The marriage peace treaty

Chapter 22 The Harshlands Part 4

There are 4 known demonic wolf species  and 2 sub species. The most common one are the great black wolves. As the name would suggest they have black fur but also black eyes, teeth, skin and tongue. There are no other color on them even the sclera is black. Other then that they look like normal wolves except a little bit bigger in height. The live in packs up to 10-25 and are found in all temperate climates. They fight and hunt just like normal wolves but like all demonic beasts they are covered in miasma so a bit from them might turn a person insane or die. But the risk for that is very low as it has only happened to 234 people world wide in the last 4 decades. 

The next one that is almost as common as the great black wolves are blighted wolves. They can come in black, grey, white, brown and gold. There fur are very scabby and short and they are very slim but tall is stature. There eyes are always red and they live in family groups with on pair and there offspring. These wolves are found in deserts and open plains and are known to kill crops because of they maiasma they carry. A living being can be affected by the miasma by simply being close to them.

Next are Saber wolves, they are smaller then a typical wolves as they are as big as a red fox. But they have long saber canines as big as a unused pencil. They have long fur that comes either in red, brown or black and there eyes are yellow or black in color. Male saber wolves lives alone while the females live in groups between 5 to 12 wolves. They live on the coast, mountains and thundra. And for last their bite is the strongest of all demonic wolves. 

Then we have dire wolves, they are the larges of all the demonic wolves as they are as big as a standard warmblood horse. They have the sharpest canines and like to toy with there food when they are hunting them. They can only be black or white and their eyes are a chilling blue. They live only in cold regions and are known to be nomadic. They live in groups of 5 ti 10 but it is not uncommon for to different flocks  to hunt together if they prey is large and abundant enough. Especially if they are a group of humans.

Then there is the 2 sub species . The first one is the subspecies of saber wolves simply named the great saber wolves because they are larger then the normal saber wolves. Another difference is that they always live near a shore of a lake,river or the sea as they like to hunt fish,crabs and are even known to attack sailors if their pack is large enough. Because of that they are known to be great swimmers  and have water proof fur and webbed paws. 

The last sub species is snow wolves, Little are known about them except that they only appear when there is snow fall or a snow storm and they are ghostlike in appearance as the almost look translucent. Once the snow stops falling they are gone No one knows which species these wolf are a sub species of but most likely it is either a subspecies of the dire wolves or the blighted wolves. That is because once one kill a snow wolf they will disappear like dust if you don't freeze them in a block of ice before they fully die. But once that ice is melted the corps are gone with it. The only thing that remains are its claws and teeth. 

The demonic wolves that has attacked them are dire wolves and with how many there are there is no doubt that they are 2 packs hunting together. With so many dire wolves the danger level should be level 6. Although not universal the danger of demonic beasts are usually categorized from level 1, being the lowest to level 15 being the highest. The origin of this is for adventures to know how dangerous it is before they except a mission. That way the can lessen the casualties. And after a while they military started to adopt the same system as they found it useful. Of Course there are other grading systems but this one is the most widely used and it is to say that both the Dyrk and Avilen uses this grading system which is named pericula daemonum which is nital ancient tongue which simply means demonic dangers. Now a days people call it Culanum for short at lest if you are from the North central region which both Dyrk and Avilen are a part of.

Seeing this Lucius starts giving his orders.

Lucius: " All soldiers come at the front with the strongest at the front and the weakest at the back. while the others move back so that we can protect you!"

Hearing this they quickly move as commanded. Most of the soldier here are Lucius men so they know what to do without him giving them further orders while the others are just some escort knights from the Avilen queendom but they are to few for him to care about giving them in depth orders and he doubt that they would would listen to him anyway as there rivalry is still fresh after the war. Then the wolves start there attacks and charge right at them and those at the back support those at the front who has but up there shields and because of that they don't fall over from the impact. But they did move back a few cm. Some of the knights as managed to wound the wolves with there spears but not enough to kill them. The wolves pushed again and almost succeeded with breaking the formation but even though they did not fall down they managed to bit the shield and broke some of them. Seeing this some of the knights started to attack the wolves and managed to wound a few of them. Seeing this Maryden who has been passive asks Lucius if she should intervene.

Lucius: " Not yet, although my men are strong they need to improve more now since we are now a part of the Harsh lands, they need for experience when it comes to dealing with demonic beasts."

Maryden: " Did you not encounter many demonic beasts during the war?" She asks confused.

Lucius:" A few but all of them was bellow danger level 4. So it is safe to say that there experience with demonic beasts are below average. 

Maryden: " That is strange, i have encountered many demonic beats and most of them where between danger level 5 to 8. There even was a level 12 at some point."

Hearing this Lucius came to a realisation: " So thats why?"

Maryden: " What?"

Lucius: " It seems the reason why there where so few demonic beasts attacking us was because you killed the stronger once and the weaker once attacked us because they where to afraid to attack your army."

Maryden: " My army? No i just killed them alone most of the time."

Lucius:... Did they use demonic beasts to bully her? No wonder so few Avilen soldiers died because of demonic beasts. They sent in a sacrificial lamb. Lucius thinks with a hint of anger with nowhere to went. So he pushes the feeling down as he cant really kill every Avilen soldier who participated in the war. So he just watched the battle unfolding while giving orders. It wasn't until 4 hours later that they have finally won and the they all sat on the ground to rest because of exhaustion. Many of them are wounded but luckily none of them was seriously wounded so there was no need for emergency treatment.

Lucius: " Treat your wounds and continue cooking. Me and Maryden will skin the dire wolves for there resources and guard until tomorrow."

Simone: " Hey, Lucius. Why the heck did you and your wife just stand by. Because of that i am exhausted to death." 

Saying this Calvest looks at him with disdain while both Duke and Zevery are to tired to even care about anything.  

Lucius looks at Simone and says: " Training, you might be excellent when it comes to fighting humans but you lack when it comes to fighting demonic beats. The strategy when it comes to fighting demonic beats are to different from fighting with humes." 

Simone: " ... We are not that weak."

Lucius:" 4 hours."

Simone:" What"?

Lucius:" That is how long it took ans it should have taken 1 hour to kill them all and you dare say that you don't need more training?"

Simone: " Ah... shit. I have no come back."

Lucius: " Thought so."

With that he went to the dire wolves corpses and saw that Maryden has already skinned 4 of them. Looking at her work he can tell that she is very experienced so he went to her to asked if she could tech him. Not because he wanted to become better but because that would be an excuse to bond with his wife. She did not suspect anything and agreed and so she taught him everything she knows thinking that he was interested with the process.