Sound of soft steps echoed between the trunks of the northern fir trees. Branches were disturbed, leaves falling with each vibrating footfall.
Sol dashed from one tree's shadow to another, obscured by the light grayness of the sky.
Around him, dashing in tandem with his speed, were five streaks of white, weaving in and out of the trees.
"You will find your quarry near the hills, little sun, just outside the woods. And as I told you before, my children won't be there to assist you. They will only be there as my witness."
"What are we doing again? Witness to what?" Sol's breath stayed steady, even as he pushed to his fastest pace, leaping between roots as if he carried no weight.
"A Hunt." Haati's voice was close, but Sol knew she wasn't anywhere near. Haati had stayed by his zhe'har's home with Nia and Rahzgir, likely because she still had something else to say to them. "And you need a way to adapt yourself to using some of my powers."
I don't feel any exertion at all. Weird. Is this because of my zhe'har's training? Was that even training?
Sol's speed ran close to the pups'. It was hard to tell whether they were slowing to match him, or whether he was just fast enough that they had to push a little harder.
Far ahead, a deer munched wild berries from a bush in peace, unassuming. The shadows of Sol and the pups passed it in a blink, leaving only a gust of wind and a scatter of fallen leaves in their wake.
Woah. That was close. I almost hit a deer.
"Aunt Haati? What are we hunting?" Sol knew the forest would end soon, and right outside this snow-laden wood was an open hill.
"A bear."
Bear? Wait a minute... Sol racked his brain for anything he knew about bears near the Dalmas, the Lowlands, and his village. Only one fit.
Helarzos. The big white bear with a back full of massive spikes that acted as armor, protecting it from Nhivens and Garms. Helarzos could be found prowling near the Dalmas when they hunted fish, but more often they were seen near the nest of the Apideis, the Harvester, the Snow Bees of the Stake.
"No way... we're hunting a Helarzos? What about the bees?" Sol slipped past a branch with ease. His reflexes were better, at least twice as fast. "I really, really don't know how to handle the bees. They can swarm me to death."
"They won't."
"How can you be so sure?" Sol wove beneath a broad tree and surged forward, closing the gap to Wanwan, who was lolling his tongue happily beside him.
"As I told you, you need a way to acclimatize your body to the powers of a Guardian Beast. Without the acclimatization process, my powers will rip your body apart."
"Yeah, well, you just touched our foreheads together and told me to go..." Skafl caught up on his left. It was impressive how he could run as fast as the pups, or at least at the speed the pups found fun to keep.
"Oh? Was our little sun expecting something else? A great blue light enveloping you, perhaps? Or a great awakening with flames? Or the sky opening to shine its light upon you, o the one chosen by one out of three Guardian Beasts of the Stake?"
"Well..." Sol had hoped something that awesome would happen, but in truth, he hadn't felt anything. They touched foreheads, and that was it. "...I guess I kinda did..."
"Fufu. I will keep that in mind."
"Wait, three Guardian Beasts? I thought there were only two."
"I will tell you again later. Your quarry is close."
Sol saw light beginning to break through the lines of trees. The hill lay directly ahead.
The treeline ended, and in front of him now lay the Snowy Hills, where Helarzos were often seen fighting the small-but-many Apideis for honey.
Sol stopped and scanned his surroundings. If there was any clue to be found, it would be marks on the trunks. The Armored Bear often scored their passage so they could find their way home.
He found one. Two. Three. Not many, but enough. Everything drew him farther west, toward another cluster of trees.
So he dashed that way with the five pups.
"Can't see him. Found some scratches on the trees. Tracking west."
"You trained yourself well, little sun." Haati's voice sounded pleasantly surprised.
"Just in theory, I'm afraid. Nobody in the village allowed me to go out or interact with people, really, even though Teacher Naama taught me everything a Hunter should know. That's why..." Sol looked around. He found a few more scratches, but they seemed older than the three he'd found first. "...I don't really have any practical experience, as I have never hunted before."
Sol heard Haati sigh inside his mind. It was a strange sensation. "...What are you?"
"What am I... I don't understand." Sol found footprints, deep indentations in the snow. Two sets. "We got two bears."
"What are you currently doing? Presently."
"Tracking?"
"And that's part of..."
"Hunting..." Sol moved fast, following the tracks toward another patch of trees on the opposite side of the mountain. The soil was wet and slippery, the roots a nuisance, yet none of it seemed to slow him. "...I'm a Hunter."
