Wind batters everyone on deck, threatening to lift them off the ground and cast them into the water like chum. The sails billow and pull hard, yanking the ship to the side and nearly flipping the entire vessel over.
In an instant, the sun is consumed by the appearance of dark clouds, followed by a downpour of rain and the deafening boom of thunder.
“Batten down the hatches, lower the sails!” the captain cries over the apocalyptic storm.
It appeared so quickly Casper barely had any time to react. Mere moments ago the skies were clear, and now the rain had soaked him through, visibility dropped to only a few feet in front of them and a clawing sense of dread drew ever closer. It was the fastest he had ever seen the weather change in his life.
“By the fates, what the hell is happening!?” Rathiel calls out, summoning his sword and using it’s divine light to try and act as a beacon in the oppressive dark.
“Hunter must have caused it!” Peter cries back, struggling to keep himself anchored to the deck as a massive wave rises under them, and drops the ship back down onto the hard waters.
The force causes nearly all of the crew to lift off the ground, only to smash back into the deck as the next wave rolls under them.
“I thought you said the hunters only attacked marked!” The captain shouts, struggling to gain control over the rocking, bucking ship.
Casper and Rathiel exchange a glance to one another in the pouring rain, expressions barely visible but still understood, that is until Annabelle speaks next.
“It’s after Engee, get her the hell off this ship and maybe we can live through this!”
Despite the roar of the wind, crack of lighting, boom of thunder and creaking protests of the boat, the air goes still and ice cold.
Rathiel's eyes widen, and flick to Engee who stands not too far from the rest of their gathered groups, before returning to Casper.
Shit.
Casper grinds his teeth and stares back at Annabelle in disbelief, though she doesn’t see him, instead her full attention is locked onto Engee.
“There is a marked aboard this ship!? By the fuckin’ fates we are dead men!” Peter follows Annabelle's gaze to Engee as he readies his own blades.
Several others turn on Engee, another lightning strike illuminating the small woman from behind, her own focus having shifted to the group.
“The fuck do you all think you are doing! She is an ally!” Rathiel reprimands, turning his back to Engee and facing the others in the group. “Now is not the time to turn on one another, we need to prepare ourselves!”
“Ready ourselves, Rathiel, that monster is here to consume him!” Peter points past the celestial to Engee. “We feed him to the beast and the rest of us might see the sun again! Be practical!”
A massive wave crashes over the side of the ship, as the entire vessel tilts to one side. Ice cold salt water rushes to meet the gathered bodies, but instead billows up and over a barrier cast by Szostes.
The sound is deafening as thousands of pounds of water threaten to consume the ship, but instead climbs up and up and up, turning into rain as it collides with her protective spell.
“We are not casting Engee to the hunter!” Casper confirms, angry boiling over at Annabelle for having revealed the secret they all swore to keep, but she doesn’t see him still, all of her being is locked onto Engee.
“Be practical!” She speaks over their clamoring voices, though the words are directed to Casper.
“The hunter wants me, I will not see you all die for my sake.” Engee turns in the direction of the hunter. It's entirely invisible in the storm, but Casper can feel its presence getting closer, and closer.
“Then you better get to swimming!” Annabelle half smiles, her satisfaction at finally being able to rid them of Engee nearly sending Casper over the edge.
“Cowards the fucking lot of you!” Casper spits the words like venom, this time Annabelle hears him, and she realizes what she’s done.
The bandit woman's heart sinks, as her eyes lock onto the raw fury found in Casper's.
“It’s a small sacrifice!” She reasons. “One life for the good of the many, you need to understand!”
“Understand? Engee is our friend! You’d so willingly kill her?!”
“Her?!” Peter asks, his resolve wavering slightly.
“For you? Yes!”
“Then you don’t know me as well as you think you do!”
He is about to reprimand her further, until another strike of lighting illuminates a massive shadow towering hundreds of feet above their ship.
The rain for a moment, stops, as the hunter shields them from the rage of the skies. The air begins to freeze all around it.
Casper can feel his blood turn to ice in his veins, as several dozen eyes slide open, each larger than a man, all promising death.
an impossibly large tentacle parts the skies, rips through clouds and turns rain to mist and mist to frost as it carves a path to split the ship in half.
Casper's ears ring, as the massive body collides once more with a barrier Szostes projects. Relief fills Casper's body as the appendage lingers a dozen feet above the deck, relief that quickly vanishes as the barrier cracks, and shatters.
