Guns. A short sword, a longer one like rope, a coat that was grey as smoke and dark like shadows. All of these were his tools, they were on his body and as he traversed the dimensions using the Warp in his belt, he carried them along. He could remember how life had been before he was burdened with the destiny of a Hunter; the destiny of a man forced to stand against forces bigger and powerful than him. But he wasn't yet a man and he strove against them.
Before he became the last Hunter, Grey van Aholt was a young man living comfortably in the city witth his trader parents. As usual, childen who are used to comfort and a soft life often grow up looking for more. Grey was the eldest of seven children and while his parents gave him all they had, he sought out more. He saw knights, men at arms whose tales of glory and chivalry won them a great crowd. He heard of the companies that won wars for the Free States and he heard that during the last Hunter dimensional war, the Gunner of Hillt had gunned down a large korok, a water monster. Monsters and demons were real, across all dimensions due to the opening and closing of curtains from which they came, but in his city, he hardly saw one. He was so engulfed by the need to do something great, to be a legend in his own right that he began to buy all the books of legend which talked about great men and orders and it was in those books he found out about the Hunters.
His parents had little time as it was to concern themselves with the growing of their children and so Grey was left to wander on his knowledge seeking path alone. He snuck from his house, bribed a trotter captain into carrying him all the way to the mountainous expanses of the Smoke Tower where the Hunters lived, trained and were made. But, he seems to forget that the Hunters chose their apprentices, and so he was left stranded outside their large castle. Everyday, he saw the initiates walk out, train their meditations, forms and physicalities and then strut back in and he approached the stern teachers many times only to be refused. His spirit was indeed running low but he thought to himself if he went back, it would be back to a joyless, boring rich life home. Surely, he could stay here, he was fifteen at the time and ate the rabbits that scurried about Smoke Tower and lived in a cave. One of the teachers however was moved by the boy's courage and determination. One day, he sought him in the cave and asked him a life-changing question.
"Why do you want to be a Hunter?"
Grey could see his opportunity then, if this teacher had taken his time to come here, then there was a at he could make it into the Smoke Tower.
He replied, truthfully.
"I want to be more than I am now." He replied.
The teacher had smiled.
"You will be more than that." He replied.
And like that, Grey was admitted into the organisation he had always wanted. He learnt fast though that been a Hunter was not as task for the average boy. The weapons they carried had to be mastered to the point of pure understanding.
"A Hunter is one with his environment and his weapons." His teacher always told him. For a boy with no much physical exercise in his life, Grey would struggle. However, he picked up fast and trained at morning and at night. He learnt all the tricks of the weapons and made his own. But, that was only half. Now, came the spiritual part, learning how to blend with the shadows and make them work for him, how to use the Warp and the Hunter's greatest asset, how to do magic. The Hunters did not do pure magic, but used universal symbols that harnessed elemental spirits and pushed them to do whatever they wanted. They were basic signs and each Hunter had to combine then to make whatever complex sign they wanted to show. By the time Grey went through this section, it was more easier for him. He was always good at literature and symbols and the teachers of Smoke Tower called him a natural.
The day came when they would be made Hunters and drink from the root that gave the Hunters immortality and all their super abilities. Before that day, his teacher the man who had made his education possible called him to a stony cliff where he medidated. The Hunter looked at his pupil and bid him sit.
"Tell me, Grey do you feel fulfilled?" He asked.
Grey took in the air, it had been three years and he was a grown teenager of eighteen now.
"Not yet, I feel there is still more for me to do." He said.
His teacher nodded and he knew immediately that the man was happy with his answer.
"Tell me, the purpose of a Hunter is to always contend with evil and in all dimensions, there is thick evil." He said.
Grey nodded.
The teacher held up one finger.
"For the past ten years, only fifty people came here, thirty five were accepted and now only twenty Hunters are been made this year.
Too few. Grey thought.
"We are too few to combat the evil that is coming. Do you know of the one called The Accuser? The Demonlord that rules Hell?" His teacher asked.
Chills ran down Grey's spine.
"The Bringer of Death, The Lion God." He replied.
His teacher snorted.
"Yes, it calls itself a god and it controls everything that is demonic. That is the main opponent, and he knows we are few. We need to transcend our current state and be more smarter. We need to take him headlong and all it takes is one man." His teacher finalised, pointing to him.
