Demon Hunters

Wartime I

Jonah Schneider grimaced as he saw a man's head get reduced to a fine red mist by an errant cannonball. He sighed and lowered his spyglass, brushing back his long and dirty hair. Though Jonah was acclimated to the sight of gore, he wasn't immune to it, and witnessing such a grisly sight did not help his appetite. Regardless, the man shook his head and leaned over to the small kettle he had set on a campfire next to him. Continuous gunfire could be heard echoing from the distance as Jonah filled his cup with an extraordinarily watery soup.

I wonder if I could get some replenishment from one of the camps? Jonah thought to himself as he forced the tasteless broth down his throat. Then again, I'm not really in the mood of being berated by a foul-tempered quartermaster.

The hill Jonah had set his camp was quite warm, as the sun shone down from a cloudless sky and even the wind had settled down. Were it not for the thunderous volleys ringing out from the nearby battlefield, the scene would have been quite serene.

It feels so odd... Here we have a perfectly lovely summer afternoon, and yet some people feel the need to have a war and spoil the day for everyone. Really, I think the church ought to only allow battles on rainy days.

Having finished his meal, Jonah once again picked up his spyglass and scanned the distant field where two armies were grinding against each other. By the looks of things, the defending army was starting to lose its ground. Jonah observed as a cavalry charge broke through the frontlines and started wreaking havoc amongst the helpless foot soldiers. Even from his distant vantage point, he could hear the screams of the dying men. However, Jonah's thought did not linger on the dying men on the battlefield – rather, his mind was occupied by the light stinging sensation he felt on his tongue.

***

As the sun started to set, a thin mist developed over the ravaged landscape that had just hosted a battle between two armies. As the soldiers had by now moved on, the area was occupied only by the detritus of war, namely, craters and mounds of bodies, and a small group of scavengers. The group was made up of deserters and some locals who were silently rummaging through the bodies of the fallen in the hope that they might find something of value, united in their purpose. In stark contrast to the cacophony that accompanied the battle, the field was now silent apart from the grunts of the looters and the croaks of the carrion birds that were enjoying their grim feast. However, a loud roar suddenly pierced this silence and made everyone on the field freeze in place. A second roar followed the first one, this time from much closer by. Immediately, the looters dropped whatever they could not carry, and quickly started making their escape.

As the last of the pillagers reached the edge of the nearby forest, a terrifying creature stepped onto the battlefield. It sniffed the air and let out yet another roar, scaring off any of the remaining birds that had been brave enough to remain. Satisfied, the creature lumbered forward, drool slopping from its mouth. The monster – a demon – walked upright on two legs like a human, yet it carried the features of a wolf, albeit skewed in a way that made it seem like a twisted perversion of the real thing and, importantly, sporting a pair of curved horns. Slowly, it was making its way toward the centre of the battlefield. It had come to feast on the bodies, and though the area was littered with them, there was something about the pile right at the centre that somehow seemed almost irresistible – a sweet scent that beckoned the monster toward it like a siren betwixt crashing waves.

"MEAAAT..." it grunted, reaching its muscular arm toward the bodies that lay piled before it.

Had the demon possessed greater intelligence, it might have realized that something was off. However, such clarity of thought was quite uncommon for demons – much to the benefit of demon hunters. As soon as its arm touched one of the bodies, a metallic clanging sound, like a spring being released, rang out and a hidden crossbow launched its projectile at the monster. The demon stepped back, howling in surprise and anger. Yet it had not time to stew in its anger, as a lit bomb was suddenly thrown from within the corpse pile.

The explosion was strong enough to knock the hulking demon onto its back, and as soon as its body hit the ground, Jonah sprung out from within the corpse mound. With one fluid movement, he pulled out his pistol and shot at the creature's head, scoring a hit that pierced its eye. Once more, the demon howled in pain, covering its head with its hands as it writhed on the ground. Jonah weaved around the demon's flailing limbs and hopped onto its chest. He plunged his sword into the monster's chest with practiced precision, and soon enough the demon stopped moving.

"There we go," Jonah grunted, getting in a few more stabs just to be on the safe side.

Once he was convinced that the demon was well and truly dead, he hopped off its chest, sheathing his sword. He removed the mask he had been wearing to stave off the effluvium from the dead bodies he had been hiding amongst. Such an act was far from pleasant, but also necessary: when it came to demons, he had to take every advantage he could muster. The prickling in Jonah's tongue was finally starting to wane, meaning that his job was done. This was a lucky break: usually, such bloody battles tended to attract multiple demons.

Ought to get going before any more show up... I'm don't really feel like spending any more time among the dead, he thought.

However, just as he was about to leave, Jonah heard muffled sobbing. Initially, he assumed this to be a hallucination – after all, his ears were still ringing from the gunshot. However, as he kept hearing the sound, it soon became apparent that he wasn't the only survivor on this battlefield. Again, this wasn't all that unusual: sometimes men became so wounded that they could no longer move and were left behind to die a slow, inglorious death. Jonah stopped and considered his options. What would he have to gain by looking for this man? Precisely nothing. Then he heard the low rumble of thunder in the distance. The sky, so clear just hours prior, had now become completely occluded by dark clouds, heralding a rainstorm arriving any minute now. Jonah took another look at the devastated field.

I suppose I could at the very least end their suffering, he thought as he started to move toward the sobbing.

It didn't take Jonah long to locate the source of the noise. He found the man curled up at the bottom of a crater created by artillery fire, clutching his leg. The man's appendage was stained with blood and appeared to have been broken. Though it was somewhat difficult to tell, the man looked to be otherwise healthy – that is to say, a mercy killing was off the table.

Well, this makes matters a tad bit more complicated, Jonah thought to himself, perched at the top of the crater.

The wounded soldier's uniform indicated that he belonged to the defending – and defeated – army. Of course, this didn't really matter to Jonah, as he worked for the church and as such had no stake in this war. As long as the winners would end up paying their taxes to the church, the end result made no difference. Still, him belonging to the losing army was somewhat problematic, as he was now behind the front lines. While Jonah was still pondering his next move, the man whined in pain and reached his hand toward the demon hunter. The man's eyes were dirtied by mud and wet with tears, but his expression – one that begged for help – was still clear to be seen.

"I can already tell that this is going to be a mistake," Jonah grumbled as he slid down the crater's walls.