“Move!” Casper dives out of the way, waiting for the sound of their impending death, only to be blinded by radiant light, as Rathiel throws himself upwards and splits the pitch black tentacle in two.
The hunter screams. Casper can’t hear it at all for the ringing in his ears but he can feel the vibrations in the air.
They might actually be able to win this thing.
The ship rocks, the color of fire erupts from the sides of it as the crew fires a volley point blank into the hunter, and a portal appears above it to redirect the leftmost volley downward onto the hunters head.
It continues to scream, but not because of the damage. It screams in anger, a deep, primordial anger, and not having vanquished the ship in a single strike.
They were going to die, Casper thought, as more tentacles emerged from the depths, dozens upon dozens of tentacles, like the spire of Highspire, all crackling with power.
They were going to die, unless Engee and Casper did something.
Pulling himself up from the deck as it rocks to the side once again, Casper finds Engee’s eyes, and in the moment the two understand what needs to be done.
Engee is the first to move. Water evaporates around her as she throws herself at the nearest tentacle that nears the ship, and pulverizes it.
Several more nearly crushed the ship, stopped by barriers and portals alike.
The spinning fury that is Janus severs more, Peter and Zesstra cut others down, and Casper charges head first into even more as they descend upon the ship like a hundred fists from a hundred angry gods.
Ears ringing, body quickly warming from the mark, Casper gives in to the power, gives in to the strength. Tentacles explode, rip, tear all around him, because of him, his companions isolate, control, and kill in a systematic dance of death.
But it isn’t enough.
With the cracking and splintering of wood one of the masts rips apart at the base, sending the crew into the sky to be turned into pink mist as other tentacles rush to kill them.
Another tentacle smashes through the side of the ship, water floods the decks and pitches them sideways.
Celeste is forced to create portals to divert the flow, unable to assist with the tentacles. Szostes struggles to maintain her focus on the barriers preventing the tentacles from crushing them all, and the barrier to protect the ship from the flow of water. Each new barrier is weaker than the next, as more of the hunters' tentacles rush to tear them apart.
Casper splits another in two, and turns to face the next, only for the mark to alert him of his idiocy.
He didn’t notice before in the dark, but now the sky is almost entirely black, black from the tentacles that grow from the stems of the old. For every tentacle they cut, two more grow, and they were just now realizing their folly.
Dozens descend upon them, Szostes tries to block as many as she can but the strength is overwhelming, stronger in fact than when it first appeared, and Casper knew exactly why.
Engee looked lethargic, the power being sapped from her body and added to the hunters, Casper as well felt his strength being consumed, all far, far too late.
The barriers break, Janus carves through a tentacle aimed at Szostes, deflects another, dives to intercept one headed straight for Dorain who struggles to stand against the impossible strength.
Rathiel shouts over the sound of the storm, rushes to intercept another three, cuts one, batts away two, and falls short as a black mass plunges itself through Janus’s chest.
It’s small at first, maybe enough to survive, until it pushes further through his body, the black hole at the center of his chest rapidly expanding until the man is split into two pieces directly down the middle.
Annabelle roars as she takes to defending Szostes along with Elisayra, both women struggle to drag the reptilian up.
Elisayra is then wrapped in one of the tentacles, her entire body nearly consumed in an instant.
Casper rushes to save her, but Annabelle is closer and cuts the tentacle holding the half elf before Casper can meet the distance, instead he arrives just in time to watch Szostes’s head explode, as a tentacle passes over where it used to be.
Casper struggles to bring his own blade up in time, working to switch it to the flat to avoid creating any more.
Casper's feet lift from the ground, as he is thrown airborne towards the main body of the hunter.
The world spins around him, Casper struggles to orient himself in time. Several more tentacles crash into him, unable to defend, he is plunged into the depths, crashing through the waves to be dragged deeper and deeper by more tentacles.
Casper activates %25 of his mark, but feels it drains as quickly as it's active.
His blade carves through the water, cutting at anything it can see until the tension around his body drops enough to begin to dry and swim to the surface.
He digs his hands into the main body, climbing it until the waters break against his face and he can once more see the ship.
