Wolves' Legacy 2: Chapter 2
Chapter 2
The
darkness gave away, and Ifrit now walked in a plain of meadow. He thought that
it finally be it, that he lost his life when he fell from the cliff, and that
he knew he was in peace. Yet, it didn't feel right. He was a hellish creature;
there was nothing of a definition of a surface race's heaven in his mind. He
didn't believe in that.
Everything
then came back to him, and he realized that if he died, Eshdar would be there,
in the plains of tranquility and peace. But then, he also knew that heaven was
also another realm, and it wouldn't be possible.
"(Guess
I don't have anything to do in here. I am still tired, though, and sleepy...)"
He
hated to admit it, but never before he felt so sleepy before. Yet, when he
slept, he woke up, surrounded by rock and marble, and torch? Wait, it looked
like he was...
Before
he could realize where he was, there was a loud explosion sound just some
position away from the place he was laid, yet it was muffled, meaning that it
wasn't inside the rocky room. Trying to stand, he realized his legs were not as
it used to be as they felt weak, and he couldn't even focus. Trying a way to
walk, he forced his hands and claws to move his body to a nearby archway. His
instinct wild, he tried to find the source himself when in front of him, a
figure flew from the left side of the corridor, and a moment of concentration
did he saw the figure had many features akin to a hellhound, like a canine
face, horns, and long prehensile tail. He was stunned. Just some minutes after
waking up and he was faced with another problem.
He
went to the hellhound just as the hellhound stood up and stared at him. As he
watched, the hellhound said, "(Stop trying to be useful if you're useless at
this moment! We'll get you out of here, Schelkz!)"
This
gave a sudden surprise to Ifrit. "(W...wait a sec. How did you know my name? Are
you a rebel or a loyalist?)"
"(Like
that's the main problem now! Keep your head down!)"
Another
explosion and a shot came at the same time, and there was a strong gust of wind
before a wave of heat hit both of them. The hellhound jumped forward in a
blink, and the next moment, Ifrit saw an opening at the wall, with so many dead
hellhounds all around the hellhound.
Just
then, he realized that this hellhound didn't feel right, and compelled to ask,
he said, "(Just what are you doing desecrating a grave, huh? I am dead
already!)"
"(Nope,
you're just in a coma)."
Ifrit
realized that the voice was high-pitched, and realized at the same time that
the hellhound was a she, and he gasped when she quickly moved to him and carry
him on her back.
"(H...hey!)"
"(You're
not fit to walk yet, hound. Damn those rebels. They got so many steps ahead of
us. With Winsel, they have killed four royal hounds....)"
The
mention of Eshdar's family name jolted Ifrit's mind, and he exclaimed,
"(Eshdar! Where is he? Just take me to where he was put to rest!)"
"(Calm
down, Schelkz, you're not as light as you thought to be!)"
"(First
of all, my name is Ifrit, and this situation is not what it's supposed to be!
Don't you have any goddamn ally?)"
Without
heeding his comment, the female hellhound quickened her pace, and with no time
at all they reached a wagon, where she put down Ifrit inside it. Just then,
there were gunshots that pierced the wagon, and Ifrit felt the wagon was moving
away, yet they were still under heavy fire.
"(Fuck!
Can't this thing go any faster?)"
"(Wagons
like this can't move as fast a car, you know! The acceleration is not even
faster than a fucking horse carriage!)"
"(How
the hell do you know that?)"
"(I
am travelling in one for almost two years! Step on it, c'mon!)"
Yet
it still travelling very slowly despite of a jolt indicating a higher speed.
The gunshots started to get to Ifrit, and pushed with instinct, he pushed
himself up and breathed fire to the bushes, setting them on fire and halting
the progress of the pursuing hellhounds. He exhaled a relief, so as the female.
"(Damn,
that was close. Retrieving you from the house of the dead really is a suicide
if not for your part. I feel bad, though. You've just recently woken up from
coma)."
"(Well,
I'll be damned. My life is on the hands of a female hellhound and the one
supposed to be protecting both of us is in this state. Damn...)"
"(Don't
blame yourself. Being in a middle of a heavily guarded mausoleum playing with
death makes your priority far exceeds the other hellhounds still royal to your
cause, despite on how your 'death' seems legit)."
Ifrit
wondered on how long had he slept, and asked it. The hellhound, despite of
seemingly didn't care, finally said, "(I'll talk about it while you're
recovering. It will be a half day trip to Aushagen from here)."
They
went on silently along the paved road (something that wasn't normally seen by
Ifrit). She occasionally stared back at Ifrit, but didn't start any
conversation until halfway through the day, in which they stopped in a petrol
station to fill the fuel.
"Diesel
engines," said the hellhound with a rather thick accent. "It's good for long
trip, but not very cheap."
"Do
you know where to find a food? I never felt this hungry before. I'm famished
near death."
"C'mon,
it's on me."
After
ordering two foods, the hellhound said, "(Some hellhounds found you by the
river with a bunch of other dead hounds. Apparently, you were washed from the
south and the way I see it, it's around Adaline, right near a cliff. Those
bodies were in a very bad shape, and it was then one morning when they found
you and Eshdar's body among the bodies. I'm sorry about Eshdar Winsel, though.
The Winsel family is an honorable royal line with long tradition of bestiary
collection, or so I was told. Of course, with a boat nearby, we gave him a boat
funeral, so don't worry, he will rest easy)."
Ifrit
then remembered about his surviving friends, and a sudden wave of guilt hit
him. If he found them and told them that Eshdar was killed, they would know the
black hellhound was alive while his best friend died horribly. Thinking about
how Sammael would react to his master made him shiver, as he never would think
on what a demon dog would do if he was angry.
"(So...the
thing is, while I want to say that you're in Dusdolf, we're not going to the
heart of the place. We're going to Tanah region along the east."
"(Tanah?
It's a very isolated place, right? The way I was told made me think so)."
"(Don't
get cocky now)," said the female with a small laugh. "(That place is not as it
looked like from outside, and there are many hellhounds living there, too. It's
the royalist's main base of operation)."
"(But
I need to find my friends! They must be in this region! I remember we are
trying to trade to this place after we completed a run in Adaline, and Albreich
said he wanted to stop by his home. Do you know where they are now?)"
"(How
should I know? The one with the most intel is my commanding officer. And then,
I doubt if they still want you, given that it has been long day after you are
lost from us)."
This
caused Ifrit to become suspicious, and then, thinking of the worst, he asked,
"(W-what year is this?)"
"(It's
year 2455 First Alliance. Why?)"
He
remembered one sentence Albreich said when he referred to the summer in their
travel, and it was just some hours before they were attacked.
"It's
summer of the year 2453 First Alliance, and counting from when we met, I guess
it has been two years since we met, Ifrit."
And so, Ifrit realized that they would
be horrified that a dead hellhound would come back to life after being lost for
two years, and two years was a long time to start forgetting on those that had
been lost