THE COMING OF AN EVIL STAR

CHAPTER 1

—

I

—

Eyes shut, he sat on his throne listening to the sounds of battle ringing out on the floor below. He shouldn’t have been hearing these sounds. The clang of sword on sword as iron met steel, the scream of severed flesh and bone, and then the sounds that took their place—the thud of combatants hitting the floor without so much as a final cry. He could even see the sparks that resulted when blade struck blade. All the defensive systems of his castle had been rendered ineffective and his warriors had been slain, and all that remained were the last fifteen stalwart individuals who now faced his fearsome foe in the chamber beneath him.

There was no light in his room. Naturally, there were no windows, either. Though there were those who, despite having eyes that could see in complete darkness, used candles, lamps, and other sources of light just as humans did, he had forgone all of that. As a result, there was nothing in this room except the chair on which he sat, a table, and a coffin. He had no need of the darkness outside. So long as he remained in this room, an inky blackness equally dark and dense would surround him forever.

How long had it been since he’d decided not to leave this room?

A white glow shone behind his eyelids: someone’s face. He heard an agonized cry. The groan that rang out was the death rattle of the fifteenth of his retainers, stabbed through the heart.

It was too early. Amazing, even impossible—such speed was terrifying. His foe was truly capable. There was a feverish aching deep in his chest. Power called to power—but though he endeavored to recall the person’s name, he fared poorly. That had all been forgotten long ago, the instant he took a seat in this room. And ever since, he’d been at peace.

Inaudible footsteps were climbing the stairs. Unable to slow the racing of his heart, he opened his eyes. Dust filled his field of view, but the world soon became visible.

His foe was on the other side of the door. The dimensional vortex, phase-switching device, hypnocircuits, and other defenses that had been imprinted into the two-inch-thick door would no doubt do their deadly best to eliminate the intruder. But he got the feeling none of them would do any good. His brain could no longer form any picture from the sounds he heard. But between the door and that attacker, a breathtaking life-or-death conflict had to be taking place.

A minute passed.

There was a flash at one edge of the door—at the side where the lock was. It carved the lock right out of the door as if it were slicing through water.

The door was opening without a sound. And he was directly across from it. The fine crack of light grew broader, and when it’d taken on an oblong shape, he saw the shadowy figure who stood on the other side. In the intruder’s right hand was the sword he’d lowered. Oddly enough, not a single drop of blood clung to its blade. He wore a wide-brimmed traveler’s hat and a black, long coat. The instant the Nobleman glimpsed the face below that hat, he let a gasp of surprise escape in spite of himself. He had to clear his throat with a cough before he could even speak.

“I’d heard there was a Hunter of unearthly beauty out there, but I never thought I’d lay eyes on him myself. I am Count Braujou. And you are?”

“D.”

His reply was more a concept than a word.

“That’s what I’d heard.”

First his eyelids and now his lips—both had caused storms of swirling dust, but through it Count Braujou stared at the gorgeous embodiment of death who stood there, silent and stock still.

“I didn’t think there was anyone left in the world who’d hire you to destroy me. The outside world should’ve long since forgotten about my manse, my servants, and me. Why, when I stepped into this room for the last time, it must’ve been—”

“Five thousand and one years ago,” said the assassin who’d identified himself as D, supplying the answer. The way he spoke without a whit of murderous intent, Count Braujou couldn’t help but voice his surprise.

“Hmm, has it been that long? So, is it the farmers of this region who’ve come to find an old fossil of a Noble like me an obstruction? I don’t suppose a Hunter like yourself is too free with information, but if you could, I’d like you to tell me who sent you.”

“It’s the Capital,” D said.

“The Capital? But these are the southernmost reaches of the southern Frontier—not the kind of place likely to draw the least bit of attention from the Capital.”

“For human beings, five millennia is time enough for a great many things to change,” said D. “The Capital has set about actively developing the Frontier regions. On the surface, it appears that they’re out to eliminate the abhorrent influence of the Nobility who remain on the Frontier—and give the farmers some peace of mind—but their actual aim is the things hidden in places like this.”

