In the beginning, there was only the comfortable darkness, when nothing but the ever present softness and warmth existed. then slowly bit by bit, the void began filling with with sound. First the gentle chaotic babbling of a river, the songs of birds near and distant, and the rustle of leaves in the wind.

Next to come in to existence was the damp soft ground, the cool breeze that carried the scent of an old forest, and the faint warmth of the sun from above.

This tranquil existence lasted for what felt like an eternity or only a short moment, when the a pain that could crack stone, and the dryness that could drain lakes, assaulted this peaceful world and made the world realize, that they were not the world but something else within the world.

They weren't the forest, or the damp ground, nor the wind blowing thru the trees, the sound of the stream or even the conferrable darkness it self.

In this moment of uncertainty by reflex they opened their eyes to see, and then came the light and with it more pain, which made them rub their face to in an attempt to drive off the pain and banish it beck to where it had come from.

With this the memories started to flood in, which made them sit up from where they had been laying, and to try opening their eyes again more cheerfully. This time the pain that came in with the light wasn't as strong, and as his eyes bilked the blurriness away, the shapes became more sharp, and defined.

And his consciousness finally coming back to him fully, Jason realized that he had no idea where he was, other than it was the middle of a forest.

Nor could he remember how he had gotten here. The last thing he could recall was walking to the pub to drown his problems with alcohol, after one the worst weeks that had befallen him in a while. And judging by the fact that he felt like he had been run over by a truck, and that he smelled like sadness and bad ideas, made him think that he had in fact been to the pub, from that he deduced that might have something to do with it his current situation.

As he massaging the back of his head in an attempt to get rid the pain in his head, he tried to take stock of his surroundings, despite his eyes feeling like they were covered in sand.

from where he was sitting the only thing he could really make out were lots of big trees, or at least they look pretty big from his vantage point on the ground. he could also see a slow moving river a few meters away from him.

He slowly got up from the mossy forest floor, and stumbled to the riverbank, where he knelt down and splashed his face with a few hand fulls of the cold and refreshing water. Almost instantly alleviating the pain, and haziness in his head, he repeated this a few more time until he was able to think more clearly.

Jason stared at his reflection in the slowly moving river for moment, the only thing keeping him from shoving his face under water and drinking until river ran out of water, was the vivid childhood memory of getting sick the last time he drank water from a river, back during the summer camp, when he had decided that he knew better than the adults, who had told him that it would make him sick "Damn, I really wasn't a smart kid huh." Jason mused to him self.

After his moment of reminiscing about his child hood blunders had passed, Jason stood back up now feeling a little better, he surveyed his surroundings again this time with a clearer, and not as aching head, only finding the same forest of big trees, just now with a more definition.

He scratched the back of his head, still not remembering how he ended up here, nor had he figured out how to get back home, until he remembered the GPS app on his phone.

with renewed vigor he dug his phone out from the pocket of his jacket, opened the phone, found the app, opened the app, only to find that he had no signal. "GOD FUCKING DAMMIT!" were the first words that came out of his mouth as a response.

"The one time i actually need you, and this happens?" Jason grumbled as he shoved the phone back in his pocket, while massaging the bridge of his nose with his fingers and looking around wondering just what to do now.

That was when movement in the corner of his vision caught his attention.

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Matthai's day had so far been pleasantly uneventful, while he did want to enjoy his walk through the old forest, marveling at its giant trees that had stood for centuries, feeling the warm mid day sun on his fur, and taking in the fresh smells of spring.

He unfortunately was unable to do so at the moment, because he was here to track down a monster. Which had been terrorizing the village of Ghilriv, and thus far killed two people and seriously injured another two.

The first victim had been a farmer who had gone missing in the night, what was left of his body had been discovered in the morning by the neighbors.

The next night two men had been attacked on their way home from the tavern, one of them managed stab the monster with a broken bottle and drove it off, boat men had been badly injured but had survived, thanks people near by who had heard the fighting and had come to see what was happening.

After that attack, there had been any further attacks or sightings for a few weeks, and people started to think maybe the monster had left find easier victims or even died from it injuries, until a few days ago a young women had gone missing in the evening while fetching water from the well and had turned up dead the next morning.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

That's around the time Matthai and his group had arrived to the village, with a merchant caravan they had been hired to escort.

After the villager had learned that they had experience with fighting monsters, they had quickly hired them to hunt down the monster that had been terrorizing village, which as a trained ranger he was happy to accept.

