[Freja Helt]

And once again she was back here. Among the trees and the soft soil of the forest. She came out here when she had a lot on her mind and needed to get away from the noise and pollution of Tokyo. Recently what was plaguing her wasn't just her own mind going crazy as her personality was being formed from the fusion of Elias and Freja, but it was also the event that had transpired in Nerima. The way the earth golems just appeared out of nowhere, the earthquakes that shook the ground and destroyed buildings around her. Her friends fighting for their lives alongside her, one of them ending up in the hospital and for the longest time, Freja wasn't even sure she was going to make it.

It was a lot and she needed to get away.

Unlike the first couple times she had come out here, Freja looked much less like a city girl, wearing practical clothing, although in reality it was just running shoes and athletic wear, so she probably didn't look like someone who went hiking often either... Naturally she had brought her bat too. There were some big animals that lived out there and while Freja wasn't sure she could take any of them down, she was a lot more safe carrying her weapon than going out without it. She had made that mistake one too many times, even in the city.

Walking down one of the less travelled paths, Freja paused as she noticed something on the ground. ''Tracks?'' She crouched down, as if taking a closer look would tell her what had left it there. Unfortunately, she knew exactly nothing about tracking. It could be an animal or a quirked up human using a transformation or mutation power for all she knew.

harukor

[harukor]

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[attr="class","puppycat"]Freja Helt

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[attr="class","puppycat"]your notes here

"That's a big one," Harukor mutters aloud, scratching the stubble on his chin as he stares down upon a set of tracks. Moreso, the singular footprint.

It's bigger than him.

He knows there's a lot of quirked up freaks in these woods— that fact is a number on the list of reasons why he wants to go back to Hokkaido. He misses the snow and the endless forests, and loathes being even in the vicinity of the city of Tokyo. His only solace is living in a hut on the outskirts by a hunting reserve. It was a run-down old thing, but he much, much preferred it that way to the sterile white walls of a modern home. But the Elementals, those creatures that had murdered dozens, they only serve to remind Harukor how much he dislikes quirks.

The beast is a large one, but he is hardly afraid of it. He would be doing a service getting rid of such a thing roaming the woods. He sees the broken branches that lead him down a destructive path that it has made way for itself, the birdsong around him silent. It's close.

He pauses, seeing another set of tracks that align with the beast's— they're fresher, and also human. Smaller than his. Someone else is here? But he can't discern whether they're friend or foe. With a small sigh, he follows them. Better to find out sooner or later before they get in the way.

The hunter eventually happens upon the person that belongs to the footprints, silently watching them from the treeline above. A girl? She doesn't seem to be of Japanese descent, but with the way the world works now, anything is possible. She seems entirely unaware of the danger she might potentially be in, and as his gaze wanders, his eyes widen as they land back on her. "Hey, you!" He shouts. "Stop right where you are."

MADE BY MIZO

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[Freja Helt]

She almost jumped out of her own skin when he shouted her way, maybe it was the quietness of the forest, the mysterious tracks and the tension that had been building, but she was dangerously close to screaming at the top of her lungs. She turned to look in the direction of the voice as she realized what was more scary wasn't the fact that he had shouted, but the fact that he had gotten this close to her and she hadn't even noticed. Had he been following her? If so, for how long? Was he friend or foe? Given her track record, she might have reason to believe he was a villain... Then again, why would he have called out if he was bad? If he could sneak like that he could have attacked her without being detected for sure.

She kept a firm hold of her bat. ''Y-You scared me!'' She was about to walk towards him but stopped. He had told her to stop, was that a threat, or for her own safety? She had to know more. ''Who are you?'' She called out, before reaching into her pocket, might as well come clean and be as honest as she could. Fetching her student ID card she held it up, even though it was far away she hoped Harukor would be able to recognize it as real. ''I'm Freja Helt, a hero student from UAU! Am I trespassing? I didn't see a sign anywhere!''

harukor

[harukor]

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[attr="class","puppycat"]your notes here

“Nobody in particular.” Harukor replies cryptically, not out of the need to be unnecessarily mysterious, but simply out of wariness of a stranger. He feels some surprise at her pronouncing her position as a hero student. To be this far out in the wilderness with no one else around, surely she had a death wish—or simply viewed it as a method of escapism. Perhaps she had been caught up in that event with the Elementals herself.

He thinks back to the task at hand, and points down to the path below her. “You’re not to me, but you might be if you go any further. Look down.”