"Exactly. Chin up. Now, I will show you how Moonwolves hunt."
Moonwolves! So their kind is called that, and not the Snow White Garms? Not even Teacher Naama knows this, I bet. Sol cracked a smile and slipped through a crack of roots, emerging on the other side with ease. He would finally have a story to tell everybody when he got back to the village.
Hopefully, people would listen.
"Moonwolves have an amazing sense of smell. And our sense of smell integrates with our sense of sight. Do you know what that means, little sun?"
"I... do not know."
"Close your eyes."
Sol closed his eyes, and what he saw amazed him. What should have been darkness was filled with dozens of lines of color, intertwining, mixing, separating.
Smell.
"What you are seeing right now is what your nose is currently detecting. Unfortunately, you are not us. You aren't blessed with the natural propensities for this type of power. So you need time to attune yourself to your surroundings. That is why I sent my five pups with you."
Sol opened his eyes and looked toward the five pups surrounding him. Except for Wanwan, it was almost impossible to tell the other four apart. "Their smell."
Sol closed his eyes again and concentrated. To his surprise, he could see each of their colors. Skafl burned bright orange. Hrida and Drifa ran similarly green, but Hrida leaned bluer toward teal while Drifa shifted toward leafy green. Fonn was earthy brown. Wanwan was the light blue of frostflame, shining brighter than the rest.
Sol, eyes still closed, turned toward the hills, the places they'd already crossed. True enough, he could see their coloration forming a track from here toward the Longrass Field, where the color dulled and began to mix with everything else.
"As expected. I knew from the first moment I laid my eyes on you that you were a very fast learner. Now, you just have to attune this sense with your eyes. Have any idea how to do that?"
"No. I don't think I'll be able to do that without guidance."
"That is the reason why our foreheads touched, little sun. I have bestowed some of my existence upon you. You don't have to think hard for this one, just think of it as a piece of me that will accompany you on your journey to guide your senses." Haati paused, then continued. "How one will use this piece of existence, ultimately, is entirely up to the one blessed with it. Now, try and will it. Combine the two senses."
"Piece of existence..." Sol still didn't understand, but he did what Haati asked and opened his eyes. "Nothing changed."
"You just willed it without doing anything with it. Try locking yourself to an aroma you want to track."
Sol looked around, tracking with his eyes, searching for any clue to the two Helarzoses' whereabouts, or signs of Apideis. He found one, a broken branch. One of the bears must have been nimble. He closed his eyes and found color clinging to the break, brown and gold, the color of honey.
Sol jumped toward it and touched it. The break was fresh. It hadn't frozen over yet. They were close. Sol closed his eyes, touched the color, and lifted it to his nose.
Will it... Sol concentrated hard. He caught the earthy musk of dirt from Helarzos' claws. The skunky, potent wet-soil reek from the paw. The wet-grass smell from its fur.
It hunts Apideis for a living, yet it also goes toward the river to hunt fish whenever the Apideis move toward the Lowlands to pull nectar from plants and flowers. It fights for fun. There's some scent of blood mixed with dirt... it killed something recently. Not a fish. The colors he saw grew more vivid with each detail he caught. The honey-colored light shone bright in the dark, drawing a clear line toward his destination.
He opened his eyes.
The colors stayed.
"I... I can see it!" Sol looked around, excited, but the more he looked, the more the colors bled into each other, graying out before dissipating. "Ah..."
"Concentration is key, little sun. If a hunter loses sight of his quarry, his life is forfeit. Be glad that you are not in danger."
"I understand." Sol closed his eyes again and reattuned his senses to the broken branch. The colors returned seconds later. He opened his eyes. "I'm ready."
"Good. Don't forget, you are here to attune your senses. You are not here to spread death indiscriminately. Incapacitate them. Lethal force is only allowed when your life is threatened, which I doubt will ever happen with the bears." Haati paused again, as if thinking. "Unless..."
"Unless? Is there something that I should know?"
"I detected some other smell near the Apideis' nest some time ago. They felt more organized."
"And that means what...?"
"That means, if you find your life in danger, the first thing to do is to eliminate the dangers you can eliminate, before...?"
"Before preparing ourselves for another skirmish."
"Good. Advance Forward, but do not forget to Retreat and Regroup. Skoll told me this once. He was fascinated by how humans conduct their wars." A hint of bittersweet melancholy threaded Haati's voice.