Rathiel acts as a lighthouse, a lighthouse quickly being consumed as he too struggles to keep fighting. A tentacle grabs at him, he cuts it, another slams into his back and he burns it. Flying into the sky he rushes the eyes, only to be knocked off course by a flurry of eight.
Engee dives to save him, her small body quickly consumed by the tentacle as well.
Casper fights to breath against the waves, fights to stay calm among the chaos.
Another tentacle grabs his legs, whips him through the water and then up into the air, joining Rathiel and Engee as they scramble to right themselves.
Casper watches in horror as one of Rathiel's wings is torn from his back, his left arm shattered and left dangling attached to strands of meat as he fights.
Engee grabs him, holds him, as they tumble. Casper fights to get to them, to help, to do anything at all, but well over twenty tentacles drive themselves into his body, slamming all of them into the ocean once again.
Rathiel's light is consumed by the tentacles and the depths. Casper struggles to find the correct direction as he rips and tears through tentacles, but it's not enough.
He struggles to activate more of his power.
He draws on %50 of his power, but it's consumed, Casper's body is pressed into by tentacles on all sides, brought deeper and deeper.
Casper diverts %70 to durability, durability he desperately needs as they pull further below the surface. The pressure threatens to crush him. The cold burns away, water turning to steam around him until it gets too cold, too all consuming to fight.
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
Deeper, deeper, until all light is gone, the pressure on his body nearly kills him as he struggles to maintain 80% output.
Everything goes numb, the world turns fuzzy, Casper tries to stay conscious but it’s impossible.
Soon, all is black, and Casper is cast into a void of nothing.
“Stay with me…” A distant voice calls to him, filling his body with warmth.
“Come on, you got me into this damn mess, you better get me out of it!” more warmth, followed by a burning sensation.
“I thought you were stronger than this…” the burning grows, until it’s unbearable, deep in his chest and lungs it threatens to rip him apart from the inside.
Casper's eyes fly open as he throws himself onto his hands and knees, and coughs up saltwater and blood in nearly equal parts.
His stomach and lungs and every muscle in his body strain to eject the liquid from him. It feels like glass in his throat as it all comes out, spilling over the slimy group under his hands.
“Where are we?” Casper asks between coughs, struggling to see anything.
The ground under his hands and feet is slick with mucus, and smells like damp earth, almost like a cave. It moves then, rippling slightly alongside a bone shaking rumble that vibrates the air and everything else around him.
“Inside the hunter, if I were to guess.” Rathiel helps Casper to stand in the space.
For the inside of a monster, it was larger than he expected, enough room to stand and lift your arms, but that was also about it. The black organs and muscle inside the monster stretch on a labyrinthian web of almost tunnel systems, some with valves that open and close and release the scent of blood, others with flowing water that crashes into the walls and rushes past them, rising to their waists.
“Where is Engee?” Casper asks, looking around in the dark for her.
“She is here.” Rathiel calls out, getting Casper to finally look at him.
Engee rests a little higher up, resting against one of the sinewy lengths of hunter insides, breathing shallow breaths and struggling to keep her eyes open.
“Shit are you alright?”
“Losing strength fast… being inside of this thing, it’s draining us quickly.”
Casper clicks his tongue and pats around for his weapon, unable to find it anywhere nearby.
“Casper…”
“Yes, I will get us out of this, we just need to-”
“Why didn’t you tell me another in your ranks was marked?” Rathiel ends up asking.
Casper pauses, and turns away. “I don’t have a good excuse other than I didn’t trust you fully. Call it insurance…”
“Insurance? Casper I gave you my word when I discovered the truth of your mark. Don’t you think it would have been important to know? We could have prepared more, made a plan, done something”
“I am sorry Rathiel…”
“Sorry? Sorry?! Casper, my friends are dead because of this!” Janus and Szostes are dead because you withheld the truth!”
“Knowing we were both marked wouldn’t have changed that. Casper would never let me sacrifice myself, you wouldn’t have let him and me go off on our own because you need him. It all would have turned out much the same.” Engee Explains softly.
“The hells it would have!” Rathiel snaps, wheeling on Engee with divine fury in his eyes.
“She specializes in clairvoyance. She predicts the future Rathiel.” Casper tries his best to keep a calm disposition, trying not to feed into the moment of panic.
“The future is what we make it! I know that much!”
“We couldn’t have done anything-”
“We could have damn well tried!” Rathiel screams the words, golden tears streaking down his face. “I owed them that much.” Rathiel paces around, flexing his one arm and one wing over and over again.
