“Well, well, what have we here? A mutt that got lost in the wrong place? Someone should learn that dogs are meant to be kept tide up, not let lose.” the Bishop snort towards the wolf as while extending his tentacle like arm to grab an orb made of stone that was around the altar and throw it towards the wolf.

He caught the incoming sphere in his mouth, breaking it down to pieces between his jaws. He rushed towards the Bishop while avoiding his attacks. Raming into him head one and smashed it against one of the pillars until it broke.

The sergeant seeing what was happening, he quickly shouted at his men “Fall back, we are getting out, now.” they all started running towards the exit, leaving the Bishop and his priests with that huge wolf.

From the cloud of dust caused by that pillar collapsing came out Shade, He was walking towards the altar were the girl was. The priests rushed to stop him but just as they got close enough to him their heads and hands were cut off, Some of them even cut in half. Nothing seemed to be able to stop him anymore.

As he reached the altar, he extended one of his hands towards the star, but before he could reach her a huge tentacle came swinging from the right side, throwing Shade into one of the walls of the dome.

“Know your place little mutt. You have no chance against me.” an abonimation of a monster came out of the rubble of the collapsed colum. It looked somewhat like a huge salamander, except for his tail, instead of which there were at least six tentacles. Where his head should be, it was a human upper torso, almost like a centaur but its whole body was covered with scales not to mention the sctyhe like hands. This creature was horrendous and gigantic, being at least eight meters tall.

Shade sprang like an arrow from the place he was thrown. His eyes were filled with rage his face had darkened to the point that he as gone mad. He was nothing like his calm and composed character from before.

The stone which Helena gave him was crushed unintentionally in anger. The ground broke under each of his steps, reaching the monster in a blink of an eye, hitting one of its legs so hard that it he tore it out if his body, making it fly across the room.

The monster letting out such a loud scream that the whole place was shaking. Green liquid started to run from the missing member. The creature tried to attack him with one of its scythe like arms, but Shade caught it, ripping it off while letting out a mad cry. Multiple tentacles came towards Shade but they only got cut to pieces by his tail. The monster got pushed back a little.

Shade had no intention of letting him, he swinged his right fist so hard into the middle of its body crushing the scales and whatever was beneath them sending its massive body flying into the dooms ceiling. As it was falling down, Shade came rushing to where it was about to land only to kick it, sending it one of the walls of the doom, squashed like a bug.

After a few moments, noticing that were was no more movements, he headed once again towards the altar. After only a few steps and a tentacle grabbed his leg again, lifting him up and slamming him onto the floor multiple times before quickly pulling Shade towards him. The creature was ready to hit with one of its scythes and cut him in half, but Shade reacted fast enough, managing to grab it.

The creature quickly reacted, trying to crush Shade under his scythe, the ground under him started to crumble. Its arm that got ripped apart had just regenerated and now was being swang towards Shade once more. Hitting the place where he was like a maniac with his tentacles and sctyhe until Shade was buried beneath all the rubble.

The monster stepped over the place where Shade was buried and started to hit the ground with his eight legs making sure that he won’t get out anymore.

Shade caught one of its legs, using it to get out of the rubble after which he ripper it off. Tearing apart all of the monsters libs, making it crawl on the ground. After the creatures was left defenseless . He went towards one of the still standing pillars. Pulling it out of its place and used it to squash the insect like monster.

Finally everything seemed to have finished, he was walking away exhausted from that fight. When suddenly he got hit in the head by a rock. Shade sat there motionless, slowly turning his head, you could hear his heavy breathing and the sounds of his fists crunching. He looked with the corner of his eye behind him “Learn to stay DEAD!” he yelled as he rushed at the monster, like a mad dog. The creature fully recovered from all the damage Shade has done to it and so they began fighting again.

The soldiers finally found their way back to the stairs, they ran all the way here. They rushed up the stairs but stopped when they almost reached the end, a body was in front of them, it was that of the soldier that the sergeant sent to get the prince “No wonder nobody came after so long.” the sergeant said feeling bad for what happened to the one in front of him.

“Lets go, fast! We need to get out of here quickly.” he ordered his men. They passed through the temple like a storm killing and cutting all the priests that showed up to stop them from leaving. As they reached the main hall where the exist was, the whole place was covered in smoke, so much that you could barely see something ahead of you. “What is up with this crazy bastards, do they intend to burn us all alive?” the sergeant furiously yelled when he saw the smoke.

“Stay near the wall men and follow me, we are getting out of here!” they moved slowly along the wall towards the exit. When they were finally out, they saw lots of people rushing with buckets of water towrads the temple. It seemed the upper part of the temple was burning up.

While walking down the stairs they saw that the prince was coming their way “What happened here? I came rushing when i heard that the temple was burning up.” the prince said towards the sergeant with a paniced voice.

“I don’t know anything about the fire, but that Bishop got us good. We lost so many of our men inside there. He is a monster and he seems to be interesed in that girl.” he explained to the prince what he knew.