There’s a thin wire— almost naked to the human eye in the dim light, and is stretching along the pathway at calf length, taut and ready to trip up anyone who crosses it. But that’s not the real danger. “There’s a poison arrow trap there. Unless you want to spend a week in the hospital, I’d advise moving back slowly.” If she followed his gaze, she would see Harukor staring at the crossbow that was peeking out from behind a tree now lit by the parting clouds, pointed directly at the path, and therefore, at her. He glances around a moment longer, still taking note of the lack of birdsong around them, but it’s hard to discern if it’s because of his own shouting, or because of the unknown beast he’s yet to meet.

“You got lucky,” Harukor grins, shifting the bow on his shoulder to a more comfortable position. “no one really comes up here, so some other poor soul might have gotten killed by that. Say, you seen anything odd when you came up this way?”

MADE BY MIZO

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[Freja Helt]

Nobody in particular??? Talk about suspicious! Maybe she really was in much more trouble than she had first suspected. No one good would respond that cryptically, right? Not unless THEY thought Freja was a villain or some criminal, but how could they? She didn't look like a bandit or anything like that, right? ''Down?'' She furrowed her brow and followed his direction. At first she thought he meant the tracks, or footprints. ''P-Poison?'' Her face grew pale, she hadn't seen the wire at all! If this guy hadn't showed up and shouted at her, who knows what would have happened to her by now. ''How did you-'' She paused and looked at his gaze, seeing that he wasn't looking at her she instead followed it.

Slowly, she started backing away from the wire, sweating as she could only imagine what stepping a poison arrow trap was like. ''Y-Yeah I guess..'' She muttered, still a little shook from how close that was. ''Huh? Odd?'' Well, her trip up here had been pretty normal for the most part. She didn't notice anything out of the ordinary, or maybe she just wasn't looking. Actually... ''There were these big tracks, uh, like paw or footprints? But they were way big, like they belonged to a big animal, or some kind of big transformation quirk.'' She gestured the entire time, as if she could accurately draw the footprint from memory in the air. She definitely couldn't. ''B-But that's all! Aside from that I didn't see anything.'' She looked him over one more time. Absolutely not a villain or criminal unless he was pulling some kind of fake out on her.

''Thank you, by the way, Mr?'' Hopefully she could get a name out of him.

harukor

[harukor]

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[attr="class","puppycat"]your notes here

Harukor's silent for another moment as he listens, walking down the slope slowly as he approaches her, looking down at the wire before walking to the tree where the arrow trap was located. He didn't know much about UAU's students, and maybe even some of them were skilled enough to dodge an arrow camouflaged like this, but he didn't want to count on it. "That lines up with what I've seen so far. It was pretty destructive, and carved up a path this way. I've been following it for a couple hours now, but nothing yet."

The hunter sighs, his sight on the treeline again— it's incredibly difficult to see through all the brush, and he doesn't know of any clearings nearby that would make it easier to lure into to see what exactly it was. But one thing is clear enough; with the deafening silence of the forest, only the wind swaying the brittle branches of the trees, and the footprints veering off into the brush nearby... the feeling of being watched was unmistakable.

"It's stalking us." Harukor says eventually, looking at the girl. "I'm Harukor. And you'd do well to listen to what I say while we're out here. Step over the wire if you're brave enough, or go around it. Follow me." He moves around the tree and continues down the pathway, footsteps light, eyes downwards and following the beast's tracks. It eventually leads off back up the slope he had come from, into the forest itself. "You said you were a hero student, right? That must mean something combat wise. You ever been hunting before?"

MADE BY MIZO

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[Freja Helt]

Had she been too trusting of him upfront? He had warned her, he hadn't ambushed her either. She made sure to lower her bat as he approached, signaling that she wasn't a threat. Even if she doubted she had been sending out any threatening vibes at all. ''You saw it?'' She felt a chill run down her spine. The thought of a big, destructive beast being out here in such a peaceful forest, she would have never guessed. Was her bat going to be enough for something like that?

