The day had started out like any other, Ostlin had kissed his wife and daughter goodbye and went out to join his friends working the fields. They had all grown up in the small village of Malbeck and known each other since they were children. They worked together, sweating under the midday sun. They helped each other build their homes and had each other over for dinner as often as they could. It was a community built on the idea that life takes a village to manage. A few men worked as guardsmen, but most were farmers, lumberjacks, millers, and builders. It was a simple life, but there wasn’t a person there that didn’t love it. They never hurt anyone and never dealt with any danger, and today seemed another day like all the rest.

As dusk was setting in the men said their farewells, some heading to pubs, many heading home. Just as they were separating after a day of hard work one of them fell, sputtering and gurgling on the ground. They all looked over and before they had time to process the arrow sticking out of his neck the sky grew darker.

Arrows rained down all around them, men fell on every side of Ostlin. Some screaming, some already silent. His body jolted and he spun around, he looked down at his shoulder to see an arrow sticking out of it. He felt a stinging that his brain couldn’t process, he touched the shaft of the arrow and pulled his hand back. He stared at his own blood on his fingers, he felt his shoulder thrust forward as another hit him in the back.

He ran. Ostlin ran with everything he had, straight for his home. He could hear the screaming getting louder behind him, and another sound, more bestial. Barking and howling echoed through the village. He couldn’t afford to look back, he had to get to his family. He didn’t slow down for anything. Arrows flew past him once or twice, and he could only hope they would continue to miss. He slowly outran the sound as he got farther from the edge of the village where the chaos began.

He burst through the door of his yurt. His wife sat smiling, teaching his daughter to cook the rice and onions they farmed all day. She looked up at him and her smile disappeared.

“We have to go, grab food and nothing else.” he told her as he reached into a trunk and pulled out an old machete.

“What’s happening? You’re bleeding!” his wife called out.

“No time, woman! Grab food and get Mathild.” he shouted, looking out the door to see if he had been followed. He saw flames rising into the darkening sky, an eerie orange glow spreading towards the stars that had just become visible. He could hear the screams getting closer as whatever had come swept through the village.

His daughter was crying loudly at all the sudden shouting and seeing her father bleeding, but there was no time to console. Only to run.

His wife handed him a bag and picked up their daughter. He took her hand and stepped outside the door, ready to move. To head for the forest and keep running until they found any other people, anywhere safe. Anywhere away from whatever this was.

He turned the corner to run past the only home he had ever known, when a large clawed hand came out of the shadow behind it. It struck him in the face and knocked him to the ground. He looked up to see a massive dog-like creature, it towered over him on two legs. It looked at his wife and child. As Ostlin tried to stand the creature caught him in the chest with a heavy kick from its canine hind leg, sending him reeling and unable to breath.

He heard several loud cracks, like thunder, go off behind him towards the woods. Fire and debris flew in towards him, landing around him.

His wife screamed as it grabbed her, she threw Mathild behind her, away from the creature. It grabbed the woman’s head with both hands and lifted her into the air. It stared at her for a moment before it threw her down, face first, into the ground. There was a sickening crack as she screamed. Blood poured from her scalp and her collarbone stuck out of her chest at a sharp angle as she rolled over, locking eyes with Ostlin.

The creature stared at her for a moment before walking towards the girl, who could only cry for her mother.

Ostlin was exhausted and had the air knocked from him, but he wasn’t dead. He pulled himself to his feet and ran towards the creature as fast as he could manage. He hacked with his machete, aiming for its neck. But the beast saw him coming and raised its meaty shoulder, letting the machete slice the flesh there. It growled and clubbed him into the dirt with a heavy paw, not even bothering to use the sword strapped to its hip. Ostlin blacked out for a full second before he tried to come to his feet again. He looked up and the animal was holding his daughter by her hair. She screamed, but it didn’t care, just stared at her as one might look at a fish on the end of a line. It pulled her hair tilting her head back, before ripping into her throat with its jagged teeth. She gurgled and grew still, the only movement coming from the creature as she hung like a doll. His only daughter was gone. Ostlin reached for the creature, but it shrugged his hand off and stepped away, not letting him interrupt its meal. He looked to his wife and saw she had already died, alone in the sand as he fought the creature. His blood boiled, he had nothing left. He swung the machete with everything he had, hacking a large chuck of meat from the creature's arm.