Engee looks to Casper then, her eyes sending him an unspoken message, a warning. She looks to Rathiel who continues to pace and mutter to himself.
She was wondering if they should kill him before he decides to take out his anger on them.
Casper shakes his head, and Engee lets the suggestion fall.
Casper didn’t know much about Rathiel, but he knew the man was moral, and reasonable. More enough to not outright kill either Casper or Engee, and reasonable enough to know he would need them to be free from the hunters insides.
Besides he couldn’t blame him for his anger, it was more than justified given the deaths of his friends.
“We might be able to carve a path through the hunter.” Rathiel finally says, his attention once more returning to the moment.
“I would advise against it.”
“Why?”
“If you recall, damaging the hunter only makes it stronger. The more tentacles we removed the more grew, it’s likely the same for the rest of it. The more it's damaged the more it grows. It would explain why it was so much larger now than when Peter had told us about it. Furthermore, it grew stronger the more it consumed, compounding the effect.
“Then what do you suggest?”
“Our best bet would be to try and navigate the internals. We came to be inside of the monster somehow, which means it must have a mouth.”
“And what do we do when we find it? Emerge at the bottom of the ocean and get crushed to death?” Engee asks.
“Rathiel, can you fly with only one wing?”
“No, not very well at least.” The celestial crosses his arms.
“Any chance your god feels like intervening to help out?”
“The gods fear the hunters. Assuming my god can even see me inside of the beast I doubt it would do much to aid me.”
Casper lets out a sigh and begins to pace weary around, scanning all around him to try and locate anything that looks different. His night vision was doing little to aid him, making it difficult to locate anything out of the ordinary.
He took a moment to examine his arms, and had to blink a few times as he noticed the mark upon his body was almost entirely gone.
Faint black lines still lingered up his forearms, but it wasn’t pitch black like normal. He could see the color of his hands for the first time in quite a while as well.
“Damnit.”
“The same is true for me, the mark is nearly gone from me.” Engee says in a gentle tone.
“Have you ever had it all gone before?”
“No, have you?”
“Once.” Casper confirms. “Fighting another hunter.”
“How did you survive?”
“I didn’t, not by myself at least. I had to be saved by some locals who found me nearly dead on the forest floor.”
“That gives me hope.” Engee sighs, resting her chin on her knees.
“Hope doesn’t exist for people like us.” Rathiel intones. “We are meant to be the hope for others. With the both of you here with me it likely means the others on the ship are alive, the hunter would have left them alone, but that doesn’t mean they are safe. The damage the ship sustained was incredible. We need to reach them before it’s too late.”
Casper examines his hands once more and looks to Rathiel, his entire demeanor having shifted from the pain of loss and rage, to calm confidence.
“He is right.” Casper nods his head and extends a hand for Engee, who takes it.
Helping her down, Casper allows the thin woman to lean on him for support.
“We need to find the mouth, and we can plan something from there.”
Together, they climb through the belly of the beast.
Casper struggles to get higher, focusing every ounce of strength on securing himself to the strands of muscle and organ in order to help Rathiel and Engee climb.
Through moving valves, thumping veins and roaring, vibrating chambers they climb higher and higher.
Eventually they manage to leave the web of black flesh behind, only to find themselves in small tubes that twist and turn in strange arcing paths. It's small enough to force Casper to his hands and knees, back pressing against the slick material to navigate the inner workers.
“Casper, I would ask you to forgive me for my earlier outbursts…” Rathiel starts.
“Nonsense. You were right, I should have trusted you more. I should have let you know about Engee.”
“I have been thinking about it, and Engee, you were right. There was very little we could have possibly done regardless.”
“You are too damn moral, you know that?” Casper reprimands.
“What?”
“You, you are too moral. Two of your friends die at the hands of a hunter that's only there because of me and Engee and you apologize to me? That's absurd.” Casper shakes his head, and digs his fingers into a nearly vertical shaft of internal tubing, pressing his body against the sides to try and begin the climb.
“My friends… died because I wasn’t strong enough to save them.”
“See? That is absurd!” Casper shouts back, holding out a hand for Rathiel to take. The celestial has to press his wing into the wall to try and support himself, while Engee holds on to his leg as he too helps her climb.
