Soul of Searing Steel

The hunter put on a camouflage over himself, applied a paste made from combining herbs and forest leaves that could remove one’s presence, lifted the bow and a quiver full of arrows. Once he fully equipped himself, he entered the forest, quietly.

The forest was peaceful and quiet. The hunter’s footsteps were dimmed down by the sound of the early summer’s wind brushing through the forest in the evening, creating sounds that mimicked the sound of the waves crashing on the beach.

When one goes hunting, it would take up to several days. It would be the norm for one to be hunting for as long as a week. Be it chasing a prey, that alone would take up half a day’s time. The beasts were not intelligent. Tens of thousands of years of evolutions had only granted them a heightened sense of observation. It would take skills of an experienced hunter to detect the beast. One might say that any novice hunter would not be able to find their lair or even detect their presence.

Coincidentally, the old hunter had abundance of experience.

In less than half a day’s time, the man had found a rather large pile of excrement in the dirt of which he had stepped on. It was not long until he had found his target.

It was a white fur great boar. The Great Wild Boar King.

It was dusk; the time where boars roamed active. In the middle of the forest where only the hunter knew, was a large wooden pine tree made cabin. It was old, too old that it had fallen to the ground. Perhaps it had fallen during a bad blizzard during winter. Standing beside the old, rotten fallen cabin was a larger-than-normal boar. The boar’s hide was thick; perhaps thicker than any that the hunter had ever seen. Muscles that defined strength. Horns, that were plowing through the dirt, searching for insects and bugs for its meal.

The majestic beast looked exactly the same as it was during spring. It could be that the beast had a belly full of pine cones during winter. That could be the reason why the beast had not lost much weight even after the dreaded winter. As such, the beast was just as strong as it was during winter and spring. The hunter adjusted the brown-green camouflage net over himself and hid behind a nearby tree that was behind the beast. Using his sharp eyes, the hunter observed the movement of his prey, carefully not to even enter the beast sight. In his hands, the short bow was drawn and the arrow in his grip was ready to fly to his desired target.

The old hunter was quiet. That alone was enough to describe how proficient he was at hunting. Silence and patience are the two virtues of a veteran hunter; that was how he knew that it was not the time to let the arrow loose. A single look was all it took to know that the hunter’s arrow would not be enough to penetrate the Wild Boar King’s hide. Perhaps, not even a trained Silver-tier archer could shoot pass that armor, what more a lowly Steel tier.

That was all the reason why he had to wait.

The hunter blended into the trees. Like a chameleon, he was the tree itself, hiding in the shadows and quietly observing the beast gnawing into the meal of which it had just dug out.

The hunter continued waiting. After he had lost count of the hours he had waited, the skies started to grow dim. At then, he heard a faint noise. The beast was full. At that moment, the hunter retained his composure and nocked his arrow to his bow. The time to kill, had arrived.

The beast stood as tall as one and half a man. Its length was at least three to four meters long, similar to that of a battle chariot. With its round belly wobbling as it turned around, the beast growled a little as it was getting ready to head back to its nest. Its massive body was so large that it could digest and neutralize many kinds of poison there was in the wild. However, to digest the massive consumption, the beast would need some time. As such, most of the blood in its body was circulating in its stomach, in turn, slowing the beast’s movement.

That was the time to act, and the hunter knew that. With the arrow drawn back to his chin, the hunter’s eyes gleamed in the dark. Years of training and had let the man gain superb night vision that allowed him to trace and observe every fiber of the beast’s body.

The weapon his hand had been infused with simple magic, allowing the bow and arrow to gain a sort of durability and prowess that surpassed its fragile appearance. As long as the arrow could land in between the eyes, any beast will die. Even if the Wild Boar King has such a monstrous life force in it, it will die once the brain is destroyed.

Still, hunting large beast will prove to be extremely dangerous. The Wild Beast King, for example, was a beast with sharp fangs that could pierce even the strongest of dragon’s scale. A full frontal charge could destroy a small brick house with relative ease. Lest not mention a human skull, perhaps even an iron wall could not remain intact. Hence, the best way to deal with a large beast is to end the fight with a single stroke—the fastest there is. If the fight was dragged, the beast will notice the hunter’s presence, by then, the bow and arrow would be rather useless in an agile fight with the beast,

At then, the arrow was nocked and the string was drawn back. Just when the hunter was about to let the arrow loose, a low humming sound was heard spreading fast from on top of the trees.

“Grooah…”

The low humming sound was too slow. A sudden gust of wind blew through the forest. Tree branches were broken off their trunks. Dried rotten leaves on the forest ground were all blown upwards when a giant, red-colored silhouette cast its oversized shadow. Like a giant that had fallen down to earth, the red silhouette descended quickly, tearing the air apart as it did and landed hard, next to the alarmed Wild Boar King.

WHAM!

The force of its landing was too powerful that its sheer impact had made the earth split apart. The leaves were blown upwards wildly.

Among the falling leaves, the hunter was seen agape, with his eyes frozen on the silhouette.

