Freeday, 3rd of Febrinna, 5662 AE, 468th Year of the 5th Era
The blood orb had started to descend into the pool slowly. I saw this with baited breath as I didn’t know how on earth I would even begin to manage to stop it in its tracks. As the orb finally dropped into the pool and disseminated into it, the waters of the pool quickly turned crimson red. For a while everything fell silent. At that moment you could be able to hear a pin drop. Then the red pool started to boil. Like water inside of a stove, the pool bubbled up and boiled as we could feel hot steam coming out of it. Seeing this, Ivan and I instinctively got up and put a little distance between ourselves and the pool.
The heat of the bloodpool was so intense that the naked corpses and that of the cult leader were melting as it all happened, merging and becoming one with the pool itself. After all of this occurred, once more the red pool grew silent and calm as nothing could be seen floating above it. In the next moment, the calm pool instantly roared as a red pillar of what I could only describe as raw energy, light, and mana made manifest shot out from the waters of the pool and into the ceiling of the cavern, destroying everything in its path as it made a large hole through several layers of ceiling, rock, and ground before piercing the horizon of the skies.
I had to shield my eyes from the pillar as it was so bright it almost blinded me for a second. The beam of light shot into the air for what I had felt was a solid minute before a figure started to emerge from the pool. At first, I could barely make out what was going on but when Ivan motioned his hand to cloak us both in darkness, we could get a little bit of a glimpse of what was emerging from the pool and pillar of red energy.
It was a behemoth of a beastwolf that had emerged from the pillar. What came out first was its head that stood two adult humans tall, its body made of white fur with tinges of red accents here and there. It had the upright posture of a werewolf but was bigger than any of those monsters I had seen before. The beast was large with its broad hands brandishing razor-like claws and what stood out most were the few scars I could see upon its body in a few places. The beast had blood read irises and was scanning around the area, getting its bearings together as the beam of energy was beginning to disperse.
The beast had seen the carnage of corpses around it as it gave a short scoff before soon enough, it had locked eyes on me. I could only give a short gulp as I felt immense pressure coming from the beast. I tried analyzing the beast’s information, but it was for naught as the system clearly indicated that it was more powerful than what I currently am. But despite the pressure bearing down on me from the beast’s aura, I had forced myself to stand straight and put on a defensive pact along with Ivan who did the same beside me.
The beast growled as it looked at us, claws ready, and fangs bared but it made no immediate moves to attack the both of us. This standoff lasted for a few more moments before suddenly, it started opening its jaws. “Nor zara zu…?” I heard the beast start talking in a growly-guttural voice. “Erantzun iezadazu!” As the beast shouted, I could feel the cavern reverberate from the vibrations of his shout.
“What’s it trying to say?!” Ivan said as he held his axe close to him, raising it up in a defensive stance.
“I don’t know! I can’t speak werewolf!” I shouted back as I too raised my weapons. “Oy, bastard! Try speaking in a language we can understand!”
The beast only growled and roared as if to voice out its displeasure before it started speaking again with its growling, guttural voice. “...Who are you fools?! How and why have you summoned me…? This is… vile blood magic!” The beast then sniffed at the cloaked corpses before he continued “THIS TREACHERY! WHY DO I SMELL THE BLOOD OF MY KIN?! HOW DARE YOU?!”
Ivan and I gave each other a bewildered look as we heard the beast’s questioning. I don’t know what was happening right now but it seems the creature was greatly confused and wasn’t all too privy to the current situation. I kept my guard up as I had no idea where this could be going, but regardless, I was the one who spoke up first.
“We were not the ones to summon you!” I quickly said as I saw the beast wolf was starting to rage. “If by ‘kin’, you’re referring to the werewolves, it was they who carried out this profane act of ritual sacrifice to summon you!”
As the beastwolf was ready to pounce and attack, he stopped as he heard my explanation before giving me a suspicious look of disbelief, his fangs still bared at me.