"Advance Forward. Retreat and Regroup. I got it."
The colors in Sol's vision grew more vivid the closer he drew to the two Helarzoses. One jump later, and he could already see them wrecking an Apideis hive near the top of a tree. Branches dropped with each swipe. The zuzu ball-sized Apideis swarmed them, yet the spikes and carapace of the bears rendered every advance of the Apideis Soldiers useless. None of the stings went through.
One of the bears looked down and noticed Sol. The five pups stopped. Wanwan let out a quick woof, a command, and the other four spread wide, forming a perimeter around the big tree where the Apideis hive was being pillaged.
The bear huffed, its face wet and coated in golden honey. Dozens, if not hundreds, of dead, melon-sized Apideis lay on the ground. Some moved their wings weakly. Some tried to stand and fly, and failed.
"I'm here." Sol readied both of his weapons, both hilts settling firm in his hands. It felt good. Finally, he could fight with two daggers.
"Good. Now, why do you think they don't pay you much interest?"
"Because they're currently munching on some Royal Jelly?"
"No... because they don't feel threatened by you. You're not their predator."
"Should they pay attention to me? Can't I just shout at them?"
"Fufu. You can certainly try." Her tone wasn't condescending. It carried an old amusement, like a grandmother smiling at a child blowing bubbles.
"Uh. Hey? Helarzos?" Sol called up. Neither bear spared him a glance, busy licking honey from the deep hive. "Uh... is the hive supposed to be that big?"
"Found success?" Haati's voice sounded smug, as if she'd known the outcome from the start.
"...No."
"Didn't it make you a little annoyed? Offended, perhaps? How prey won't take notice of its predator?"
"Honestly... no, not really." Sol found her amusement more annoying than being ignored by the Helarzos, but he couldn't say that.
"Do you know why prey are usually very keen on changes in their surroundings?"
"Yes. They need to pay attention, unless they really, really have a deathwish."
"Correct. It is precisely because they don't want to die that they force themselves to be aware of their surroundings. And you should also notice how the forest, caves, mountains, or wherever it is, goes silent every time a predator arrives." Haati paused, seeming to remember something. "That is because there is something about a predator that everything within its domain can sense."
"Just like how I sensed the Nhiven's attack before it hit me."
"That's different, but it works in a similar vein. A predator always brings their domain with them, a place where, within it, their rule is absolute. The higher the predator sits within the pyramid, the larger this domain will be, the more it will invade or even swallow other, smaller predators' domains."
Sol kept his eyes locked on the two bears, still feeding above.
Predator's Domain, huh...
"What you're saying is I don't have what it takes to be the predator of the Helarzoses? Because I don't have that domain?" Sol twirled the dagger in his right hand, brows furrowed. His eyes flicked to Wanwan, yawning somewhere to the northeast.
"Oh, no. On the contrary. The best predators are those who can suppress their domain until it is as small as possible, until it ceases to exist. You just have to control yours. If you know how to suppress it, you must also know that you can expand it." She sounded deeply amused. "You already performed far above my expectations, little sun."
"And I will be able to achieve that by..." He twirled the dagger in his left hand as well.
"What I said before. Take offense. Just like how a Master takes offense at their pupils' disrespect and weakness. Just like how a Ruler takes offense when their rules are broken."
"That easy?" The twirling stopped. One of the Helarzos was eyeing him now. "I don't think it'll be that easy, Aunt Haati."
"You already hold a piece of my existence, little sun. Have a little more faith."
Have a little more faith, she said... Sol looked up again, toward the two big, fat bears, their carapace shielding them from Apideis stings, their spikes guarding them from larger predators like Nhivens and Moonwolves.
How do I even hit them? They are well protected with their carapaces and spikes on their back... Sol observed the two bears.
Both looked bigger than normal bears, but one of them was more nimble than the other. That was the one that broke the branch.
You know what. It does feel annoying how both of them can ignore me like that.
"Oi." Sol twirled his daggers once more, eyes still locked upward. The two Helarzos stopped feeding and stared in his direction, like they sensed something.
Sol could finally make sense of what Haati was trying to say. He could feel his annoyance start to rise, like something beginning to boil inside him.
A Predator took this insolence as an offense.
Without realizing it, the five pups looked toward him at the same time.
His eye color turned gold.
"Get down."
An invisible wave expanded instantly from him.
The entirety of the forest went silent.
The two bears fell from their perch.