The prey that he had his eyes on, the one that had been eyeing for since the beginning of the hunt, was trampled by a giant red dual-winged dragon. Its razor-sharp claw had pierced through its iron-like hide as it was made of thin paper, and injected its poison into the beast’s body.

“A male fire dragon?!”

The hunter dared not move. In a split second, the hunter drew in a deep cold breath. His grip went weak as the bow in his hand nearly fall out of his palm. Without thinking much, his body reacted instinctively. He went back to the tree and froze there.

A male fire dragon…There was only supposed to be one or two heads in the Dark Forest of the Great Ajax Volcano… Their usual habitat and active ground should be around the hot spots of the volcano. There were also a few that roamed around the forest. Those that roamed further away from the volcano were the defeated that had failed to claim a territory. Yet… no matter how the hunter observed, the fire dragon was… just…

He poked his head out a little and from the corner of his eyes, he saw the great Wild Boar King was desperately trying to wrangle its way of the dragon’s claw. Even though the beast was in the dragon’s grasp, it was hurling its massive fangs out. As such, not even the male fire dragon could let its guard down for the beast’s strength was that of those that could break a dragon’s bones.

Luckily, the dragon’s claw was coated with poison that could numb its prey’s. So be the Boar King had the ability to digest and neutralize ingested poison, it could not repel such a poison. In just a short time, the Wild Boar King had shown signs of fatigue as its movement gradually became sluggish until it finally stopped moving.

“ROAR!”

After a satisfying roar, the male fire dragon plunged its head into the back of the Wild Boar King and had a mouthful of the boar’s flesh in its mouth. Even though the Wild Boar King’s hide was tough, it did not stop the dragon’s fangs from making a few holes on its back. Blood oozed out from the back of the boar like a broken wine barrel, yet the boar made no signs of any movement. Looks like the boar was truly incapacitated.

Once the male fire dragon was certain that its prey was completely subjugated, it sank its claw deeper into the boar’s body. As the blood squirt out of the dead carcass, the dragon spread its wings wide and shot to the sky, carrying the gigantic boar as if it was weightless.

The sheer force of its wings was truly demonstrated when the powerful gust of wind generated with each flap had bent and snapped trees around the vicinity. In just a few seconds later, the wind died down, leaving the hunter alone, still hiding behind the tree.

When the dragon had truly left, only then the hunter dared to breathe loudly. With his eardrum ringing with the sound of his own heartbeat, the hunter wiped the sweat off on his forehead.

It did not make any sense. The dragon, no matter how it looked, was superior in every way. Its massive wings, its powerful claws, the powerful speedily flight…everything it had shown no signs of it being a weak dragon that would be defeated in a territorial fight.

The hunter tried to reason with himself as the one, most profound question kept on surfacing in his sea of thought—Why was a dragon there?

Deep in the northern lands where the Ice Plains spread across the North, where there were Rimetooth Dragon, there would also be the White Dragons appearing in the frigid lands. That, was their regular habitat. It would only make sense if an ice elemental dragon roaming around the icy lands. Weirdly enough, the hunter was just standing in a small forest, located not far from a mountain and a village where he came from. The strongest monster that could be found there will be the Wild Boar King—That was it! How could a male fire dragon appear in such a place? Their usual feed would be the larger mammoth and other weaker, smaller dragons!

With no conclusion after giving it a long thought, the hunter realized that he had no other reason to remain in the forest. Not after the dragon had just taken his prey. He then packed up his equipment and gear and left for the village. He had to be quick if he wants to alert the irregularity to the guards.

At then, the sky had dimmed down. Dusk was long gone and the sea of stars had filled the high heavens. The twin moons had just begun to rise from the horizon. The twin moons’ light was bright enough to illuminate parts of land yet it was still dark enough to see a small flickering light far up north.

Flickering lights? Could it be flames? Did the dragon just breathe fire there? Perhaps the forest was set ablaze by it… Or… Could it be?!

A sudden ill thought came to the hunter’s mind as it sent a shivering chill down his spine.

Just where did the dragon come from?

Where did the dragon fly to?!

The hunter froze and quickly found his direction. The place with the faint flickering light was where he came from! His village!

That must be where the dragon had headed!

Waves of shivering chill were sent down his spine, again and again, until he could feel a fear deep in his old bones. He could not think properly then. Such a fear had made the calm, veteran hunter to panic. The bow and quiver in his hands nearly dropped to the ground.

As he stood still, the flickering light had grown larger and wild. Something was burning!

“I should calm down. My house is just next to a river. The winds should blow to the opposite site, away from my house. The fire could never spread there.”

“They should… should be fine… They will be fine!”

The same thought repeated itself in his mind like a mantra. He started to pick up the pace and started to sprint towards his house.

At that moment, he had nothing to care for. Hiding his presence, covering himself in the camouflage net had become an action which slowed him down. He was no longer hunting. He was sprinting. Even so, he did it carefully, avoiding the slippery moss and mud, and only stepped on hard rock and dirt.

At last, when he thought he had made it out in time, the hunter stood at the edge of the forest, only to witness a scene of despair.

There was the dragon. Fire… and dragons.