Battles raged on, in the boulevard, in the deposit, to the south, all for the vampires to steal enough time for their heist…
Once again, the vampires consult over their plans, but Cain and Klaus have joined them…
Klaus: Erylis will take on the west. Take a few hulks with you just in case, they might send in seniors.
Erylis: Leave a poor lady alone? Why hasn’t Lord Cain volunteered to accompany me I wonder….?
Her snide comment went unnoticed by the vampire youth pickin’ his teeth in deep thought…
Klaus: Oscar, Ezra, you’ll take the east. Make sure you make a good commotion, this will be for naught if the old hunters don’t join in. Leuto and Edward. You guys keep the reinforcements arriving busy. Don’t let ‘em get inside the city…
While Leuto nodded in agreement, Edward hopped in excitement, licking his lips at the thought of all the blood spilling. Oscar agreed in his position, but Ezra just started looking around in distaste of her comrade’s orders…
Klaus: Problem?
The shrimp of a bat made a few noises, before scratching the back of her head and turning her attention to Klaus…
Ezra: Eh, you see…I ain’t doin’ none of that.
Klaus: And what exactly does your loud ass wants to do? This is our Lord’s orders, need I-
Ezra : YOUR Lord's orders…And I didn’t waste ten years inside four stone walls so I’d be some decoy !!
While everyone exchanges looks of confusion, Klaus already pinches his eyes nervously, gasping with exasperation at what is to come…
Klaus : (God, can’t believe I have to do this) Look, It’s the Lord’s plan, we follow it to the last detail unless everyone here wants to find themselves hanged and gutted.
Ezra: And I’m telling you…
She opened her mouth and screeched like a madman. The pitch was high enough to have the vampires kneeling in pain… At that moment, she dashed to Klaus and grabbed ahold of his neck…
Ezra: I’m not sitting around like some third-ate dependent to waste on the silver heads while you two go and get all the glory !!! Especially by some orphan lordling like you !!
The bats were ready to jump her, Oscar pointing his musket, Erylis and Edward ready to plunge their hands down her back, while Leuto had his bats hiding between the dark green tree leaves…Cain remained ignorant of the situation, gaze averted…
But Klaus halted their assault. He stared down Ezra’s veiny eyes and her gritty teeth. Even with her hand ready to crush his neck, her breath grazing his visage, or her insults meant to break his focus…
Klaus: You sure can’t keep your mouth shut, can you Erza…
All it took was a split second, and Ezra’s hold on the vampire felt much lighter, almost fading from existence. It was too late when she saw her limb cut in half, as Klaus quickly made a spin and kicked the girl back to a rock…
Her back smashed on the stone, and she could barely get up afterward…
Ezra : (What is this ? When did he-)
Klaus: Erza. I don’t give two shits who’ll get the job done. But Lord Jacob gave us these orders, so that’s how we are gonna care this out.
Approaching her, he pointed the tip of his sword between her eyes as she tried to get up…
Klaus: Waste any more of our time, and the Ripper won’t have anything left of you to punish…
That was enough to shut the bratty girl up… Edward and Cain snickered, while the rest remained silent…
Suddenly, through the trees, a bat rushed to Leuto, holding a small paper note…
Leuto: What is it? Huh? It’s from the Ripper!
Klaus: Already? What is that man’s problem?
Leuto rolled open the note…His wide stare meant the letter was holding surprising news…
Leuto: There’s a small change of plans, apparently…
With Leuto and the estranged vampire taking care of the South, and the boulevard in chaos, the deposit of a battlefield, only remained Beryl and the chest room…
And its new visitor…The scissor vampire, Edward…
Beryl budged not from his position. Up straight, hands crossed, chest out, shoulders back, legs wide, he entered the staring match against the hunch back, towering vampire snickering at his opponent, hands in pocket…
Beryl : (As I suspected…He’s the only one fast enough to sneak in…That means someone else is at the south gates, and they knew we would recognize Scissors immediately…That trap they played well, so we would never guess he would be the one to come for the chest…I don’t see blood on his hands and from the sounds upstairs…He must have sneaked past while the other vampires kept Aaron and Suiga occupied. I guess all the traps had no effect on him either…)
Edward: So, you are the guard…
Beryl: And you must be the scissor vampire I heard so much about…Why scissors though…
Edward: Hmmm…
Accepting the question, Edward pulled out his right palm. Making a two-finger peace sign, iron blades extended from his fingers…
Edward: Snip – snip. Get it?
