The Mak Toras Chronicles

Chapter 15 - Resurgence

The light of all three sister stars faded into the darkness. From shadows to bark, the forest floor was teeming with critters bound to the darkened edge of Ner'aka: a chilling, sinister jungle located on the far side of Yautja Prime-where no hunter has ventured. Not even the brave and the bold were that naïve to believe such terrain can be explored. Much was known from the outer edges as it was. Kept in seclusion, among the verocious, twisted creatures roamed freely; the Vy'drach circling like vultures in the nearby deserts to the jungle canopy from time to time, bathing in radiation and enjoying what little the suns had to offer to the surface dwellers, leaving the remaining beasts down below to sulk despairingly. Only the strongest survive in these harsh lands; runner-ups would not suffice. Either kill and survive or become food for the ecosystem, for nothing shall go to waste in Ner'aka.
Even with pesky critters like the Vy'drach, there lingered a darker presence-one which ruled the forest with an iron fist. A semblance that hunters of the Legion feared, like an evil twin forming a new society to slay the predecessors. The jungles of Ner'aka were a sinister place-fitting for the super predators for simply that purpose. Their spiteful hatred towards the legion plagued the forest, twisting it all into the monstrous realm it was. Not only do they hypothesize their dominance over all, but burn with a desire to wipe out their competition-to make the classic days come to end; the stronger, enduring species would outlast the other. Whatever was available, the super predators would hunt no matter the size of a beast or even their own. A ruthlessly efficient motive to entice in all bad bloods, ones willing give up the ways of honor for simple goal to survive and become stronger, even if it meant slaughtering innocent, helpless animals that were once a threat. No mercy was the way of life on Yautja Prime, after all. Instead, it was now exercized in a radical form that bred into the Blood Hunter Clan. Those with a heart of stone pertained to the dark powers for support. For ages, they relied on said powers for a fighting chance against the Yautja Legion and so far it has worked in all aspects. Baring on the fringes of the planet, the Legion dwindles by the minute under the Blood Hunter's lust for power. Notable, yet gruesome warriors outmatched even the Legion's strongest fighters. With a primal touch to their ways of life, they were almost unbeatable. As their influence spread across the planet, so did the waking of hell. All that stood in the clan's way was destroyed, tattered, and mutilated by the acts of barbaric, cold-blooded killers.
Ner'aka, on the other hand, was its own functioning evil, picking off bad bloods unable to keep up to their word and consuming them alive. Beasts of immense sizes and power kept their ranks in check as a way to even the odds. Such natural selection bred the Clan's toughest fighters. Eventually, said beasts wither away and die, only to be replaced by a higher organism with a will to engulf the Prime. It was its own necessary evil.
Shadows lined the floor in the faint light of the sister stars, concealing all below the canopy's thrall. The sound footsteps penetrated the deafening silence as the leaves and twigs crunched under the hunter's weight. A bad blood had returned from his hunt, dragging along a Blood-pig to the nearby camp. The fliuds looming from the cadaver stained the path with pestilence and a horrid stench to drive even the herds of horses away. The kindling fires warmed the camp and cooked the carcasses in drows as another was added to the pile every so often. Supply never ran short, for every blood hunter was busy either in harvesting or out in the field of battle. The camp itself was among many that circled the great fortress of the Blood Hunter Clan; primitive, tribal, and connected to the wildlife, paired with technological advances of Prime. Like a network of chasms, the society of the Blood Hunter Clan answered to one single mind as the driving force of the war.
    A patrol nearby approached the blood hunter during his hanging of the carcass, stripping its flesh away to the muscle and bone. It was a welcome sight for all hunters for fresh kill to be torn into its assortments; much less of an eyesore than it was an appeal. Albeit the mesmerizing view of skinning an animal, the patrol quickly intervened the hunter's temperamental task. Each member was outfitted alike with the hides of their fallen victims; skulls, bones, armor plates, anything that was salvagable. The masks themselves beared the familiar face of a hound imprinted on the masks, a crown displaying their lethality as a group.
    "Well well, look what the pantry dragged in, Do'lak jta hish-qar," the group leader said with praise, "keep that up and you may turn into a natural born killer, Zer'ar." A snort of cackles escaped the group as mockery. The hunter merely chuckled as he rose from his kill, confronting the patrol leader.
    "More than you bone-heads ever will achieve, Lars," Zer'ar retorted. It was like of his kind to lash out such remarks, despite it fruitlessly not stirring a riot. Rather it was meant to pinch their nerves, for bad bloods were ill-tempered which, in turn, make them all the more vicious. Shrugging off their greetings, the leader silenced the groups bickerings behind his back.
    "All kidding aside, I am to inform you the high lord demands your presence at once-don't keep him waiting," he said, glaring to Zer'ar. Any request from the high lord was immediately undertaken by all subjects-even in remote instances, the high lord came first.
    "What exactly for? I already finished polishing his throne, metaphorically."
    "That remains classified, young blood."
Of course it is...anything important is 'classified'.
    "Very well then. Back to initiations then." Biting back his title, he held his upright demeanor. It was painful already being deemed young-blood in a rank he well surpassed antecedently. Yet no questions were to be spoken under the high lord's demand. Most, if not all, voices raised against the high lord were easily snuffed out or worse, unlike the Legion, where voices of fools answered by their king were gladly anticipated, much less heard with some form of approval. It disgusted Zer'ar with image of speaking freely; a plague that places doubt into the minds of the unweary-what he deemed 'weakness' of the Legion, as did the Blood Hunter Clan-a disgusting, vile form the Legion took shape in. Even the king himself was ridiculed by the clan; lord Talar was already outspoken himself. The main driver of a rebellion long ago that bore his name in scorched earth ran his mouth like no other Yautja, winning the hearts and minds of the citizens. Blood for blood, he was next in line in the Blood Hunter's pool of Offering. Though seen as a hero of the Legion, the Clan sought him nothing more than corrupt for he turned away the true, ruthless nature of all Yautja alike. An empire built on the ashes of hearts broken. Honor-more so, cowardice-to the Blood Hunters was despised indefinitely. In a world where nature could care less about feelings, the Blood Hunters utilized to the fullest; what Zer'ar and all Blood Hunters called the law of life, was the basis of their Clan, integrated into the minds of every Blood Hunter: either fight and survive; kill all who pose a threat in the path of salvation or die like an animal they always were.
The Legion shall fall someday. Long live the Blood Hunters.