Chapter 5: Bad Wolf

A purple eyed demon, it was running. Out of breath. As if it had been chased for leagues, by something. And it had been. A dense mist seemed to cover what was this area in hell. The forest that had once been known as Solvay. For once this demon of terror was finally tasting that. Which it had inflicted on others so many times. And yet, this was not justice. It was retribution. Revenge. The demon leaned itself against a tree, eyes constantly shifting around. The sound of a twig breaking within the mist, the fog blanketing the forest obscured vision. It could not see. But the thing chasing it could. A low grow from somewhere within the mist. Once again. Hard to discern a direction because of the echo created by the forest. The moisture in the fog too, buffering the sound. Causing it to spread over the area. These effects only enhanced the feeling of pure terror that the demon was now experiencing. The sound of a bark to the right, a snarling bark. Then to the left, another twig snaps. It was all about environment. About setting the scene. The demon shuddered closed its eyes and then cried out in the mist. " Stop please just stop! I'll do anything". There was a blur of black as the mist parted and the beast bore down on the fear demon, leaping into the air and pouncing onto its chest. The wolf looking down at it. Snarling, salivating from the mouth as it breathed heavily and spoke. A dual toned bestial voice. " Yes, yes you will....but theres no deals for your kind... no mercy...theres only going to be death, you just get to choose". A low growl echoing as the mist twisted around them. An odd silence as the fear demon stuttered out the words. "Ch ch-choose what?". Jack the bad wolf raised his head and opened his maw. A cruel bestial laughter that echoed throughout, causing birds to take flight from their nests and fly beyond the haze of the fog. Jack looked down at the fear demon again." You get to choose...just how long you suffer for". He moved down and took the leg of the man in his jaws, crushing the upper thigh and then dragging him kicking screaming and clawing into the mist.

This hadn't been like the desire demon, no. Not at all. The demon of fear broke almost immediately. Allowing Jack to lap up that information along with his blood after sinking the jaws of this form into his throat. There was very little pride in this one to consume. But he still did it anyways. Increasing his power. The fear clan and sloth clan had moved their encampments closer together. Safety in numbers, but yet they still didn't fully trust one another. Fear were naturally paranoid. Sloth didn't too much care, the alliance seemed like most with Oni including his own with Ceila to be one bore of convience as opposed to actual shared beliefs and goals. It was fragile at best. Normally if Jack had wanted to destroy them both he would have simply found a fuse point to blow the old rickety bridge that they met in the middle of. Force both to go to war with one another and start a bloody battle for supremacy. Unfortunately at this stage Sloth and Fear had screwed with him far too much this week. He wasn't going to let them have the pleasure of killing each other. He was going to do it himself. And with this form, he'd be able to tear them apart and taste their blood.


EXP:724

The mist fell down in the valley were both clans of demons were taking sup. The bad omen was recognised almost immediately by several elders of the demons, whispering to the younger ones of things that hid in the mist. Of things that were hungry in the dark. Such things the young ones paid no attention to. Among these clans the demons were almost as foolish as humans. Despite knowing fine well that there were things that lay waiting in the darkest corners of their imaginations. Despite being that very creature for humans. They still preferred to live in blissful ignorance of things like this. Of things like him. He drew closer. Looking over the encampment of sloth first. These demons acted lazy, but they were far from it capable of great speeds and acts of strength. Although they pretended that they did not enjoy showing it off. So much about these demons was a fabrication. He had to wonder if indeed there was anything real about them. These were the ones of, who one of their number had trapped him within his own dreams. Had fed upon him. It was an unforgivable act. A sacrilege that he would show his wrath for. Such things did not dare deserve to do that. He was a figure in the mist, in the blackness. Most of them had entered their abodes, their tents stitched together from the raw hides of weaker demons and Yokai. It was tribal almost, nothing compared to the glory of the Seat of Pride. These demons were little more than nomads. Not worthy to lick the shit off his feet. Each one, he moved into one tent, two demons of sloth sleeping. How typical. In, slowly moving to the side of one, lowering his snout down to their face, And then. Chomp. Taking it within his mouth, feeling the bones of their head cracking under the pressure of his jaws, it was something fantastic. Each tent he visited it was all much the same. Some of them awakened, tried to fight back but he killed them before they had the chance to open their mouths. Had the chance to scream. Every one he drained their pride. Alive or dead. Prideful or not so much. Everything was part of the meal. Everyone was part of the meal. He had made his way through every single one of them and yet all the way through he hadn't came across the leader. He knew that simply because the amount of taint in all of his victims was not equivalent to the amount of taint he'd sensed in Joan, in Echidna, or even in Ceila. There was no leader of sloth here, and the one he had killed in the Seat of Pride certainly wasn't the leader either. Which meant that the leader wasn't here. He could be in the fear encampment brokering some sort of deal. He wouldn't let them have warning to example. Immediately, he moved into the fear camp. To hunt and kill the last of sloth. And begin his genocide of Fear.
EXP:555

