Amidst the trees, a tall deformed man crouched within the thickets, his bow and arrow aimed at the car driving slowly down the road.
As the eldest son of the family, he bore the heavy responsibility of feeding the clan.
Hunting was not just to fill their bellies, but to please the Mother Goddess within the forest.
Swish!
The bowstring thrummed as the arrow tore through the air.
Watching the car forced to a halt, the deformed man let out a series of low, rasping chuckles.
He licked his cracked lips in excitement and notched another arrow.
This time, he aimed at the man who stepped out of the car wearing a Dark red trench coat.
In his mind, he could already see the exquisite image of that skull being pierced by a sharp arrow.
He wanted to watch this human collapse in agony, then drag him back to the camp to be slowly butchered.
Swish!
The arrow shot out, slicing through the air.
In the next second, the cruel smile on the deformed man's face froze. The imagined scene of the prey's brain being skewered did not occur.
The human before him, whose back was turned, didn't even look around. He simply raised a hand and made a casual snatch behind him.
The arrow, powerful enough to pierce straight through a wooden plank, was caught firmly between his fingers.
The deformed man's pupils contracted. His underdeveloped brain experienced a sudden short-circuit.
How was this possible?!
How could a human catch his hidden arrow with bare hands?
Before he could figure it out, a surge of violet-red flames erupted from the man, the violent heat making the surrounding air shimmer and warp.
How did he just catch fire?
Cold sweat rolled from his forehead into the corner of his eye; the deformed man blinked in terror.
When he opened his eyes again,
The figure by the car had disappeared.
Where did he go?!
He looked around frantically, his palms gripping the bow slick with cold sweat.
"Looking for me?"
A voice drifted down from above his head.
The deformed man snapped his head up.
High up, a man stood upon a tree branch, looking down at him from a height.
The silhouette against the light obscured the man's features, leaving only two glowing points of crimson visible.
As their gazes met, the deformed man felt as if his heart were being squeezed by an invisible hand.
Sephirot stood on the branch, looking down at the hideous creature whose facial features seemed to have been put together at random.
This appearance reminded him of a movie he had once seen: Wrong Turn.
A group of deformed monsters produced by inbreeding, detached from human civilization, who spent years setting traps and hunting tourists in this primeval forest.
The deformed man below let out a strange shriek and turned to flee through the woods, occasionally turning back to fire arrows at Sephirot.
This was his favorite trick...
Using the advantage of the terrain and his superhuman physical stamina to play cat-and-mouse games with his prey in the forest. Slowly draining the prey's stamina, enjoying the thrill of desecrating them along with his family.
Even if they couldn't win a direct fight, they could lead them into traps, savoring the kill slowly after inflicting heavy wounds.
"So you like playing hide-and-seek?"
Sephirot gave a cold laugh.
In one fluid motion, he reached out and caught a flying arrow right out of the air.
"Then I'll show you what a real hunter looks like."
With a burst of demonic power, Sephirot charged with sheer, violent force, slamming straight toward the fleeing deformed man.
Boom!
He seized the deformed man's throat with one hand, driving his body into a thick tree trunk. The massive impact snapped the entire tree in half.
Countless birds took flight in a panicked blur.
Sephirot used the momentum to pin the deformed man to the ground.
With a flick of his right wrist, he flipped the arrow he had just caught into a reverse grip and slammed it down hard into the deformed man's head.
Pfft!
The arrowhead pierced through the skull, sending a spray of red and white fluid bursting forth.
The deformed man's limbs jerked feebly a few times before falling still.
He died without even having the chance to let out a scream.
Slowly standing up, Sephirot shifted his gaze toward another deformed man nearby, who had been drawn in by the sound of the falling tree.
Seeing his companion's brutal end, the creature let out a sharp, grotesque shriek and scrambled on all fours, fleeing toward the depths of the forest.
"No rush. I'll give you a head start."
Sephirot stretched his body, his joints letting out a series of crisp cracks.
After driving for several days straight without so much as a motel in sight, his body felt like it was starting to rust. These monsters were perfect for working out the kinks.
He casually crushed the deformed man beneath his foot and began to follow the fleeing shadow at a leisurely pace.
