Ashenvale Forest

The rain poured in rivulets down Tharion Greyseer’s exposed torso, but he did not move. The cool water came down from the cloudy sky in sheets, flooding this small section of the Ashenvale forest and drowning anything smaller than a field mouse. The demon hunter’s blindfold, mask, and feathered mail kilt were soaked.

But he felt none of it.

In front of Tharion stood a hulking silhouette, a hunched dreadlord with piercing red eyes. It held itself ready to strike, a look of over-eager confidence etched into the creatures leathery face. Sharp fangs, too many to count, filled a grinning maw ready to sup on the demon hunter’s soul. Its claws were extended at the ready, dripping with the runoff from the leaves above them both.

“This hunt ends now,” said Tharion plainly. He stood straight and tall, his arms relaxed at his side. The demon hunter stood not even in a battle stance, instead keeping himself poised upright. “I tire of your games.”

The harsh response came in eredun, the profane language of the Burning Legion. Tharion cringed as the words unraveled themelves in his mind. He understood their language, no matter how much he wished to not. “Where one hunt ends, Greyseer, another begins. This massacre is far from over… far from complete.”

The nathrezim dreadlord gave no other warning before lunging its massive frame towards the seemingly unprepared night elf, its immense wings propelling it forward with a great force.

Tharion was prepared, however, and with a motion natural only to someone who had practiced it for millenia, he ducked beneath the beast and drew the gnarled bone polearm from his back. In a single motion, Tharion swung upwards, bringing the razor-edged blade into the demon’s stomach and through its abdomen.

In what was less than the blink of an eye, the demon hunter known as Tharion Greyseer had cut the dreadlord in half.  The demon’s expression became one of shock for a brief moment before the flesh of its upper torso dissolved into a swarm of batlike creatures. The beast’s legs, however, merely hit the wet foliage with a sloppy splash.

It isss … good to hunt with you again, Greyssseer… Good to tassste blood once more…

Tharion clenched his jaw beneath his mask as the hissing words invaded his mind, but chose not to respond. The entity once known as Felborne already knew what he felt anyway.

It had always known.

* * *

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I’m writing these “As He Returns” shorts as practice. They’re small scenes from present day Tharion Greyseer, chronicling the return of the entity once known as Felborne. For those unaware, Felborne was the signature sword that Tharion carried with him for many years. It was the vessel for the very same demonic spirit to which Tharion had been bound as part of his demon hunter initiation.

The guild plot had eventually seen Felborne shattered. But even after being reforged into Netherborne, it was discovered that the weapon, and thus the soul attached to it, had gone silent. Ever since, Tharion’s been masking a weakening of his abilities.  Few understand that this has been the reason for his more … cautious … approach to the hunt in recent years.

But Felborne has seemingly returned. Where did it come from? Why was the demonic entity now chained within a bone-carved polearm? And what does this mean now that the greater part of the Greyseer’s demonic essence has returned to him?

I’m using this plot to rebuild my inspiration for the whole demon hunter story. I’ve fallen out-of-sorts recently, and wish to return to the core of what built this guild, these tales, and that bit of “demon hunter notoriety” that allowed me my small bit of recognition amongst this game’s community.

Constructive criticism is humbly requested. I write these shorts in order to practice the craft of writing a scene, and one can only truly advance if one’s work is critiqued appropriately. Please, if you have a constructive comment to make, feel free to do so.

Thanks.

))