“Tread carefully! I have little patience for lies or tricks!” The wolf spouted out once more.
“Then there is no quarrel to be had here, for I speak no such falsehood.” I said further as I lowered my weapons slightly “And seeing as to how you have yet to fully bear arms against us, I can assume you can be reasoned with…”
“I wouldn't be so quick to trust the intentions of a heathen ‘god’, Carl…” Ivan still had his guard up
“I AM NOT A GOD!!!” The wolf roared in fury as it seemed the mere mention of the word ‘god’ caused a flip to switch in him “And neither are those false ‘heroes’ your people worship any more divine than anyone else!”
I was honestly quite lost at what the wolfbeast was even talking about. He didn't seem to fully grasp the current situation we were in as the things he was speaking of were reminiscent of tales of millenia past within Alfred’s books.
“What the fuck are you on about, you mad beast?!” Ivan retorted back in frustration “Are you not Malcanis, Ancestral blood God of the Wolfman Clans, the Father of Werewolves?!”
“Ivan! What are you doing?!” I elbowed him on his side as I had no Idea why he was provoking the monster in front of us like that.
However, looking towards Malcanis, his expression showed a conflicted look upon his face at Ivan's words. His stance became a little less fierce and even had a tinge of sorrow left in him.
“...Answer me… where am I currently? Why am I speaking words in a tongue I do not know…” Though he was still guarded, the wolfbeast’s tone softened a tad bit as he further questioned us “...Why am I in such a horrible place? This wanton savagery..! The last thing I remember was a huge explosion occurring as I had a blade pierced through my heart…”
“I assure you, we mean no harm at all to you and are just as confused as you in this entire ordeal…” I said as I sheathed my weapons back showing my pure intentions of diplomacy “We are but adventurers sent on a mission to investigate a recent string of massacres on nearby villages and what we found out was that a cult of Werewolves bearing the name of ‘Malcanis’. These… followers of yours were butchering and murdering innocents wantonly to bring about your return through rituals of blood magic that we too have yet to understand…”
“..NO! I take no claim over anyone who would dare to commit such atrocities as my kin!! I… I never taught anyone any of this..!! You say that I have been worshiped as a god, but I left strict instructions to my kinsmen not to treat me as such! And I abhor you using the name put upon me by those accursed Elves! I am Malcanis only to my enemies!!”
“I meant no offense, Lord Malc-.. I mean.. uhh… how should I address you.. then.. um, sir?” I asked with a wry smile as I scratched the back of my head.
“...My mother named me Edezuri…” the Beast said as his voice softened even more for a moment but immediately he regained his ferocity “...But know that I am still wary of you two! You still have not answered my question of where this is!”
“You are currently within the Realm of the Kingdom of Feldonia.” I answered “I don’t know how best to tell you, but… It has been two thousand years since the destruction of Megasras and the heroes you knew are no more…”
“Two thousand years…” the Wolf said “It felt as if just a moment ago I was experiencing hell on earth… then everything went black and… urghh…! ARGGHH!!!”
I didn’t know what was happening as all of a sudden the wolfbeast growled and crutched his head with both hands as his eyes reddened until all of it was a crimson blood colour. I had readied myself as I drew my weapons back out. In the next moment, the bloodpool boiled again as out of it appeared several crimson coloured gel-like pillars… or tentacles… that seemed to form from the waters of the pool itself. They immediately coiled around Malcanis before restraining him as I could see the wolfbeast struggle, trying his best to free himself from the coils.
Ivan and I immediately lunged towards these water pillars to try and help Malcanis, but it was to no avail. It was as if our attacks either bounced off of the pillars or just cut through them without doing much if any damage to them. As we were frantically trying to help Malcanis, a few more pillars appeared and struck towards us but we had deftly managed to avoid it as we were forced back.
I could only watch on in horror as I saw the pillars of blood fully assaulting Malcanis and was forcing itself to be absorbed by the wolfbeast, with a few of the water pillars as if stabbing him in the chest as it entered the beast. Malcanis gave another pained howl as he continued to struggle before he mustered all the strength he had to spare to look at Ivan and me and shouted, “RUN YOU FOOLS…!!”