The prince was put into thought “Very well, sergeant you and your men take a small break.” he then turned around to a man that was sitting by his side “As for you lieutenant go and get all of our men here, were are going into that temple.” the lieutenant saluted the prince and rushed back to get the rest of their soldiers.

Inside the dome it seemed that the monster which was the Bishop and Shade were still fighting. From one of the tunnels Helena finally made her way there, she saw the crumbled stated in which that place was looking. The ceiling was barely hanging on, since most of the pillars that held it were destroyed. She looked around for the source of the clashes, through the thick cloud of dus she saw Shade and the monster fighting.

Shade got kicked away by the monster, as he got up from the ground he spoted Helena which was sitting near the tunnel entrance from which she came “Get her and get out of here.” Shade said to her with a raging voice, pointing towards the after then rushed towards the monsters again. pushing it into a wall and punching it like crazy, grabbing rocks and other debris to crush it.

Helena looked around for the star through all of the bodies, she moved carefuly around for she didn’t wanna get crushed by any falling stone or caught between those two. She walked slowly between the rocks and bodies up the stairs towards were Shade pointed. On top of the altar she spotted the star which was laying there unconscious. She tried to teleport her out of there, but nothing seemed to work.

Helena didn’t waste too much time, she had realized this whole temple was build with an anti magica barrier that would prevent almost any magic from being casted. There was no other way out of here, but the same way they got in. Grabbing the star with both hands and placing her on the edge of the altar in order to pick her up on her back.

While heading towards the tunnel, in order to leave the monster saw her “Where do you think you are going little fly?” his voice ringing through the dome as he threw three huge piece of a colum in the drection of the tunnel. One of them barely missing Helena, second one hitting the wall to the left of the tunnel as for the third one, it was heading straight for tunnel.

Shade ran towards the front of the huge rock, trying to spot its momentum. After managing to stop it he threw it back at the monster, he looked at Helena which was carrying the star on her back, her face was all panicked and sweaty from all the effort “Why are you still here!? Leave!” he yelled at her. He charged back at the monster just as he got out from beneath the drebris.

With the path clear, now Helena had to leave the temple and eventually the town as well, but first she needed to get out. While going up the stairs, the whole building started to shake as if a earthquake was hitting it. It seems that the fight between Shade and that monster is gonna destroy this whole building up.

After getting out of the stairway she noticed that the whole place was starting to crumble. She had no other option but to head to the main exit of the temple, since that one was the closest to where she was now. While running towards through the halls, multiple times she had to stop and avoid falling objectes before finally reaching the door leading into the main hall.

There she saw a lot of smoke coming from beneath the door, so she took a few steps back and used a simple magic spell, casting a wind arrow in order to break the door so flames won’t jump on her if the place was burning.

To her luck, it was only smoke, but it has gotten so thick that it would be impossible to pass without intoxicating yourself, considering how large the hall was. She casted another wind spell, surrounding herself and the star in a bubble like thing, which prevent the smoke from reaching them. She walked by the edge of the hall and probably that was for the best as the floor was shaking like crazy from the fight going below the temple.

While half way through, the floor in the middle of the hall started falling making the whole place shake even more. From that hole the clashing of those two could be heard even better. She had no choice but to reach the door faster, just a few steps away from the door a loud crashing sound was hear from above. Shade was sent by the monster into the ceiling of the main hall while he was coming out through the floor.

“Oh, if it isn’t the little fly.” the monster extended his tentacles to grab Helena. Shade came crushing down onto his tentacles, cutting them apart with this hands that had turn into blades. The bishop was about to crush Helena with one of his tentacles, but Shade hit her wind bubble with his tail sending her through the door like a projectile.

Soldiers were rushing up the stairs and were about to go in, just as Helena was throw outside, stopping as she hit the statue of the god representing the temple. She was lucky with the bubble that protected her from any damage, but she was still shaken by the impact.

Some of the soldiers rushed towards her in order to help her get out of that place. The rest of the soldiers tried to go inside of the hall, inside of which Shade was fighting the demonic bishop relentlessly. There was no way for normal soldiers to do anything in this kind of situation, they all fell back and focused on evacuating the place. One of the soldiers rushed to the beacon left by Apollo for times of need.

Helena was take along with the star in the main square of the city, which was quite far from the temple in which Shade was fighting. She sat on a bench with the star leaned against her shoulder while having one hand wrapped around her.

She was looking in the direction of the temple, where crumbling sounds could still be heard from time to time, all of the people around her were panicing, but she was still holding on.

Meanwhile, at a tavern nearby the sergeant was giving the prince an explanation as to what happened inside the temple. The prince looked angrier as the sergeant continued his explanation, but despite that he didn’t raised his tone as he talked “Very well, you and your men can wait here. Lieutenant are the men ready?. We are to make a search party and look inside the temple for the girl.”

