Shakugan no Hybrids: Chapter 40

Chapter 40: Lords of the hunt Part 3

"He...created a horror.
Our despair, our hate, our pain…our deaths..from both sides..were a massive catalyst.
Fuel for his dark grand design.
The Nightwalker laughed at us, a laugh ushered in the joy of our torment.
It was probably the first creation you could call a true curse in the world of man. It was nothing compared to The Black he had taught us…not only was this more malicious, powerful…it actually was bigger than any type of Affinity or spell known at that point in time.
You see, even in these days the uses of existence were largely unknown.
We knew we ate it to be able to manifest into this world, we knew it had some interesting capacities, the first crude incantations were just discovered, treasuretools were an entirely new phenomenon all together..it was all child’s play when compared to the thing that was being forced into existence.
This massive…thing…the curse he had wrought…it spanned the night sky..
It was..a gate. No a portal.
And on the other side we saw.. THEM.
I cannot describe them to you as it was a sight that all who were present have since tried to forget.
Even if we once shared the same realm, the same dimension, that was the only common ground we had with these monstrosities.
They were no crimson lords.
Not anymore.
They had fallen into something beyond any of us had ever seen.
This was the face of pure evil, destruction, hate..and above all, immense hunger.
Unescapable doom.
Those who had become ghosts, watched.
Those still alive were petrified.
Outwitted, outplayed, manipulated.
We never knew The Nightwalkers true intentions until the end, when the shroud over his plans fell down to reveal themselves in their baleful glory.
This was a ploy created for all to end.
A plot for the end.
And everything would have ended, if not for the fickle machinations of a single person, a very unlikely entity.
Because most petrified of all was The Scourgelord, finally realizing he had been played. Even in his thirst for power, as far as he wanted to go, even Leurent realized that he had been a pawn in a scheme that made his own ambitions insignificant in comparison. Then and there, The Scourgelord realized what he had done. And probably for the first time, he  took responsibility for his actions. His mind quickly laid the connection between The Nightwalker, the creatures beyond the gate and The Black, and deduced that they probably had the ultimate control over anything cursed. In a split-second he made his decision.

Standing the closest to The Nightwalker, whose masters were on the verge of setting foot on this world, he grabbed Cae Bolg and whispered:’ Cú Chulain…strike true..through me!’. Knowing that such a terrible act as his, fighting with cursed weaponry, against his own kin, could only be washed away by the ultimate price, he threw Cae Bolg up high as he threw himself at The Nightwalker. The creature laughed as it swept Leurent in the path of his own throw as the Cursed Cae Bolg redirected its path...which was what the Scourgelord predicted. He did not resist as Cae Bolg pierced him like it had pierced me only moments earlier…before leaving his body through his back, burying itself in the head of The Nightwalker, freshly drenched in Leurent’s flames. I do not know if it was The Scourgelords gamble that payed off, if the spear somehow responded to a righteous impulse, if the curse he had placed upon the weapon was so crude that the Nightwalker and his masters could not manipulate it fully, or if it was sheer dumb luck, but it worked. Both fell, one traitor who redeemed himself in his final moments, the other surprised as his foul life disappeared from the face of the earth. Even the mightiest foe can be taken down at the moment when he expects it the least.
With The Nightwalkers demise, the portal started to fall apart. The Curse was not finished, as it needed all of our deaths, Branded and Lord, to work. And it needed The Nightwalker to keep it stable. When they realized the portal was collapsing, The Sixty entities on the other side fought among themselves to get through, to our side. But their numbers were  to great, and the portal could barely sustain the passing of one such powerful menace, let alone Sixty of them. As they fought to be the first to set foot on earth, the portal collapsed on itself, cutting one of them cleanly in half. The  aftermath was... Apocalyptic.
Where it hit the ground it became toxic, devoid of life, its flame and fire was like a rain of acid, its passing causing thunderstorms as violent as those only seen during the most destructive phases of nature. The portal itself added to the onslaught. Upon its collapse the moon got blacked out, as it sent out dark shockwaves that tore through everything in its path, leveling mountains, raising valleys, boiling rivers and creating lakes overflowing with a toxic miasma of filth. It only took a minute perhaps. But in that moment we saw a glimpse of the destruction these fallen Crimson Gods would bring if they ever managed to set foot in this dimension.
We could do nothing about it. Nothing had survived the portal’s collapse, not within a staggering  radius of many miles. Those still alive when the portal collapsed on itself were gone. Not dead, not spectral, not a torch, gone. Entirely. Nothing. You could call it the ultimate disruption of balance. There was just a wasteland without life. And us. Those of us who had died before. Who had become ghosts.
Ghosts on a warped plain of lifeless destruction. Ghosts on a warped plain that would eventually become a twisted forest in the far future.
The hunt was destroyed, and so were all The Branded and fläemhaz who took part in this battle. In a way, The Branded could claim the moral victory, considering all Lords were destroyed, the portal collapsed, and The Nightwalker gone. But if anything it was a pyrrhic victory.
It set back the clock of human civilization for many years, caused the numbers on both sides, flamehaze and denizen to dwindle, both afraid to either enter this world, or to make a pact with something from beyond the world they knew. Japan secluded itself for millennia after, and it took even longer for flamehaze and crimson denizens to appear again, to start history as you now know it. You know the history from the dawn of time. But all of this happened in a time long before that dawn.
Through the ages some of us, those who went beyond the forest, disappeared. Going to far from this place dissolves us. The curse that killed us binds us here. But we also started to fade away…and started to forget. Those who forgot became feral, unable to do anything but claim to their hate, becoming a blight to these lands, a mockery of what they once were. Others clinged to their memories until their memories was all they had, reliving their final battle time after time and again. Sometimes a visitor would appear..to never return to civilization. And all this time more and more of us started to disappear…become mad..a terror…or forgot.

Until Malachite appeared, most of us had close to completely forgotten. I however, was intrigued by him. And thus by my urging we did not kill this visitor, but I appeared to him, spoke to him, and learned from him, how history was written, how we were forgotten, the state of the world as it is right now, and about The Six, as they call themselves now. Over time, we have slowly banded together, Spectral Branded and us, remnants of the Lords of the Hunt. Banded together over a single purpose: To have our vengeance.
We were the hunt.
And now we are nothing.”

As Jures ends his story, the ghosts behind him finally become clearly visible and stop being vague outlines. The Denizens who formed the hunt are a varied bunch, but all instill an ancient primal feeling. Shana sees one with a head that looks like a deer skull, including horns, one that looks like a crocodile with additional teeth on his tongue and eyelids, a snake covered in red feathers who wears a clay mask that depicts the face of a man with a serene smile with closed eyes...even while dead, they pulse an aura of pride. They were true to their nature,  even if to the morals of man that made them evil. In a way, they had formed their own culture and ideas about dignity and honor. To man that made them evil. But mostly, they were different.
Ferocious.
Wild.