The count smiled thinly.

“The wisdom and treasures of the Nobility? So, the lowly humans would pick through the dregs of those they called monsters? I can see where a fossil like me might be a hindrance.”

He made a bow to D where he stood by the door.

“Thank you for sharing this with me. I greatly appreciate it. And to show my gratitude, I shall shake off five millennia of rust and battle you with all my heart and soul.”

Putting his hands on the armrests, the count slowly rose to his feet. From head to foot he was shrouded in gray detritus—dust that had collected on him over the span of five thousand years. Since taking his place in that chair, he hadn’t moved a single step. The dust actually felt rather nice as it slid off his skin.

Putting his hands on his hips, the count stretched. Not only from his waist, but also from his spine and shoulder blades there were snaps and pops. Warming himself up, he swung his arms from side to side, bending and stretching them.

“It seems I’m not as rusty as I thought. I suppose this place will serve.”

Looking around, he found the entire chamber filled with ash gray. The eddying dust constantly filled his field of view.

All this time, D watched him silently. You might say it was an incredible folly on his part. Who in their right mind would give a motionless Noble the chance to move again?

The count reached for the spear that was leaning against his chair. Once he’d grabbed it and given it a single swing, the dust fell from it, and his imposing black weapon was awakened from five thousand years of sleep. Twenty feet long, the great spear had a tip that ran a third of that length, and although it seemed like it would be a highly impractical toy or decoration, such would be the case only if this weapon were in the hands of an ordinary person. Having risen from his throne, the Nobleman stood exactly ten feet tall—it was over six and a half feet from the floor to the seat of his chair. Yet the way he pointed his weapon at D’s chest without another test swing or any rousing battle cry seemed terribly simplistic, and the count was entirely devoid of killing lust. Just like D.

“Most kind of you to wait. Have at you!” he said, and then the entire situation changed.

D’s body warped as if he were behind a heat shimmer. The murderous intent radiating from the tip of the Nobleman’s spear was transforming the air. A normal adversary would’ve fainted dead away just by seeing it directed at him.

In response, D slowly raised his longsword.

Just then, the count said, “My word—who knew that D was such a man?” This time his voice shook with infinite terror as the words spilled from the corner of his mouth. But whatever he’d felt, it would never be made known.

D kicked off the floor. Only those Nobles who’d fallen to his blade knew how amazing and horrifying it was to have it come down at their heads. A millisecond opening—and then a glittering waterwheel spun beneath that shooting star and the trail it left behind. Was it sparks that were sent flying, or the blade?

With the most mellifluous of sounds, D’s sword bounced back, and the hem of his black garb spread like the wings of some mystic bird as he made a great bound to the left. As the Hunter landed, so gentle he didn’t stir up even a mote of dust, the head of the spinning spear whistled toward his feet. The figure in black narrowly evaded it with a leap, but the shaft of the weapon buzzed at his torso from an impossible angle, only to meet his sword with a thud.

The swipe D made with his blade in midair was something to be feared. Because a heartbeat later, the spear’s apparently steel shaft had been severed a foot and a half from the end and was sailing through the air. D’s left hand then rose, and a black glint screamed through the air to pierce the base of the giant’s throat with unerring accuracy.

Though he staggered for an instant without making a sound, Count Braujou swiftly grabbed the murderous implement with his left hand and tossed it away, groaning, “What have we here?”

It was the severed end of the spear. Lopping it off, D had caught it with his left hand and hurled it like a throwing knife. And that was probably the reason why he’d sliced it off at an angle.

However, even as black blood gushed from the wound, the giant wasn’t the least bit rattled as he stood with his long spear at the ready.

And D was equally composed. The right ankle of his boot was split diagonally with fresh blood seeping out, making it known that the count’s attack earlier hadn’t been without effect, yet the Hunter remained perfectly still with his sword out straight at eye level like an exquisite ice sculpture standing in the inky blackness.