In any case, Freja was no expert survivalist or man of the forest like Harukor here, but she knew that her best chance at getting out of this unscathed was sticking by his side. At least until they were out of the woods. ''Stalking US?'' She pointed a finger between them, dumbfounded, ''I thought you said you were following it.'' Harukor was an interesting name. It sounded very distinct, and yet she couldn't really place where he was from just based on his name. ''You got it.'' She nodded, nervous but determined to get the heck out of this forest with all her limbs attached. Gingerly stepping over the wire, she kept her body low to the ground and hugged her bat, ready to swing at anything that might come at them. ''Never hunting, not unless fishing counts.'' She wanted to look at Harukor, but her nerves kept her eyes trained on the treeline. ''I've gotten into plenty of street fights before.'' Understatement of the century.

''Hey so, did you see how big this thing is?'' She finally looked over at him, unable to hide the fear and doubt that was slowly building up in her mind.

harukor

[harukor]

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[attr="class","puppycat"]your notes here

“I haven’t seen it, not yet.” Harukor says, glancing over his shoulder. “But haven’t you noticed how there hasn’t been any birdsong for a while now? We’re still going to follow its tracks, but it’s definitely here. And watching.”

Trying to discern its presence by staring at the tree line wasn’t going to work— he knew that much. They weren’t dealing with a typical beast. A lot of the predators he had hunted never hunted him back, however— the falcons fled, the wolverines merely tried to rip him to shreds head-on, and the one bear he had killed in Russia… was a hunt he would never forget. But it wasn’t anything like this, because both parties here were hunters, and neither prey. He thinks, and he realises, gaze moving to the treetops.

“Konru,” Harukor says out of the blue, a word in an unknown language. “Meko— leopard. It’s a cat of some sort. The only wildcat out here would be the tsushima leopard, and the tracks looked like they belonged to a cat’s…” He scratches his chin, watching as the tracks form in a straight line, towards a series of heavyset brush that led into a clearing. “It’s not small. Definitely some quirked up beast, bigger than a tiger would be—” Abruptly, he stops, silent, eyes focused on the tracks beneath him. Ahead, they go for a few more meters.

And vanish.

The hunter immediately draws his bow, readying and arrow as he crouches down, gesturing for Freja to do the same. It’s too deafeningly quiet to be a forest, not even the trees swaying with movement. The snap of a twig is the only thing that lets him fire at the giant leopard’s frame as it pounces for him.

It nicks the beast’s shoulder, too far out from its muscle to do any damage. He curses under his breath in his unknown language again, rolling out of the way as claws pin the earth where he had been a second earlier. Not wanting to give Harukor another chance, it immediately leaps away again, into the treetops, out of sight. In the brief instance he had seen it, he’d come to realise that it was no doubt a predator, with an oddly formed jaw, dark fur, lanky limbs and sharp claws. A leopard, but an empowered beast to be rid of nonetheless. “That explains it,” Harukor grunts as he moves to Freja again. “don’t separate, or run. We can’t split up.”

MADE BY MIZO

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[Freja Helt]

Huh? She was exactly as perplexed as a city dweller like her would be in this situation. ''Bird song?'' She looked at the treetops, as if she was hoping to see birds, but there was nothing. ''I hadn't thought about that, it's eerily quiet, isn't it?'' It kind of gave her horror movie vibes, like when the tension is building before the monster shows itself. A shiver traveled up her spine. She had to stop thinking about things like that or she was going to freak herself out. One thing was for sure, this Harukor guy was sharp, it felt like she had bumped into a real survivalist expert. ''Aren't we talking about a wild animal, why would it be watching us?'' Unless it had hyper intelligence, surely it would just charge at them, right?

Konru? She had no clue what that meant, but thankfully he was quick to elaborate. His description freaked her out more and more the more he talked. Some kind of big beast, definitely quirked up?? Most likely intelligent since it was watching them? She almost let out a yelp when he abruptly stopped and she followed step, but she stopped herself at the last second by covering her mouth with her hand. She's sweating and the fighting hasn't even begun.

As he draws his bow, she raises her bat, ready to strike at anything that might pounce at them. She wasn't about to become cat food and she wasn't going to allow it to get to Harukor either. This was part of becoming a hero. A real one. Protect people no matter what. She gasped when he released his arrow.

Then all hell broke loose.

''It's fast.'' She was relieved he managed to escape its claws. Pointing her bat directly up, as if she was aiming the tip like a gun, Freja did the best to control her breathing and focus. With her aim at the ready, Freja would fire the grappling hook directly at the beast once it reemerged, trying to intercept its attack midflight. It wouldn't be an easy feat, heck, she wasn't even that skilled of a shot, but they clearly had a range advantage from what little information they knew. ''If you need me to, I can be bait.''

harukor

[harukor]

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[attr="class","puppycat"]your notes here

"Konru are predators," Harukor replies, gaze darting to and fro, naturally slipping back into his native tongue due to the pressure. "so naturally, they stalk their prey from the dark before attacking to gain the advantage. Like hunters." He instructs her to keep her to his side. It's better to stay reasonably close in this environment rather than running off on your own to get picked off one by one.

