Till Death Do Us Part - The bear, the worm

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"More than 200 years have passed and I can still hear their screams and their fear-stricken faces, they gave us help and in return we became their nemeses." - Scars

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Scars had been walking through the Shadow Forest, having recently departed the village. A rustle a little further in front of her caught her attention and like the turning of gears that changes the mode of a machine, Scars's brain turned the gear and she promptly went into hunting mode. Her senses became sharper, her hearing muffled all sounds that were not referring to her prey, she kept moving forward, her movements were precise, without exaggeration of force or distance and her gaze fixed in front of her, staring at an adult brown bear.

- It looks like dinner is guaranteed. -

Before any movement, Scars noticed clawed wounds on the bear's side, a strange green liquid oozing from it.

- Four cuts in parallel, green liquid, region around necrotic wound, irregular breathing, yellowish and watery eyes. -

- Damn, why is there a Butterfly hunting around here? They shouldn't be expanding the territory now, is it because of a turf war? The Infinite Night? No, there's still at least three months to go until The Night. -

If it were because of a turf war, the bear would have become food, there is only one occasion when a living being survives a Butterfly, when it carries its larvae during the expansion of territory.

- There's only one way to find out. -

While Scars was lost in her thoughts, the bear began to sniff the air and when she finally decided to act, the bear had already noticed her and began to run frantically in the opposite direction to the girl.

"Damn it! Nightwalker's blood." - As much as being covered in Nightwalker's blood helped her scare away predators, the same was true for her prey.

She threw her spear at the bear, made no mention of being in pain or slowing down, and continued even with the spear stuck in his neck.

Scars started running, normally she would have no problem keeping up with the speed of a bear, but this one, this one ran as fast as a racehorse, which further corroborated her thought about the bear being a host for the larvae of a Butterfly.

Every creature has a limit to which its body can withstand physical exertion, there are a few ways to break this limit and one of the most effective and equally dangerous, is to be a host of larvae of creatures of the abyss, the stronger the creature, the stronger the lava and consequently the stronger the host. This is because it is a defense mechanism of the larva, to remove the limits of the body that hosts it in order to ensure its safety.

Scars laughed as he reminded himself of the irony of this, one's defense mechanism is to take away another's defense mechanism.

The bear was getting away from Scars, but its giant body left an easy trail to follow.

-If only I had my real spear here.-

"When I had finally rid myself of the spirits and future debts, here I am, creating a new debt to the gods."

Among the ways to break the barriers of the human limit, there is a contradictory and equally forbidden one, it is safe to the body, but there is a price to be paid by the user, this method is a contract, a future debt to a god or creature strong enough to lend him the power, the amount of power borrowed is at the mercy of the god, And the greater the power, the greater the debt.

"You are the end and the beginning, from you disorder was born, just as the Order was born, another bears the name of the wind, but even this which is called the origin of hurricanes and breezes originated from you, I beg you to lend the power that once belonged to him, but which was stolen by a false god, This poor soul who has lost the path of chaos, asks you for a future debt contract in exchange for a fraction of the dominion over the wind."

Scars's left eye began to ache, his iris that had previously been gray had become light green, his body had become lighter, his footsteps were silent, his sense of smell had become sharper, and the pores of his body felt the wind from all directions and any slightest change in the air.

Scars was approaching the bear, she stared at her spear and stretched out her arm with her open hand and closed it, but an invisible force prevented her from closing her hand, the spear that had pierced the bear's neck swung frantically, trying to free itself from the muscles and flesh that bound it. Scars pulled his arm towards him trying to pull his spear, his body was suddenly thrown into the air towards the bear and in the middle of the trajectory the spear flew towards him leaving a trail of blood in the air.

Scars held the spear with both hands and landed it on the bear's back, her body hung to the side, but she held firm holding the body of her weapon, she pushed both of her feet on the ground causing them to sink into the earth and then spun her body in the opposite direction the bear was running, soon after the huge body of the bear was on Scars's head, the shaft of his spear was bent, threatening to break and with a final thrust of force, the bear was catapulted against a tree, the impact was so great that the tree broke and fell towards the girl who threw the body aside, narrowly escaping being crushed.