Beryl: And you hope to get through me with that? You must be getting more arrogant by the day…
Edward: Or bloodbags are too weak?… Tell me hunter…are you weak? Will I just need these two fingers to slit your throat tonight?
As he pulled out his other arms, he filled his fingers with iron blades, along with two long blades out of the elbows…
Edward : Or did I come to the right place ? I’ve been itching for a fight since that factory...
Beryl had to stay calm…He stood still, unaverred by the vampire’s attempt at threat, with his creepy, harrowing voice that would make children run in fear…
Edward : Impressed…and satisfied. Killing you wouldn’t be fun without a little fight, now would it ?
Beryl : Kill me first, then talk about fun !
Edward dashed in the blink of an eye to reach Beryl’s throat. His attempt to slash the guy’s neck open failed. Beryl simply remained in place and bent over right as the vampire’s hand swiped the air. With his belly exposed, Beryl maneuvered to change his stance into a squat, and brought a full-force uppercut up the vampire’s torso, enough to send him up flying…
He then clapped his silver fist cuffs. The clunking sound and the white glow alerted the vampire, who quickly spread his small, flapping wings and fled to the back as Beryl brought his cuffs together and shouted Blow, escaping the double wind attack...
The vampire made a U-turn and attempted another assault, only this time opting to use his speed to attack the hunter from multiple sides, spinning around him to aim for unguarded points.
But Beryl proved quite the match. Some of Scissors' hits landed, but most of them would miss their target, cause Beryl would carefully dodge the strikes in continuous movement, and others he would send back with his cuffs…
The sound of his blades clashing with Beryl’s cuffs, the rush of the wind grazing his ears, and all the close calls had his timing been a second split late, a centimeter to the front, an attack not seen, a fist underestimated…
Beryl remained stoic and focused, but Edward was ellated with the fight, tongue out, screaming and gushing with pleasure…
Edward : Now that’s what I call a fucking fighter !!!
Beryl: Keep this charade up and you’ll be calling me a victor.
Edward missed. He tried to trick the hunter by staying upside down afloat and taunting him into opening his guard for a haymaker. That, in his demented mind, would allow him to fly right under his legs , cutting them away and then annihilating his back as he kneeled in place…
Beryl saw through the tactic and instead stepped backward to hit his cuffs once again.
Edward quickly rebounded and tried to take his chances, assaulting the hunter while in preparation. Beryl seemed unsatisfied with the winnings of his gamble…
Edward : Problem in paradise, hunter ?! I’ll carve a smile for ya’ !!
Beryl drew in the bat and brought the cuffs together before him, chanting shield.
Evidently, Scissors’ blades found no flesh, but rather a light blockade protecting the hunter.
Beryl then tried to follow up with an assault of hooks, but could only land two or three before Edward spun around in fast movement and sliced through his arms and torso…
Both of them stepped back to regain their guard, but made sure not to lose a moment of the fight…
Edward : (Strong, firm, and well trained. Not one of his moves goes to waste…This man is something else…)
Beryl : ( The lads were right, he’s as fast as the sword dancer, and those blades aren’t something to be trifled with. His wings and build allow him to make swift movements and drift around the field, having me spin around without a moment’s rest…)
Edward : Boy!!!
Beryl: Huh ?
Edward : Your name! What is your name ?
Beryl : Why would you care ? You said you were gonna kill me anyway.
Edward : I respect anyone lasting alone more than 5 minutes with me…I find meat tastes better when I know the name…
Beryl :…Beryl…Beryl Grut…
Edward : Beryl…you’ve got skill, for a guy using Heavy Hitter…
Beryl : !? You know what this is ?!
Edward : You think vampires live as little as you ? I’ve fought someone a long time ago using that thing…
Beryl :…
Edward : Silly folk, he was. Waving those cuffs around, shouting « Heavy Hitter » every time he called it out…Thought he was the talk of the town because he did in two of my kin…
Beryl : Sound to me like he was…
Edward : Probably…before I snipped his fingers off…
The lad was silent, but Edward’s creeping smile could still send shivers down his spine…
Edward : Snipped them off right after I shredded his skin, I stabbed every organ he had, then hanged his crippled corpse on the town gate with his fingers tied like a necklace around his throat !!
Beryl : Why ? Why all that violence ? What did he do to you ?
Edward stopped talking…
This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.
Edward : Hm ? What do you mean ?
Beryl : If revenge was what you wanted, or to fill your belly, you could have just killed him . No pain, no torture, nothing at all…What reason did he give you to make him suffer like that ?