Just as the lieutenant gave him a salute and through the taverns door one of their soldiers came bursting in “Sir, i just saw the girl we left at the temple outside in the main square.” the prince suddenly turned his attention to him and with a loud tone “Where? Take me there! Now!” he ordered the soldier. They all rushed towards where the soldier was leading them, even the sergeant followed.

It took them a few moments to reach the square and even less to find Helena and the star. The soldiers signaled the rest around, slowly they started grouping around them. By the time Helena had realized it, it was already too late. She was completely surrounded by them. She didn’t get up, instead she just pulled the star closer to her. The soldiers sat around them in a circle that prevented anyone from approaching them. Until from between them a man wearing a black cape with a crest on the middle of his chest armour walked towards her, it was the prince.

“Thank you very much.” he said as he opened his arms wide as if he wanted to hug someone, smiling “I’m so glad to see this poor girl again, i though i would lose her in that temple.” he continued as he walked towards them.

Helena looked at him with keen eyes and didn’t show any sign of letting go of the star “Who might you be and what buisness do you have with her?” she cut him short.

The prince stopped walking, his smile was erased, his face turned serious “I have saved that girl before as well and she was to be given to me. Now hand her over.” he said with a serious tone as he lowerd his arms. This fast change of spirit was probably because of her not recognizing him.

Although Helena saw the crest on his chest, she didn’t care much about his status or from where he was, her answer was simple and straight “You think just because you are a prince, you can have whatever you want? Guess what, she’s not yours to claim like a trophy and even if she was a trophy the one to claim her would be the one fighting that monster inside the temple and not you.” a disgusted smiled showed up on Helena’s face.

The prince clenched his fists, not once, not twice, not trice but four times he met people who would disobey him in this town. Although Helena wasn’t from around, he had no way of knowing that. He bursted up “You think i’ll late some nameless soldier take this beautiful girl just because he fought soem monster!? Oh, you are so wrong, I’m the prince of this country and yes i take what i like when i like it. And if you dare stop me i’ll make sure you regret it.” drawing his sword and pointin it towards her.

Her smirk remaiend on her face, she looked even more amuzed by what he was doing “You really think you can harm me? I think you are over stepping your boundries, little prince.”

Her response hit him even harder than before “You think some wretch like you has anything over me? All citizens of this kingdom are to pay their respects towards the royal family and meet their demands. You didn’t do either so i could execute you on the spot.”

At this point Helena bursted into a laugh “You, execute me? I even lost the count of how many people wanted to kill me, guess what happened to them?” she made a slight pause“They are all dead.” her smirk almost turning into a laugh while her eyes were almost burning up, with a snap of her fingers over a dozen fireballs appeared around her.

The prince took a few steps back when he saw the fireballs “Hm, a magician, there aren’t any magicians that don’t serve under the royal family. That means you are obligated to do as i tell you too. Now hand her over before i’ll have both you and your master pay for this.” the prince grabbed the shield he was holding on his back underneath his cape, it had the same crest drawn on it.

Yet again Helena started to give a disrespectful laugh towards the princes actions “You want to make my master pay?” she continued to laugh “You think you got enough authority to order my master around like you do with your little toy soldiers and pawns?”

It was the last straw the prince could take “Give me his name, i’ll make sure to arrange a public execution for him and show you he ain’t worth the praises you are giving him.”

She finally stopped laughing “My masters name is Kadesh Tharsis, the demon which gave me power. And since you didn’t even bother asking for my name, i will present myself.” she gently cleared her throat and with a sweet and charming voice “I’m Helena Hecate, the grand witch as well as one of the captains of the Beasts of Grendel.”

Although the mercenary group she belonged to was faimous for accomplishing heroic and impossible feats and her master was one of the most dangerous demons. He didn’t show any sign of giving up “You think, just beacuse your master is a grand demon as well as being part of that mercenary band you can get away with taking what’s mine!?”

She interrupted him “Excuse me? This girl isn’t yours to begin with, nor did she belong to the people of that temple to give. You don’t even have a clue who she is.”

The prince reached his limit, he raised his hand “Guards get he gir...” before he could even finish talking giant boulders came falling from the sky in the main square where most of the people where. Some of them being caught under the huge rocks, the rocks were coming from the temple where Shade is fighting. People started running from that place, but the prince and his soldiers were still focused on getting the star from Helena.

The prince hit one of the soldiers that was next to him with the handle of his blade in the shoulder “Get the girl already, we don’t have time to waste” he shouted at them.

The soldiers turned their attention back at the girls when suddenly one of the buildings that was around crumbeled underneath the boulders followed by other building to the right being crushed by the demonic bishop as Shade threw him away. The demon showed slight injuries despite his regenerative abilities while Shade was all messy and covered in dust.

The monster attacked Shade with one of his claws directly while at the same time with the other he grabbed the rooftop of a nearby building, throwing it at him from the side. Shade jump above, easily dodging the claw but taking the roof head on making him fall to the ground. The monster then started to hit the spot where the rooft landed multiple time to squash him, as he was hitting aggresivly one of his claws was stopped.

