Shadowless

Prolog

It was a dark night, darker than any other that he could remember. The stars were gone and the air was so cold that he could see the shape of his breath dancing in the air. It was erratic, dispersed and constant. He was getting tired. Hunter was running through uncountable trees with only a silver light, faded, from a full moon to show him the path. The shadows behind him appeared from nowhere and started to persecuted him for no reason. He thought he would die without achieving anything too important to be remembered, he will just disappear, no clues behind, no one to care to look for them had anything being left, he will just vanish from the face of the Earth and no one would care. A really sad dead.

He refused to let that happen.

He was fast, faster than many wild beasts, but they were fast too. They were big and really hard to perceive in the dark forest. Alternating patterns trying to deceive them, attempts of hiding himself within the darkness, all that in a desperate attempt to survive. But nothing seemed to be working. They could see him clearly, maybe hear him or even catch his scent, which would turn everything in a situation even worse, cause, if they were animals, a bunch of beasts with no brains to reason, he will not have a chance to get out of this hellish night alive.

The gold shining spheres were the only thing clear enough to be described about those shadows. Two big gold eyes, with diamond shape pupils and clearly thirsty for blood. There were terrifying and Hunter didn't have enough courage to look at them again. The first time he did, he felt like he's soul was being drain from his body, he felt weak, afraid and completely lost, like he just couldn't recognize himself for a second. Just that second was enough to know that, whatever those things were, "good" wasn't an adjective he could adjudicate to them.

He turned left, the path of trees was fading, every time less and less places he could use to hide, once the forest ended, his life will end too. He ran to the right and jumped over many rocks that were popping out of a small river till he got to the other side. The forest was gone behind him, now he was in an open field, Hunter could not specify were exactly he was, nor were to head on to return to his house, but none of that matters, he was alive and safe, at least physically.

He looked every way possible within his optical range, no shadows, no golden eyes. He left the heavy air leave his longs and got ready to go.

The night had turn quite, no sound but the water running down the now far behind river.

Then he heard it, the crack of a branch. The air turned cooler, heavier and extremely hard to inhale. He swallowed, it hurt, he hadn't noticed that his throat was completely dry. He turned around and, taking all the courage that had left, unleashed the iron sword and took a fighting posture. Nothing, there was nothing in his surroundings. He sharped his ear and try to clear his mind, but again, the gold eyes were there taking everything from him. He then opened his eyes and saw nothing, only the flat extension of land in front of him, the horizon seemed unreachable, so far far away that was pretty sad. He put the sword back in its sheath and walked towards the river, once he was close enough he sat down and took some water to relief that pain in his throat. He swallowed fast and  not too careful, letting small drops of water falling on the floor. It felt really good. Once he finished, he felt how his energy was back, his legs were not burning any more and the buzzing sound in his head stopped, he came to realize that he was so focused in escaping that didn't even know that his body felt that way.

"The effects of the adrenaline." He thought.

Hunter took several minutes to regain his full strength, the mussels now relaxed and his mind more clear gave him some impulse to keep walking. He stood up and walk in the other way, towards that unrecognizable horizon, and then the crack sounded again, this time, closer.

His reaction was too slow. By the time he saw what was coming his left arm, his good arm, was ripped apart. The blood started to drain out of his body quickly, within seconds he already felt dizzy and wanting to return everything he eat in the pasts days, he took a breath and regain his control, he won't lose to his body. He stepped forward and his foot got wet, a red sapphire liquid was leaving a trail behind Hunter while he was trying to fight back and push himself towards his invisible enemy.

Sweat was coming down his forehead and, despite the cool air touching his face he felt all his body on fire. One arm, exhausted, and dripping blood all over the place, if he didn't stop the blood he would bleed to death. But it wasn't that easy. The shadows were there, hiding somewhere close to him but he could not hear them nor see them.

Where did they attacked from?

Hunter's dark eyes were dilated and his night vision was good enough to catch a mouse leaving its tiny burrow, but this shadows were nowhere to be seen.

Shadows?

He saw behind him, right at the floor, it was a huge shadow with the shape of a beast, not human, not even close to something humanoid, it was only darkness taking any shape that it wanted to. So nothing was clear, at least not until the gold eyes appeared and then, he lost all control over him.

The shadows eat him.