novel047. Imperial Prince is Hunting Beasts -3 (Part One)
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It was truly an incongruous spectacle to behold.
Redmoon even forgot all about its fear and terror. The lycanthrope simply stood there and dazedly stared at its front before asking itself a question.
What on earth could 'that' be?
The group of humans wearing red robes suddenly knelt down and lowered their heads. They even covered up their ears with their hands too.
At first, Redmoon thought they were doing that out of fear.
But that wasn't it.
What the boy did next kickstarted an extraordinary event.
It was unknown just where he got such a strange-looking skull, but the moment he put that thing on his head, the dried-up ground was suddenly filled with a shallow puddle.
That signalled the start of the incongruous event. Because, even more bizarre things began unfolding afterwards.
A hand made out of bones suddenly popped out from the water's surface.
Forget about rising out of the holy water puddle, the skeletons practically began shooting out from the water now.
At first, there were only five of them. But soon after, the number ballooned past ten. And then, twenty, thirty, forty, until eventually, there were so many that it was impossible to count them all.
Redmoon faltered and stumbled back, its expression showing how it so badly wanted to deny the reality in front of it.
The dry ground suddenly turning into a holy water lake already seemed like an illusion in and of itself, yet undead skeletons were basically flooding out from there? No matter how dim-witted and foolish the lycan was, it still knew how to differentiate between what was possible in this world and those that simply could not happen.
And now, a pure nightmare that couldn't be found in reality was taking place right before the lycan's disbelieving eyes.
-Kkiiiiaaaahk!
They weren't some emaciated, shabby skeletons either. Each and every single one of them emitted a powerful presence.
They plunged their hands into the holy water's surface and began extracting weapons one by one.
It was like a scene straight out of a child's bedtime story, or some legendary myths where heroes pulled out weapons from rocks. This whole scene was oh-so holy to behold.
The evil holy spirits, now wielding various murderous weapons, shot cold glares as they stared at the zombified animals.
And then...
The zombified animals pouncing towards them got 'slaughtered' mercilessly.
They got pierced by the spears and dangled in the air. They got sliced by the swords and ended up into chunky pieces. They were crushed by the maces. They were constricted by the steel chains before exploding into bloody bits.
The holy undeads were cackling away.
However, this scene didn't carry on for long; the chorus of evil cackles abruptly came to a halt.
Their gazes all suddenly shifted and locked on Redmoon at the same time.
-... !!!
An icy chill ran down the lycan's back.
From atop the brightly-glowing 'lake', several hundreds of eyes gleamed bright blue, glaring only at Redmoon.
They began cackling away as if a really delectable prey had been discovered. Divinity-infused breaths leaked out from their bony jaws.
They then began walking closer to Redmoon's position.
Despite being made of only frail-looking bones, each of their steps felt imposing and heavy.
Only then did Redmoon regain its wits. It urgently shouted out towards the other lycans near its vicinity.
-Get rid of those skeletons! Buy me time so that I can esc... ?!
A portion of the sprawling skeletons suddenly crumbled, but then, their bones gathered into a pile and created a new type of skeleton.
A much larger, much stronger giant had been created out of their bones.
Although the lycans were at least two metres tall, they had to look up while stumbling backwards.
The huge Bone Golem was well over three metres tall, and it now looked down at the undeads while hoisting a greatsword over its shoulder.
It reached out with its massive hand, grabbed the head of a lycan, then easily crushed it. After doing so, it swung the greatsword with its other hand and hacked down on its other victims.
Ashes danced in the air.
The lycans couldn't even mount any notable resistance as they were crushed and stomped to death.
All these weapons and undeads were infused with awe-inspiring levels of divinity. But how was that even possible?
Redmoon glared at the human boy.
-Y-you! You bastard! Just what have you done?!
"Wonderful."
The boy standing in the middle of the lake which kept spewing out undeads uttered out a single word in a satisfied tone of voice.
He seemed to be carefully observing the undead around him.
Even at a casual glance, one could tell that he was experimenting with something. He glanced at Redmoon and spoke up."You guys were really wonderful test subjects. But your role ends here now. So, beast, why don't we wrap all this sh*t up and go home?"
The boy grabbed his musket rifle and began offering a prayer once more.
His eyes seemed to glow eerily from within the eye holes of the huge skull on his head. f𝔯𝒆𝚎𝚠𝑒𝚋𝒏oνℯl - 🅽🅽novel
Divinity began rapidly gathering within the stubby muzzle of the rifle.
Redmoon, on the other hand, fell into a pit of deep confusion.
What should it do? What should it do to survive this event? Use its head, or perhaps let instinct take over?
