The Last Hunt of the mighty warrior
Snow fell like ash it covered everything and everyone .It clung to the great man's skin—gathering in the ridges of old scars, settling in his hair like frost on stone. He didn't brush it off. He barely moved. The once-godlike shape of him was now hunched in a cradle of dead trees, his arms wrapped around his chest—not from fear, but to keep the heat from leaving too quickly.
Pickle, the last predator of a forgotten age, the age where giant beasts and dinosaurs rule. He was dying.
Not from battle or injury . Not from any predator or rivals. There were none left that could challenge him.He had outlasted them all he had seen through to that. By killing and eating them to fill his stomach.
Trex . Mammoths. Spears and flames.
His whole life had been a continent of blood and bone. His victories had been measured in broken spines and severed limbs. But time—time had no throat to rip out. No scent to track down. It could not be challenged or outrun in any manner of sorts.
It simply waited patiently till the end eventually happens and now, he was at its feet at its mercy.
He hadn't eaten in days. His last fight—an old sabretooth—had ended with both bleeding. He'd won, but just barely. Wolves had taken the corpse while he lay half-conscious. He didn't stop them he no longer had any strength or energy to do so.
His limbs torn and weary no longer coiled when danger stirred itself . His skin had lost its shine it no longer protects him from harm. The power was still there—coiled inside muscle memory—but his body had grown too slow and weak to catch up with it.
He didn't fear death he had to many encounters with it throughout his life.But he hated the stillness of it.Even now, he wanted to move. To breathe something in that wasn't cold. To hear the crunch of something weaker dying beneath his fists once more .
Instead, all he heard was wind.And his own heartbeat slowing down each passing minute. He tilted his head back and tried to roar to try and keep his strength from leaving.
Nothing came out of his mouth no roar not even a peep.The throat was frozen and too strained from years of roaring.
Still, he opened his mouth and forced breath through it—because that's what he had always done.
Even if no one heard a sound from his mighty lungs.Even if no creature feared him anymore in the slightest .
He was still him. He was still Pickles the same predator to face down the era of dinosaurs and come out on top.
He did not ask to be remembered by anything. But he refused to disappear from this world due to time.
And so—something ancient inside him moved. Not the flesh it had no strength to do so.Not the organs they were shutting down one by one.
Something deeper than anything physical.
The instinct itself.The pure, undiluted essence of what it meant to be the one that eats, not the one that is eaten.
It stirred like fire catching dry roots.
And it refused to die out and dispersed.
It wasn't a simple soul. It wasn't a spirit either .It was pure survival made real.
It peeled itself from the dying body, like steam rising from blood. It carried no language, no form, only purpose.
To live again once more in flesh and blood . To dominate all of the predators to remain on top. To find new flesh to challenge new predators in life.
And it drifted—silent, weightless, invisible—through time.
Through millennia and centuries.
Through ancient wars, swords that were swung, cities that rose and fall.
Until it found something small.
Something screaming in the arms of a woman.she was running from something. Curious it followed the women.
She was already bleeding when she reached the foothills.
Her feet were bare no protection. Her breath came ragged and wet. Behind her, the world burned—the remains of her village, a smear of fire on the edge of the world. She carried one thing.
Not food of any sorts. Not a weapon to defend her self .
It was a small baby.Her son her small precious little boy..
She didn't look back as she staggered through the snow-dusted underbrush. The mountain didn't welcome her. It only accepted her the way it accepted all things that didn't last.
She found a low place—beneath a fallen cedar, its roots like fingers clawing skyward. Dry, half-sheltered. A cradle made of roots and moss.
She laid the child down. Covered him with the scarf from her neck.
She kissed him once. Her lips were cracked. Her tears froze on his forehead.Then she stood. And walked away.
The child cried for its mother all night.It brawls echoed off the cliffs.No creature ever came close to this child.The crows didn't come
neither did the wolves sniffed closer.
But something else did. Something much older than anything living in those woods.
Something hungrier than time.
The presence slid into the forest like heat into marrow. It made no sound. Cast no shadow. It moved with intent, not shape.
And when it reached the crying thing, it stopped.
Not because it felt pity.
Because it recognized the strength buried deep under skin not yet hardened. It felt the pulse of an unfamiliar heart—and saw the potential to dominate.
It entered the soul of the infant.
And the crying stopped from the baby.
The infant stared upward, blank-faced. But his breathing slowed.
Something inside him had changed.A second presence now lived there.
It didn't speak in words. It spoke in impulse.Strike down all that crosses you.
Hunt down anything that can nourish you.
Dominate all the animals in this land and ver become prey.Stand alone at the top of the food chain.
The child didn't cry again since he gained the second presence .
Not that night not every again as he grew. Seasons passed.
He grew in silence no other noises ever heard or made.No names were spoken since there was no one to speak . No stories were ever heard . No comfort was given to him.
Only hunger was ever present . Movement of his body. Claw and fangs were his main comfort.
He chased things before he could stand upright. Climbed trees to reach nests, drank rain from curled leaves, snarled at thunder.
Inside his mind, the presence pulsed. Not as guidance it did not help the weak. Not as kindness only the weak yearn for kindness .
As pressure to the boy to thrive.As reminder to never back down. To not kneel to anything else besides yourself.Do not beg for anything always fight for it
He learned to listen to the trees—not for words, but rhythm.
He mimicked the boars.He outran wolves—not to escape, but to steal.
