2.

The wide boulevard was littered with dead and dying, pitiful wails a symphony of despair as he marched towards the Armory. Men and demons fought in alleys, rooftops, and in homes. Erak ignored it all as he closed in on Titus's Square. The sounds of energetic battle filling the air invigorated him.

Another of the decrepit beasts lunged from the shadows at him, talons glinting in hunger as its ravenous smile spread across its face. Erak planted himself and lifted the heavy kite shield in a contemptuous swing, heavy steel shattering teeth and flinging the hellspawn to the side. It lay in a crumpled mess, blood and saliva oozing from its mouth as it spat a wad of chipped and broken tooth fragments out. Erak rammed the spear down and groaned through gritted teeth as another surge of power wracked him.

He turned away from its still corpse and looked around the wide boulevard and the towering buildings of white stone around him. Chaos and death all around him, but for the moment he stood alone and unchallenged. Every person that he measured, words appeared over their head, highlighting who and what they were.

Classes, levels, rarity, weapons, all of the information flowed with ease. Survivors began to look at him and dead spawn at his feet. Cries of salvation rose to the heavens and the people began to flock toward him. Erak raised his bloody shield like a banner and roared wordlessly, challenging the denizens of hell.

A cry matched him, a shrill shriek that stopped the wave of citizens from reaching him. Hellspawn stopped what they were doing, turning and looking down upon him and backing down as the hunting cry rose again. Erak pulled forth his spear from the spitted demon and lifted it up above him, black blood dripping in steaming rivulets down to the smooth stone street.

It came running on long knobby legs, elongated head pale as moonlight with inky orbs for eyes. Jutting yellowed teeth gnashed at the air and its wide nostrils flared back and forth again and again as it loped forward. Thin arms of bone and sinew ended with long claws dripping with viscera. Erak met its gaze and roared at it, unyielding in the face of its speed and rage.

Plane Hunter lvl. 9

Erak cared not for its arbitrary number or name. He set his feet and watched as the hunter sprinted at him with its cruel hooked talons outstretched. Drool dripped from its jaws as a gray tongue licked at its black speckled chops.

Erak brought his shield down to shoulder height and tucked it hard to his body as he matched the beast's charge. They rushed at each other, crossing the space between in a moment’s notice to collide, steel and flesh, talon and blade. The hunter tore at him, jaws snapping and hungry, skating off his armor while curved talons failed to find traction on his breastplate.

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Erak’s spear pierced a long thigh, shattering bone with ease as the beast screamed and went into a frenzy of slashing and hacking, metal shrieking in protest but failing as Erak rammed his shield’s edge down into its other leg. Bone snapped and the beast’s jaw unhinged and it reared up and clamped down over Erak’s head.

The thin visor went dark and his world became hot and humid, foul fetid air washing over him as its smell invaded his helm. Erak calmed his frantic heart, cooling his first nervous urge and he reacted with calmness as he left his spear buried in the creature’s thigh. He balled up his now free fist, feeling the ancient steel shifting over his knuckles.

Metal met flesh with a meaty smack, echoing through the air as Erak began to hammer the beast. The grinding of the fangs on his helm, the pressure on his skull, the feeling of blood over his fist. Blow after blow rang out, the iron like flesh slowly yielding to his strength as the creature’s shrill screams became a barking whine as pain overrode its bloodlust.

Steel broke flesh and Erak felt thin rivers of blood become a lake as he pushed his hand deeper and deeper with every blow, the ridges on his gauntlet shredding flesh. Erak wedged his hand deep, sliding and gripping and pulling, yanking the beast’s insides out.

Teeth released their grip and sweet, cold air flooded his mouth as Erak could breathe again. His vision slit returned and he saw his right arm drenched in black gore to the elbow, entrails pooled around his feet and the hunter’s torso with a gaping wound in its chest. The hunter tried to pull away, dragging at the lodged spear that kept it pinned to the ground.

The heavy kite shield slammed into it again, smashing teeth free as he began to bludgeon the crying hunter as it tried to flee. It fell to the ground, claws scratching at the stone trying to get away from him. Flesh tore away from the spear and it burst forward suddenly as it sacrificed its own flesh.

Erak leapt, not willing to see his prize escape from him. The gore drenched shield rose and fell, battering away at the screaming demon as the world grew quiet in Erak’s helm. Only his echoing breaths audible as he continued to break and shatter bone with each strike. It shuddered and grew still and limp beneath him and a flood of power that made pale everything that had come before.

Pain intermingled with the ecstasy of power, his stomach and sternum tightening and cramping with fire burning along his veins and through his heart. Erak choked back a cry of pain as he rose to his full height and looked over the street and met the gaze of all who looked at him.

Human and other they met his eyes and slowly the hellspawn retreated back into shadow. Humans crept out and gathered slowly around him as Erak pulled free his spear from the ground, shaking free the flesh of the dead.

First a dozen, then a score, then two scores, they gathered around him. Questions rained down on him like hail and he stood silent waiting for them to quiet as the last survivors came down to gather around him. He stood silent with his spear and shield and then turned and began to walk.

The fire in his stomach was lessening into a comforting heat as Titus’s square and the sounds of war beckoned him and his trailing line of followers.