Edward : …Reason ? Why would I need a reason ?
Beryl could not understand the freak’s attraction to violence. At the sound of empathy, Edward’s elated state came to a halt.
Beryl : I'm human. I get hungry, so I kill animals to eat. I’m scared of vampires, so I kill them when they attack me to protect myself. But none of those times, did I result to anything more than the necessary…
Edward : Well, then you are a fool.
Beryl : ?!
Edward : I don’t need a reason to hurt humans. I like it, it brings me joy. It brings me joy watching you lose a limb, bleed, cry, and cry as you watch me tear apart your flesh with my teeth and claws…
Beryl :…
Edward : But you can’t tell me you’ve never felt it, now, have you…
Beryl : What ?
Edward : She told me you know…Tragoedia…
The young hunter’s eyebrows rose in suspicion…
Edward : How you were ready to kill that bat…show her what you wanted to do for revenge…
Beryl : I was never going to-
Edward : But you still wanted, right ? She killed the entire plaza, her and her asshole friends did. They killed the locals, they butchered them, and then they ate them. Those people. YOUR people.
The cuffs trembled inside Bery’ls rough, sweaty fingers…A week’s worth of slumbering hatred and rage would boil over minutes of Edward reminding him of the horror Tragoedia’s guard had laid upon the plaza…
Edward : There. No killing my ass, you want it. Even now, I come in, take that chest, and plan to raise hell all along this city full of bloodbags, you want to kill me…
Beryl :…
Edward : With those cuffs, land your fist right down my jaw, and smash it till it turns all soft and bloody!!!
Beryl : Stop it, you disgust me-
Titillating, elated with his own words, Edward grabbed his head by the cheeks, slashing it with his own claws as he spun around smiling and screaming while drops of blood fell to the floor…
Edward : Yes!! You will!! You’ll do that!!! All the bloodbags end up doing it!! You’ll hit me and hit me, and then once you’re done and tired, I’ll get angry and slice you!!! I’ll slice you up nice and dead!!!
Beryl remained speechless, but still trembling, a little out of fear, a little out of anger…but all of it came from Edward losing his tongue in his madness…
Edward : I’ll slice you up!!! Break your bones from the outside!! Then I’ll hang ya’ from the robes!! I’ll cut your pits in half, then snip snip go your balls, and let your blood drool onto the floor!!!
As Beryl kept his ground, he went back in time, to a meeting with his peers during the preparations for the upcoming anti-heist. Shaka and Finn had arrived much earlier, so Beryl had some time to discuss the current events with his comrades…
Beryl: So, none of us had it easy with the aristocrats, huh?
Finn: I swear, all three of them sound monsters, and we survived only one of them…
Shaka: That freak was easy prey, he just caught us beaten and surprised!
Beryl: Still, these three don’t sound like average bats we kill on a night’s patrol.
The three pondered over their experiences…
Finn:…Do you guys ever wonder why?
Shaka: Hm?
Finn:…I know it sounds stupid, but…
Beryl: Out with it, buddy!
Finn:…These three made a mess of the districts…Edward carved up a whole factory, Tragoedia made a plaza her feeding nest…And I won’t talk about Danno and his gang…
Shaka: Yeah, they’re bats, alright, they can’t do anything else.
Finn: But why?...
Shaka: …Food is one reason…
Beryl: You can’t tell me Scissors did all that because he was just hungry
Shaka: Well…hell no…
Finn: It’s just…I always wonder…why vampires look down on humans that much…
Shaka: You ask the big questions when you open that mouth, Balecq…
Finn: Oh well…we’ll never find out…
As Edward ran amok in his own sadomasochistic thoughts of gore, Beryl had started to crack Finn’s question…He was nowhere near the final answer, but the exam sheet was starting to fill up…
Beryl : ( No, Finn…each of them has their reasons, for sure…but the one thing they have in common, is that none of those reasons will ever be right…They are just evil monsters…)
Edward: Come fight me, oh Beryl the Just!!!
Edward blinked to thin air, then dashed like a humanoid bullet to the hunter, blasting dust all up in the air as he traveled like a carriage with a thousand war horses, claws at the ready…
Beryl: And that’s why I can’t afford to let myself drown in these vile thoughts…The more I let my anger consume me…
The hunter hit his cuffs as hard as possible… A brighter light engulfed the weapons, and with that, Bryl prepared for his foe’s next move.
Beryl: The more I let myself become one of you…A deluded, blood-starved, freak!!
