ꜱ1ᴇ1　　south quarter

@☼　Rolf Helson 2/2

↳ ᴀᴘʀɪʟ 15, 2051 (evening)
↳ ɴᴏᴡ ᴘʟᴀʏɪɴɢ: trøllabundin - eivør

There was a cut bleeding across Ailell’s cheek, the half-elf wiping blood on his hand. At some point, he’d discarded his black cardigan—it had done nothing but get in his way—and his black pants had new tears in the left thigh, shredded strings getting in the cuts left behind by sharp claws in a battle to the bitter end. Ailell didn’t notice the pain, only the irritation of blood drying and his pants sticking to his leg and the wound.

The creature that had attacked him lay dead, another stain on Ailell’s soul. When he died, the gods would surely punish him for his murders of innocents at the command of Mortem. Nothing he did would ever redeem him or his actions.

His earpiece crackled.

/“The other squad is requesting backup,”/ Lian told him, her words rushed and hasty. Ailell knew the stress and fear was beginning to get to her as it grew later in the day—and the pain, from listening to the war and the losses, the pain, the cries that she surely heard from all of the fallen hunters. /“Apparently something happened—something big—I don’t even know what I heard but it was bad.”/

His right hand, the hand that wasn’t wrapped around the shaft of his battleax came up to adjust the earpiece, settling it more securely in his right ear. “How bad is bad?”

/“All of them are dying, bad.”/ Lian’s voice was shaky. /“It was getting so bad… I turned my earpiece off. I—something was killing them. But I couldn’t hear it. It was like it wasn’t even there.”/

“Say no more.” Ailell pulled out his earpiece and muted his input. He could hear Lian if she continued to speak to him, but she wouldn’t hear him—Ailell had no desire to help the other squadron, for they were filthy hunters who hadn’t been raised with the most basic of ethics that Ailell had instilled in his own squadron—but he would go in that direction anyway, if only to find out what it had been that was wiping them out and left Lian so shaken up. Perhaps she exaggerated, as she was wont to do, but there was a /feeling/, a sinking in Ailell’s gut that told him otherwise.

A feeling that told him he would find something he didn’t want to find.

The monsters that entered Ailell’s path on his way to the south side of the city were cut down, blood singing across the surface of his axe. The half-elf left a trail of death behind him, what straggling hunters he found from the other squad of Mortem little more than broken corpses when he left them behind. Ailell had no emotional attachment to them and there were no witnesses to see how he struck them down and left them to be picked at by the carrion birds or carted away with the rest of the dead when the battle eventually came to a close.

They were of no concern to him.

The hunter emerged into a street and drew up short, his eyes wide when he took in the devastation that was beginning to pull away, a rift that was closing. It was a powerful magic, more powerful than that Ailell had faced before. And for a moment, the hunter felt threatened.

But then he saw the man who stood at the far end of the street, and all of that faded away.

Ailell’s strides were sure when he approached, his battleax propped on his left shoulder and his eyes never tearing away from Rolf. Even if the hunter hadn’t witnessed the event that had left the street devastated, there was a part of him that just /knew/ that this had been Rolf’s handiwork.

It wouldn’t change anything. Ailell had known Rolf was a nonhuman for a long time. And these hunters were not from his squadron, so Rolf hadn’t shed the blood of Ailell’s clan.

As he neared Rolf, Ailell reached out for the bartender, pulling him in close to check him over for injuries as panic rose in his chest—not for Mortem and their losses but for the man in front of him—the realization that Rolf had engaged in combat had sunk in and Ailell was concerned that he may have been harmed by the second squadron. “Rolf,” he breathed, his hand sliding down Rolf’s arm, “you promised me you would stay in today.”

