Broken Hearts. Mended Lives Chapter 24

With the cold iron tools I needed, I went and picked up Elsa, Annika, Hinata, and of course Ahri.

Hinata of course, still being combat-phobic would be sticking close to the vampires who could protect while I acted as bait along with having Ahri with me as support.

With walkie-talkies synched up to some Bluetooth ear buds, we could talk over some distance without issue. And with all these preparations, we drove our car into the wilderness. 

Into the long forgotten roads, hiking trails that were only kept cleared of fallen trees basically in case companies wanted to re-open the old silver mines and even the road work were done entirely off of 'slave labor' Being the local prison population doing the work.

This meant that the roads/paths were often overgrown on the sides of the roads with thick grass and brush.

But the drive was uneventful as we headed towards a large lake that acted as a campsite and previously a home for the miners who used to work the silver mines more than a century ago.

And the lake houses were seemingly empty with the single guard house also seemingly empty of the person who was supposed to be watching the lake houses people typically rented during the summers.

As our car was the only one I could see in the area. "Hinata, use your Byakugan to see if you can pick up anyone in these houses." 

After a few minutes, Hinata spoke again with a bit of sickness in her voice. "Yes, it looks like one of the houses was torn apart on the inside with the people being torn out of the house." 

I frowned before I asked. "Can we follow the tracks?" And Hinata nodded with us going to the back of the house and my frown deepened as I saw how the back of the house looked like it literally got torn open by a grizzly bear with large claw marks around the door where the thick wooden door was literally ripped off its hinges.

'These thick doors are made with bears literally in mind to say nothing of keeping hooligans from breaking into the houses.' I thought as I gazed at the dark brown splotches of the poor bastards who were ripped from the house.

"Alright, let's get going up into the mountains then. These Wendigos are hunting for humans with entirely too much fervor." I said shaking my head.

Hinata nodded with a pallid light across her face at seeing the dried blood but she moved with the group without issue as we left the campgrounds and headed up into the dense darker forest that had a soft layer of fog across the ground.

The sounds of dark forests filled our ears as we entered the forest and Elsa spoke softly. "This forest is filled with a great number of human deaths... The miners who died of exposure in the winter storms when the mines were open. And then the Wendigos that began hunting the humans and natives of this region." 

I was silent myself as I could feel it myself with my chakra. The spiritual energy of this area was... Just off. It set my nerves on edge and even the fog that obscured our feet seemed heavy and obscuring the sounds of our footfalls.

And after we made our way deep into the forest and our view was utterly swallowed by the sea of tree's and the rolling hills and mountains it happened. A loud haunted howl rang out with a tremendous volume that shook the air.

The howl wasn't from any wolf, supernatural or otherwise. No it was born of a ragged, mad, and hungry creature. A creature that sensed us entering its territory. And that howl was it awakening from its slumber and letting us know it was coming.

Because prey that had been stewing in its juices of fear and desperation would have its flesh taste all the sweeter to the endlessly hungry beast.

With Annika dryly reporting. "Seems we ran into the territory of a lonesome Wendigo, probably the one that broke into that lake house."

As it was just the one Wendigo that howled, rather than the haunting and literally maddeningly song of howls that tribes of Wendigos were known for that could shatter windows from dozens of meters away when they howled together.

Hinata then spoke up quickly. "It's coming! That way!" She pointed and I looked over in that direction with the cold iron axe I had been leaning onto my shoulder falling into both my hands as I waited for the beast to come into view.

Soft thumping noises rang out and I watched with cold eyes as the monster came into view... Flitting between tree's to break our view of it. Its long loping gait is obscured by the supernatural fog below our feet.

But I locked on, to the bastard.

Its vaguely humanoid form was burned into my view and I knew I would have zero hesitation in slaying the monster as it was a far away as possible a human figure like my cum drunk pet vampires were.

It was tall, like more than ten feet tall, closer to three meters high and its entire form was skinny if not scrawny with its form clad in dark fur.

But that wasn't the disgusting bit, its white ribs were popping out of its fur-lined chest with how 'starved' it was. And instead of a remotely human head, its had a large skeletal elk head with dripping gore hanging off its raw bone head and its horns.

"Hinata, you watch for more." I spoke as I used my chakra to reinforce my body and then I was off. My feet kicked off dirt behind me as I dashed forward to meet the monster and as I came close to the monster I held the axe in one hand as I formed a couple of hand signs with my other hand.

As soon as the monster and I drew close and its massive clawed hand drew up to fall upon me with its malevolent crimson glowing eyes starring at me.

I gave up all signs of honorable dueling or whatever as a fucking massive semi-truck-sized fireball exploded from my mouth and consumed the highly flammable and combustible monster.