The darkness solidified. The temperature in the room was rapidly falling, thanks to the killing lust that billowed at D from the giant.

What would D do to counter that?

The young man in black simply stood there. In fact, the killing lust disappeared as soon as it touched him—it was unclear whether he absorbed it or deflected it. However, his form distorted mysteriously, and from it there was just one flash—his blade alone remaining immutable, poised to take action against the fearsome spear man.

There was no point in asking which of them moved. Harsh sparks were scattered in a chamber lacquered over with five millennia of pitch blackness.

But before their transient light vanished in the air, a voice told the Hunter, “Wait. The life I abandoned five millennia ago isn’t dear to me. I have remained here like the dead for just such a moment as this. D—we will settle this. But may I ask that before I fulfill this promise to you, you allow me to fulfill an earlier pledge?”

The murderous intent had already evaporated, and the two figures—one with sword extended, the other with long spear sweeping to one side—looked as if they might’ve dissolved into one.

“A star just shot by,” D said.

His head only came up to about the solar plexus of the giant. But from a room with no windows, his eyes had apparently glimpsed something in space.

“Is that the reason?”

“Valcua has returned,” the giant said.

There was a faraway sound to his voice, and a distant look in his eyes. Those same eyes gave off a red glow.

“And he’s bound to see to it that those who drove him into space are charred to the bone. He’ll be merciless with their innocent descendants. But I must prevent him from doing so. For you see, it’s in keeping with a pledge I made in days long past to one of their ancestors.”

The tangled silhouettes separated. At the same time the count lowered his long spear there was the click of hilt against scabbard by D’s shoulder. His blade had been sheathed. Turning a defenseless back to his foe, D walked toward the door.

“You have my thanks,” the count said, although it was unclear if his words reached the Hunter. “The last time I raise my spear, it shall be against you.”

—

As D exited the darkened chamber, his left hand rose casually, and from it a hoarse voice said, “I really have to hand it to you this time. You saw it. I did, too. Yep, we saw the same thing he did. A wicked star fell in the northern reaches. I can still see the long, long tail that streamed behind it. Oh—here it comes! An impact only we’d sense. But it’s neither its death nor the end. Five . . .”

D kept walking. Not pausing for even a second, he began to descend the staircase.

“Four . . .”

In the midst of the darkness, the giant heaved a long sigh.

“Three . . .”

In one tiny village in a western Frontier sector, a family of three awoke.

“Two . . .”

D halted. He was in the middle of the staircase.

“One . . .”

The star was swallowed by a land of great forests and tundra.

“Zero.”

It was quiet. A silence gripped the world as if time itself had stopped.

Then, when the hoarse voice finally told him, “There it goes,” the gorgeous young man in black who’d been like a sculpture of death finally began walking again.

“Half a northern Frontier sector was laid to waste!” the hoarse voice continued.

The Hunter’s eyes as well might have beheld that vision of death.

—

II

—

It was two days later that the survey party from the Northern Frontier Administration Bureau set out for the area where the meteorite had landed.

“This is just . . .” The young geologist was going to say horrible, but the spectacle before his eyes had finally robbed him of his speech.

It was a sight that no one could ignore. The roar that assailed their ears was that of a muddy torrent that snaked by in a thick ocher flow just a few yards from where the men had frozen on their mounts. And there wasn’t just muddy water. Titanic trees floated by, the places where they’d snapped in two showing plain as day—and the dull thuds that rang out from time to time were the sound of these countless boles banging into one another. As if tethered to the trees, the remains of enormous armored beasts and other unidentifiable monsters also flowed past—as did human corpses.

“The ice on the tundra’s melted.”

“It’ll still take two days to reach where it came down. And yet here we are, running into a river like this? The damn thing’s gotta be dozens of yards across!”

Another of them pulled out a map and a photo and compared them to the scene before them. The river was easily in excess of five hundred yards wide, and while the spray from the water didn’t create it, a fog hung over the opposite shore that kept them from making out anything on that side. There wasn’t any trace of the great stands of trees depicted on their map. For that matter, it didn’t show this river, either.