Contrary to his expectations, Ivan and I could only continue to gawk as a foreign sense of fear entered us. I don’t know what the feeling was as I’ve never before felt anything like it, both in this world or my last one. But I could do nothing as if frozen for a moment in fear. It was in that situation where what I saw next could only serve to cause me even more dread.
The red pillars of crimson liquid had all entered Malcanis’s body as I could now clearly see him slightly bloated but with a red crystalised apparatus upon his chest where his heart should be. Though it looked like a crystal or diamond rock the size of my fist, it glowed red and from it, numerous red markings in symbols quite similar to the ones that were on the wall appeared. What was the red pool of the cavern was now just an empty crater as all the water had - I assumed - entered Malcanis, but what happened next was even more terrifying. Malcanis’s body seemed to grow ever so slightly larger as flames of red fire appeared around his eyes to his brow all the way to his back and his tail. The claws on his hands grew sharper as they glowed with a red hue. As it came to and looked at us with its fully-red eyes, I knew the Malcanis we had been conversing with earlier was now nowhere to be. What stood before us now was truly ‘Malcanis the Dreadwolf..’
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
In the next moment, Malcanis howled out such a fearsome growling howl that the air shook as rock particles and some stalagmites even started to fall from the reverberations in the air. Lord in Heaven above aid me, for what I saw in front of me was just far too monstrous for me to even think about trying to contend with it.
“Ivan, I know I’m not usually one to rely on craven methods but…” I started as I kept my eyes on the hell wolf who now had its attention placed squarely on the two of us like we were just morsels.
“We have to fucking run!!” Ivan said as we immediately took a stance and started trying to run out of the cavern back to the stairs but not giving us even a moment to breath, the corrupted Malcanis had jumped at us in a powerful lunge which we barely managed to dodge by a hair’s breadth as he crashed into the walls instead. I quickly sent out several wind slashes in response which struck at the beast but didn’t do as much damage to it as I had hoped. Ivan in turn struck the beast with his berdiche which simultaneously conjured up a wall of ice spikes which had hit the wolfbeast and managed to trap the beast in an icy shackle, though unfortunately this state of affairs didn’t last for too long as again Malcanis unleashed a terrifying howl as the flames upon his back blazed and roared which melted Ivan’s ice easily enabling the wolfbeast to again launch a strike towards us as its jaws were quickly up to my neck. Ivan had vanished once more towards the shadows at that moment.
Once more I turned sideways before I launched myself backwards by summoning powerful torrential strikes at Malcanis which I hoped would incapacitate the wolf somewhat. My eyes could only widen as in the next moment, the beast opened its jaws and unleashed a breath of fire which had dispersed my previous wind attacks towards it.
“Scheiße!” I spat to the ground as I prepared myself to launch another attack despite my constantly depleting reserves of mana and energy “What’s it gonna do next? Shoot fire from its ass?!”
“Like hell it will!!” Ivan retorted as he reappeared next to the beast’s head which seemed to have caught the beast off guard as Ivan managed to slam the beast’s head sideways with his berdiche axe and not letting up on the momentum, proceeded to connect several more strikes towards the wolfbeast as shards of ice appeared on every attack which quickly turned to steam as it made contact with the beastwolf’s body. “I apologise, Mr. Wolf-man, if you could even hear me, but nothing personal if I lop your head off!”
As Ivan’s scuffle with Malcanis continued, I had taken the opportunity to drink a couple of elixirs I had brought with me to help in the regeneration of my mana reserves. Ivan looked like he was somewhat handling himself, but even so, I could hardly say he had the advantage. Just like that, at the next moment, Malcanis had swiped both his arms towards Ivan, summoning flames in the air in the process which pushed him back by quite a bit. Not missing another beat, the beastwolf once more unleashed a mighty howl which reverberated throughout the cavern. At first, I had sought to take advantage of this to strike towards Malcanis, but it didn’t take more than a few moments for it to become apparent what the purpose of that last howl was.