He wore the skull of the first creature he ever broke with his bare hands—not as clothing, but as confirmation of its existence .
He spoke no human tongue how could he speak what he has never heard of.
He learned nothing by lecture or scrolls since he could not even read if he had any.
He was taught by instinct, sharpened by ghost-memory, carved by the whispering of a man who had never learned to speak in his life , only to survive from beast and nature.
And in this way of forging , Inosuke Hashibira became the vessel for something ancient.Not a demon it was too old to be one.But the first predator the modern world had seen in a thousand years.
As the years pass inosuke grew older and more powerful thanks in part to the presence but most of it due to his strength. He had taken out all sorts of prey but his favorite to hunt and eat were demons. His second presence telling him these wise words
"Strong prey gives good meat"
So he spends his time every day hunting for prey.
Till one day he catches a large mixture of different scents.The mixture began with blood.Not demon blood it was too sweet to be demons.
It smelled like his blood intrigued of the propspect of facing down another him. Inosuke began tracking down the scent— it was sharp, cloying, wrong.
A demon had killed something large, but left the meat behind. That never happened to with any demons he had hunted . He followed the trail anyway more intrigued.
The forest changed as he kept chasing the scent . Trees thinned out becoming less and less dense . The air was holding the scent more and more.
Inosuke move till he arrived at a open area in the forest. He looks around to where the scent had move and then—there was movement.
A man had appeared. He look young and small. His head can only reached my stomach. He must be young mused inosuke. Wrapped in a black cloth . Two swords at his sides.
The man stood over a demon's corpse—freshly killed, steaming in the morning cold. The man wiped sweat from his brow and sheathed one blade. He was humming, unaware that something enormous was already watching from the sidelines .
Inosuke crouched low, unseen.His eyes were fixed not on the man's face, but what he held in his hands.
Blades made by humans. Inosuke have been told of them from the presence it had told him them of its power. It can be made of anything but sharp enough to pierce a demon's skull those would be hard to come across.
The scent of blood was a familiar smell to inosuke . It showed control of the fighting.
Inside his mind, the presence stirred and talked to him.
That man hunts the prey. That one lives to fight the prey. Test him to see his strength .
Inosuke burst from the woods charging straight at the man hungry for battle.His steps thundered from his weight.
Random man pov
The man turned hearing loud footsteps—his eyes wide—just in time to see a wall of flesh and fist flying toward him.
His sword came halfway out of his sheath too slow to stop the fist then it landed onto him right in the ribs.
He hit the dirt hard, rolled back a far distance , he staggered back to his feet
His face pale from how much his ribs hurt . Breathing fast due to the pain.
He stared at what had hit him.What… was that? He taken aback by its appearance That wasn't a demon. That wasn't a man.It was a thing.
It was towering above him he had to crane his neck up high to see the being face. It had to be at least Eight feet tall. Its form was litter in scars showing that it was no novice to battle. Barefoot. To preserve any modesty it covered its self in mangled pelts.Its form was riddle with muscle no part of it was small.
It wore no shirt of any kind. No armor with how thick his physique look why would he bother.. Only a shredded hide skirt and the skull of a boar strapped over his face like a helmet.
Too tall. Too broad. Its arms were longer than normal. Its spine curved like a predator . Its mouth—barely visible behind the boar skull—gaped with sharp, yellowed teeth no fangs.
The demon slayer's hands trembled on his blades. He didn't run he figured he couldn't run due to how powerful the Giant man legs look.But he regretted not running from the man.
Inosuke pov
Inosuke attacked again without a second thought .No hesitation came to his mind only a worthy fight. No pattern was use to his attacks .The only thing inosuke thought about was the impact.
Random demon slayer pov
The swords clashed against flesh. The man parried—once, twice—but each block numbed his arms. Those huge fist holds so much strength the man thought.
Let's try something else a overhead attack.
Self made breathing stlye: basic slash
He lands a shallow cut on the giant's shoulder it didn't draw any blood.The beast didn't react to the attack further showing how weak the attack was.
The demon slayer dodged left—then right—but the creature adjusted too quickly to his movements.
Too instinctively like it could predict and see his movements .
A moment later, he was on the ground again. Sword gone.
The giant stood over him, panting through flared nostrils.
Inosuke pov (inner monologue)
This man is smaller than most animals I fought but not any weaker he reminds me of a bear. Challenging at first but easier as time passes.
Then—he turned.
He walk over to his prize and picked up both fallen swords that he force the small man to drop .
Inosuke Held them in the palms of his hands testing the grips. Turned them over to look over .He started testing its weight. The balance these swords had.
He wants to find more worthy opponents to test them on.He looked north the scent of something stronger carried on the wind coming from north .
He ran happy to find something to fight.
Random demon slayer
I shall never forgot the look in the beast's eyes. There had been no rage held in them. No hate directed at me. Just focus on my blades.Like a wolf staring into a river.
Later, somewhere in the woods, the blades changed.
Inosuke pov
The blades felt wrong at first.
Balanced for someone weaker. Too clean. Too light.
Inosuke gnawed the binding from one hilt and discarded it. He rubbed the edge along a rock until it no longer whispered through air, but bit it. He worked in silence for hours, sitting cross-legged on a flat stone, carving serrations like the fangs of a beast.He did the same with the second sword.When he stood again, the blades were no longer weapons.They were teeth his teeth
He sniffed the air. The scent of the swordsman he had beaten was already fading, but the scent coming from north indicated worthy prey so he moved.