“There’s bound to be more of this. I say screw it!”

“Shut up, Dan. Back in the Capital, folks are sitting on pins and needles waiting for word from us, you know. I don’t care if it’s a river or the sea; if it’s in our way, we’re crossing it. Start getting ready for a fording right away.”

Nearly twenty men dismounted in unison and began to take their gear down off their horses’ backs.

“We’re all set with the ropes!” someone shouted twenty or thirty minutes later, and another twenty minutes after that, explosions rang out overhead.

Rocket launchers shot ropes to the unseen opposite shore, and special metal-alloy drill tips on the ends of the ropes bored down dozens of yards into the earth to secure them. When the current was strong, there was no other way to cross with their horses except to hold onto these ropes.

Resigned to their pitiful lot, the group members looked up to the sky as one.

“What in the world’s that?”

“Choppers, I think.”

“Whose?”

These shouted remarks were in response to five aircraft flying purposefully across the cloudy, ash gray sky.

“I don’t think any of the villages around here own anything like that—which can only mean . . .”

The rest of that sentence had already formed in the heart of every man present.

“They’re bandits!”

“Those bastards—they’re fucking ghouls! They’ll loot the place dry!” another man cursed, the words rising with the sound of his teeth grinding.

But this became a cry of astonishment when all five helicopters were thrown off course simultaneously and dropped behind that silky veil that wasn’t quite spray or mist. Rotor struck rotor, throwing free chunks that impacted on still other aircraft—and no sooner had this happened than the sky was filled with fiery lotus blossoms. Black smoke spread in the air and flames consumed hundreds of pieces of debris as all the crimson blooms scattered their petals. Once they’d vanished into the depths of the fog, only the smoke snaked into the sky, and then that too disappeared.

“What the hell happened?”

“Turbulence?”

“The wind ain’t blowing all that hard—the meteorite’s gotta be to blame. A cursed star is what it is!”

“Damn! If we get too close, we’re liable to drown. We’d do well to turn back, boss.”

“Shut your pie hole. Josh, you’re gonna be the first to go across.”

“Shit. I wish I’d kept quiet.”

Ultimately it took half the day for the whole group to cross the stream, dodging oncoming trees and corpses floating in the current. Not only was it more than five hundred yards wide, but they also had to get their horses and baggage across, too. The dense fog hid any scenery more than three feet away behind endless white, so the leader ordered the men to form a circle and to be sure to keep tabs on the people to either side of them.

“The ground’s mush.”

“Yeah. And it’s warm.”

“You think maybe there was a volcano or something in the area?”

“Nope. That wasn’t it. It’s still warm on account of the friction when the meteorite struck.”

“You’ve gotta be kidding me! That was two days ago. This should’ve long since cooled.”

“Which tells us something—the meteorite itself is still boiling hot. Just look. We’re still two days’ journey from where it fell, yet every last tree’s been uprooted. The ice hereabouts runs a foot thick, but it’s been turned into this river and the fog. Every village we’ve passed up till now was knocked flat by a quake or swallowed by cracks in the earth. Hills crumbled, swamps boiled away, and there’s not a bird or a beast to be seen. I don’t care how big a meteorite we’re talking about; there’s no way it could do all this. On top of that, the communiqué from the Capital said astronomers watching the shooting star reported that it was just a little deal, less than eight inches in diameter. There’s no way in hell it could’ve caused a disaster of this proportion.”

“Why didn’t you say anything about that before, boss?” a number of them asked.

Their leader replied impassively, “Oh, that’s simple. Because if I’d let that slip, there’s not a man among you who would’ve come along!”

“Well, you’re right about that, but still—”

Just then, the old huntsman who’d been by the campfire with his eyes shut tight put his finger to his lips and shushed them.

“What is it, Pops?” the leader asked.

“Something’s coming from the north. And it’s headed this way at a hell of a speed,” he said.

“What is it?”

“I don’t know. Hey, put that fire out. Everyone, don’t make a sound, now.”