Shade grabbed on to it tightly and started to spin the monster, destroying all the buildings that were on their left side and the huge statue that was in the middle of the square. Killing a few of the soldiers that were around Helena and the star while the rest tried to cover their heads as rocks were falling down.

Helena was distracted by what was happening so the prince quickly rushed towards her, hitting her in the stomach with the pummel of his sword, knocking her unconscious. “Let’s get out of here Sergeant.” the prince said as he grabbed the star and rushed towards the cities main gate.

Shade threw the monster to the other side of the square into the buildings. Neither Shade nor the monster saw the prince running away with the star, they were too focused on fighting one another.

But their fight was interrupted by a bright ray of light that pierced through the night. It came from the sky straight towards to the square. It was large and bright as the sun, from it something was descending at a quick pace, the more it approached the ground the more its form was becoming clearer. A tall man, wearing leather with leather pants, his chets was bare open and armguards made of silver. The man’s physique was somewhat regular although all his muscles were standing out, he was truly the description of a perfect male. As soon as he was about to reach the ground he stopped, two meteres above it, he was floating or more like standing on air.

With an angry and fierce tone the man said “Such foul smell, how dare you demon bother a city which is under my protection!? Me!? The Sun God Apollo.” he started to shout at the end.

When the bishop saw him, he started running, despite his size he was quite agile, through the building, ruinning everything in his path, he was trying to reach the wall and get out of there as fast as possible.

The light around Apollo shined brigther for a second and in front of him a large golden bow along with a quiver appeared, he grabbed the quiver and hanged it around his waist after which with his left hand he took the bow. He turned towards the demon that was running, took out three arrows from his quiver, firing all three of them in the sky, one after another in quick succesion.

A few moments have passed and from the sky came down similar huge bright pillars onto the demon, at first they were made of light but as they hit the ground they turned into gold.

While that was happening Shade walked towards Helena which was laying unconscious on the ground, the star was nowhere near her. He grabbed her by her shoulder pulling her up and called her a few times, but to no avail.

As Shade was focused on Helena, the Sun God Apollo turned his gaze towards him, drawing another arrow from his quiver and getting ready to fire it at Shade. When he released it Shade noticed the light that was approaching him and quickly jumped from where he was, dodging the huge pillar that fell on the ground, with Helena in his arms.

“Well, well those some nice reflexes you have demon. Seems like you will prove to be a better hunt than the other one, hope you’ll manage to entertain me for a bit.” the sun god raise his voice while speaking towards Shade, he drew arrow after arrow firing them at the speed of light, giant pillars filled that empty square and dust coulds were formed around the ground from the impact of so many heavy objects.

Shade managed to sneak away from the attacks and was looking for a way to get out, but even the slightest movement seemed to be noticed by this god. Not to mention the light that was being emanated from him made things harder for Shade. He finally found a small opening between his attacks and let Helena rest against a wall, covering her with shadows so she won’t get spotted. He rushed away from there as fast as he could and towards the sun god, picking up giant boulders from earlier, throwing them at Apollo.

So many rocks came flying at the sun god that he was surprsied, he used his right arm to punch each one of them, breaking them to pieces. Seeing as there is no end to this he placed his bow on his back and grabbed one of the rocks throwing it back then in the dust that was made rushed down towards Shade, making a huge crater as he landed, destroying the nearby buildings.

Shade was caught up in the shockwave and was thrown into a wall, Apollo dashed to him at incredbile speed, punching right through him, making a whole through his body five times the size of his fist.

In that moment Shade took advantage of him letting his guard down and grabbed his hand. He casted all of his power into it, shadowy spikes started to erupt from the sun gods skin, piercing it from the inside out while going up. Its speed was slow as Shade was obstructed by the dense light that was near him as well as weakned by the earlier hit. He took the chance to distance himself from the god.

The sun god screamed and cursed in pain “You filthy demon. You fucking dare touch the mighty god of the sun? I’ll burn your whole race for this, i’ll torture that bitch that you try so hard to protect while you watch, i’ll make you suffer so much before finally killing you!” he threw light bolts at Shade which was trying to run away. He managed to dodge some of them while trying to avoid his sight by taking cover behind thsoe pillars. The sun god couldn’t throw them that fast as his right arm was badly hurt and those spikes were still moving up towards his head, reaching half way through his arm by now.

Shade reached the place where he left Helena, getting her out of there fast, by this time the hole in his chest had barely covered up. Apollo took flight and now was throwing his light spears from up high, although he used only one hand, each throw was like ten to twenty spears at once, which was hard to dodge. One managed to hit Shade in his left arm, erasing it completely, leaving a burning smell, since it touched Helena’s clothes as well.

Shade tried to grow wings and leave faster but just as he got them out and were already cut down by the light spears which came raining down, making him fall in the narrow streets between the buildings.

