The Voidbreak Crisis: Part 2; The Rise Of Ak-Dovurak.

11. The Red Wolf

Talon ducked behind the embankment suddenly, motioning to Aldo, one the wilderfolk he had freed, to get down as well. He heard the Honor Guard moving slowly through the ruins at the cliff's base, searching the houses with their chains and cuffs, and talking amongst themselves. He looked over the cliff's edge slowly, as Aldo crawled up next to him. There were at least twenty of them, each of them a wolven wilderfolk with deep grey fur. They were eight feet tall, and thick with muscle. Talon had seen them dispatched from the Dragon Tyrant's castle a day ago, and had spread the caravan out to hide in the hills. But the Honor Guard didn't seem to relent. They had tracked them from Talon's village far into the hills near the border, always just behind their group. But Talon had an ace up his sleeve. He had the Horde.

"They're not here," one of the Honor Guard said loudly from the village square.
"They can't have just vanished," another said, sniffing the air deeply.
"I can't pick up their scent, and we haven't heard a peep," another Guard said, joining them in the village center.
"All I can smell here is grass and dust, and I haven't seen hide nor hair of them. Perhaps we've been chasing an illusion?" one of them asked, spinning his chain around his finger.
"I don't think it was an illusion," the one at the back of the group said, nodding to the cliff facing the village.

Talon stood high on the cliff face, the gentle wind ruffling his mane as he glared down at the Honor Guard with fury in his eyes. One of them stepped forwards and let loose the cuff he carried, attached to a long, thin chain. The chains could stand thousands of pounds of weight, and the cuffs were nigh upon unbreakable. As he unleashed the cuff, the force of his throw blew the dust out of the village and caved in the nearby stone houses. The cuff hurtled towards Talon at three times the speed of sound. Talon's hand moved with impossible speed, and caught the cuff just before it reached his neck. The cuff snapped shut harmlessly as Talon wrapped the chain around his wrist. The Honor Guard had time to widen in his eyes in surprise as Talon leapt forwards and yanked the chain, pulling him down towards the Honor Guard at breakneck speeds. As he did, the Horde rushed into the village from the hills around him, howls and screams filling the air as the Honor Guard hurled their chains and cuffs into the approaching crowd.

Talon spun in the air and brought his foot down onto the guard's arm as he raised it to block. The blow was far more powerful than either of them expected, and it slammed the guard into the ground with a thunderous crash. His arm had snapped like a twig, and as he hit the ground, his neck broke on impact. The other guards rushed Talon all at once, ignoring the Horde that closed in around them. It seemed they knew something about him that even he didn't know yet. But he always loved a challenge.

He yanked the chain off of the guard and slashed it through the air like a whip, wrapping it around one of their arms and pulling her to him. She leapt with the force and spun, bringing her fist down towards him as Talon countered with a punch of his own. Their fists connected and created a shockwave that blasted the rubble that had been a house into the town. She rebounded from the shockwave as Talon spun the chain around again, snagging one of their legs as the others jumped. Talon threw a loop of the chain around two more of them and pulled both ends of the chain as the three he had snagged were yanked together. He felt something slam into his back that sent him flying into a building nearby. He pulled himself out of the rubble to see a guard bringing a massive stone down on top of him. Talon rolled back onto his hands and kicked upwards, shattering the boulder with his feet. He leapt back to his feet as the other guards closed in on him, he ducked a kick and rolled away from a punch. He rolled to the side and under another's furious punch that kicked up a massive cloud of dust. He rolled behind another as she swept her leg around, barely missing his head as he flipped backwards.

The guards all rushed him at once, but felt a subtle tug at their belts. They all looked down to see their chains had been strung together, and through the bell tower behind them. They looked up at Talon to see him holding all twelve of their chains as he grinned maniacally. Their eyes opened wide as Talon's muscles seemed to grow before their eyes. He pulled all of the chains with a furious roar as they were all ripped through the air and into the bell tower's base behind them, crushing it's stone walls and caving the entire tower in on themselves. The other eight had been taken down by the Horde, albeit with a large amount of injuries. Talon heard the rubble moving, and walked over to the fallen tower to see one of the Honor Guard shoving a boulder off of herself. Her legs were trapped underneath a piece of the tower, and seemed to be broken. Talon picked up one of the chains and wrapped a length of it around her neck with a flick of his wrist. He leapt up and wrapped the other end around a massive boulder behind her. He wrapped several lengths of the chain around his hands and pulled gently as the Honor Guard screamed, clawing at the chain around her neck.