The wind howled, gently caressing the trees as leaves drifted down, shedding raindrops that heralded the silence following a storm. But amid this stillness, something moved with staggering speed through the branches. It moved so fast that one couldn't discern its nature—was it a bird? A primate? A predator on the hunt? Or a prey in flight?
The specter came to a sudden halt atop a towering tree, standing tall to reveal a human form—if it could still be called that. The lion's pelt covering his chest gave him a savage, bestial appearance. It was Harten, standing there assessing the situation with piercing eyes, like a predator tracking the movements of uninvited guests.
"Hmm... what should I do with them? Wait below and pick them off one by one? No... I have a better idea. I've always been fond of surprises."
He began to move again with that same lightning speed, leaping from branch to branch and tree to tree. He vaulted onto a colossal tree, vanishing within the dense canopy of leaves. A long, eerie silence ensued, finally broken by the sound of a single footfall, followed by the synchronized rhythm of many more.
The uninvited visitors arrived. They scanned their surroundings, searching the mud and tree trunks for footprints or markings on the bark. They spoke in a foreign tongue, appearing to consult one another on something suspicious, until their leader pointed forward and uttered a strange word. Following his command, the group pushed deeper into the foliage, only to be met by a sudden, sickening crunch, followed by a visceral scream and the sound of shattering bone.
They spun around instantly, only to find their companion sprawled on the ground—legs shattered, ribcage crushed, and neck twisted lifelessly. They saw no enemy, nor did they understand the cause of their comrade's swift demise. The leader barked an order, and they formed a defensive circle, protecting each other's backs from the invisible threat.
They waited in breathless anticipation, their eyes fixed on every fluttering leaf, until another scream tore through the air. They looked on in horror, faces pale with dread, as they saw a fellow warrior dangling by his head from a silken thread. The thread jerked upward, and the corpse vanished into the thick shadows of the canopy above.
A terrifying silence fell—a silence born of pure panic. Their formation fractured as their focus wavered, and the leader felt the blood freeze in his veins. The monster reaping them one by one was already among them! He didn't know how it arrived, when, or from where. But Harten knew how to exploit their distraction. The leader screamed to alert his men, but it was futile; they were paralyzed by the terror of suffering the same fate as their fallen brothers.
The leader looked up to see Harten standing on his own two feet, a smirk plastered across his face. The massacre had begun.
The "Ivory Horn"—if it could still be called that—lunged forth like a small, crimson-stained demonic blade. The blood coating it after every soul it claimed gave it a terrifying, jagged glint. The blade drove into one man's neck and erupted from the other side. Harten yanked the silken thread attached to the hilt, grabbed the corpse, and coldly tore the head from its shoulders. Then, he swung the blade horizontally at shoulder level, piercing the skull of another victim.
To the leader, it felt like an eternity, but in reality, it took mere seconds. Harten retracted the blade from the throat of the fourth victim, reducing their numbers to six.
The leader finally snapped out of his shock as his team stood helpless before this superhuman foe. He gripped his primitive spear and lunged at Harten with a direct thrust. But he didn't realize he wasn't fighting a man; he was fighting a beast. Harten watched with mockery, stepping aside to evade the spear by a hair's breadth.
The leader, unable to keep pace with Harten's supernatural reflexes, stumbled past him like a child playing with a stick. In that fleeting moment, Harten delivered a crushing blow to the leader's shoulder, shattering his collarbone and ribcage. The leader couldn't even process what had happened; all he knew was that he was slumped against a tree, blood spilling from his mouth.
He raised his head with agonizing effort. None of his men remained. There was only Harten, calmly searching the nine corpses he had left in his wake. He had annihilated the entire squad without breaking a sweat. The leader looked at Harten with eyes full of the fear of death and the agony screaming through his body. Harten turned to him and spoke with chilling indifference:
"Oh... this one is still alive? I really must aim for the vitals. I wouldn't want to forget someone who might survive and try to seek revenge."
The leader stared, not understanding a single word, until the blade pierced his skull. His eyes went dark, and the spark of life vanished. Harten retracted the blade and sighed. "So this is the power of the chip when it's fully fueled... damn, but it's exhausting. Well, I need to get out of here."
Usually, Harten had a reason to kill; that was how he had been trained on the cliffs eight years ago. He didn't kill randomly; he chose targets that offered utility or posed a threat. Sometimes he avoided predators because the risk yielded no reward, and his fight with the lion had been nothing more than an attempt to die with honor. But now, things were different. Harten could have avoided these humans, but he wanted to grow accustomed to killing them without feeling a thing.
Harten approached the edge of the forest and looked back one last time. "Well... I suppose it's time to say goodbye, Forest of Sorrows, Death, Joy, and Rest... Ugh, why am I getting so poetic?"