The sun hung low and bloated over Anasil's private hunting grounds—a sprawling, walled-in forest designed specifically for the "Great Sport."
Anasil stood on a raised marble terrace, dabbing his lips with a napkin. Surrounding him were the elite of the High Council: Count Cedric, who reclined with a glass of vintage blood-wine, and Viscountess Samantha, who was busy stringing a recurve bow made of polished ivory.
"I must say, Anasil," Valerius chuckled, leaning back as a servant trembled while pouring his drink. "Your invitations are the only ones worth accepting these days. The capital has become so... tedious. All those laws about 'proper disposal' of assets."
"Rules are for those who lack imagination, Valerius," Anasil replied, his eyes scanning the horizon. "Tonight, we celebrate the purity of the hunt. No politics, no ledgers. Just the thrill of the chase."
Viscountess Elara let an arrow fly, thunking it into a wooden post. "And the quarry? I hope you didn't bring more of those sluggish dockworkers. They tire so easily. It's no fun if they don't scream with a bit of... spirit."
Anasil's grin widened. "I've curated a special selection. Three demi-humans from the northern wastes—extraordinarily fast—and a handful of political 'dissidents' who thought they could outrun their debts."
Below the terrace, a set of heavy iron pens shrieked open.
A group of ten people—men, women, and a young demi-human girl with fox-like ears—stumbled out into the clearing. Their hands were bound in heavy iron cuffs that clanked with every step. They looked up at the terrace, their faces masks of raw, primal terror.
"You have a five-minute head start!" Anasil shouted down, his voice jovial, as if he were announcing a parlor game. "If you reach the western wall, you'll be... well, you won't reach it. But do try! It makes the heart rate so much more succulent."
The group didn't wait. They scrambled into the treeline, the fox-girl whimpering as she tripped over her own chains.
"Let the games begin," Elara purred.
The Harvest of the Woods
The "hunt" was not a hunt; it was a massacre. The nobles moved through the woods with the grace of predators, laughing as they exchanged jests about the "quality" of the targets.
Thwack.
An arrow buried itself in the back of a running man. He fell, his body skidding through the dirt. Viscountess Elara didn't finish him; she simply laughed and moved on to the next.
Anasil, however, preferred the "personal touch."
He found a demi-human youth crawling through the brush, his leg shattered by a previous shot. The boy looked up, his eyes wide and leaking tears. "Please... I have a sister... please..."
"A sister? How touching," Anasil whispered, drawing a long, slender stiletto from his belt. "Perhaps she'll feel this, too."
He didn't kill the boy instantly. With the precision of a clockmaker, Anasil began to drive the blade into non-vital points—the shoulder, the calf, the palm. He watched the boy's face, fascinated by the way the features contorted.
"You see, Cedric?" Anasil called out as his friend approached. "If you hit the nerve cluster here, the sound they make is almost like a flute. Listen."
He twisted the blade. The boy's scream reached a glass-shattering pitch before his eyes rolled back and his heart finally gave out.
Anasil stood up, wiping the blade on the boy's tunic, looking genuinely refreshed. "Simply marvelous. The way the light leaves the eyes... it never gets old."
As the sun dipped below the horizon, the terrace was littered with discarded wine bottles and the bloody trophies of the day.
"A shame about your nieces, Anasil," Cedric remarked, picking a piece of fruit from a tray. "The Count mentioned they were 'damaged.' Do you plan to hunt them too?"
Anasil's eyes flickered with a dark, wet heat. "Hunt them? No, Cedric. They are far too precious for a simple arrow. I have much, much deeper plans for them. They are going to be my magnum opus."
He looked toward the high towers of his laboratory, where Nyxelle and Solvayne were currently chained to the cold stone.
"They think they've seen horror today," Anasil whispered to himself. "They have no idea what it means to truly be 'repurposed.'"