He readies another arrow from his quiver— this time, it's induced with a paralysing agent of hemlock. He knows he can't do much on his own, and as much as he would have liked to hunt this beast by himself, he couldn't deny having a student with hands-on experience was better than him wasting all his arrows. He starts to move slowly towards the clearing, an arrow nocked on the string of his bow as the green of the bushes shuffle quietly around him. Had he not been an experienced hunter, he surely would have run for the hills by now— only to be pounced on and killed. Even now he felt a bead of sweat making its way down his temple.

"That might work for your villains, but being bait here will only split us up." Harukor adds on, voice hushed. "If one of us runs, then you'll be attacked. It activates their prey instinct." He blinks. "Unless you want to be willingly pounced on like that. I could get in a clear shot that way and paralyse it."

MADE BY MIZO

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[Freja Helt]

''I see. So it really considers us the prey right now?'' She was used to being underestimated, whether it was a quirked up wild animal or some crazy villain. No one ever took the quirkless woman seriously, not until it was too late anyway. She kept to his side, just like Harukor instructed. She was surprised at herself and how well she was keeping her composure. In reality, she was shaking like crazy. Would she have felt this confident if she had been stuck here on her own? She had probably turned and made a run for it ages ago, but could anyone blame her??? She was from DENMARK, the country where the scariest wild animal you could come across was maybe a swan, and even then it's not like they sought out humans like this beast was. Of course she wouldn't know how to behave around big wild animals!

When he repeated her plan back to her, her stomach turned. It suddenly sounded much worse than when it had just manifested as a thought in her mind. Hadn't she just met this guy? Was she about to trust him with her life?? She didn't really want to, but at the same time she was feeling worse and worse in this tension-filled back and forth. Neither of them unable to get a good shot in on the beast while it stalked them from the shadows. If they acted, adapted to how it was hunting them, then maybe that could be their ticket to victory. ''I-I can do it!'' She reaffirmed, holding her bat ready as she looked at him, waiting for Harukor to be ready before she took off. Her awareness was far from superhuman, but she was going to try her best to guard against the beast's fangs and claws if it showed itself. Thank goodness for her metal bat, she would be in a much worse situation without it. ''You've got this, Harukor!''

harukor

[harukor]

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[attr="class","puppycat"]@someone

[attr="class","lemonsoda"]

[attr="class","puppycat"]your notes here

It hardly feels morally correct to send a near-child into the field as bait like this, but Harukor isn't above making good of opportunities, so he merely nods and moves away as soon as she does into the nearby brush, feeling the leaves shift around him as he raises his bow. Faintly, he feels like he's intruding on something— whether it be because they were in the beast's territory or something else, he knew for certain that right now he wasn't as cracked up to fighting this thing as he thought he was. Did this mean that this reserve was another one to cross off his list?

Oh, fuck that. He wasn't about to let quirks ruin one of the last things he was good at in life.

That feeling of intrusion surfaces again. When he hears a growl, he knows it's because he stepped on the beast's tail, and it emerges from the green, body shifting with its environment. "Camouflage?" He exclaims before it leaps.

There's no time to dodge. He only manages to brace his bow between its jaws so he can stop it from sinking its teeth into his neck, landing on the ground with a rush of dust and the wind getting knocked out of him, its claws piercing his shoulders. Yeah, that's why he didn't want to split up. Why didn't he take his own advice? Ah, classic Harukor. He grits his teeth at the thought of his daughter silently laughing at him— it's an incredibly embarassing way to die, gazing into the bright yellow eyes of a predator as it snarls and glares at him hungrily, and he can vaguely hear the limbs of the bow cracking under pressure and blood trickling down his sides.

