Sebastian sighed and took off his jet pack. It had fried circuits and a blown gas canister, the chances of it being able to ever be functional again was slim to none. Then he heard Mason mention the encampment. Maybe they had spare parts. He slipped it back on and walked over to Iris who had called his name. He smiled and tried to pick her up. Then he felt a lance of pain in his right shoulder, and wincing he gave up. "Nice job out there Iris." He smiled and kissed her on the nose. "I can't carry you this time princess." He chuckled and looked with alarm at the wounds on her back and shoulder, "Is there anything I can do to help?"

He looked up to Dante's inquiry, "Yea she talked to me. Sorta freaked me out, but I'm glad she's back. Do you think we can bring her back? But she doesn't have a body anymore... Just ashes... do you think she wants us to take her ashes?"

She smiled at him and said, "Yeah you can, is why I called you... In my current state I can only spawn 2 arrows but... I can make a third one for you, me and Nikolai, you'd have to give it to him tho, I don't think I'll be able to move with no energy on my body so... please..." she then spawned 2 green arrows with great effort, her skin went a bit pale and cold sweat ran through her face,then she gave them to Sebastian. Iris then squeezed Sebastian's arm as another green arrow slowly spawned on the crossbow "...give thi--- this one to.. Nikolai..." she closed her eyes and the arrow finally appeared a deep sigh could be heard and Iris finally fainted on Sebastian from the fatigue.

Nikolai comforted her, sliding his hands up and down her back as she layed her head on his shoulder for a moment, before looking up toward him again with a smile, saying at least everybody didn't die. He smiled back at her, wiping the welled up tear from her eye. "I saw her too," Nikolai replied, a pang of sadness coursing through him.

The battle had lasted well longer than it should have as the sun was getting dangerously close to setting.
"We don't want to be here come nightfall." Michael said allowed. The laser was completely out of juice so he decided to leave it.
"We need to get to that town." He agreed. He immediately lifted himself up and began progressing towards the ruins of the safe haven.

Three people to heal, and three arrows, he liked that math. He stabbed one into his shoulder, and as it did its work, he gently pressed the other one on her back and watched it dissolve and spread over her wounds. He picked her up and gently began walking over to Dante and Nikolai, placing Iris next to Dante he walked over to Nikolai and scratched his head, "Man you look worse than I would've expected. Seems like you were a dog's personal chew toy." He pressed the last arrow on Nikolai's chest and watched it dissolve into green dust and then attack each wound, sealing it in a fit of bubbling flesh and sewing skin. He looked around for a container, indicating to Dante, "Hey can you help me find something to perhaps to store Anna's ashes in? I feel like leaving her with Sirius isn't fitting."

Finished he gently dusted his fingers off into the pouch as to not a miss as much as he could, there would still be some on the ground but nothing he could do about it sadly. He gave the pouch to Dante and smiled, "Mason will be Mason." He chuckled and went over to pick up Iris, he began to follow Michael to the town.

Mason looked over to where Dante was standing. She and Sebastian had laughed at what he had done. He wished he could tell them what he had saw, what terrors Sirius dreamed about. But there were no words to describe the horrors, even hell wasn't worth it. "The fucker didn't deserve to have his grave go un-desecrated." Mason was finally regaining his focus on things, which was nice. He held his head as he walked to the town as well, not after shoving his foot into sirius' side for good measure.

The group staggered towards the town, which was a fair distance away. Once they reached it however, they were not so sure that this was the best place to come. Chaos and destruction were everywhere. Dead bodies lay strewn across the street a long with the bodies of the worm creatures that the Destroyer summoned. Hope was beginning to run out that they'd find any survivors when a shout rang through the air.

"HEY, WE'RE OVER HERE!"

The shout came from a middle-aged woman standing in the entrance to a bar. The group made their way over towards the structure as a crowd of people ran out. The survivors of the town cheered and praised the group, treating them like champions.

"We saw what you did to that giant monster. We'd never seen anything like it!" exclaimed the woman.
a rather elderly man stepped up next to speak to them. "I think talk for everyone here when I say that you're welcome to rest in our town, or at least what's left of it."

The group all moved into the bar, where they were fed warm food and given clean drink. They were then all told that the upstairs of the bar was an inn, and it didn't take long for them to travel up to rest in the soft beds, everyone that is except Michael, who decided to stay with the townsfolk and celebrate. Even through the merry making downstairs, sleep claimed every member of the group.




Iris was the first to wake. She yawned loudly before getting out of bed and changing out of a night gown the townsfolk had given her. She strapped on her regular attire before hoisting her crossbow onto her back. It had been a long time since she felt this rejuvenated. She decided to let the others sleep and made her way downstairs. The sight she was met with made her scream. Iris could hear the other members of her party waking up and quickly coming to her aid, but none of them were any more prepared for the sight that greeted them than Iris was. The townsfolk hung with their heads towards the floor, their bodies strung up to the ceiling by some kind of thick rope-like substance. Blood covered the floor, every villager had deep cuts all over their body. They had clearly been tortured. Following the carnage everyone's eyes eventually fell up Michael. He was crucified against a wall, his healing powers not enough to save him from whatever evil had attacked last night. Deep cuts covered his entire body, Dante and Nikolai's experience in the subject let them notice that the cuts were placed in the places where it would be most painful for the soldier. Whatever had attacked had a good time torturing the man.

"What... what could of done this..?" Iris breathed.

