It was fascinating to watch and experience the reaction of the Hunters to our attack. On one hand, there was the purely physical part, the creatures we had struck let out hisses of pain, and the others let out angry yowls, nothing that I wouldn’t expect from a feline that was suddenly in pain or confronted with an enemy. On the other hand, there was the psychic side, where I could hear an explosion of activity, though all somewhat in the same tone, for a lack of better word. I would have expected that those we had attacked would have a different texture in their emanations, that it would be more akin to a scream of pain, something sharp and piercing. But no, it was all in the same tone, making me wonder just how disconnected from their physical form these creatures were.

I was just about to throw an Icicle into the middle of the creatures when I realised what the canister Alex had thrown was. Namely, a rather flammable aerosol, likely taken from a gas station we had visited while hunting for supplies to make our traps with and punctured with a sharp stone or something along those lines. The realisation changed my plan and I channelled the hated Fire Magic, barely managing to get it to work across the distance but with a bit of extra Astral Power, I managed to get it to work. And the aerosol to ignite, creating a surprisingly large fireball.

For a moment, I was torn between joy and disgust. Why did it have to be fire, I so hated the stuff, why couldn’t it be something more pleasing? Likely because it was incredibly difficult to get a nice, large reaction out of something endothermic, these reactions were mostly confined to their medium, so unless we managed to find a supply of liquid nitrogen or similar liquid gases, it would be difficult to induce freezing, unless I directly used my magic. And yet, despite my disgust at unleashing such large-scale fires, there was a small part of me that revelled in it, the knowledge that I had created the fire, that I was its master. And maybe, there was also a tiny part of me that was happy at throwing a fireball, no matter how much I disliked fire, it was such a staple of fantasy battle magic, even if it was relatively useless.

The fireball, as impressive as it had been, had merely singed the fur of the Hunters before burning out, Lia and Silva were completely unharmed, though Silva looked a little spooked. But other than it working as a distraction, something the others were already exploiting with brutal efficiency, the Hunters were nearly unhurt, just a bit of cosmetic damage.

Before I could continue my spellcasting, I felt a build-up of power and reacted, almost completely instinctual. Bullet Time activated, giving me enough time to work out a response, other than throwing power into their general direction.

“Stop!” I yelled, my entire being focusing on that simple concept, to prevent something from happening. In this case, the thing I wanted to prevent was a psychic attack from two of the Hunters, trying to turn Silva’s brain to mush, or at least stun her so another could tear out her throat. It was a near thing, amusingly, my yell had barely started by the time the magical side was already over, but I managed to interject my own power between the spear of power coming from those two creatures, feeling it crash into the shield I had formed on instinct.

Stumbling back, I felt a bit of blood ooze from my nose, a headache starting to form as I tried to clear my mind. I needed to find better ways to utilise my Mind Magic on the defensive side, but that was something I had to consider later.

For now, I stepped back forward to the window I was using as cover, letting out a sigh of relief when I realised that I had managed to shift the battle by blocking the attack from the Hunters. Just like I had been briefly stunned by their attack, they, too had suffered from the backlash, and Lia had ruthlessly exploited that opening. My daughter was truly coming into her own, especially when it came to her Martial Arts. If I hadn’t known that she had only been training for a few weeks, I would have thought she had been doing so for at least a year. There was an incredible certainty in her movement, an assurance that her strikes would land and she would pull through. That confidence might have made her attacks a little reckless but it certainly gave her enough power to strike true.

And in this case, her strikes, one with her claws, the other with the cleaver we had acquired in the Dark Slaughterhouse, struck beautifully. The cleaver did what it did best, cleave something apart, in this case, it managed to cleave through the spine of a Hunter, sending the beast to the ground from where it would never rise again. Her other attack was less decisive but just as brutal, ripping a deep wound into another Hunter’s side, tearing through flesh, muscle and sinews, crippling one of the Hunter’s legs before she had to retreat or get wounded by another Hunter.

The battle continued, with me mostly providing fire support alongside Alex, who kept back but added their own twist, randomly throwing rocks, debris and small amounts of psychic energy, similar to the massive blast the creatures had used only smaller by an order of magnitude. With our help, Lia and Silva were able to quickly destroy the Hunters, leaving them dead on the ground. Silva had a few scratches alongside one nasty puncture wound where the one Hunter that had joined the battle late had managed to get her but overall, we were in okay shape.

“Let’s move to another location, we don’t want to be here when they come with bigger numbers,” I told the others, already drawing the Blood Runes I used to heal on her side. They worked quickly and moments later, I could replace them with the runes I used to conceal her.

After a quick check to make sure nobody else was injured, we moved back into the alleyways, towards one of the groups I could feel in the distance. It was a smaller group, only three Hunters moving together, so my plan was to pounce on them as we made our way out. I briefly glanced at my notifications as we moved, grinning at the point in Mind Magic I had gained, alongside the point in Fire Magic, bringing the two skills to twenty-seven and five, respectively.

Given that the Hutners were rapidly moving towards the position we had just vacated and we were moving to intercept, it didn’t take long for them to be close enough that I signalled for the others to hide. We all moved into somewhat concealed positions, though they were far less advantageous than those we had in the fight before and settled in for a brief wait.

Not even a minute later, the Hunters came barrelling through the street, barely looking at their environment, allowing us to launch a beautiful attack from our ambush. Just like before, Lia used her chain, Silva drew their attention and Alex used their psychic powers to distract, a move I decided to copy with my Mind Magic. If we managed to keep their death quiet, we might manage to ambush yet another group, there were enough moving in the area to make that worthwhile.

Our attacks were quite successful, especially the psychic attack. It seemed that their own abilities made them somewhat vulnerable, just like a creature with especially sensitive ears would be greatly affected by a loud sonic attack, or like I was especially vulnerable to harsh light, thanks to my excellent night vision. Without a moment of warning to shut my eyes, I would be utterly devastated by any flash of light and for these creatures, it was no different. Our attack caught them off-guard and the psychic strike sent them reeling, creating an opening that Lia and Silva happily exploited.

By the time the last creature was half-way back to its senses, its brethren were already down for the count, one with a crushed spine, thanks to Silva, the other neatly decapitated. The last Hunter didn’t even have the time to turn around and try running, it might have wanted to, or maybe it wanted to launch a desperate attack, but before it’s hindlegs managed to push it into action, Silva barrelled into it, sending it sprawling while Lia struck with her cleaver, crippling one of its legs. It was a move Lia liked quite a bit, crippling an enemy's mobility so they could be bled at her leisure but now was not the time for it, so she simply killed the Hunter.

“Perfect, now we’ll leave again,” I ordered and moments later, we retreated back into the shadows of the night, hunting for more prey. And there were many Hunters coming for us, not knowing that they were no longer hunting. They were hunted.