"What do you mean? That I should go against the Lion God. I am one man, he's a diety." He replied fearfully.
"What you are is what you make yourself." The teacher said, and that was the last piece of education Grey van Aholt got.
He hunts the Lion God, not because he was asked too, but because he was the last Hunter just a month after his final rite of passage. The Lion God's forces hit the Smoke Tower, sieging all teachers, Hunters and pupils and in that moment, Grey saw what they were up against as sorcerous power tore the Tower apart and killed everyone. Only he survived and because at that moment, he had managed to sneak out and was leading an attack on the forces outside the gate with three other novices. He looked to the sky and saw gigantic tendrils ripping a dimension curtain and when the power blew up everything on that mountain, he fell to the deep waterfall below. He was injured and most of his gear fell into the water, but came back. When he was able to walk, he looked to see if any of his comrades had been wounded but there was nobody. He sent out the telepathic messages again and again but nobody answered. He flew up the demolished mountain with his coat to where Smoke Tower once stood, but it was a charred pile of magic brisks and there wasn't even one body, all of them had been pulverized into ash. He was unable to cry, the process of drinking those roots had dulled all his human emotions, but Grey made his dead teacher one promise. He would bring about the end of the Lion God no matter how long the road be or how hard the struggle. It was all he owed them as the last of his kind.
The road was filled with littered objects, from the broken wheels of cards to pots and clothes, all strewn like they'd been abandoned in some rush. He looked at the grass on the side of the road and huffed, the sun was beating on his head and this was the second village he'd come through that had such an eerie silence. It wasn't normal and he debated leaving everything as he saw it, somewhere a piece of machinery groaned and he sighed. It was better to see what had happened amd whether anybody has survived it at all. The wind blew chilly and he rubbed his arms. His coat was flying overhead in front of him and he wore only his thin mail short and trousers.
"Alright, let's get this over with." He said to himself. To the truth, he was eager to see another living thing that wasn't trying to kill or eat him and with a set face of grim determination, he moved forward.
The first house was a smoldering pile of ashes and for almost thirty minutes, he walked through burnt houses of bricks and wood, including the only tavern.
"Ugh. I was looking to chug a mug of beer." He said. He was thirsty for walking, the Hunters might have a device to transport from dimension to dimension but teleportation was out of their reach for now.
As he walked into what was once the town's market and centre, he heard growling. Mind you, it wasn't around him but enhancement powers from the root he drank gave him special powers and those powers enabled him to have super senses. Grey waited for a second before stepping forwards and just then something flew at him from behind a pile of fallen sacks. He moved back and fended it off with one hand, throwing it away.
He swore as he saw the other things that had now surrounded him. They were once people just like the people of the other town, but some sorcery had changed their being, twisted their bodies into grotesque positions, they stood on their hindlimbs like frogs and from their drool-dropping mouth, a forked tongue darted out. Their skin was green and they had the signature look of the other cursed people.
There was no reasoning with them and even if he loathed what he was about to do, he knew it was the only release. These people had done nothing and were just trash thrown out by a wicked diety.
The Lion God. He said to himself, clenching his teeth. He strained his ears but could not hear any further, it seemed that these ones had cannibalized the other residents of the village.
"Good then, lesser demons to kill." He said.
His coat came down and he shrugged himself into it, the creatures circled him, as if unsure on how or when to attack. He touched the long whip sword in his belt and the first one pounched, launching ten feet into the air.
But, few things can surprise a Hunter and fewer things are faster. In one motion, the whip sword shot out and the creature crumbled to dust. Grey moved in now, he was never the type to wait and be attacked. The others, motivated by anger and hunger rushed towards him, their movements faster than that of a man. But Grey van Aholt was no ordinary man again, and he moved the whip sword like a cotton fly whisk, to and fro and like a vengeful rope, the weapon cut through the demons and ended them all. By the time he was done, he'd hardly strained himself.
"These people bodies were raped by that magic. Nothing but a shell of the demonic spirit that animated them." He said to himself.
As if on cue, the sky opened and the rain fell in large drops. Grey looked up and smiled, his journey was just beginning but it was a small declaration; what he had just done.
The Lion God had wiped out the Hunters, the only people capable of taking the war to it but Grey was still alive and if it was the last thing he did, he would make sure he killed this god.