“I am meant to be a hero, Casper. A Hero, a hero who protects the people of this kingdom. You wouldn’t understand the feeling.”
Casper climbs in silence for a moment, dragging and pulling the other two up and up until the tub levels out once again, and begins to work in a downward spiral.
“I was raised to be the leader of my village.” Casper explains, helping Rathiel and Engee over the last hump to start their short descent. “I was raised to protect the people. The last thing my father ever told me was that a leader ought to be firm but fair, strong but kind, and most importantly level headed. Never act in anger”
Casper listens to their labored breath as he speaks, no one wanting to interrupt him though he desperately wanted them to.
It was a hard thing to talk about, and now that he was this far into it he couldn’t stop, so much like their journey through the organs of the hunter, he pressed onward.
“I have failed to do that at every turn. I am neither firm, nor fair. I’ve killed men for the very moral crimes I commit now of owning slaves. I’m strong, but I'm not kind with my strength. I’ve hurt people. People I love, people I've cared about because I couldn't control myself. And I am far, far from level headed. The mark consumes my every waking moment. It urges me to hunt, to kill, to consume, to do anything. I act in anger all the damn time.”
The path once more rises, and once again Casper struggles to climb it, helping the others as they fight to gain inches of ground.
“I was meant to be one thing, my fathers son, and in that I failed. I failed so miserably in fact that my entire village was decimated. Burned to the ground, the women and children raped and killed and set on spikes or trampled into the mud. I was strong enough to protect them, but I was off on my own little adventure and I didn’t get back in time.”
The memory of it all rages inside of Casper, his anger boiling over, forcing the words to grind from his mouth.
“I know what it’s like. I too was meant to protect people, far fewer people, with far greater strength available to me and I still failed them.”
A vibration runs through the inside of the hunter, nearly shaking them from their hold in the tube. Casper grits his teeth and drives his legs into the side and strengthens his grip around Rathiel's arms, who nearly slips free from him due to the mucus coating their bodies. Engee slips from Rathiel's leg, forcing him to extend it for her in order to catch it.
The vibration rattles Casper skull. Forcing his eyes shut to try and drown out the sound, he feels his hand slip from the side just as Engee catches hold of Rathiel's leg again, sending them sliding down a few crucial feet.
The vibration comes to a stop, leaving Casper breathless for a time, before he has strength enough to continue the climb.
“I am sorry, I had no idea…”
“Quit saying sorry.” Casper spits.
“What was Janus like?” Engee ends up asking.
For a moment Casper winces, worried the shift to his recently dead friend would upset him, but instead Rathiel laughs.
“Janus was quite the adventurer.”
“He seemed like it.” Engee smiles. “How did you meet?”
“Janus and Dorain both came from lesser nobles directly under the king. Born and raised in the capital they were a rather rambunctious duo. From what I understand, Janus’s mother passed, Dorain's Father passed, so the two living parents married one another to ensure that the children would be treated well. “
“That's sweet…”
“Isn’t it? I ended up meeting the two during a quick stay in the Capital. They were doing work for a local guild I had a close connection with. The guild master introduced me and the rest was history.”
“Honestly, I was expecting something a little more dramatic.” Engee admits.
“Well, life is rarely like the stories. Not every chance encounter is one of drama, not every death is meaningful or appropriately timed unfortunately.”
“Is any death appropriately timed?” Casper offers, pausing to take a moment to breathe.
“Some… Some deaths are in a valiant last stand against impossible odds, some are sacrificed to save another, I've seen it all before. Poetic and climatic and worthy. Though those are few and far between.”
Casper nods his head, the image of his own father dead in his home, taken far too soon.
“What of Szostes?”
“Szostes, unfortunately, I didn’t know very well. Even among the company of friends she was quiet, secretive, and closed off. She is one of the people I wished I had known better. To spend so much time with a person and to not even know their family name.”
Engee slowly nods her head and sighs. “I'm sorry.”
Rathiel nods as well, her lips pressed into a thin line. “I know she was a good woman. A noble woman. She cared for the people with every fiber of her being. She loved them, even if they never loved her. She wanted to help them, in spite of the fact that they never helped her. She was the single most generous, caring, and kind soul i knew even if she refused to show it.”
Casper feels a lump building in his chest. She was a better person than he was, that was for certain. They didn’t deserve to die, while he got to live.