As Malcanis continued to engage with Ivan after that, I could see the corpses of the dead cultists and cult leader seemingly twitching before they practically exploded as bursting from their bodies were ethereal spirit-like forms of wolves with red hue and a murderous gaze in their eyes, fangs bared completely, growling in menace. I cursed my luck once more as I spat on the ground at the reality that I now had to face more than a dozen new foes to which I didn’t even know how to handle.
Could my attacks even have any effects on these non-corporeal life-forms? As I asked myself that, the spirit wolves wasted little time in immediately charging and attacking me from all sides. I had barely been able to dodge a couple of them before one of them landed a bite upon my shoulder. The stinging sensation was dreadfully painful, but it did not feel the same as when a beast was physically biting me down but this sensation was different though it was still pain, it felt more like a burning sensation that gnashed right to the structure of my being if that would make any sense.
Regardless, I had quickly countered to attack the wolf spirit lodged on my shoulder with a quick stab of my Windwyrm, but to my shock, the attack availed to nothing as it seemingly passed through thin air as it struck the beast. My eyes widened in shock as my heart sunk with my brain racking all sorts of countermeasures that I could attempt whilst still dealing with the pain of a fucking ghost-wolf biting down my neck. Then the next second, I struck out once more with Windwyrm but this time with the wind-affinity attacks infused and it actually managed to do damage as my blade bit into the ghostwolf’s neck and it let out a whimper as I continued to send in wind energy into the wolf and soon enough the ghostwolf exploded though without the guts and bile as you would normally expect as instead it moreso dissipated back into the air as it left behind soul-essence similar to what I had first encountered when I was sent to Orbis.
*You have gained 3000XP!*
With this discovery, I calmed myself down as I regained my composure on how to deal with these spirit wolves. Though I had found a proper way to deal with these monsters, I did click my tongue a bit as I had to contend with having to spend a considerable amount of mana and energy to deal with each and every single one of these ghostwolves and the amount of mana I had to expend to deal with them was slightly more than normal beasts and while not much on its own, when compounded, it would be a total waste of my reserves. Taking a quick mental check of my inventory, I also only had a handful of potions left to deal with these beasts. Regardless, at the corner of my eye, I saw Ivan was now being pushed back by Malcanis as he only got one strike in as he ran around to avoid the ten attacks Malcanis was dishing back.
The situation was dire and I couldn’t afford to conserve any energy and waste my time. And so, I launched forward and immediately went into a crazed frenzy at the ethereal wolf spirits. I had focused myself to almost the point of tunnel-vision as I struck towards the ghostwolves with empowered strikes towards their general area as I weaved and sifted through the dozens of beasts, deftly landing strikes as I did so and sneaking in some drinks of my mana-regeneration potions when I had the chance to keep up my attacks.
*You have gained 3000XP!*
*You have gained 3000XP!*
…
*You have gained 3000XP!*
In this first foray against the evidently supernatural, I managed to disperse several of the accursed beasts, sending them straight back into the afterlife… or oblivion for that matter. Regardless of that success however, I had felt my focus being significantly bogged down as my energy levels and mana levels once more reached critical levels. Despite all of that, I managed to squeeze out what little more mana I had left to unleash a harsh whirlwind at the several spirit wolves that were left, but this only managed to push them back somewhat as I saw them beginning to get back up.
My energy was nearly depleted, my mana was gone, and I only had about three potions left which would mean that I probably only had enough to deal with the half a dozen remaining wolf spirits but none to deal with Malcanis, that is of course… I took a quick look at my status box and saw that I was close to leveling up. If I could deal with the remaining wolves, I could probably exploit the system as I usually did and get myself back to full power. Not wasting any more of my time to overthink my course of action, I chugged down on my remaining potions before I placed the empty bottles back in my inventory and I once again launched myself towards the remaining spirit wolves.