Now he had no choice but to run away by foot. The sun god was also taking his leave, most likely because his condition was getting worse and he had no time to waste “I will make sure to pay you back for this demon. Just you wait. I’ll personally come and hunt you down!” Apollo was yelling as he went back into the sky through the pillar of light on which he came. All of the huge golden pillars vanished, leaving golden sparks behind them after the god left.

Although the sun god had left, it wasn’t so easy to leave since the whole place was on alert, the soldiers were looking for him. The sun god’s words were proof enough that he should still be around. All of the soldiers started to search around the city, the walls were being patrolled constantly now. Despite that Shade tried to make his way towards closest wall and climb it in order to jump outside.

Easy as it was soldiers spotted him a few times on his way towards the wall. They fired arrows at him, luckly none of them hit their marks as they would have harmed Helena instead of him since the hole in his chest wasn’t covered that much. He ran up the wall as if it was something normal. When reached the top soldiers spotted him from both sides and opened fire at him, he had to rush and jump over the ramparts.

The soldiers ended up hurting one another since Shade was already in air, falling between the trees that were around ten meters away from the trench. Because he was missing an arm his landing was a rough one, hitting multiple branches on his way down. Helena getting roughed up from all of it. Helena didn’t wake up from the falling, but Shade had no time to waste since soldiers already started to fire arrows in the direction he jumped.

He ran away from that place, as far as possible so he wouldn’t be chased by them. He ran for ten kilometers after which he took a break in the middle of the woods near a large tree. After placing Helena down he tried to wake up her by gently patting her head, remembering that’s how he woken her up before, to no avail this time. Without knowing what to do, he sat there waiting. It took her ten minutes to finally get back to it.

First thing she noticed when she woke up was Shade’s missing arm and hole in his chest, which was slowly getting filled as small dark strings were connecting with each other. “What happened!? Are you okay?” she almost jumped off the ground, but fell down immediatly as she felt pain from her ankle, it was sprained.

“Someone who called himself the god of the sun showed up and wanted to kill me and you, he had no plan on letting us go so i had to fight with him.” he explaind as short as usual, looking down at her ankle seeing that she was holding onto it.

“Don’t tell me you managed to kill a god!?” Helena was shocked by what he said, to fight a god would be a feat impossible for almost anyone on this earth, yet he talked to casually about it, but maybe that was just how he talekd.

“No, i can’t do that. I don’t like the light, reason why i even got hit by him. But that also helped me in making him leave.” that made Helena calmed down a bit, she tried to get up, while holding onto the tree, she tried to walk but it seemed the pain was too much to even stand.

Shade looked at her in a strange way “What’s wrong? Is something wrong with your leg?”

Helena looked at him, tears had gathered in her eyes from the pain, making them glow in the night “It seems that i’ve hurt my leg and i can’t walk.” she said to him with a shaking voice as if she was almost about to cry.

“What happened with the star?” Shade looked down at her with a serious face “Did you put her into your magic bag?”

Helena was shocked by what he said as well as a bit angry “No! Of course not, i can’t put beings into it, otherwise they would die.” she made a short pause as her head leaned down “Someone surrounded me and asked me to give her to them. When you came into the square with the demon they attacked me and took her away.”

Shade stopped all of a sudden, he didn’t say a thing. He kicked one of the trees that was on his right with his leg, breaking it apart. He continued to destroy the trees around him in a rage while Helena was resting against one, now scared of what he might do.

In his rage he failed to see the great numbers of werewolves that have gathered all around them. They were at least ten times more than they have faced the day before, when they were heading towards Angelzark. The werewolves slowly and carefully approached him until they were only ten meteres away. At this point Shade has spotted them.

He turned his head slightly to the side, to see those behind him, his eyes had a piercing gaze, it was if he was death himself. With a defeaning roar “GET OUT OF MY WAY!” hitting the ground with his right leg so violently that he made the earth shake around him.

The werewolves were growling, although slowly backing down, taking distance from him. Soon all of them were gone. Shade was just standing there looking at the night sky through the trees. Helena was completely shocked. It was complete silence. Nothing could be heard in that moment in that whole forest, no birds or animals, a complete standstill. Almost as if everything stopped moving after Shades raging roar.

After a few minutes have passed Shade asked with her with his normal voice “Who took her?”

Helena quickly raised her head and looked at him. Tears gathered up in her eyes “It was one of the prince’s of this kingdom.” she started to cry as she was saying it, she thought that he would kill her in his rage.

Shade sat there a while longer until she was starting to calm down “Do you know where they might have gone?” he asked with a more gentle tone.

She got her bag, pulling from it some medicine and a scarf to attend to her wounded ankle. It only took a moment until she was done. She still held onto a tree while getting up “I think they might have went towards the east. We could try and ask around towns. Let’s go towards a road i could use my magic to find their tracks, since the star has such a high concentration of magic it should last for a while.” Shade only noded to her.

