The wind howled fiercely, as if it was alive. A dark abyss had befallen over the entire town in the garb of night. One couldn’t venture far from the crumbling wooden huts that formed the entirety of that settlement, stretching over a small area. Far away from the meandering roads that connected to that poverty stricken place, a figure passed under the flickering radiance of a lamppost. There were plenty of them on the way to the town…only half of them lit. His skin glistened under the lamp post, the sharp onyx eyes stern with the duty that had brought him here. The moment he drifted nearer to the town, silent as the prey he had come to hunt, his chest ached for a moment. What if everything had been already lost? The silence surely gave it away. The next moment, he shook his head. Uncontrolled sentiment was not a luxury that could be afforded in this line of work. His focus now turned on the surroundings.

He took in the moist damp air, smelling all sorts of timber, resins and pines from the woods nearby. His leather trench coat hung till his knees, concealing much of the spiked cudgel and the long sword underneath. A streak of lightning flashed, revealing what the lampposts couldn’t manage. He took notes…his focused eyes inspecting everything.

A silent town…at a distance far away. Menacing woods on both sides of the small civilization that extended to a short stretch. And a small muddy road that once was a trading hub. He pitied the fate of those who dwelled there in the town…or a village, whatever it was. Taking a sharp breath, he felt his loose raven hair falling to his rigid shoulders that relaxed forcefully, releasing all that he had been carrying from the fight with the barbed hounds. Vicious bastards! His trench coat would have been torn to shreds had he not been active in his fight. He was down to his last silver bullet now.

Breathing once more, throwing the last bit of tension away from his frozen muscles, he let the blood course properly. Stomping his long boots on a water puddle nearby, he finally headed towards the town.

What greeted him was pin drop silence, save for the wild howls from the woods or the roars of the wind. Yet no human sound…not even a whisper travelled to him even when he crossed the threshold of the town. The line of shacks and huts was lit…with doors closed and not a single soul in sight.

His hands moved to the velvety red hilt of his sword, as he took it out. The serrated steel glinted in his hands, as he swung it. The weight of the sword would have been heavy for the common hands. For him, it was gracefully balanced, its curved form perfected for slicing. Windsong, he used to call it. Peculiarly because the blade sung through the air gracefully, leaving behind clean cuts in its wake.

Even now it cut through the air swiftly, feeling like the extended arm. The cross guard felt lighter and lighter with each swing. He swung it multiple times to test the blade. His muscles still remembered how it was done…the pirouette… deflect…the beheading…

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The weapon responded to its master’s touch, coursing with mystical energy. Sharing its wielder’s senses, it too detected the anomaly. He swung it one once more, just to make sure it was battle ready.

The deathly silence soon became too suspicious, as he passed by what seemed to be a tavern…a place where the hustle was never supposed to have stopped. Light peered through the broken windows and the cracks on the locked entrance.

The moment he breathed deeply, his temples responded with a throbbing. A foul sign! He threw his head to the left, eyeing the tavern’s locked door while tying his hair behind his head to keep them from interfering. The door responded to his kick, opening with a blast. What greeted him was a disturbing stench of the carrion, along with the sight of bloodied chairs and the creviced walls. The bartender was still there, frozen in one place while his lifeless eyes stared at whoever entered the door.

“Poor bastards!” he responded, pitying the sobs who were here before. He started narrowing down his analysis, trying to find one firm reason why this entire town fell victim to such a tragedy. Bandits? No! Wild animals…? Not at all! No wild animal had the strength to rip apart twelve people simultaneously, and throw away their remains on the walls around.

“Not thrown!”

He concluded, seeing a sickening pattern in the guts and flesh that decorated the walls. The stench that would have churned his stomach was masked…not drifting outside the tavern’s door. Only one sinister force was capable of such a deadly feat. Magic…

He quickly glanced in the direction of the only preserved corpse of the bartender. Poor man had been caught in the middle of something. The beer was untouched, still warm in that mug that laid right beside his arm…the bare skinned arm with flesh exposed on the wrist.

“Frozen expression…but not iced…he was paralyzed…” he concluded, letting his left hand drift across his body, slowly and steadily.

“Flesh has been torn from the rib cage. He was still alive when that happened…the heart…it failed as a result of pain trauma. Fear still grips his stare…work of a…barbed hound? A gorgon…? Scarecrows…? Need to look around some more!” he concluded, stepping away. The grip on his blade’s hilt tightened. This seemed to be the work of something foul…a beast he couldn’t identify.

Right when he breathed sharply, letting the energy course through his entire body, his senses picked up a faint sound. He would have dismissed it for the wind, had it not turned into a sobbing. Somewhere…in one of those huts, something sobbed uncontrollably in the sound of a human voice…with mechanical repetition...

His weapon gleamed, the runes on it becoming visible momentarily. He knew at once what it meant. Inhaling sharply, he moved stealthily towards the tavern’s door. From his experiences, where a deathly stillness had pervaded, the sound of sobbing could only mean one thing…a predator luring the unwary into a trap.