But that simply wasn’t how things were. So for as long as he lived he vowed to ensure people like that, good, moral, honest people were safe. This god forsaken kingdom sure as hell needed as many of them as it could take. Losing two? That was a devastating blow.
“Ahk!”
Another low vibration sends Casper's ears ringing and head spinning. He forces his body to maintain its hold on the tubing as his hands slip and slide down.
He tries to shout at the others, but his voice is drowned out by the vibrations entirely.
A rush of ice cold wind blows down past him, along with a spray of saltwater. The water coasts the tube, slickening the mucus lining around his hands that slips even more.
Casper strains with every ounce of strength he can muster, slowing their descent as much as possible as they are brought back down lower and lower and lower.
The vibrations strengthen, the force of the vibrating air causing Casper's ears to bleed and blood vessels to pop in his eyes. Red saturates his vision. Pressure builds in his head.
Caper slips from the tube and enters a freefall, colliding with Rathiel and Engee as the three plummet. Their bodies bounce and slide along the length of the tube, rind rushing past until Casper finds the strength to claw his hand into the sides. Flesh and blood and water flow from the gashes he creates in his fall, soaking them through once again with the sickly sweet scent of hunter blood.
Casper digs both of his hands inside the side, slipping for a moment before he can grab them. Wind rushes past him, his fingers burn as the skin and muscles tear in his desperate bid to slow the fall.
The sound of crunching bones sends panic through Casper as their bodies smash into the bottom. struggling to stand and get off of Engee, he sees her wide eyes staring up at him, her neck contorted at an odd angle.
“Fuck!” Casper kneels down to try and grab her but Rathiel pushes him away, healing magic radiating from his hands as Engee wheezes.
Casper's eyes are locked onto the quickly growing purple bruise forming around her neck, listening to her desperate breaths, watching the tears form in her eyes as she mouths the words before she speaks them.
“I can’t feel my legs… I can’t feel my legs…”
It was Casper's turn to mutter as Rathiel works desperately to heal her, his voice slowly being drowned out by the sound of rushing water.
The ocean hits Casper in the back with a force unlike any he has ever felt before, as the tubing is flooded with the cold dark brine of the sea.
His legs are ripped out from under him, sending him slamming into Rathiel who is forced into Engee as the torrent consumes them, sending them once again ricocheting off the walls as they are forced back, back towards the way they came.
Casper tries once again to grab at the walls, slowing down, anything, but the force of the water is overwhelming, his fingers break and bleed as the tendons snap from the effort of trying to stop himself.
He screams, but the sound is lost, and instead water fills his lungs to replace the breath.
Head over heels he collides over and over and over again, brought deeper into the depths of the beast.
His lungs burn, everything in his body screams at him to breathe. Casper fights it, struggles against the pain until his eyes flutter and his chest heaves, sucking at nothing.
His lips part to take on the water, but he brings his broken hands to seal his lips.
Casper’s head grows fuzzy once again, struggling against the sensation; he is relieved when he feels his back hit open air and his body cast into an empty chamber.
Breath fills his lungs as he tumbles through the air, only to have it driven from him once again as his back collides against a strand of muscle. Casper's head snaps backwards as he flips, only to land on another that cracks his ribs. Tumbling again he rejoins the water that drags him even deeper, and sucks him back under.
His side connects with something solid. His hand grazes cloth. He grabs it, it’s too weak. The cloth slips from his fingers and he is in open air once more.
Casper tries to breath, but the air wont come as he once again crashes into a mucus membrane, sinks slights, is torn free from it in the rapids and brought into pure darkness once again for what feels like an eternity, until eventually it slows, and then stops.
The water disappears somewhere else inside the monster. Leaving Casper face down, his eyes stinging, breath shallow, and everything hurting.
His eyes linger on Engee’s broken body, her own eyes wide, body unmoving but breathing.
Rathiel is mangled in the distance, his one remaining wing a tangled mess, blood pooling into the ground around him.
Casper lets his cheek rest against the cold, sleek internals of the hunter, every ounce of strength in him gone. He lets his attention follow to his twisted arm, sitting at an impossible angle directly in front of him. Black and blood from his wrist spinning around more times than it should.
The bruise was the only thing black remaining on his hands. Any indication he was ever marked at all had faded.
Casper lets the vibrations of the hunter resonate through him, listening with nearly deaf ears as the impossibly powerful beast consumes what remains of him.