Chapter 148 - The Antiquity

The lake view is the sanctuary for animals and for some people, but the time they get there, it was all but a total blanket of silence. Alastor was paying attention to the field. He wasn’t sure if this is a safe place.

Nevertheless, Timber has something to say for him.

Alastor observed his tall stature from behind as they walked towards the lake. He observed him for a while. Something had popped into his mind.

Alastor took a wide berth. He fortified and made a roundhouse kick.

Almost, Timber’s arm move swiftly as if it was automatic and caught his calf.

Timber gave an over-the-shoulder look and smirked. The corner of his eyes brimmed in green light.

“You really trying to press my button, aren’t ya boy?’

Alastor grinned. “No. I was just testing you. It’s been a while.”

“I doubt about it. If I were to deduce, you just want to settle the score with me.”

“The last time we fought, it was a draw.”

“Little prick.” Timber announced. “Hold down your Comodo and listen to what I am going to say.”

Timber threw his legs on the air. Alastor sighed and sat down a bedrock.

He drew out a bottle of beer he got from them and plucked out the sealing with his teeth, spitted it out on the ground while watching Timber kicked a speck of dirt and sat down.

“So, how long have you known your parents before they dumped you to the glade?”

Alastor winced for a moment, annoyed. “Wow, that is so not awfully a personal question.”

“I don’t mean to offend but it’s all part of my investigation.”

“And what again you’re investigating?”

“In particular, your origin.”

Alastor did not flinch and looked at him straight in the eyes.

“If you truly understand what I am just like what you said earlier, then I don’t think you need to ask me that question.”

Timber snickered. “You are sharp as your mouth, attaboy.”

“Instead of investigating about my origin, why don’t you tell me about exclamation before. No matter how I put it, I don’t find similarities to you guys, especially you.”

Timber laughed then a moment he paused and coughed. He sighed before continuing. “Very well, huh. Where do I start? Ah yes, I have to make it simpler for you to understand. For starters, these people, MY people are Tribunal Hunters.”

Alastor who was in the middle of savoring the beverage nearly burst out.

“I can see that you’re surprised.” Timber let out a brief sighed. “We Tribunal Hunters are blessed with ability that allows us to see the mark.”

“The mark of what?”

“The mark of a Hunter.”

Alastor pretends to look and inspect his body. “As far as I’m concern, I ain’t seeing anything mark on my body. You sure you ain’t seeing something else with that gem eye of yours?”

Timber heard him right. “Oh, I’m sure I’m seeing it right.” He replied as he observed Alastor’s clavicle on the right part of his chest. A mark Υ appeared to be beaming in white light but that appeared to be visible only in Timber’s eyes.

Timber continued. “You don’t seem to be surprised?”

“Because I know it is not true. If I’m one of the Hunters, I should be able to know that by this time of my life.”

Timber pondered on his thoughts. He glanced back at Alastor. “Well, if you don’t believe then let me tell you the history of the Hunters.”

Timber stole Alastor’s beer and drank all of the remainders. He continued. “It all started with the Seven Wonders.”

Alastor raised a brow. “You mean the gods who came before?”

Timber chuckled. “They are not gods, just mere apparitions that represent the characteristics of all living and non-living things. Ashura-Tenrei, the Indominable Will. Cyfer, the Neverending Passion. Sylvette, the Paradigm of Justice. Tyf, the Guide of Souls. Pryka, Provision of Life. Ifta, the Keeper of Order. And Jaksen, the Overlord of Chaos. These celestial beings had help formed this universe and build the life as we now experienced.”

“These celestial beings you spoke of, are you sure they’re not gods? They sound like gods to me.”

“They are not.”

“How do you know?”

“It was written on the transcript passed down by our ancestor.”

Alastor raised a brow. His interest was caught. “May I take a look?”

Timber looked back at him. “What do you think of yourself, lucky?”

“It’s a no then?”

“Obviously,” Timber continued narrating. “Sometime after they’re done creating, the celestial beings have grown tired watching the humans and the other species of the universe, and so they wanted to create new more species. Not just to satisfy their curiosity but also to turn the tide between the world of mortals and the supernatural at balance. We Hunters were created for that purpose, but the first line of Hunters was not born here on our planet. They spawned from another planet. It has many names, Gaia, Midgard, but currently known as Earth.” Timber spat saliva and continued, “The celestial beings left them with the given purpose and that is to make sure that the world between mortals and supernatural remained in balance.”

“So I have been told, but how many Hunters are there?”

“Many. In fact, if combined our world there could be more than 7 types of Hunters. The first one was the Primordial Hunters, they’re made to be hard to kill. They may not able to conjure magic but they can cancel any kind of magic if they will, other than that, they possessed superhuman strength, agility, and kinetic observation skills. The second to spawn was the Gustafahl Hunters, they are the ancestors of werewolves and alike to it. Aside from their superhuman strength, they can harness celestial energy and use it to create magic. The next is the Archaegian Hunters, they’re similar to the Mephistic Hunters, but only that they have full control and have their own dark energy and do not need to perform rituals to gather dark energy. The Mephistic Hunters, on the other hand, has to gather dark energy, there are a lot of ways of how to do it, such as celestial events or using nature itself to convert it into dark energy and store it somewhere, by that they can use magic on some extent. The next is the Tribunal Hunters, we can copy the ability of any monsters as long their level is not too far from us or too low. With sheer will, we can also control a monster, although it has a drawback…”

Alastor intercepted. “The more controlling and demanding the command, the harder to control them.”

Timber nodded in agreement. “You are right, despite controlling them, they are still aware of their surrounding, hence they can resist the spell.” He paused. His eyes turned to suspicion and then continued. “How did you know about it?”

Alastor eyelids swelled. He wasn’t supposed to say that. “There’s no used to keep it to myself. Oh well. We encountered monsters that were controlled by a man named Hannibal.”

Timber’s eyes widened. “So you have met that traitorous bastard, eh.”

“Yeah,” Alastor replied.

“I assume that they’re still experimenting.”

“Yes.”

“Have you successfully killed them?”

“No. We got separated. So, I have to fight him alone and his lackeys, but he escapes.”

“I understand.”

“What is it they want?”

“They want to experiment to control the monsters without any drawbacks.”

“Isn’t that a good thing?”

“NO!” Timber was also taken aback with his tone. “I apologize.”

“They really did get on your nerves.”

“You can say that. Listen, we Tribunal Hunters live with a code. ‘We don’t mess with nature’. We have to make sure that humans won’t screw with nature and vice versa. It has been passed down that we should be the medium for the man and nature coexist, that includes the monsters and animals, too.”

“So, you’re like forest rangers but still enslaves the monsters like what would a poacher do?”

Timber stared at him for a while and so Alastor did too.

“You’re an asshole, you know that, right?”

Alastor put on a proud face. “I’m not ashamed of it.”

“Scumbag.”

Timber responded and heard a chuckle.