The sight of him emerging only enraged them. Growls rose like a storm. From above, one rothound barked to the others, gloating: this intruder would be an energetic meal. The best kind.
Renny scoffed, lip curling. Best? They were flattering him the way men flatter a whore before use.
"Fuck that," he muttered, tightening his grip on the dagger. "I'll show you why I'm the demon, and you're just the rothounds." He readied himself, demon eyes scanning the pack. Ten rothounds in total, yet he was certain Oliver and his brother could devour them once he had brought them down. And if there were leftovers, the rest of Oliver's captive family would finish the feast. With that thought, he braced himself.
"Well," Renny said, spreading his arms in a wide, taunting stance, "you want lunch, right? Food's ready."
The rothounds didn't take him seriously. They underestimated him. Only three leapt from the ground level to attack, while the remaining seven lingered on the upper platforms, drooling with anticipation, eyes gleaming as if already savoring the moment his head would roll.
But their excitement soured quickly. The three couldn't pin him down. Renny's defense was too sharp, his counters brutal. In a blur, he had already shattered the leg of one hound, his technique snapping bone with calculated precision.
In truth, the rothounds' arrogance had worked in Renny's favor. Only three had been unleashed, and that gave him the breathing room he desperately needed to feel out the battlefield. He evaded, countered, testing the edges of his space as his demon eyes searched for fracture energy to exploit. But as a novice, the task was overwhelming, destruction causes rippled everywhere, chaotic and layered, and he struggled to isolate a single fracture point.
If only he had a spell. A spell could have taken a single cause of destruction and woven it instantly into an effect, giving him leverage. Without one, fracture was all he had to work with—a difficult, but not an impossible one. Victory could still be carved from it.
He pressed on. Another strike, another break, He shattered the leg of the second rothound. The clashes with the first two at the forest had given him a crucial insight into their patterns. They attacked with ferocity, but not with caution. Once they lunged, they left themselves wide open with no defense, only the blind drive to kill. If you met that charge with a counter, the damage was theirs to suffer. Renny seized on that flaw relentlessly, darting across the space, refusing direct engagement, turning their own momentum against them.
Now that two had lost their mobility, the last ground-level rothound held back. But above, impatience won. One dropped from the platform, aiming to catch Renny off guard.
Oliver barked sharply, a warning, then lunged to intercept. It bought Renny just enough time to evade, but Oliver was caught in the attack. The beast's jaws sank into his neck.
"Oliver!" Renny's scream tore out of him. He didn't hesitate. His dagger flew first, whistling past, and then he was there in the flesh, driving his knee hard into the rothound's jaw, forcing its fangs out of Oliver's flesh. The blow launched the beast back into a cluster of rocks, stone shattering under its weight.
Renny dropped beside Oliver, hands trembling as he pressed down on the wound. But the gash was too deep, survival was impossible.
"Fuck! Don't you fucking die on me, Oliver. I'll save your family, just hold on, buddy. I've got you."
He scooped the bleeding Oliver into his arms and carried him back toward the cage. Above, the others finally leapt down, the air thick with snarls and hunger.
Seeing Oliver beside his broken sibling ripped something in Renny's chest. Fuck this. What in Hell is all this? He couldn't believe he was getting emotional, over creatures of Hell, no less.
He let out a sharp breath, forcing the weight in his chest down. Then he turned to face the pack. Claws scraped stone, teeth gleamed, and hunger rolled off them in waves.
Renny tightened his grip on the dagger. "Come on, then," he spat, cursing under his breath. He needed focus, not grief.
One was unconscious, two had broken legs. That left seven. Seven against one. And if the one he'd knocked out woke soon, the odds would tilt even worse.
They all charged at once, surrounding him from every angle, Renny made a high backflip, propelling himself backward, and any rothound that drew too close he marked with his demon eye, spotting a fracture beneath its jaw and driving his dagger upward, the strike connecting and dragging through as the effect burst, its head shattering entirely. One was down but there was no time to breathe, four more closed in from both sides, and as he tried to use his evasive leap again, a set of teeth clamped on his leg and dragged him down, slamming him hard against the stone, and before he could push back, the rest of the pack pounced, claws and fangs burying into him as they began tearing and devouring without pause.