Ronald's frown deepened as the hairs on the back of his neck rose. A cold awareness prickled along his spine.. old instincts whispering warnings in a language only warriors could understand. His eyes narrowed, scanning the treeline. Silent. Still. Too still.
"I think we have company," he said, voice low and razor-sharp. A crimson glow sparked to life in his palm, coalescing into a blade of pure blood energy. His stance shifted... ready, centered, deadly.
Richard exhaled a long breath, shaking water from his hair like a soaked dog. His glowing yellow eyes flicked toward Ronald, and he broke into a grin. "They couldn't even wait till we dried off.. we just took down a bloody Leviathan," he muttered, his eyes glowing yellow this time. He had assumed a playful personality.
It was as if he and Ronald had swapped personas... or rather, he was never the serious type to begin with.
He rolled his shoulders, a casual bounce in his step. The mirth in his tone wasn't just sarcasm, it was strategic. The cousins had an unspoken rule, forged through centuries of survival and bloodshed: when one turned serious, the other had to turn reckless. Logic met chaos. Caution danced with madness.
"For a battle to be won," their creed went, "we must have the ones that think rationally... and the ones that don't."
But in reality, they were both the playful and reckless type.
Then the air shifted, something moved. A blur.
A shimmer of motion in the trees, silent but swift, like a ghost wrapped in muscle and fur.
Ronald's crimson eyes locked onto the blur. Massive. Lupine. It raced toward them, feet silent on the forest floor, like it had been hunting them for centuries. He didn't move. Charging it would be stupid. Always let a speeding beast burn momentum before striking.
But Richard didn't think so, he wasn't the rational one today. He grinned like a lunatic and charged.
As he ran, his frame bulked out... bones stretching, muscles swelling with unnatural power. His gait became heavier, strides longer. Claws burst from his fingers. His jaw cracked outward into a long snout, bristling with fangs. His laughter warped into a growl.
"Richard!" Ronald barked through clenched teeth. "What are you doing?!"
"Showing this pup who the superior wolf is!" Richard called back mid-sprint. His voice deepened, distorted as fur bloomed across his skin, and in seconds he was no longer human... he was a lycan, in all his terrifying, muscle-packed glory.
The creature reached him in a heartbeat. And they collided.
BOOM.
But the thunderclap wasn't from claws meeting flesh, it was from Richard's fist, planted square into the werewolf's jaw with seismic force. The beast was sent flying, tumbling through mud and root before skidding to a stop.
It didn't stay down long.
With a snarl, it sprang up... revealed in full now.
It was a Lycan. Like Richard. But with grey fur streaked with brown, it was leaner, shorter, but fast. Its amber eyes glowed with rage and curiosity.
It launched at him again, faster this time.
Richard ducked the first strike, but the second came from the side... razor-sharp claws slashing at his throat.
Richard ducked just in time, the swipe missed his throat by a hair's breadth, but caught his shoulder, tearing clean through flesh. Blood splashed across the clearing, steaming as it hit the cold air. But he didn't flinch. He grinned, a deep rumbling chuckle erupting from his chest as he twisted mid-roll and slammed his elbow into the creature's spine.
Crack.
The werewolf howled in pain, but didn't fall.. it spun around, snarling, its claws ready for another strike.
The two lunged at each other again, fangs to fangs, claws to claws... an elegant, violent dance under the moonlight.
On the other side of the clearing, Ronald watched as Richard fought with the other lycan. He contemplated whether to join the fight, but before he could make a decision, his eyes shifted suddenly. He could feel movements... on both his left and right.
His eyes narrowed. He sensed them before he saw them.
Two more shadows emerged from the tree line. Fast. Silent. Coordinated.
They emerged from the misty trees, low to the ground, fast and coordinated werewolves, feral and hungry.
They circled him like jackals... one was taller, lean with black fur and golden eyes. The other was stockier, with reddish-brown fur and long claws that scraped the earth as he moved.
Ronald smiled, he took one step forward, and a wave of crimson energy shimmered around his body.
Another blade formed in his left hand, elegant and curved like a scimitar forged from pure bloodlight. Both blades pulsed.. living weapons of will and wrath.
"All right," Ronald exhaled. "Let's get to it then,"
He spun the blades lazily in his hands.
Back-to-back with him, Richard was still fighting... No, toying the grey lycan. It hadn't been able to lay a single claw on Richard ever since the first strike. Richard just kept evading, teasing and wearing it down.
But after a while, he got bored and ended the fight.
The grey werewolf lunged, but Richard didn't even move. He clenched his fist and then...
One fist. One perfectly timed, casual uppercut.
CRACK.
The grey lycan lifted off the ground like a broken kite and crashed through three trees, each one exploding into splinters.
Richard snarled. "Amateur,"
Back with Ronald, his fight had just begun.. but he wasn't sweating. The two werewolves circled him like vultures.
One pounced.
Ronald didn't move.. he waited. The lycan approached him, ready to strike at his head.. but his blade extended mid-air, forming a glaive that impaled the creature clean through the gut before dispersing like smoke.