However when he reached the encampment of fear he was met with a sight that he didn't think he would be. It set him back some. Enraging him enough that he would change back from the form of the wolf and into the form of the man. The encampment was set aflame. All were dead. But it didn't look as if they had been killed. Rather, it looked as if they'd all killed themselves. The idea of something embodying fear killing themselves out of knowing he was coming wasn't as far fetched as it would look. However. He didn't believe it for a second. Mainly down to just how the individuals looked. They looked as if they had ate and drank themselves to death. And he knew of only one kind of demon who had that trademark. Gluttons. Demons of gluttony were closely related to demons of desire. But whereas greed comes mostly in the form of possessions. Gluttony came in the form of things that gave pleasure. Mostly. A ravenous hunger. And by the looks of them, these demons of fear had been infected with such a hunger that they had started eating chunks of themselves and each other when they had ran out of food. So, there was a demon of hunger and gluttony. Or perhaps more than one, hunting down Fear. Yet they hadn't touched sloth. Jack had to make sure that the leader of sloth wasn't dead. That would be the gravest of all accidental insults from gluttony. Stealing a claimed and required kill from him would end up putting them on the same list. He walked through and thankfully, found no traces of the leader of Sloth. Or for that matter the leader of fear. Both were considered good things. He could at least kill the leader of fear, and then finish off Sloth. Not the kind of slaughter he wanted, yet those of fear did look like they had suffered greatly before the end. And that’s all he desired. He changed back into his wolf form, being wrapped in the taint and darkness which bore him before trotting along on four legs, taking the scents sights and smells of everything. He found the remains of the leaders tent. And took the scent from some of the belongings. By the looks of it the leader of Fear was a female. That made 3. Jowan must have been one lucky man to have dealings with three women in charge of three other clans.
EXP:450

He didn't know what it was, perhaps women were just naturally better at handling administration issues. He had to wonder to the gender now of the leader of sloth. If it was another female. Well he could just imagine why they were all constantly at war with one another. Other than being demons of course. With the scent in his nostrils and engraved in his memory, just as the quest for revenge was engraved into his heart, He pushed forward into the wilds back into Solvay forest. The scent headed back in this direction, oddly. As he noticed whilst moving, it was back towards the direction where he had captured the original demon of fear. As he drew closer, it became more and more apparent that where heading toward the place that he had captured the fear demon in the first place. The trail however was older, perhaps maybe an hour or two. Which meant....they had been there with the fear demon? Were they...tracking him? He stopped moving the moment that thought came to mind. The fear and sloth leader may have been tracking him initially when he was tracking them. If so then it was perfectly plausible that the leaders of both were in fact still watching him now. He listened. Looked around and smelled. Nothing. But yet, he hadn't picked them up before. Not on his sense of smell, sight or hearing. Even the tainted senses of the blood failed to pick anything up. But then. It sometimes failed on Ceila as well. Was this something to do with being the leader of a clan? Was there some kind of trick to avoiding it? His blood froze, but then...if they had been tracking him all along it meant that they weren’t at the camp when the glutton had killed their clan, but it meant that they were there when he had witnessed the scene, it meant that the sloth demon leader could have been there when he was killing its entire clan. And yet here he was standing there perfectly easy to attack. And there was nothing. He thought back. The fear demon had been distracted by other sounds, breaking branches, at the time he had merely thought that this could have been animals of the forest, perhaps another spirit or Yokai that was watching through the mist. but what if it wasn't. What if it was fear and sloth?
EXP:444

As it turned out, Fear and Sloth had been there. They had actually been watching him ever since the intial reports from their spies went out. Sloth and Fear however, didn't want war with Jack. At least. Not at the moment. The leaders of both groups had shared...peaceful. If little else. Times with the Pride Clan. This in the end came down to the relationships between the Leaders. The leader of Sloth was a woman known as Gerren, like most Sloth demons she had white hair followed by the typical white eyes of her clan sake. She was attractive, precious few could doubt that. But no one underestimated her, or really trusted her. Perhaps except for her lover. Who..as a matter of fact. Also happened to be the Leader of Fear. Jonah was a strange man, a whisp of a thing, yet with strength that was not told in his frame. He was sneaky. A master of stealth and subterfuge. Prefering to attack from a distance, or not at all if the situation called. Perhaps it was his ingenuity that attracted her. None the less. Both clans shared a bond through this. And Pride, with Jowan at the head had entered a third party into this. Jowan was, at the time neither friend. Nor foe. But a neutral despot to solve issues between both clans. Since neither leader could really be counted on to be non biased.

This of course was kept a direct secret from all other Pride demons. Including Jack. When Jowan died, there was no real love lost. He wasn't an ally. However they wanted to maintain the peace with Pride. However. Some elements within their clans disagreed. And unfortunatly got to Pride first. The two leaders watched Jacks rampage. And, thankfully. Jack's hunt brought him to an outlaw rebel. Who in turn led them directly to the camps of the outcasts.

EXP:352