The whole group grew tense. Aside from the old huntsman, they were all farmers who’d just signed on for the per diem and the reputation that came from having taken part in a survey party. But farmers were only used to dealing with the sort of supernatural creatures and monsters that ravaged their fields. Scattering an extinguishing powder on their campfire, they grabbed their respective weapons and took cover behind their baggage—all without a single extraneous action.

A minute passed. After another thirty seconds had gone by, red points of light appeared in the depths of the fog.

“Here they come,” the old huntsman said, cocking the old-fashioned rifle he carried.

The points of light swiftly grew from the size of a fingertip to that of a fist, and by this time the outline of the things had become visible as black silhouettes in the fog. From the bottom of cylinders about six and a half feet tall, a number of thin pipes wriggled like tentacles. A red point of light glowed from a spot about halfway up each cylinder. There were more than a dozen of these things.

The leader looked at the huntsman. When it came to combat, he was a veteran.

The old huntsman ignored him. His instincts had been triggered by the approaching foe. The same instincts that time and again had pulled him back from the jaws of death into the land of the living told him not to mess with this. They weren’t telling him to run—just not to mess with it.

But before the huntsman could take any action, hostilities were declared.

“Draw them in before you open fire,” the leader ordered his group.

The silhouettes glided closer. They’d heard him.

“Fire!”

The shout was followed by ear-shattering reports, while the old huntsman leaned his rifle up against his pack and grabbed the right lapel of his fire-beast vest. Telling himself to calm down, the old man focused his attention on his own fingertip, which soon found something hard and thin.

Up ahead, screams split the night air. A tentacle had just snared one member of the party. Legs thrashing, he was hoisted up into the air. Along the way, he raised his rifle and fired. There was the sound of something hard being struck, and his slug changed direction.

The cylinders were now plainly visible. Entirely silver, they were supported by two of the tentacles, which seemed to be tied to them by iron rings. The other six tentacles were apparently meant for combat, and they seized another member of the party who’d taken cover under his baggage by the ankle and effortlessly pulled him out again.

Screams rang out here and there. The crack of rifles followed, and soon there was silence.

The men hadn’t abandoned resistance voluntarily. As they were struggling in midair, a tentacle had been put against the back of each man’s head, and from the end of it a slim needle had penetrated the skull. Although it didn’t look as if the needles had pierced very deeply, this attack had a horrifying effect on the party members. There was a slight pain in their heads—as if something were flowing out from them to nowhere in particular. And that was the last thing the men felt before they lost consciousness—and their lives. By the time their limp bodies were thrown to the ground, they’d already stopped breathing.

Scanning wildly all the while, the cylinders passed over the dead, and then they finally spotted the old huntsman crouched down behind his baggage. A tentacle stretched from one of the approaching cylinders and touched the base of his neck. It soon came away again, and as if they’d lost all interest, the cylinders disappeared without another moment’s hesitation into the mist from which they’d come—into the depths of the steam.

After the tentacles that could be called sensors had registered whether the person they came into contact with was living or dead, a long, needlelike suction device drew out what was essentially the core of his life force. A human’s life force flowed through his body from the chakra. As a human reached higher mental and physical levels, the chakra shifted to a loftier position, with the chakra in the back of the head linking human beings to the power of the universe. This is why when people had ascended to an existence that was more than human, they’d been depicted in ancient artwork as saints with glowing halos behind their heads. Undoubtedly that was the reason the cylinders chose to extract the life force from the back of the head.

The shore lay under the stillness of death. While the sound of the river hadn’t died out, it still felt that way. This was probably due to the blanket of pitiful corpses. When an hour had passed since the butchers had left, there was movement in this dead world. It came at the moment when dawn tinged the eastern sky blue, its light spreading across the cruel ground like faint wings. It was the corpse of the old huntsman. His body had been like a mummy’s, with its pulse stopped, brain waves gone, and every trace of life missing, but now it was returning to life. The blood pumped fiercely through his body, his heart beat strongly, and he opened his eyes. Then, closing his eyes for a few seconds to reflect back on what’d happened an hour ago, he strangely enough reached for the very same spot on the back of his head where the cylinders had drained the life from his compatriots and pulled out a long, thin needle. A foot in length, the needle was stark white beast bone—and he’d learned where to jab it from his father, who in turn had learned the trick from his grandfather.