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It let out a yelp and threw the girl to the ground in the pool of blood at its feet. The beast kicked him again, onto his back. It stepped a clawed foot on his hand and pulled its own curved blade from the sling on its hip

“Wait!” a voice called out, “Stay your hand, he has strength.”

The beast looked angry, but begrudgingly it slung the sword back on its belt. It reached down and lifted him with its immense arms, as easily as it had lifted his daughter. He struggled and thrashed but it was too strong. He looked around and saw several other creatures of the same species walking around, slaughtering many of his neighbors and friends. But not only them. Humans were mixed in, dressed like fighters. Arms and armor against peasants and farmers. They were chaining people together, only the adult males.

“Take him to the cages.” the voice spoke again.

Ostlin looked over and saw a man with dark brown hair, in a long grey and brown coat with armor embedded in it. With a bandanna over his face. Next to him was another man wearing a heavier set of bronze armor carrying a halberd just taller than himself. The creature threw Ostlin down and two other humans grabbed his arms. He had no fight left in him, and he was losing blood too quickly and all he could do was stare at the remains of his family and everything his life had been before today. He relaxed in their grip, as he started to lose consciousness. They dragged him away as his eyes closed.

The beast that killed Ostiln’s family howled into the night and took off through the village, finding all manner of prey. Killing all it could, and feeding when it had the time. Its brothers and sisters bolted around it hacking and biting anything that wasn’t with them. Man and animal alike. It looked up and saw the men their tribe was working with. They never worked with men before and he hated them, but his shaman had told them that this time they would. As bad as they smelled, men had power and together they couldn’t be stopped.

He saw the men riding their infernal creatures, who smelled even worse. But they were useful for hunting. In a village like this many smells could cover many hiding places. The beasts these men rode could not be hidden from.

Two men riding gorvoleth strode past the beast as it looked for any stragglers from the village.

“Let’s check that barn, we can’t burn it with the food inside.” one rider said.

They rode their six legged mounts over to the large bay doors. One gigged his creature and it used the two serrated hand-like appendages at the front of its body, as large as a man’s chest, to wrench one of the doors off its hinges. A man ran out with a pitchfork and stabbed at the creature. It used its claws to hit his tool away as its long tail curved all the way over its back and its rider, striking the farmer in the chest with the massive barb at the tip. It lifted him into the air and threw him aside like he was nothing.

“Oh, we could’ve used that one.” said one of the men, laughing as the corpse slapped the ground lifelessly.

They rode their creatures slowly into the dark barn. They pulled out and lit torches, held high to illuminate the large room. It was filled with bundles and crates of wheat and baskets and bags of rice and onions. Tools and cut wood took up one corner, and there was a loft filled with hay for the many livestock the village had. The men looked around, keeping an eye out for any survivors hoping to be overlooked.

One of the men gigged his creature and gave it a command “Gas.”

Vent-like slats of cartilage along the creature’s side opened and a thick clear fume blasted out in a cloud. The men began to see their own breath coming out black. They slowed their breathing so as not to block their own vision. The gas wafted up against a box near the entrance, and immediately the edges started trickling out a slow cascade of black. Every second the creature’s cloud was around it the black fumes became slightly more noticeable.

“There.” one whispered to the other, nodding to the box.

One man dismounted and walked over quietly. As he got within a step the lid flew open and a young girl swung an axe at his head. The bandit’s hand flew up and barely stopped it from going into his skull, catching it by the haft.

The girl breathed heavily, covered in sweat. Her breath came out in short gasps, black air billowed out of the box she was in and fell from her mouth down the front of her simple dress.

He let out a whistle, surprised by how close the blade had gotten.“She’s no good as a slave, too much moxie, but she’s good for other things.” he called to his friend as he winked at the girl.

His friend dismounted his creature and walked towards them undoing his belt.

Her screams rang out from the barn, only to mix with every other soul in the village. The entire town was ablaze, the beasts and men alike took what they wanted and killed anyone they could.

From a rooftop, the man in grey stood and watched, rubbing the amulet around his neck. “One step closer. Always one step closer.” he said to himself as he pulled the bandana down. He inhaled deeply, taking in the smell of fire and blood. A smile spread across his face as he watched his friend below, swinging his halberd and battering one of the last town guards to the ground. He hacked and laughed as the man begged for mercy. “One step closer.”