Beast be damned

Hector truly enjoyed crushing their bones with his hammers, but he knew that being careless would be very dangerous.

So he still paid attention to his surroundings, and thanks to it he was able to see one of the creatures wasn't approaching them but just walking in circles around them. He hoped that killing him would take care of others, something akin to a hive mind.

And so he pointed at him and yelled, "Walter! Shot at that one."

Walter was able to understand who he was meant to shoot and so he took aim and hit his mark.

But what happened next was different than he expected. The creature did not fall to the ground like the rest of them, but held his wounded head in his hand and started to trash around.

After a few moments, it started to scream and howl. Its body twisted, its bones broke and realigned themselves.

'So not a hive mind, good to know.' Hector said.

The creature's skin and flesh started to mutate to that of bestial shape. Like those mutated libs that they have, but now it was changing his whole body.

Hector did not wait for it to fully transform and started to shoot at the creature repetitively.

Unfortunately, he was not able to take it down with his revolver and so he run at it and smashed it with his light hammer.

'Light hammer is much more effective.' He concluded as the creature fell to the ground dead halfway through its transformation.

Hector then heard hurried steps behind him, and as he was turning he could see one of the creatures running at him in his peripheral vision.

He saw that he wouldn't be able to block it in time or counterattack, and so he jumped to the side, barely avoiding the creature.

After jumping to the side Hector stabilized himself and smashed the creature in the back of its head with his full force. He felt his hammer enter the creature's head and tear part of its skull.

When the body fell to the ground he could see the brain of the creature. What caught his attention wasn't the gore of the situation but what was there.

On the inside of the creature's head was something that looked like an overgrown baby head with hair growing out of its mouth. The hair was attached to the inside of the skull, and something like an umbilical cord went through the baby's head and eye to the spine of the creature.

For some reason it makes him think of some twisted version of ascension through a rebirth of one being.

Hector knew that he had no time to think about it and that he needs to act fast as others were approaching them.

------

Hector enjoyed slaughter as any other but now he was getting slightly tired. Thankfully about two-thirds of them are already dead so only a few remain.

When the last of the creatures fell he sighed with relief as he walked to the rest of the group. He saw that Anna was equally exhausted while Bella was hunched breathing heavily.

After that, he saw as Edwin and Walter joined them from the balcony, "Is everyone all right?" Edwin asked looking at each of them individually.

"Yes, just exhausted," Bella answered still panting and Hector gave an affirmative response.

As Edwin was about to speak they could hear rumbling and bestial hands had risen from the corpses of dead creatures. When it stood up its height was about two meters. It was a fully transformed creature. Its body was covered with white fur, its build was thin which only made its head look more grotesque as its mouth was the size of a watermelon.

The beast howled and started to run at them on all fours of its limbs. As it was charging them it opened its mouth trying to bite them. Hector and the rest of the group were able to jump to the side avoiding it'đ bite.

The creature did not stop and run farther until it hit the wall with its head. The group took out their guns and started to shoot the creature. Bullets were able to harm the creature but from the wounds, its skin is much harder than before.

Thankfully Walter had a rifle as that was much more effective than revolvers. Hector then thought about what to do and then he took out water that he purified with his light hammer the night before. He then took aim and threw it at the beast, spilling its content on its hide.

The beast started to howl in pain as the water was akin to acid to the creature. Then he runs at it and slams the hammer at the beast's eye, jamming his other hand into the beast's second eye. When he touched the back of the best eye he summoned poisonous flames so it would burn from inside.

As the best howled from the pain it trashed with its head and as Hector was wedged in its eye socked he flew from side to side as he lost his footing.

Even when his feet no longer touched the ground he was still using his flames to burn the beast, "Why won't you just die already!" He yelled as he regain his footing and with full strength, he pulled back trying not to be bitten by the beast.

After a few more moments of fighting beast had fallen to the ground no longer moving.

When he took a few breaths he took out his hands and hammer and tried to clean them with beast fur as they were covered with gore.

He could hear hurried steps of the group running toward him, and when they came they started to check if he is alright. When he told them that there was no problem they saw as the fog that was present in the room started to dissipate and another balcony with a door leading farther into the tomb

When they saw it Edwin spoke, "Well that was interesting." As they were contemplating what to do next Walter saw light coming from the corpse of the beast, "Hey, look at that."

They saw as worms crawled from the eye socket of the beast. And when they fell to the ground they started to withe. After which phantasmal slug slithered out.

"What is that thing?" one of them said.

Hector wasn't sure but from his experiences, with video games, he was guessing that it was their reward.

"Probably our spoils after the fight." He said but did not attempt to take it into his hands, he would prefer if others would try it first.

"Spoils?" Edwin asked as he went to it and started to study it.

"I propose that you should take it and at the end, we will split it based on what we will find next," Hector said as he did not know what it was, but it looked interesting and so he wanted it if it won't be too dangerous.

"And I also propose that we should return to the balcony and rest for a little bit. After which we can continue with our exploration." Others agreed and so the group climbed the ladder and sit on the balcony.

Hector took out his provisions and saw that others did the same. Walter took out a metallic object with some liquid inside.

"For cooking," Walter spoke as he took out matches and started a fire. Then to everyone's amazement, he put a small frying pan on it. After laying a few sausages on it they could smell a fragrance that made them salivate.