If you’re in the forest or out on the tundra and can’t move, and you don’t think you’ve got enough food to last till help comes, press here. When you do, you’ll become a corpse. Aside from the very smallest of arteries, which will carry blood to your brain to keep it from dying, you’ll be a dead body in all other respects. And no one will be able to detect that pulse. Depending on how you push the needle in, you can make it last a half hour or an hour, a year, or even a decade if you like.

His father had told him he’d survive all that time without anything to eat or drink, and that he had to make sure there were no wild beasts around before using the needle on the appropriate spot.

Your grandfather’s grandfather said that a long, long time ago, these things with bodies like cylinders and snaking tentacles appeared and started killing folks like crazy. Our ancestor was the only one to survive because at the time he happened to be doing these experiments with needles.

The old huntsman mouthed something softly: words of thanks to his father and his ancestors.

Looking out across the gruesome tableau, he muttered, “I’m gonna have to get these boys buried.”

And with that he reached for the rifle leaning up against his pack. Once it was back in his hands, he was transformed into a professional on the hunt. By the time the stock came to rest against his shoulder, he already had the hammer cocked. The two-pound rifle meant for killing armored fire dragons was trained unwaveringly on the muddy flow; the huntsman’s ears had detected a change in the water’s roar.

—

III

—

The old huntsman’s eye caught an arm reaching for shore from the muddy torrent. Appearing to struggle against being washed downstream, a second arm appeared, and a moment later the whole body popped up. While it couldn’t exactly be described as effortless, the figure managed to collapse on land after being pushed just a foot or two further by the water.

The old huntsman called out to the wheezing form, “That you, boss?”

The mud-covered figure jumped up, but his tension passed as soon as he saw the old man.

“Pops!” he said, letting out a deep breath. “I’m glad you made it. The fact that those damned things didn’t go into the water saved my skin. I suppose everyone else . . .”

The old huntsman nodded. “They all bought it. You’re lucky to be alive—oh, but you’re a veteran fish trapper, aren’t you?”

Though the leader tried to smile, he couldn’t.

For generations, his family had made a living hunting the fish that lived in the ponds and lakes near his village. Up to ten feet long, these fish were voracious carnivores, but there wasn’t one of them that the leader’s family couldn’t land with ease. The leader was better than anyone at this sort of hunting because of the way he’d been raised—he could stop his breathing and remain underwater for more than an hour.

“When they grabbed Roscoe, I jumped into the water. I clung to some weeds—damn, I must’ve been scared, because I couldn’t come out for over an hour. Anyway, I’m glad you survived, too. From here on out, having someone else along should be more reassuring than going it alone.”

“You don’t mean to tell me you intend to keep going?” the old huntsman said, his eyes growing wide. “Those things will be up ahead. Probably worse stuff, too.”

As he got his breathing under control, the leader lay flat on his back on the ground again.

“I can’t help it. See, that’s the job. Back in the village, everyone’s scared stiff, waiting for our return. I can’t very well be the only one to come moping back. For starters, it’d mean all the rest of these guys died for nothing.”

At this point, he finally realized something.

“Oh, I can’t force you to go along with me, Pops. You’re lucky to have survived. You don’t just turn around and throw all that away. I’ll continue on alone from here on out—Godspeed to you.”

“At any rate, let’s get everyone buried,” the old man said, gazing at where light hung in the eastern sky. “Then we’ll set out. Get as far inland as we can while we’ve got daylight. I’ll go along with you.”