Helena tried to walk, but she was moving slowly because of the wound. Shade came from behind her, quickly grabbed her, lifting her in her arms. She let out a scream as he did that “Next time, give me a warning or something.” she said while looking mad at him.

Shade started to run while Helena was pointing direction towards a nearby road. There were only four roads that lead towards Angelzark, so they didn’t have many place to check to find a trail.

At the pace at which Shade was moving, they reached the first road in only a few minutes. While there Helena performed her spell to check for any traces of mana, but she couldn’t find any so they moved on to the next one. Just as they got a little closer and she could already tell without even activating the skill again “Its this road, I’ll use my spell to track it down.” Shade let Helena down for a moment so he can change into his wolf form.

Although it was her second time seeing him do it she couldn’t help but be shocked by it. She understood why he did that so there was no need to wait for him to tell her what to do. So they resumed their search for the star with Helena pointing ways and Shade following the calls.

The prince and the star were ahead of Shade and Helena by at least thirty kilometers. Although Shade was moving at an insane speed, it will take them a while to catch up to them, not to mention that the prince wasn’t slowing down either. Rushing through the forest with his knights as if they were chased by death.

If someone saw them coming they would have thought that they were dullahans, considering that all of them were wearing caps and the sound of their armour shaking could be heard from the distances, the sounds their horses were making only added up as well. It was a horid sound that nobody would want to hear while walking in the night, although it was made by humans.

They soon got out of the forest, a large filed extended before their eyes, with hills and a small village just a little up ahead. The prince lifted his right hand up making all of his men to stop “Set up a teleport in the field here. We aren’t gonna walk back like this. I’m not in the mood for who knows what surprises might arrive along the way to the castle.”

All the soldiers dismounted their horses, three of them headed towards the field setting up a large circle made of stones. They were quite a distance away from the edge of the forest as the circle required some space and because of the prince not wanting to get ambushed from those trees. As they were setting it up a wicked howl was heard from the direction of the forest as a large number of werewolves came rushing towards their location.

“Wreched creatures.” the prince said as he looked at the hoard coming towards them “Release all the horses, make them distract the beasts!” he yelled out at his soldier, which did as such. The horses ran towards the left and right of the werewolves, but they didn’t seem to care about the horses as they headed straight for them. “To damnation with this, BATTLE FORMATION!” the prince shouted with all his might while pulling his shield and sword.

All of the men gathered up in defensive positions, their large shields held to the front with spears in their hands. Archers positioned at the back with a few soldiers around them just in case some would slip by. The archers started shooting arrows in a volley as soon as they were ready, but despite the arrows that hit them, not even one werewolf would fall.

Seeing as the werewolves were not affected by any of the arrows the sergeant shouted “PLUNGE YOUR SHIELDS AND SPEARS IN THE GROUND!” and so the soldiers did, making the shield wall look almost like a spiked wall. They all drew their swords as werewolves started to hit into the shields and get pierced by the spears. They came with such speed that some of them had their heads crushed by the impact onto the shields. Their bodies crumbling on the ground, even those impaled moved in a wicked way as they tried to set theirselves free from the spear that pierced their bodies.

The werewolves were slower than usual which made it easier for the soldiers to kill them, but even so their strength was far to great for that of a normal human. Many would get sliced up, dismembered or decapitated with just a swing of their claws. Even the prince found it harder than usual to kill this creatures as a normal slash or hit by a sword would not affect them, they would get up and continue their attack even went cut in half.

“This blasted creatures don’t want to die!” the sergeant said in a loud voice, as he beheaded a few werewolves with a swing of his greatsword, slicing a few more up as he spinned it around.

“We need to buy more time, chop them to pieces if you have to, but hold them for a while longer!” the prince yelled as he rushed into the middle of them, slashing and cutting through their ranks as well as bashing them with his shield. He sliced them up, crushed their bodies beneath his feet. As he noticed that he could crush the werewolves head with a heavy step, he shouted back at his men “They bodies are frail, crush them under your shields!”

The sergeant with a few others rushed to keep up with the prince in case he would need any help. The whole place turned into a bloody massacre as the bodies continued to crawl on the ground even when cut in half. The only ones that were not moving where the ones that had their heads or chests crushed. Their numbers had slightly went down but same thing could be said about the knights.

“THE PORTAL IS OPEN!” a loud voice from behind them echeod through the clash of swords and claws. Finally their way home was open, but they still had to reach the portal in order to leave this place.

“Go to the portal, NOW!” the prince yelled at his men as he moved back as well, cutting any of the werewolves that would stand in his way.

The sergeant and those around him moved back at the same time with the prince, so he wouldn’t be left alone. As the were moving more and more towards the portal, most of the remaining men already passed through. The star was still left just outside of the circle, near one of the soldiers that was keeping the portal open.

The sergeant turned towards the prince “Sir, take the girl and leave we shall cover your retreat!” the said to him.