I spared no effort in slashing and dashing towards the remaining spectres as I sent out countless energy attacks towards the ghostwolves that were still on the ground and I even managed to destroy a couple of them who had already been grievously damaged from my earlier attacks. I counted myself lucky that despite these spirit wolves being considerably more powerful than their corporeal counterparts - even moreso than the werewolf guards - they lacked the integral part that would make any force effective. They lacked intelligence and reasoning, being even more prone to instinct than even the regular wolfbeasts as if they were only tracking me through some sense of my life force or whatever other nonsense they were operating by.
*You have gained 3000XP!*
*You have gained 3000XP!*
Regardless, with the initial shock of facing these spectres having completely subsided, dealing with the remaining three spirit wolves proved far simpler than I had previously estimated as I was able to chain a connected attack of several strikes, deftly destroying the remaining ghostwolves, and with that, It was back to only me and Ivan versus Malcanis.
*You have gained 3000XP!*
*You have gained 3000XP!*
*You have gained 3000XP!*
*You have leveled up!*
I gave a minor fist pump in the air as I had leveled up and once more, the strength was returning to me. On that very note, I saw Ivan had too regained some of his strength as he was successfully holding his own against Malcanis’s onslaught. In spite of all that, the wolfbeast was far from what I could even consider to be ‘battered’ as it still seemed like it had enough energy to raze the entire place down twice over.
Ivan had gave out a couple of strikes towards Malcanis, but instead of avoiding said strikes, the beast tanked them and immediately lunged at Ivan and tackling him down as his claws held back Ivan’s arms as it was about to take a chomp at Ivan. Just a few short moments before Malcanis could manage to sink its teeth into Ivan, I had struck the side of the beast’s head after launching myself towards it at near-bullet speed, sending it crashing towards one of the sides of the cavern’s walls. I immediately helped Ivan get back up as he clasped my hand to pull himself back up.
“As always, late to the rescue, Carl… Hehehehe!” Ivan chuckled as he shook his head
“If you hadn’t noticed, I was busy…” I said whilst noticing Malcanis was quickly getting back up as the flames upon its body raged on and glowed redder in annoyance at our putting up a fight against it. “I don’t think the old bastard will run out of energy any time soon and I’m skeptical of our abilities to kill it…”
“Fuck it, Carl, let’s get out of here before we’re really cooked!”
“My thoughts exactly!” I said before I unleashed a couple of strikes towards the cavern's ceilings and the rock stalactites hanging upon the ceiling to land and crash towards the beast. At the same time, Ivan once more motioned an upward strike towards Malcanis as he summoned another Icewall to damage and entrap the beast at least for a few seconds to get some extra time in escaping.
Not willing to look back and gawk, Ivan and I immediately rushed towards the stairway as we quickly climbed out of the caverns and back into the praetorian buildings. Throughout our climb, we could hear the crumbling of walls, crashes, and reverberations as well as the loud howls of the beastwolf as it was freeing itself and raging within the cavern. Regardless, the narrow passage of the stairways should prevent Malcanis from following us out. At least that’s what I was praying to God for. We’d be well and truly fucked if the boss could leave his area so to speak.
Not paying any more attention to our peripheries, we had finally reached the entrance to the building and made our way out. But in our excitement to escape and get out of this absolute shithole, there was possibly something we might have let slip from our minds that had rudely come back to remind us when we had exited the building and the setting sun had begun to assault our eyes.
In the middle of the fort was a large gaping hole. It was the hole left behind by the earlier pillar of red energy that bursted towards the skies.
“Ah fuck!” As the realisation had dawned on me, both men and Ivan could once again hear the menacing howl of the beast wolf Malcanis as from the hole, the Dread Wolf had climbed out in blazing glory as it once more appeared in front of us, murderous intent fully visible upon his face as he bore his gnaw upon us.
“We’re cooked.” Ivan said giving an apt summary to our current situation.