—

After burying eight corpses and taking a short rest, they ended up embarking just past noon. Before they’d walked an hour, the pair found their surroundings had begun to take on a weirder aspect. With the gradual thinning of the fog they could see quite far into the distance, but all that greeted their eyes was a wasteland. Perhaps it would’ve been better to call it desolation. Black soil spread as far as the eye could see. There was no sign of any living creatures, and the pair was surrounded by such a vast expanse that the glowing red lights of those cylindrical things would’ve almost been a welcome sight. With provisions and weapons on their backs, the two men sank ankle deep into the miry ground, and steam hid the blue vault of the heavens, although it also occasionally filled the pair’s field of view with rainbows, as if to atone for its sins.

Two hours passed, and then two became four. Just as they were about to enter their fifth hour, there was a change in their environment. The boots they pulled up out of the mud met the one thing the pair presently desired more than anything—solid ground.

“Huh?”

After glancing down at their feet, the pair looked across the earth stretching into the distance. It could’ve been described as a silvery land.

“What the hell is this?” the leader asked, sounding unnerved.

Here was a man who’d been chosen to lead a survey party in exploring the unknown, and he burned with such a sense of duty he still pressed forward even after watching most of his men get killed. He certainly wasn’t a coward. But his voice was quaking.

“Damned if I know,” the huntsman said, shaking his head. “I don’t know what it is, but it’s sure as hell gonna be like this all the way to where that meteorite fell. We’ve gone and stepped into a whole other world.”

“What kind of other world are we talking about here?”

“Good question.”

“You mean like the world of the Nobility?”

“Probably.”

Something about the huntsman’s tone bothered the leader.

“Is it or isn’t it? Spell it out for me, man!”

“It’s just a hunch.”

“Oh.”

Halting, the old huntsman adjusted the pack strapped to his back. He soon started walking again.

“Nobles are Nobles—but this is some different kind of Noble, or so I think,” the old man said.

“Different? You mean to tell me there are other kinds of Nobility?”

“I don’t know. That’s why I said it’s just a hunch.”

“Well, I trust your hunch,” the leader said, looking all around with a chilled expression.

There was only fog and silvery terrain. No hills, no trees, no tundra locked away under eternal ice. Even after twilight fell, the pair continued walking in the darkness. They were afraid to stop. From time to time the leader pulled out his map and survey records and checked their position, but he did so while they were still on the move. The further they advanced, the more a terror and despair that had nothing to do with their exhaustion spread through their hearts, now heavy and dark.

We’ll never make it back. We’re gonna die out here.

Despite this, however, both pairs of eyes gleamed with a resolute determination to fight. Even if they were going to die, they had to see what lay out there. And without fail, they’d get word of what they discovered to those who waited.

In the middle of the night, they took a rest. The leader had collapsed. When he awoke, it was past noon. The fog and the featureless silver land stretched on forever. For quite some time, both men had held in their hearts a certain conviction: This land is man made. But who could’ve made something so incredible? Who’d packed it away in an eight-inch meteorite?

After having something to eat, they started walking again. And the old huntsman ended up telling a story about a giant he’d seen in the western Frontier sectors when he was young.

“You know, Pops, you’re a good-enough shot to hit an angel worm from a mile away. You’ve got nerve enough to take on a Sanki dragon with no more than a machete, so no one can fault you there. You shouldn’t be rotting away on some lousy little mountain bagging birds and beasts to sell their meat when you could go to the Capital and find a better job. So, why don’t you?” the leader asked, and that’s how the tale got started.

“It was quite a ways back,” the old man said, starting the story.

Like so many other young men with boundless confidence in their own strength, he’d wandered through various parts of the Frontier looking for an opportunity to make a name for himself. At the time, he heard about a legendary creature that would eat every beast off a mountain in a year’s time, then move onto the next mountain to sate its appetite, and that sparked a desire for honor and combat that burned like a flame in the young huntsman. When he headed up the same kind of mountain where he lived even now with no more than his trusty rifle, it wasn’t out of rashness at all. Rather, it was merely a manifestation of his youthful fervor. For a whole month he moved among the colossal boles and weirdly shaped rock as if he were the lord of the mountain, but he’d abandoned the search and was on his way back down when he was swallowed by a thick fog. As soon as he decided to bivouac there, the fog grew even denser, and it showed no sign of clearing any time soon. Not even the wind blew.