But it leaves a prime moment for Freja to attack. "Kid, I think we might have swapped places," Harukor grunts as the beast leans in more, his strength giving way, almost nose to nose. "and very unwillingly so—"

MADE BY MIZO

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[Freja Helt]

They had deviced the perfect plan together in seconds. If she could run away and be the distraction, that would leave Harukor a much better opportunity at landing a shot, and he most certainly was the better shot of the two. Only once she started running, Freja didn't feel any attention on her. She didn't feel that she was being stalked, or even chased. Looking back, her eyes widened as the beast had lunged on Harukor. She was sprinting before she even knew it, bat firm in her hands as she readied her swing.

As far as she knew, this man was just a civilian hunter. Sure, he had fighting experience, at least with facing animals like this, but at the end of the day he was a civilian. Someone she needed to protect. She'd sooner see herself get bitten than for him to incur anymore injuries, even minor scrapes. ''I've got you Mr. Harukor!'' She shouted out, swinging her bat at full force as she tried to slam it into the monster's head, aiming to hit it where she could do the most damage.

She could only hope that it was enough, that her training had bore some kind of fruit, enough to save a life, just this once.

harukor

[harukor]

tw // animal death, gore

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[attr="class","puppycat"]@someone

[attr="class","lemonsoda"]

[attr="class","puppycat"]your notes here

Its hot wet breath bore down his neck as it inched closer, reaching for him with a growl that briefly reminded him of the bear that he had hunted, sending shivers down his spine— but the creature was a long, long way from anything he would have liked to get close and personal with. He's about to start snarling animalistcally himself, feeling that soldier in him rear its head as flashes of a muddied battlefield echo in his vision, when it vanishes before his eyes as the beast gets launched from his view.

It takes a moment for him to get situated, but with a shadow over his gaze and his wounds stinging him from the sideline, he looses his arrow. The beast screeches, pawing at its eye. He's blinded it. Harukor takes no chances and whips out his bayonet as disfigured leopard rears back on its hind legs, leaving the hunter to pierce its chest, the knife sinking into its heart. Not a second later does it collapse with a wheeze, twitching violently, before growing silent. He would have liked to kill it instantly to avoid it being in pain like it was. It couldn't have been avoided.

He sighs. "That's why I didn't want to split up. I should have listened to myself. Idiot," he grumbles to himself, holding a hand over one of his shoulders as he looks at Freja. "you're not hurt, are you? If you're not, grab me some of those cobwebs by you there." He points to a low-hanging branch where a set of spiderwebs sway in the breeze. Faintly, he thinks he hears birdsong in the distance.

Harukor lifts his shoulders, wincing in the process. It really did a number on him. They're shallow cuts as far as he can see, but he's bleeding too much for his liking. Did it hit an artery? No, the blood is flowing too slowly for that. It's probably a vein. Shit, now he's going to need a checkup with a doctor. Great. If Freja didn't comply, he would fetch the cobwebs himself, layering them over his shoulders. After a moment of silence, he realises what he had just done probably made him look insane. "Cobwebs are waterproof," he explains hastily, raising a hand. "they clog up bleeding pretty well. I don't have any gauze or bandages on me."

Another sigh as he leans against the tree behind him, sitting down in front of the leopard's body, its now pale yellow eyes boring into him. "These things are getting more and more out of hand. I thought this was a hunting reserve, not a place to die in. Damn quirks." He glances at Freja. "Speaking of which, why were you walking around in a hunting reserve? Did you want to get yourself killed?"

MADE BY MIZO

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[Freja Helt]

Was she hurt??? More like was he hurt? He had just been pinned down by an absolute unit of a monster. “I-I’m okay, your wounds are you-” she turned to look at the cobwebs as he pointed to them and had a look of visible disgust on her face. She hated spiders. Did she really have to? He did get hurt because of her idea to split up. Just this once, she took a deep breath and decided to swallow her fear as she reached for the web. “H-Here.. What are you going to do with spider web?” She shuddered and shook her hand whenever he took them, wiping the last bits of uncomfortable web texture off in her pants. “Really?” She was still disgusted, but a little fascinated too. Not that she was ever going to use this trick herself, no way. After today? It was backpack with bandages over her shoulder always when she entered this forest.

“You mean there’s more like this one?” She panted, sitting down in the open. “Wait a minute! I didn’t know this was a hunting reserve! I was just going for a hike, promise!” She waved her hands in front of her face, frantically trying to defend her dumb self. “I always bring my weapon here, BBB.” She gestured to her bat. “When I have it with me I feel safe. Speaking of which, you carry a weapon too, so I’m guessing you’re a hunter of some kind? How did you find me? How did you get so good at spotting wire traps?

harukor