He looked back and saw the girl still on the ground in this madness “You fools, you should have taken her back in the first place. Sergeant take her and go back, its an order!” he yelled at him. While swinging his sword like a madman, chopping the werewolves to pieces. Two of the werewolves would jump on him, knocking him down.

He held them back with his shield as they tried ot bite his head off, he moved his sword and stabbed one of them, he pulled his sword up cutting the werewolf in half and dispate that he would still try to rip his head off up until the moment its head would be sliced open. He let go of his sword and grabbed the other one by its jaws and opened its mouth wide until he ripped it off, he rolled over the werewolf and crushed his head under the shield.

The sergeant seeing the determination the prince had to protect the girl, he had no other way but to do as he was ordered. He ran towards her, taking her into his arm and passing through the portal. Now it was only the prince and ten of his men were left, they all seem to be exhausted from all of the fighting. The soldiers asked him to leave as they would follow him.

Although stubborn, this time he didn’t go against the idea of leaving seeing that their numbers are ever growing, he headed towards the portal. Now only the men were left against the remaining hoard of werewolves, but something far more horrifc came out of the forest, which made the werewolves seem like some little dogs.

A knight in a black leather armour, chains warpped around his body along with belts which held multiple daggers, a huge claymore in his right hand and a mace in his left. He was gigantic being almost twice the size of a man, but the most terrifying thing was his head, which was missing and in its place a black fog would come out.

As the knights saw him they almost froze in place, recognizing that a dullahan has appeared. After he took a few more steps out of the forest, five more appeared behind him, each wielding different weapons and wearing all sorts of armour.

The soldiers knew they had no way of running from such creatures, they barely even had the will to fight anymore, even the werewolves this undead werewolves were sitting put. One soldier found the strength to talk “CLOSE THE PORTAL! They must not get through!” he yelled as loud as he could at those holding the portal open, which were frozen from sight of the dullahans.

An arrow flew over from the forest, piercing the skull of the knight that yelled, his body fell on the ground. Werewolves walked over its body, rushing towards the portal which close just as one of them was about to jump through.

Now the remaining knights were left for sure death, as an enemy they had no hope of ever defeating had appeared. And so it seemed for terrible cries of pain could be heared from the field as the soldiers were ripped to shreds by either the werewolves or the dullahans, who knows what kind of horrors were done to them before they would die.

On the other side of the portal, the prince was the last one to walk out of it before suddenly getting close. Only twenty soldiers along with the sergeant out of his two hundred made it back from his trip to Angelzark. Even those that made it through were wounded or exhausted.

The prince walked towards the sergeant that was holding the girl, taking her in his arms and letting the soldier rest. In that through the doors of the teleportation room walked in the king along with a dozen of his guards “What in the meaning of all this?” he shouted at the sight of the men that were covered in blood as well as the prince being a little roughed up.

The prince walked up to his father, with the girl in his arms “We were ambushed by werewolves while heading to Angelzark. Some priest turned into a demon and tried to eat this girl. When we created a portal to leave some undead werewolves tried to attack us.” he explained to his father very shortly “I will explain it in more detail tomorrow, but now this girl needs to get some rest.” after which he took his leave.

Back the forest, after quite some time Shade and Helena finally reached the place where the massacre happened. It was a terrible scene to witness, you could barely distinguish the bodies of most that were around as they were crushed or cut to pieces, mawled by the claws or ripped to shreds.

Shade moved through the battlefield as if it was something normal while Helena held a hankerchief over her mouth as the place was stinking of blood and surprisingly dead bodies, she took a closer look at the place as she found it quite odd. The bodies of the soldiers seemed to be still warm, meaning the fight happened recently but when she checked the werewolves their bodies were already dead for a few days. She thought about it for a bit as he checked a few more other, now she was sure, some strong necromancer raised this werewolves and had them attack the knights.

She rushed over to Shade which was standing on the other side of the battlefield, a large circle was burned on the grass, a few dead knights were laying around it. She looked around a little “Seems like they got away, i don’t see her around either. Hopefully she isn’t harmed.” she said to Shade.

Shade didn’t reply at all, but instead he pointed to the ground, towards the circle of ash that remaind, for some reason he had an interest in that thing.

“It seems they’ve made a teleportation circle to leave.” Helena pointed out as she kneeled near the circle looking at the ash that remained on the field.

Shade looked at her in weird way and with a questioning tone “What do you mean teleportation circle?” he said with a straight face.

She turned her head at him “They’ve used this here to move to some other place.” she said as she struggled a little to get up “Sadly enough we can’t use this circle to follow them since it turned to ash. We don’t even know where they’ve went.”

Shade’s face turned grim, he lowered his head to the fornt a little, looking at the ashes that were on the ground. Helena saw the look on his face and got a cold sweat, as she recalled what happened earlier. She turned to him, took a mouth of air “Even if we don’t know where they went, we can still find them.”