He had made Rolf promise not to leave his apartment, so that he would be certain Rolf was safe. And now all of the worry was seeping in all at once, thick and tense in every line of the half-elf’s body as his hand hooked on one of the bartender’s, feeling the warmth and life and letting it ground him, letting it reassure him that Rolf was still in one piece. “You told me you wouldn’t leave your apartment. That you wouldn’t put yourself in harm’s way.” The words came out soft, shaky. Things that Ailell could never be in front of Mortem and yet Rolf wrung them out of him as though it were easy to reduce Ailell to a man rather than a soldier.

Ailell stepped back so he could lower his battleaxe, letting it rest on the ground beside him so he could pull Rolf into a strong hug, wrapping Hel’s son up in his arms and holding him tight.

“Are you hurt?” he whispered, even if it might have seemed a foolish question to ask—he knew the nastiness Mortem was capable of and Ailell didn’t know Rolf’s durability—it was a thing he didn’t want to know—what interest had he ever had in harming him? There was none—but Mortem was dangerous and Mortem had weapons that Ailell had seen carve even the monsters who seemed the strongest into slivers. “Did any of them touch you?”

@☼　Rolf Helson 1/2

↳ ᴀᴘʀɪʟ 15, 2051
↳ ɴᴏᴡ ᴘʟᴀʏɪɴɢ: skugge - wardruna
↳ ᴀɪʟᴇʟʟ: https://i.pinimg.com/564x/fa/b7/08/fab70867b610e63b1fce0be47bc7d741.jpg

Ailell had roused his soldiers in the quiet of the earliest morning, his voice gentle until they were gathered in the hall. His eyes scanned over the ranks of hunters as his voice echoed throughout the high-ceilinged chamber, informing his soldiers about the mission they were all going to undertake. It was a somber morning, the rows of hunters more quiet and still than Ailell had ever seen them. They knew that this was serious, and they were actually treating it as such.

If Ailell’s chest swelled with pride, he did not allow it to show in his stoic face, in the hands clasped behind his back as he paced before them, bellowing his orders throughout the hall. Laying down ground rules, for he knew the expectations of war and he knew that he could not live with allowing his soldiers to bring excessive torment to the poor people that he was forced to send them to kill.

Whatever Mortem did reflected upon Ailell. He was responsible for them. Responsible for their actions. Responsible for every death they wrought when they moved into the city.

And beyond that he was responsible for their lives, and each hunter that fell in this ill-fated onslaught would be another tally in Ailell’s small black book. Another name in the list of hunters that Ailell had brought up through the ranks only to watch the life ripped from them because of their evil, evil syndicate, the corruption sapping away the brightest of little stars and snuffing them far too early. His children, his sweet little blooms that couldn’t grow to fruition when Mortem cost them their lives before they could truly even begin to live. It was one of the things that he hated the most about the syndicate. It was a beast that devoured youth, reducing bright children to little more than husks who would be mown down by the creatures they were brainwashed to hate and to hunt.

It was a cold morning, a chilly wind blown in from the sea. The half-elf led his hunters in a run around their outdoor training yard so that they would have their blood properly flowing, a good long stretching session following so that their bodies would be loose and limber and prepared for the war that they were to bring to the city. Ailell was concerned, though his worries never reached his face, remaining as though chiseled from stone as he prepared his army for the attack.

Two of his girls were standing together, little Lian with her arms wrapped around tall Beau. In the early morning Lian was quiet, blinking bleary tired eyes around her as she chattered in a tired, stumbling voice at her friend. Ailell’s heart ached, knowing that at least one of them might not return, that it would be a miracle if they both survived. His approach was slow to allow them a little more time to talk before he issued both of them their assignments.

“Dad!” Lian squeaked, always so open and lax in the mornings. Ailell smiled, but it wavered. It was an open secret that he had always had a soft spot for Lian, her bright soul and kind exterior.

“Your assignments,” he rasped, voice hoarse like he’d been choking on gravel—an experience he wasn’t eager to repeat—and his throat dry with guilt. He was sending his child army to their certain deaths, for the gods’ sakes! “Lian, you will be manning the communications center so you can distribute my orders to the other members of Mortem.”

“And Beau will be with me, right?” Lian asked, her face hopeful, smile bright like a light.