Edward managed to plunge a part of his makeshift lance out of his palm and inside Beryl’s gut…But soldiering through like a Titan, and timing his downward pound just right, he chanted Blow as Beryl’s left silver cuff smashed through Scissor’s skull, not only smashing his face down the stone floor but also sending him up and down from the impact like a vampire spring in release…
Chasing him, he engaged in a skirmish where blade and fist would clash in almost perfect harmony. Rushing movements, blades grazing skin, silver hitting bones, Edward’s bloodshot crimson eyes would meet Beryl’s brown pupils within every end of their exchanges, running, jumping, dodging through every spot of the room, while the chest remained seated and untouched…
Edward: Carve you!!! Carve you!! Carve you up!!!
Beryl: Is that all you are going to say!!!???
Edward: What is there to say?! I’ll murder you, here in these halls!! And then once I’m done, I’ll kill the rest of you!! I’ll paint the town red with hunter blood!!!
Despite Edward’s deranged state, he proved Beryl’s equal match. The hunter couldn’t believe in his eyes, that butchering beast that could barely speak was able to fight like a hundred swordsmen…
Edward: Because I fucking love cutting humans apart!!!
He clawed away; at speeds the hunter couldn’t reach. Whirlwinds of his slashes would graze his clothes and even tear through his defenses…His small, buzzing wings and slender build let him pull out moves only a ragdoll could do, spinning mid-air and plunging spikes out of his feet and into the hunter’s shoulders from the most bizarre positions. And yet it worked…
Beryl though didn’t falter…Despite the damage, his training had turned him into a close-quarters monster. He endured, kept his calm, and did not let a single moment go in the monster’s favor…He kept kicking, punching, each time enchanting the cuffs to give himself the advantage of variety and keep the bat on his toes while pouring down all of the Lord’s biblical incantations onto him…the more this kept on…
Beryl : (I need to fall back…The more I use the cuffs, the more I’ll reach mental fatigue…That’s when he’ll kill me…I’ll take my chances and let him strike, then just backstep and regain my guard while I recover…)
Edward: Out of breath, now, are we?!!
He extended his arm, and took out a large, curved iron blade out of his joint and from the long of his arm, then brought it onto Beryl with all of his might…
Edward: Watch your step!!!
Beryl: That I’ll do!!
He backstepped. Easy as a peach. Until now, the bat would have tired out the hunter with small upfront strikes, then try to outmaneuver him to an opening so he could plunge his larger blades down his torso…
But Beryl stood lucky. He didn’t even question it. It might have been the mental fatigue. It might have been his own optimism. He just took the chance and dodged his blade…
And he pondered over his options, as the messy, painful feeling of an arm piercing through his open gut wound from behind would have him question the whole skirmish…
Beryl: (…What)
Cain: God, Edward, you are too slow…
It took Beryl a few seconds to realize what was happening. But once he saw the edge of Cain’s arm piercing through his rib; he quickly stopped and pulled away, despite further opening his wound…Blood started gushing out…
Cain: I suppose you have some of those syringes. Try these out already, I just started hating drawing out fights…
Beryl tried to pick them out of his pockets, but nothing could be found…Edward appeared with the two syringes in his hand, crushing them with a smile on his face…
Beryl : (He wasn’t just toying with me…)
Edward: Cain, aren’t you supposed to be with Klaus?!
Cain: He’s coming in a minute, he’s sending the departure signal to the others…But none of that matters if this one doesn’t kick the bucket…
Edward: Well, don’t just stand there, let’s help him down the grave!!
Beryl couldn’t figure it out. When did Scissors steal his syringes? When did Cain sneak inside the room? How did he let that attack hit him? Does that mean Aaron and Suiga are dead? What happened to the rest of the team? Is Landen doomed?
Cain: Did you break him or something? He’s barely moving!
Edward: Oh, he does that! But don’t worry, he’s the bold type of hunter!
Beryl shook his head. He clunked his cuffs, despite the headache it brought him, the nausea and dizziness clawing their way through his body…
Beryl: (I can’t fall now…If that chest falls to their hands…)
Cain: Tchk. Let’s kill him now…
Edward: Loved our clash, Beryl Grut! Any last words?
Beryl's husky, blood-filled laugh confused the bats…He coughed and coughed as the open wound would slowly dry him out of fuel…
Beryl:…That chest…
Cain: Huh?