On his third night camping out there, the situation suddenly took a stranger turn. From the swirling white depths of the fog, a gigantic figure appeared, accompanied by a great rumbling in the earth.

“When I was a wee young’un, I’d seen the same thing in a picture book all about the Nobility. It was a giant beast that combined machinery with an artificial life form. More than a dozen feet high it stood, wearing rusty old armor and a helm and carrying an iron club with its hairy arms. As for its face, I suppose you could say it looked like a crazy person. Its eyes were vacant, and drool ran down from the corner of its mouth like a waterfall. Black drool, at that. Even now I can still recall how it reeked of oil. There was just one thing that bothered me then, and still bothers me now. According to that picture book, that type of creature had supposedly been dubbed a failure, and they were freed from computer control and destroyed by the Nobility more than five thousand years ago.”

The beast had headed straight toward the huntsman. Pure luck was the only way to describe the way the man managed to dodge the iron club the thing swung down at him—but the way he got off a shot with his rifle as he was rolling around on the ground was the work of a born huntsman. His bullet hit the giant beast right in the middle of the face, and the creature’s upper body jerked back.

“Well, I thought I’d hit it dead bang. And that was the way it looked, too. But the thing didn’t fall. It didn’t even drop to one knee; it just spat up a wad of blood, which landed at my feet. But what I’d thought was a wad of blood turned out to be a bloodstained slug and one of that thing’s fangs. Why, that freak—”

Seven hundred and fifty miles per hour—his bullet had flown nearly at the speed of sound, and the thing had stopped it with its fangs, giving a whole new meaning to the expression “biting the bullet.”

The huntsman was so stunned that he didn’t get another shot off until the creature charged him. Made in desperation, his second shot hit its chest protector and ricocheted off, while his third streaked through empty space, for the giant had unexpectedly leapt to one side.

In the fog to his right there was a great forest. From it echoed the sounds of enormous trees being snapped or uprooted by something that was approaching with tremendous speed. The giant beast only had time to loose a single howl of insanity. Because what bounded from the fog was a figure every bit as titanic as itself.

“His coat and cape were in tatters—but I could tell at a glance they’d both been crafted from the finest materials. I swear, I’ll never understand why Nobles would ever use anything as flimsy as all that when they could’ve made the same thing from indestructible metal fibers.”

The giant’s weapon was a long spear. Carved with intricate designs, it was well over fifteen feet long, and the keenness of the point that ran almost half its length was just as imposing as his foe’s iron club.

The giant beast struck first. Though the Nobility had created this creature for combat, those same Nobles had decided that the control DNA in this type alone hadn’t functioned properly. The iron club it brought down appeared just as fast as the huntsman’s bullets. But it rebounded, and then the giant beast, leaning forward from the attack, was knocked away. As it lurched, a gleam of light streaked at its neck.

After deflecting the club with its shaft, the long spear had spun around to cut through the opponent’s neck, and then, in the giant’s black-gloved hands, it spun in another great arc before halting.

“I watched the whole thing there from behind a tree, out of sight. Right off the bat, I knew it had to be a giant straight out of the legends. Dangling from the shoulders of that red cape of his were the corpses of greater elk and twin-headed bears. Maybe he didn’t notice me—more likely he did and just wasn’t worried about me. Toting the body of the giant beast like it was nothing, he headed back into the same fog he came from. I didn’t go after him. Hell, I was scared. It had to be a Noble. But what kind of Noble can walk around free as you please in the light of the sun? The mere thought of what he really was makes my hair stand on end.”

And yet, about five minutes after the sound of the giant’s footfalls had faded completely, he chambered a new round in his rifle and went after the enormous figure. And then, high above the ground where the giant’s footprints remained so clearly, he saw an enormous head glaring down at him. The instant he realized it was the severed head of the giant beast, he turned around without a word and climbed down the mountain that very day.