—--
In the dense forest, inside an abandoned logging camp.
Of the seven or eight people who had originally come to participate in the wilderness reality show, only one survivor remained.
Nina, the vegetarian, sat frozen in a chair, not daring to move.
Her hands were bound with barbed chains; any struggle only caused the iron thorns to dig deeper into her flesh.
She watched in despair as a three-fingered deformed man stood before her, sharpening a massive cleaver.
Several other deformed men sat at the dining table, meticulously enjoying their meal, while the corpses of her companions hung upside down nearby like butchered hogs in a meat plant.
"This isn't a survival show at all..."
Nina's body wouldn't stop shaking as horror and hopelessness consumed her mind and soul.
Seeing her state, the three-fingered deformed man grinned, revealing a row of rotting yellow teeth.
He walked up to Nina and raised his blade, preparing to slit her throat.
Right then.
Boom!
A deafening crash erupted.
A mutilated corpse smashed right through the wooden wall, landing squarely in the center of the dining table. Stale broth and entrails splashed onto the deformed men sitting on either side.
The cacophony of eating stopped instantly.
A smaller deformed man instinctively let out a low growl, venting his mounting rage. But when its gaze landed clearly on the corpse, a wave of grief washed over its hideous face.
It recognized this body.
This was its mother, and also its wife.
"Looks like I made it just in time for dinner."
Sephirot walked in slowly, looking at the severed limbs and internal organs scattered across the floor. "Don't you know that wasting food is shameful?"
He slowly scanned the gang of monsters, whose appearances seemed to have been sculpted at random.
"Roar!"
The three-fingered deformed man let out a furious howl; that corpse had been his wife as well.
He reached back and pulled an axe from his waist, charging at Sephirot with a roar.
Sephirot's expression remained unchanged. His palm dipped, and a shotgun appeared in his hand.
Bang!
The three-fingered man's forward momentum jerked to a halt as several fist-sized holes appeared in his chest.
In disbelief, he lowered his head, looking first at his own body and then at the weapon in Sephirot's hand.
In his past hunting career, he had been wounded by this type of weapon before, but he had never seen one with such immense power.
Finally, the light faded from his pupils, and his body collapsed.
Seeing the strongest father of the family killed, the other deformed men let out wails of grief.
They did not choose to run; instead, they snatched up various crude tools and, eyes bloodshot, prepared to fight Sephirot to the death.
Suddenly.
A large cloud of black mist erupted from the three-fingered man's corpse lying on the ground.
"Oh?"
A flash of surprise crossed Sephirot's eyes.
He sensed a powerful demonic power dissipating from the opponent's lifeless flesh.
In the original setting of Wrong Turn, the deformed men were the result of long-term consumption of water contaminated by a chemical plant, leading to their physical mutations.
But looking at things now, that wasn't entirely the case.
After all, no matter how much a physical body changed, it shouldn't be able to rise from the dead, let alone generate demonic power.
"A clan?"
Sephirot speculated internally.
A clan generally attached itself to some high-level being, exchanging constant sacrifices and offerings for power.
Under the shroud of the black mist, the three-fingered deformed man's body healed rapidly, and he stood up straight.
His frame ballooned, wrenching upward from his original height of 180 centimeters to well over two meters, tearing through his filthy clothes.
A pair of antlers made of flesh and blood burst through his scalp, and black fur grew across his entire body.
In just a few seconds, the transformation was complete, and he had become a half-human, half-demon species.
(Translated by yourtl.app)
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TL NOTES - CROSSOVER GUIDE
Some references in this chapter come from source universes that may be unfamiliar to some readers. The notes below are here to help readers unfamiliar with these universes follow along more easily.
SOURCE UNIVERSES
Wrong Turn - A horror film franchise about cannibalistic, inbred mutants living in the backwoods of West Virginia. These deformed hunters set traps for tourists and travelers who stray into their territory, using the dense forest terrain to play cat-and-mouse games with their prey. In the original films, the mutants are the result of generations of inbreeding and chemical contamination. In this story, Sephirot recognizes the deformed men's appearance as reminiscent of the Wrong Turn antagonists, though their ability to resurrect and channel demonic power reveals a supernatural origin beyond mere mutation.