"Hello dearies." came a sultry voice from the entrance to the bar.


The group all turned, prepared for a new fight. There stood a woman, obviously corrupted by Fraysa. She had two behemoths on each side of her that nuzzled up against her as if they were nothing more than puppies.

"I saw that you killed Sirius. That was rather interesting. Tell me, is Baren still alive?"

at the mention of his name the group all remembered the large man dying, his blue moon body crushed by Sholdra.

"Ah... your expression speaks for you. Very well. I come on behalf of my dear husband, Mrath. We expect you will be heading towards Behemoth territory next and he would like to warn you to stay away. Nothing but death awaits you if you challenge him. However I've seen your strength, and I think it would be rather... interesting... if you were to fight him." With that the woman had said all she had needed to say and turned to leave.

"Wait!" Iris called out. "Who are you?"

The woman stopped in her tracks and turned slowly. "My name is Liu Shin." She turned back away and waved her hand nonchalantly. "Kill them." she whispered as she turned into green dust.

The two large guard-dog like beasts turned their eyeless gaze upon the group, saliva dripping from their mouths. They roared together before charging.

not playin but niqqas shit just got uber realist

They couldn't just have a whole twenty four hours to relax.

Sure, they had a good night after such a perilous battle. People cheered for the group of glorified heroes as they walked into the town, and were greeted with great hospitality. It was the first time that the mercenary had actually been cheered for. Been actually considered a hero. He was always a killer. A machine with guns. Never a Good guy.

Even with the hospitality, he didn't like all of the people around him. If one of them were to get on his bad side, he would no longer be considered a hero. He was still reeling over Anna's death, even if he had gotten some sort of closure by blowing Sirius Nightshade's brains out. He wanted to just be by himself. It only took a few minutes for him to abandon the party and sneak upstairs. He sat in his room, on the sheets, thinking. He began to think about Sirius. He had nothing to truly live for. He had no companions. He had lost his mind completely, and simply wanted to kill everything. Really considering it, he was just like Nikolai.

So, what was stopping Nikolai from being like him?

He didn't have to say it to himself. He already knew as the door to his room opened. Dante. She walked in and didn't say much of anything, nor did he. She sat down, laying her suit and everything else in various places. Nothing was said that whole night. They simply sat in silence for hours. But, Nothing needed to be said. The sorrow, the emotions, the affection, they were all there in the body language. Nikolai wasn't much of a talker, and neither was Dante. Every movement, every glance, every frown and smile, told the entire story between the two of them. And it was a good story.

She gave him one last smile before laying down and going to sleep. Nikolai soon followed. It was in that moment that he knew that Sirius and himself were different in only one way. Nikolai had Dante, and Sirius did not.

***

He awoke with a sudden start. He looked around at the clock, realizing just how early it was. He had been sleep-deprived for days now, but he was fully awake. His senses were sharper than ever before. He heard the voices. The screams. Immediately, he threw his trench coat on his body and thrust his revolvers from their holsters. He ran down the stairs, however at the bottom step he drew in a startled breath. What he saw, was pure carnage.

The people that praised the group, that made them feel welcome, that partied over their freedom. They were now hanging from the ceiling, their faces blue and their souls long gone. In the middle of the carnage was Michael. He was completely crucified, and it looked like he was tortured for a long time. There they were, upstairs the whole time, and they had slept through this absolute massacre. Michael had saved Nikolai from that horrible place, where Sholdra made him her play thing. He made it so he could see everyone again. He had saved his life. And he was not able to do the same.

He glanced over to the woman who had committed all of this destruction. She looked to be an almost-human woman, except that she was infected with Fraysan blood. Two behemoths nuzzled up to her like gargantuan guard dogs that loved her dearly. She explained who she was, and that she was...Mrath's wife. A fucking behemoth lord and a human woman. How did they....

He didn't feel like thinking about it.

He watched as the wife, named Liu, walked away, leaving the behemoths to do her dirty work. Well, after dealing with one bitch in Hura, they were now dealing with another. Great.

His eyes focused in on both behemoths, and yet he could still hear Dante. He then came to the realization that her suit was still in the room. She had almost no form of defense. Not thinking another moment about it, Nikolai slid his trench coat off of his body and threw the 100 pound article of clothing to her.

"Use that. It's not anything like Fraysan technology, but it should be enough to deal with some glorified guard dogs."

A smug smirk crossed his lips. "Come on, boys. Let's play."

"Five more minutes." Mason groaned as he heard Iris scream from the ground floor. He soon came to the realization that it was a scream and not a person asking him to get up. He rolled out of his bed and quickly threw his pants and shirt on, not getting a chance to button up his shirt. He came down and saw what had happened over the night. Mason hadn't felt much remorse because he stayed mostly away from the festivities, he would've loved to, but his head hurt too much. He watch the self-proclaimed Liu leave as her bezerker dogs attacked. He lashed out his claws and winded up to whip at the beasts.

Apparently now they can't rest for a full night without getting attacked by a sort of monster. Iris even felt bad for sleeping that night, maybe something could've been done to prevent that tragedy.

As soon as the monster responsible for the slaughter turned her back on them ready to leave, she ordered her guard-dogs beasts to kill them, they just defeated a 12 stories machine amd a really powerful enemy, so Iris didn't get even a bit nervous or surprised for the sudden attack. She immediately lifted her crossbow and aimed and shot at the heads of the 2 monsters with bluemoon arrows to hopefully finish them off in 1 shot.