe us these cultivators aren't strong enough to be in association with anybody like us." Arwin explained.
"Excuses, excuses. Anyway, we're following them aren't we. It won't be long before we take them off the map." The hunter explained, lifting a stake in his hand.
A straw dummy stood behind him and crackles of green electricity appeared around the stake. Once one bolt of lightning struck the stake, the entire piece of wood lit on fire.
He whipped his arm and the stake shot forward like it had been shot from a crossbow. It landed right in the dummy's chest area, just to the left of its centre.
The entire straw dummy lit on fire and illuminated the surrounding area. There was a strong warmth emitted from the roaring, chaotic flames, and a hunter then started elegantly flowing his arms.
With the extension of his left, an aura of white qi enveloped his body and a dense, intense gust of wind rushed off the top of his arm. It was shot right toward the dummy and the fire was extinguished just as quickly as it had started.
"Now, back to this guy." The hunter stated, turning to a man that had been tied down to a wooden cross made out of the trunks of trees.
He lifted a silver dagger off the dark oak table they were looking at and dipped it in a metal container of a sizzling hot solution.
He waved it around nonchalantly, before aiming it right at the man's neck. He looked weak, and could barely even resist. There was a light sizzle as the tip of this hot dagger just touched his neck.
"Tell me where your pack are." He ordered.
"What? Just so you can slaughter them. Just kill me now, you won't get anything out of me!" He shouted, as his eyes glowed yellow.
Upon seeing this glow, Arwin squinted his eyes slightly.
"Hmm. His eyes look a little yellower than Duncan's hybrid friend. I wonder why that is." He observed, indifferent to the suffering he was enduring.
"Are the eyes of hybrids more orange?" He asked a hunter beside him.
He was leaner than him and taller, with brown hair and more olive-toned skin.
"Not necessarily. All werewolves that aren't alphas should have that characteristic yellow glow to their eyes." He replied.
"What, so their eyes can't be like amber or something?"
"Amber? I mean, I don't think so I heard that the primordials had amber eyes but that's only in legend, I don't think that's true. Might've just been some cultivators scared out of their mind when they saw them."
The hunter laughed after making his last comment, and Arwin did the same but his laugh was much shorter and more forced.
"A primordial? No, there's no way he's an utter weakling." Arwin concluded.
Primordials were the very first werewolves. These supernaturals possessed terrifying amounts of power above even the strongest of supernaturals and were described as heartless, soulless.
They would cold-bloodedly murder any humans on any chance that they had, and wreaked havoc akin to the most devilish beasts, especially on the night of full moons.
He didn't give the situation any more thought and took his mind back to the interrogation.
"Oh, so you think I'll give you the easy option with death so soon? No, we want information out of you so we can commit the murder that you ask of on a larger scale."
"I'm not satisfied with mere homicide of your kind." He coldly declared, now inches from the werewolf's face.
He stabbed the burning hot dagger into the wood beside him, and the steam emitting off this blade burned the skin of the werewolf as it flowed upwards.
"I desire genocide."
The werewolf had a look of disgust and also fear. He tried to pull his face away from the hunter but he could not. All he could see was his maniacal face, covered in black battle markings.
Swipe!
The dagger slit the throat of the werewolf, making him cough out blood that sizzled and bubbled upon release.
The wolfsbane entering his body was causing extensive damage, and the wound didn't seem to be healing.
Cough! Cough!
"AARGH!!" He roared, as his eyes glowed gold.