The wolf dropped, twitching.
"You brought claws to a blade-fight.. that's unwise," Ronald muttered.
The second wolf struck from behind. But it was too slow.
Ronald turned mid-spin, one blade dissolving and reshaping instantly into a jagged whip of crimson energy. It cracked like thunder, wrapping around the beast's throat mid-lunge.
He yanked.
BOOM.
The wolf slammed face-first into the ground with a sickening thud. Ronald stepped on its back and twisted the whip into a blade again, holding it to the creature's throat.
But before he could finish the blow, a shadow flew across the field... the grey wolf was back.
Richard growled. "It's mine!"
Then he charged. This time, he didn't punch.
He leapt.
Like a black bullet, he rocketed into the wolf mid-air, grabbing it by the throat and driving it into the dirt with so much force the ground quaked.
BOOM.
Dust rose in a cloud. When it cleared, Richard was crouched over the crater, pinning the grey beast with one hand.
It didn't move.
Ronald crossed his arms, standing over the other two who now whimpered under the weight of his aura.
He sighed.
"Well. That was anticlimactic."
Richard tilted his head, then his body reverted back into human.
"Pffft! I expected more... this was child's play," he grumbled
Ronald cracked his neck. "Then you're in luck... cause it's not over yet,"
They both turned toward the deeper woods, where they felt the presence of multiple eyes gazing at them. Watching.
From the shattered treeline, the shadows thickened like storm clouds at dusk. Then, they emerged.
Eight lycans... tall, muscular, with eyes that burned like dying embers and teeth that gleamed beneath snarling lips. Their movements were tight, practiced. These weren't ferals. These were soldiers.
The forest trembled with their presence.
Low growls. Heavy footfalls. An ancient rhythm of war.
Richard's grin stretched wider. "Perfect."
Ronald didn't flinch. "Told ya."
The air buzzed as his crimson aura surged to life, coiling up his limbs in jagged spirals of bloodlight. From his open palm, a weapon bloomed.. a monstrous greatsword, serrated like the spine of a demon, dripping raw power from its glowing crimson edges.
"Try not to kill them," he said with a smirk, nodding toward Richard.. whose body had already re-entered lycan form, a towering wall of muscle and fur, claws twitching with anticipation.
The wolves charged.
And chaos danced.
Two lycans lunged at Richard, claws out, howling for blood.
He met them mid-air like a meteor, spinning with terrifying grace. His clawed fist caught one across the muzzle...
CRUNCH!
Sending it spiraling through the air. It slammed into the second mid-leap, and both tumbled into the underbrush in a heap of groans.
Two more came from behind. Richard didn't dodge.
He let them leap on him.
With a snarl, he grabbed them both.. one by the throat, the other by the scruff, and slammed their skulls together like thunder cracking stone.
CRACK.
"Lightweights," he growled, tossing them aside like rag dolls. But they all recovered quickly and stood to their feet, charging in once again.
Meanwhile, Ronald was pure art and destruction.
His greatsword spun in his hand like it weighed nothing, even though it carved trenches into the ground with every swing.
The first wolf lunged.
Ronald stepped sideways, pivoting smoothly and the greatsword came down in a red arc, slicing through the air and catching the beast across the chest. It didn't bleed. it exploded in a flare of crimson energy, sent flying back with a wail.
Another one tried to flank him, but was too sloppy.
Ronald's aura flared again, and in the blink of an eye, the sword morphed, shifting into twin curved blades crackling with power. He caught the wolf mid-pounce, blades slicing into its shoulders, spinning and kicking it away as if it weighed nothing.
A third and fourth came at him together.
"Finally, some effort." he grinned, and brought his blsdes together. They clashed and...
BOOM!
A shockwave of crimson erupted around him, launching the lycans back into the trees, snapping trunks like twigs.
Richard was now in the center of the chaos, fighting three at once, and he seemed to have been subdued... or not.
One grabbed his arm. Another tried to claw his flank. The third came from the front.
He roared, spinning like a tornado. The one at his front caught a punch to the gut so hard it lifted off the ground. The second got elbowed in the temple, and growled in pain. The one on his arm tried attacking, but he simply yanked it forward and kneed it in the ribs, then slammed it into the ground, shaking the earth.
He stood, growling over their crumpled forms. "This all you got?!"
The dust settled. Silence fell.
Eight werewolves, beaten. Battered. Groaning.
But they all stood again, slowly, with pride still burning in their glowing eyes. Hurt... but not broken. They prepared to charge in again.
Ronald sighed. "What a resilient bunch. All right, perhaps this time, I'll snap a few necks," he muttered, summoning a large war hammer.
And just as the second round was about to begin...
AWOOOO!
A piercing howl... Low. Deep. Commanding. It rolled through the trees like a wave of thunder, and every wolf froze.
From the dark woods, something stirred. Heavy. Powerful. Then, a figure emerged.
A lycan, same height as Richard, draped in shadows and streaked with age. His fur was pitch-black, dusted with streaks of grey like ash on a fire that refused to die. His golden eyes cut through the night with an undying fury.
And he did not look pleased.