What should it do... ?
The inside of the lycan's head turned blank. The only thoughts popping up in its mind was 'death'.
There was no chance of victory. It could only escape in order to survive.
Redmoon sneakily stepped backwards.
However, every time it moved, the eerie light of the skeletons' eyes around it grew fiercer. Every time it took a step away, they also moved in sync.
They were just like hellhounds staring at a delicious prey, almost as if they would pounce on you if you dared turn your back on them.
Because of this, Redmoon faltered and stopped moving. The lycan then shifted its gaze back to the boy.
"Through your grace, grant me the steel mace to crush and tear apart the undead..."
That human boy... he was the real issue in this situation. Even if Redmoon decided to turn tail and run, it still wouldn't be able to evade the magic this human was capable of shooting.
Cold sweat trickled down the lycan's body. It also began trembling from agitation. Its reasoning was threatening to abandon the creature; it began entrusting itself to the primal instincts of a wild beast.
It was then – the boy's brows barely visible underneath the skull furrowed deeply. He stopped praying, and then addressed the lycan.
"Hey, beast."
Redmoon flinched in surprise and stared at the boy.
"Didn't you say something about knowing honour and whatnot earlier? From what I heard, you keep mumbling some stuff about being warriors and all that."
His eyes underneath the skull were arching like a pair of crescent moons.
"But hey, I hope someone like you isn't planning to turn tail and run from here. I mean, the way you run your mouth off about being warriors and honour and stuff like that, I figured that you'd be a fan of fighting till the end. Was I wrong? Or maybe..."
He continued talking in a sarcastic tone of voice.
"... You were planning to escape from here like some terrified little mutt? Ah, but you've already run away once, so I guess you don't have any honour or pride to begin with..."
Redmoon's eyes widened.
This was clearly a provocation. The lycan knew that, yet the boy's words still managed to snap the very last fabric of reasoning inside Redmoon's head.
-You're right, human. I shall not run anymore.
Even if it ran now, it'd eventually be hunted down anyways.
Since that was the case, Redmoon needed to at least land one solid blow at the human bastard who dared look down on the lycanthrope's pride.
The lycan swore that it'd crush that sarcastic human boy. That was the only way it could wash away all the pathetic, sorry sights it had displayed up until now.
Redmoon began gathering demonic energy from the surroundings. The concentration of all that energy began amassing in its remaining arm.
The sound of bones shattering accompanied its arm ballooning up greatly. The ground beneath caved in from the lycan's legs bracing the weight.
-Even if I die, I shall drag you along with me.
"You made a wise decision. Yup, you should behave yourself and stop making me feel annoyed."
The boy resumed letting out a breath of divinity into the musket rifle.
-Ku-oooooh!
Redmoon kicked the ground. The soil underneath its feet exploded and the lycan's body was flung forward with terrifying momentum.
It strengthened its whole body with the gathered demonic energy and focused every last bit of its strength into this one final strike.
However, the groups of holy undead stood in its way. There were more of them surrounding the lycan from the left, right, and even behind it.
These skeletons must've shared emotions with their master, because the glow coming from their eyes also arched up like crescent moons as well.
Spear blades pierced deep into Redmoon's body. The steel chains arrested and confined the lycan's torso. A huge, bony hand blocked the beast's path, then a greatsword descended, cleaving apart Redmoon's body.
Its torso got hacked to bits and turned into a figurative rag. But even then, Redmoon's eyes remained fixated on the boy.
Real 'death' was approaching. Its false life was about to be extinguished. But to land that one strike on the boy, the lycan struggled desperately with all of its existence.
This was the only way to regain its pride that had been trampled on.
Even its soul was being torn apart into pieces. Terror and fear washed over Redmoon.
Meanwhile, the boy was finally finished with his prayer. He raised the musket to take aim.
Redmoon stared at the swirling, spinning divinity inside the weapon's barrel before shifting its gaze back to the boy.
He opened his mouth to speak."This is the final test for my musket rifle."
'... Ah, I'm too late. '
In the end, Redmoon failed to even inflict a single injury on this human boy.
Just one more step. It only needed to take just one more step, and swing with its arm – that would've been sufficient, but the lycan no longer possessed enough strength.
By then, the holy undead were dragging Redmoon away from the boy. Not only that, as they were dragging it away, these damned things continued hacking away at the lycan's body.
Eventually...
"Have a nice trip, beast."
The boy pulled the trigger.
The spinning divinity inside the barrel spread out to the surroundings at the same time.
A blinding ray of light enveloped the dark forest.
The explosive power completely obliterated the skeletons, Redmoon, and even the portion of the forest.
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