"I didn't expect it to work, but I was tired of this persecution. But I'm glad it worked. -

Scars' torn muscles made her feel her arms burn under her clothes, even with the help of the winds, it had been too much for her body, with difficulty she raised her right hand that held the broken shaft of her spear steady.

"It seems that our history together ends here, you were a good one and one of the best companions I've ever had."

"Now..." Scars struggled to his feet, ignoring his body's cries of pain.

- Even after all these years, I can't seem to get used to the discomfort of pain. -

The girl walked towards the base of the fallen tree, under her, the body of the bear, she searched for the blade of her spear, but was unsuccessful, perhaps she had sunk into the animal's back, she looked at the shaft in her hands.

"This will have to do, maybe if I pierce through the eye, I can put a stop to it."

Scars approached to finish off the creature, but before he could attack it, the bear leapt towards him, pushing the tree that held him away and falling on top of Scars, his paralyzed half pinning the girl's legs with his weight. His teeth tried to reach the girl's neck, but found the metal that protected his arm preventing it from being crushed almost instantly and slowly pierced it, hitting the flesh.

Scars howled in pain and stuck with his free arm the broken rod in the eye of the bear who tried to pull his head back, but the girl's arm that was trapped in his mouth, pulled him back, out of options he opened his mouth and let his arm go, but Scars was quick, with her free arm she grabbed the animal's jaw and pulled its head, further burying the broken rod in his head.

A few seconds passed, Scars' vision was red from the blood dripping from the bear.

"JUST DIE AT ONCE!" With one last tug, the rod went even deeper, to the point that the wanderer's hand also penetrated the creature's eye and it finally fell lifeless on Scars.

It took a few minutes, but finally Scars was able to crawl out from under the animal's lifeless body. The girl spent a few more seconds lying down, gathering her strength, staring at the sky that was beginning to become cloudy, the clouds were not gray, they were completely black, it was as if the night was invading the domain of the day.

The wanderer got up and she walked up to the already lifeless bear, looked again for her blade and found it deep in the animal's back, pulled it out of there and went to check the wound she had found earlier and it really hit with a wound made by a Butterfly. Scars then cut the wound by digging deep into the animal until he could find the larva.

It was the size of Scars' two hands together, was white, smooth, and had a large round mouth with hundreds of teeth that tried to bite into the girl's hand. The worm let out a high-pitched cry of pain as the girl squeezed it tightly with the hand that had previously held the broken shaft that was now in the bear's skull, after exploding in her hand, Scars dropped the remains of the worm on its host.

"I'm not the best at rituals, but I can't take the risk of having another worm inside or coming back to life and..." Scars closed her right eye, seeing the world only with her left eye, she saw a world invisible to mundanes, this world was like a drawing, the objects had a faint color that referred to her life before being an object, but they had the traits that delimited her shape, like a prison holding her essence, Living creatures, on the other hand, were like free flames that vaguely assumed the form that resembled their appearance in the physical world, but never attached to traces.

The flames of the bear's essence were black flames, normally a dead creature would lose its essence and the environment around it would consume it, but some circumstances, such as for example a host, these flames would never be extinguished would continue to contaminate the environment, consuming the surrounding life until someday it becomes a hive of abyss creatures. In addition to the bear's essence, Scars noticed smaller ones, even darker and more intense, just looking at them made his eye burn and his head hurt.

"... As I thought, there were other worms hiding, it doesn't surprise me that he fought so hard."

-Without the necessary ingredients, I really have no other choice but to ask for the help of... -

"You."

Scars looked to the side and sitting on the fallen tree was a silver essence, whose shape resembled that of an owl, the outside of his irises was completely black while his iris was silver equally to his body, it was like the moon on a starless night.

-A fragment of the real Moon-

Scars knelt down staring at the fragment.

"I, ----- ---- wish to solicit a mutual exchange, give you the fragment of my story, my true self, in return I ask for your company strength during the infinite night and to help me prevent the Abyss from consuming this world destined for chaos." - Scars closed her eyes and when she opened them, she was now in the center of a lake during a full moon night.

Her body touched the water but did not sink, her armor had been replaced by a silver dress, her helmet had been replaced by a wreath of blue lilies, she looked down and saw in the water the distorted reflection of her face, her bare arms were marked by scars, her left had a new scar, symbolizing the recent combat with the bear.