Two hours earlier (when they entered the cave)

Aurelie and co. squinted in the low light of the cave, trying to see what was in front of them. Their power as cultivators gave them better night vision than usual, but the darkness was so dense that even with this advantage, Aurelie couldn’t even see her own hands. Behind her, Gallo and Farn shifted uncomfortably. While they had no bad memories in such dark places, they liked to be able to see what was in front of them, thank you very much.

Aurelie, on the other hand, was used to the darkness. She had undergone rigorous training to ensure that she wasn’t wholly reliant on her sense of sight, as most others were. However, she still shivered in cave. The last time she had been in a place this dark was the place she had stayed in between Earth and Sorainella, after she had fallen off of the building, but before she had fallen into the forest. That weird place where physics didn’t seem to apply, and she didn’t breathe, and was so strange that it made her skin crawl just thinking about it… Shaking the memories off, Aurelie desperately wished for a light source to suddenly appear.

Then she remembered, in a eureka moment that cut through the fear, that she did have a light source. She summoned her phone out of her ring, turning on the flashlight. Farn and Gallo looked at one another in amazement (well, in each others’ general direction), then moved so that they were standing next to Aurelie, benefitting from the light fully.

About five minutes of walking in silence, Gallo reached down and picked up a few sturdy, thick, club-like sticks, and rummaged in his pockets, finally pulling out a small red ball. He crushed the ball, letting the powder fall onto three of the sticks he’d picked up which ignited them. He passed out the makeshift torches, one per person, and a back up as well.

The powder was from a beast called the Flaming Monkey. Whenever one was killed, at least five such spheres were produced. Whenever the sphere was crushed, it would turn into a powder that automatically ignited whatever it touched, though it’s fire only lasted five minutes on inflammable surfaces. Flammable surfaces, like wood, caught fire until they burned completely. The Flaming Monkey’s weren’t rare, but were hunted down so humans could obtain the red spheres. Recently, though, Alchemists had found a cheap and easy way to mass produce the spheres, and they became so common that even a poor person like Gallo could easily obtain as many as he needed.

“You don’t have to keep the light up anymore. Wasting your Spirit Power right now isn’t a good idea. Conservation never hurt anyone.” He said kindly. Aurelie nodded, glad that he had thought the phone’s flashlight wasn’t due to anything out of this world, and turned off the flashlight. Though her phone was at ninety-five percent, Gallo had been right. Conservation had never hurt anyone.

The flames flickered, and the light they provided created shadows that danced around them, as though the darkness was just waiting for a chance to advance and swallow them whole.

~~~~~~~

The beast didn’t mind the darkness. He was a being of the dark, could make his way through the dark with the grace and soundlessness of a dancer. His prey, those who entered the darkness and the stone, couldn’t handle the deep blackness he was so accustomed to. Their reliance on the light of the world outside of the cave immediately announced their presence in his domain. He didn’t kill them immediately, though. If he struck immediately, it was likely that at least one of them would be able to make it outside. He found it a waste for such a delicious meal to escape.

He enjoyed teasing them, leaving little hints of his presence here and there, making them slowly aware that there was another being in the cave, one who could easily kill them.

Oh yes, he liked to wait until they were well within the winding stone pathways, such that when he struck, even if someone escaped the battle, they would be blinded by the dark, panicking and letting the delicious scent of fear emanate from them in waves. And then he would eat them, when they were terrified out of their minds. He salivated at the thought.

Besides, going out to hunt them meant that he would have to go out to and leave the delicious fruit behind. He didn’t want to leave the fruit. It was his, it was his, it was his, it was his. His, his, his! All HIS!

Within the beast, though he was unaware of it, red energy had completely fused with his brain, his blood, his organs, and every single cell in his body…

~~~~~~~

Quickly, his head snapped up, catching faint flickers of light. More prey had entered. He smiled, revealing rows of gleaming fang, and went out to hunt.

~~~~~~~

He had been following them for two hours now, and he was decidedly unhappy. He couldn’t play his usual game, couldn’t stalk them as openly as he liked. The reason for that was the girl. Everytime he got close, she would snap her head in his direction, her eyes narrowed as she attempted to penetrate the gloom. After a while, she would shrug and turn back, but after this had happened three times, she told her friends. They were scared, but they were still feeling brave. It upset him, not being able to control the hunt, to smell their fear.

He didn’t like the girl for another reason, too. She reminded him of fire, with her bright red hair that burned in the light and her glittering blue eyes, so like the heart of a flame. He disliked fire, hated the way it hurt his eyes. It was why he always made sure to blow out his prey’s torches before he made his move.

The girl would go first, he decided, pouncing at the group of three. The wind brought by his large body as he whistled through the air blew out the fire, but not so fast that they couldn’t see him for a brief moment.

He let them soak him in, preening at the fear in their eyes. Did they see the way he stood above them, towering over them like an invincible mountain? Did they imagine being ripped to shreds by his claws and fangs, which sliced into the floor as though it were made of butter? Did they tremble upon seeing his grey fur, matted with the blood of the hundreds of other humans that had fallen victim to him?

Allowing them a minute to soak in his brilliance, he swatted at the little girl who annoyed him so.