“...no. Beau is being sent to the north side of the city,” Ailell answered. Immediately, Lian looked as though he had crushed her soul and Ailell had to look away, lest he change his mind about the assignments. (Later, he would regret that he hadn’t caved. In the meantime, he had no idea of what the future held for the two girls who stood before him.)

Lian immediately twisted to face Beau, her expression turning as serious as the bubbly girl could muster. “Don’t go looking for trouble!” she commanded. “You have to stay safe!”

Ailell left her to scold Beau, seeking out the rest of his soldiers to give all of them their assignments. It took him some time, enough time for it to almost be time for the hunters to mobilize when he was done. But he stood before them one more time, looking out across the pond of young soldiers that he had raised and he had trained, and the others who had been sent in from another of Mortem’s squadrons for the purpose of the attack, and he inhaled.

“There is no promise that we will walk out of this alive,” he began, and it wasn’t the best way to open a motivational speech, “but even though we may not live to see another day, we will take as many of them with us as we can. For each of us that fall, let ten monsters. For each of us that scream, let ten monsters. For each of us that cannot see another sunrise, let our brothers cut down forty so their blood can kill that void. We are outnumbered. We are outmanned. But they are not ready for us, my warriors. They do not know we are here and that we are coming. And we will strike hard and fast and throughout this city and we will take these beasts with us to hell when we go ourselves. And if all else seems lost...” Ailell drew in a deep breath. “...if all else seems lost, call for me and I will come. I will be in the thick of it with you. I will not let you fight alone. You are never alone, even in what feels like the darkest hour I will be there until my corpse grows cold.”

He thumped the of his battleaxe on the ground, the signal to mobilize, and Mortem separated.

Ailell could only pray that they would return alive.

war was never something that hel has been thrown into by mortem, but it's not something that is unfamiliar to her. as a matter of fact, it feels like she's in her element.

the enderr's rank has the least amount of mortem soldiers being dispatched into it. despite the infamous reputation that she has built for herself for the past couple of years, she is still one of the top soldiers that mortem has. maybe it's from the fact that her only being a human and being able to reach to impossible feats in mortem's standards. if it wasn't for her behavior of conduct, she would've led her own team by now.

the south quarter is entrusted to her with only a couple of other soldiers to provide her with support, yet it looks like a bloodbath. monsters have fallen into the ground wherever she steps foot, the blood of different colors painted the pavements. it was a goya-esque painting depicting the sad reality of the war between humans and monsters. hel is winning the fight, but she is not unscathed. after all she's only human. her left side of her armor has been destroyed, there are cuts on the exposed parts of her body and her head is bleeding, covering her face mostly in red. but it only gives into the terrifying picture of the war criminal that mortem has created, the blank cold eyes that seemingly show no real emotion.

at that moment, a large rock hit the back of hel's head creating a loud sound. she fell to the ground. "we got her!" a voice shouted out from the buildings as a team of five monsters emerge and circled around the fallen soldier. "this killed thousands of us but it only took a rock to get her? humans are so weak" one of them sneered and the other spits at her. "let's take her to the base and we can do anything we wa-" before he could finish his sentence, that's when he realized that his legs are gone. not just him, but the rest of the group. hel spun with her poleax in hand, slicing their legs off in an inhuman speed. "just kidding" she said as she stood up, but there's no humor in her voice. with nothing to hold them up, they all dropped and fell silent in shock. and then screams came.

a soldier ran into her aid with a gun on his person "what do you want us to do with them ma'am?" hel steps out of the circle and rubs the back of her head, her eyes looked up to one of the monsters limping away frantically and cursing out of fear. hel flips her poleax and got into a stance, her eyes focused on the target. once again, she spun but this time she threw it like one would a spear. the sound of a sharp object going through flesh, and her target goes down. "ma'am?" the soldier asked her again, but she didn't respond as she casually strolls to take her poleax back. the soldier sighs and shakes their head

four gunshots

and then silence