Shade imediatly turned his head towards her, looking with cold eyes straight into hers, Helena was scared at this point, but she continued “The man who took her is part of one of the royal families. There are nine kings who rules this kingdom, we just need to check which one of them took her.”

He started to walk towards the road “Very well. Let’s not waste time, the sooner we find her the better.” he talked as he continue to walk. Helena was walking by his side as they headed towards the small town.

A few weeks have passed since the incident at Angelzark. News spread as fire about the demon that attacked the city along with that of the witch who summoned him. Although the demon was slained and the witch drove off, a bounty was placed on her head, be it dead or alive she is to be brought to Angelzark to receive her punishment at the hands of the god Apollo.

In order to avoid being seen Shade and Helena walked during the nights towards each of the places where the star might be. Since this kingdom had nine kings to rule it, they had a few places to go to. They’ve managed to check five of the places without raising any alarms or getting into any kind of trouble so far.

“Shade.” Helena said with a low voice as she was riding on his back “Let’s stop by a healers house. Its in our way, there is also a small village close by from where i could buy some food.” she leaned on his back, almost talking straight into his ear.

Shade only listened and followed her directions afterward to the place she wanted to go. Since they didn’t have to change directions, he agreed to her request.

It was still light outside as they reached an old, large hut in the middle of the forest. The whole place had plants every where, it was completely covered with them, they were masking the whole place very well that you could hardly see it from a far.

Helena walked towards the door, knocking a few times. A little while passed since she knocked and someone opened the door. A middle aged woman with messy hair, but very elegantly dressed and well looking greeted them. She made a sign with her hand, welcoming both Shade and Helena in.

The inside of the house was completely different from the outside, it was clean, very clean and everything was placed in such an order. The house was very well decorated with shelves filled with books, vials, plants and all sorts of other things. You couldn’t believe such a place existed in the middle of a forest.

The woman walked towards a chair in the middle of the room and sat on it, looking towards her guests which were still at the entrance, looking around the house. “What brings the two of you here?” she asked right away without wasting any time.

Helena took a few steps towards her “’Yes, i would like to buy some plants, in fact I need quite a few of them.” she pulled a paper outside of her bag as she talked, handing it over to the woman “I’d like to buy these ones, if you have them.” ending it with a smile.

The woman got up from her chair, taking the paper from Helena’s hand. She looked a little surprised from the list she was reading “You sure do need some interesting stuff. Yes, I do have them. But they will cost you some pretty coin.” she talked while going towards the back of the house.

Helena eagerly responded “If you have them, of course I’ll pay for them.”

The woman told her and Shade “Take a sit, i’ll go bring you what you asked for. It might take a while so do get comfortable.” and so they did. Shade still sitting up, looking at the bookshelves and plants around the house.

“What use do you have for all this plants?” Shade asked Helena as he continued to inspect the place with his gaze.

“I’m going to use them in case anything happens, like getting wounded, sick or who knows maybe poisoned.” she smiled as she said the last part.

Shade noded as he continued to look around “Interesting, using such simple things to heal yourselves.”

Time passed by quickly as they chatted, the woman came back with the goods Helena asked for “Here’s what you wanted, it will cost you one hundred gold coins.”

Helena was a bit a shocked when she heard how much it will cost, but none the less with a bit of a stingy face she pulled the money out of her bag, handing it over. The woman snatching the small purse containing the payment out of her hand.

“Thank you very much, we shall be on our way now.” Helena politly said as she walked towards the door, going outside of the house. Shade looked at her as she let out a huge sigh. They walked away from the hut, heanding towards teh village.

While they walked Helena suddenly bursted “One hundred coins for this plants!? That’s robbery. I can’t believe i paid so much of this things...” she made a slight pause to catch some air “I should have just went and picked them up myself.” she finally calmed down a little, taking a breath of air after all the yelling.

Shade looked at her a little surprised, leaning his head a to the side not actually understanding what was happening. “Ok, now we shall head towards the village that’s nearby to buy some food, then we can resume our search.” she said with a calmer tone. Shade quickly transformed into a wolf and with Helena on his back he rushed towards the village.

The sun was already setting as two travelers were approaching the small village, both of them wearing cloaks with hoods over their heads. It was a cloudy dusk, darker than usual. Both of the travleres stop at the towns entry. They seemed to be talking to one another.

“You stay here Shade, i’ll go buy some food from the tavern over there.” she pointed towards a building with a strange sign hanging from its wall “Then we can move out, it won’t take long. We just got to check a few more place and she has to be in one of them.” Shade replied with a nod as he watched her go into the town.

So he waited there. He looked at the people that were passing by. He just sat there looking at all the people walking to their homes or some place to stay. An hour has passed and there was no sign of Helena, so he continued to wait. It slowly began to rain, drop by drop until it began to pour. Two hours have pasted by and still nothing. He sat there in the rain, not minding the fact that he was getting wet. He stood there like a statue for three whole hours, but there was no sign of Helena coming back.