However it had not take long for him to realize that frustratingly enough, no one apparently knew what the monster actually looked like. The descriptions given by the villagers conflicted so wildly with each other, he really did not have a good idea what exactly he was supposed to be searching for. The only thing they could really agree on was that it was big, and possibly walked on two legs, which really wasn't enough to go on.

Thankfully he had found some strange looking old tracks, and a few dark hair while searching the area around the farms where the monster had supposedly been sported at, so there was something at least, and he had something to go on.

However he still didn't know what it was, and Matthai really didn't like being out here not knowing.

Regardless it just past noon now, and he had been searching the forest since early morning, with not much to show for it, and his legs were beginning to tire from all the walking.

Matthai could hear the faint sound of flowing water growing louder as he neared the top of a small hill. 'think I'll take short rest on the riverbank, and after that head back down along the river to the village, I should have more than enough time to make it back before it gets dark, tomorrow I'll have a look if i can find tracks on the other side of the river.'

He thought as he reached the top of the hill, from there some distance away from him, he could see the river through the massive trees.

As he was about to head down to the river bank, he was snapped out of his thoughts by what sounded like some one was yelling something, though he couldn't make out what was said it sounded furious. He looked up at the river in the direction where he believed the the sound had come from. Not seeing anything that could have made the noise, he hurried in the direction making sure to be as careful as possible since he didn't know what he might find.

When Matthai got near the riverbank he froze in place upon seeing the creature that was standing further up the riverbank a good stones throw away, It was some kind of monster, one he had never seen before.

"By the god, wha..." Matthai whisper his words were interrupted when the monster suddenly turned its head in his direction.

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Jason scratched his head while scanning the under growth. "I could have sworn i saw something." After a while of looking for any movement, and not seeing anything more than leaves being pushed around by the slight breeze. Jason shrugged. "Must have just been the wind."

Getting back to his thoughts. "Right, what did they say about finding your way in a survival situation again." Jason muttered to himself, closing his eyes and crossing his arms, trying to think back to that time at the summer camp from his childhood.

Racking his brain, he could vaguely recall something about how to determine what way north was, tho not clearly enough to help in this situation. Nor could he really think of a reason how that would really help him now.

The next thing he recalled was something about following a river down stream and you will eventually come find people. He opened his eyes looking the river up and down, spotting a large hill thru a gap in the trees up river, with some kind of white shapes on its side, however from where he was standing he couldn't make out what the shapes were.

"Or i could go take a look at that hill, those could be buildings which means there's hopefully people, and if not then i might at least get a better look at my surroundings" Jason thought out loud to him self, as he started walking up the river bank and towards the hill.

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Matthai laid on the mossy forest ground, hidden behind a large rock he had dived behind, staring his ears listening for any sings of movement, and hoping that he hadn't been seen by the creature.

After what felt like way longer than it definitely had been, Matthai slowly rouse his head, from the wet moss still listening to his surrounding, only hearing the sounds of the forest, and the babble of the river.

feeling more confident that he had not been spotted, Matthai quietly stood back up and readied his bow just to be safe.

carefully peaking from behind his hiding place, looking to where the creature had been standing, only to find that it was no longer there. Moving slowly out from behind the rock and scanning the are with his eyes, he could hear the faint snapping branches, focusing in the direction the sound was coming from he could see movement heading up the riverbank and away from him.

he wish that he had gotten a better look at the creature, it being obscured by the foliage of small trees and by the sun reflecting off the rivers surface, he had only been able to make out the general shape of it, as in it had two arms and seemed to stand on two legs like he did, however he didn't remember seeing a tail, it's legs looked somehow wrong and its head looked oddly shaped.

He could also tell that the creature was very tall, however how tall specifically was harder to say,

do to the ancient trees filling the area being so massive they made everything else look tiny in comparison.

'i wonder, could that been the monster that attacked the village.' Matthai thought weighing his options on how to move forward this situation.

'On one hand i could head back to the village and bring back up... No, i need to make sure this is the right creature first, and if i go back now I'll just loose track of it, also if I'm lucky I might even find where it sleeps, i just need to be careful about this.'

Matthai gripped his bow tight and took a deep breath to ready himself, knowing that this was a bad idea, but he just had to know what the creature, not only so they could better prepare for taking it down, but because he himself wanted to see what exactly it was that he had seen.

He pulled up his hood and dashed after the monster, moving as fast and as quietly as his legs permitted.