Beryl:…Why go through all this trouble…for this one thing…
Cain:…Why do you think it even matters to you, human?! You’ll die…
Beryl grit his teeth, even if that can’t stop the blood from gushing out of his mouth…
Beryl:…Typical…Can’t even give a man the answer he’s worth before his death…
Cain:…That chest…that and the other ones…will bring our empire back…
Bloodshot were his eyes, but they would still open after the vampire’s sudden revelation…
Cain: I don’t know what they’ve got inside, and I don’t give two craps…but if we get them…they promised us a world just like the old…an empire lasting years, where vampires will stand atop the hills…and humans in the stables, where they always belonged…
Beryl laughed again, through coughs of blood and ounces of pain…
Beryl:…What a…joke…A funny…j-j-joke…
Cain:…What about it?
Beryl: Humans…will never bow to vampires…we aren’t blood bags, nor livestock, nor toys for you to…needlessly torture!… Humans deserve to live, and if your kin can’t get that through their heads, then every hunter in the world won’t rest until you’ve learned that lesson, head by head, bat by bat!!! You hear me!!!???
Edward and Klaus rushed at him, blades at the ready. Beryl ran in response, his boots stomping against the bloody floor…
Beryl: Torture us, eat us, kill us. A hunter won’t back down, he’ll fight and fight until every one of you lies to the dirt, dead ten feet under!!!
Clashing away, the more time spent during the fight, the more the sound of blades carving up against the skin, lightning sparks hitting the walls, the deranged laughs coming out of Scissor’s and Cain’s mouths, and the loud, desperate battle screams of Beryl would be heard from across the room…
5 minutes pass…Cain enters the room, to witness Edward and Klaus, drenched in blood, limbs in disarray slowly healing, eyes missing…
Ahead of them, a standing corpse, with its maimed, charred fist raised towards the vampires…
Klaus: Symbolical, one would say…A fool’s trial to go against the superior…How did you two manage to get beat up like that…
Cain: I was tired!!! Willheart and that blight fucker got to us good! Next time, I’m-
Klaus: There isn’t a next time, we’re leaving! The gunslinger senior is back in town, 4 old hunters up our asses are too much, even if Lord Jacob comes to help…
Edward: What?!! When will I get to see the Lecourt girl?!
Klaus: Keep your family squabbles out of the mission, Scissors. You’ll get your chance, but we’ve got to grab the chest and get out of here…
Cain: Still, crap bastard still had a few left in him, you sure ya tired ‘im out Edward?!
Edward: Heard he was the Butcher’s boy, like your Willheart kid. He didn’t fail to deliver…With a bit more time, he could’ve been a senior…Nice thinking there, Klaus!
Klaus: Well, humans shouldn’t think we play fair…
Cain kept looking at the charred, bloody corpse…
Cain:…Edward, help me out.
Edward: Huh?
Klaus: We got no time for.
Cain: Willheart and the blight fuck pissed me off! Can’t leave the city without a goodbye letter now huh?!
Edward: Oooh, now I get it…
Klaus sighs, and goes to pick up the chest, which he lifts with ease, all while Edward and Cain fiddle with the corpse…Beryl’s cuff lay somewhere far, slowly fading away…
Comes tomorrow. The depository is canvassed. Tape all around, military guarding the place like it’s the holy church visited by the Lord himself. People sit around in anguish, staring at the beaten hunters trying to get in…
Shaka and Finn try to push through, failing to overcome the soldiers who’ve taken orders from the Chief and Shroud to keep anyone out…Url tends to Lau and Cassie, especially the latter whose injuries were much more severe…
Inside the room, Shroud, Eliakim, Luca, and Samuel look upwards in shock, to the direction of the missing chest’s podium…
None utter a word. Sitting still, they can only gaze…
Fast footsteps are heard from behind… Aaron and Suiga…With bandages all around them, Philomena can’t hold them back before they enter the room in total anguish…
What happened? Did they win? Did they get to capture another vampire? What happened to the chest? Did we figure out the noble’s plan?
All of those questions would remain unanswered…cause the moment these two entered the room, it didn’t take long to lay their sights upon what Cain and Edward left for them…
Hanged by the arms with his own entrails, his hardened torso now carved open, with the organs still attached and dangling in the air, eye sockets blasted open, blood and gore covering almost everything…
The only thing clear enough for them to comprehend out of this horror was what clearly Cain and Klaus had written for those two, and probably the rest of the hunters, on the only place not carved, too charred, or brutalized…
“It’s all yer fault, Willyheart, and Akiller”
Both kneeled. The old hunters couldn’t bother to help them, at least not until the screams started covering the rest of the rooms…