The Extra's Rebellion
Chapter 55: Hunt successful

Chapter 55: Hunt successful

Zephyr crouched high in the cradle of a towering tree, one knee balanced on a thick branch veined with moss, the other foot braced against the rough bark. His body was still, breath controlled, even as his muscles trembled slightly from the effort of holding position. The canopy stretched around him like a cathedral of emerald, light filtering through in dappled fragments. Thick vines dangled like serpents from branch to branch, and glowing fungi nestled in the bark cast a faint bioluminescent hue across the forest’s underbelly. The air here was humid, soaked with the scent of wet wood and old roots.

Beneath him, in the forest clearing mottled with shafts of light, moved the creature he had been tracking for the better part of an hour—a lone raindeer riftsprawn. It looked like something pulled from a half-finished myth. Easily twice the size of any natural deer, its hide shimmered with a sheen of translucent gray-blue fur that flickered like oil on water. Long, branching antlers glowed faintly with pale green runes— it’s birthmark, pulsing in rhythm with the creature’s slow breath. Its hooves left no mark in the soft moss

Zephyr exhaled slowly, crouched on the branch like a predator sculpted from shadows and intent. The raindeer riftsprawn moved through the clearing beneath him, each step nearly soundless, its muscles rippling beneath that strange, opalescent hide. The air around it shimmered faintly, a tell tale sign of the Aether running through its blood, the remnants of the rift that birthed it pulsing with every breath it took.

This one was smaller than the last few he’d hunted—leaner, younger perhaps—but still powerful. And still elusive. Zephyr’s jaw tightened at the memory of the last three he had let slip through his fingers. Failed ambushes, wasted energy, and mounting frustration.

’Not this time’.

His grip tightened around the handle of his scythe as the deer moved directly under him.

And with a sharp exhale, he dropped.

Branches rushed past in a blur as gravity hurled him downward, cloak flaring behind him like torn wings. The scythe curved in his hands, wicked and hungry, aimed for the base of the riftsprawn’s neck. One clean strike—that was the plan.

But the creature moved.

Its antlered head jerked back, eyes flaring with a flash of unnatural instinct. The blow missed its neck by mere inches—and instead sheared clean through one of its antlers with a sickening crunch, sparks flying as the blade scraped bone, slicing deep into the side of its skull. Blinding one of it’s big black eyes.

The raindeer let out a warped, strangled cry—a haunting, layered sound like a flute being crushed—and staggered back, Aether leaking from the gash. Its runes flickered erratically, then dimmed. It didn’t fight. Didn’t charge.

He had previously consulted Elden and he had learnt that deer could barely be called a riftsprawn, it was an animal twisted by the rift able to bear a birthdmark but unable to invoke a Art. But the older ones do possesses an Art.

It turned to flee.

Zephyr hit the mossy earth with a roll, instantly back on his feet. His eyes narrowed. He could already hear the guilted voices of failure creeping in, as they always did.

’no you don’t’.

This time he moved before the deer did.

The riftsprawn had barely pivoted on its slender, scarred limbs before Zephyr whispered .

"Limbo Border Jail."

The deer froze mid sprint, it form suspended mid air as it was in the middle of jumping forward.

Zephyr blurred to the side of it—his footwork explosive, his eyes burning with purpose.

He moved in a single breath.

The scythe screamed through the air in a horizontal arc, humming with the force of his swing, and the edge met flesh with terrifying finality. It’s Aether that was flowing through his neck sprayed like chill air, followed by a gout of blood, hot and arterial, soaking the grass and staining Zephyr’s coat black in a single blink.

The riftsprawn’s head separated cleanly from its body, eyes still wide with the echo of instinct.

Its legs twitched once, then crumpled.

Silence fell.

A pool of shimmering blood spread across the moss as the body slumped forward with a dull thud. The antler, still intact on the remaining half of the skull, glowed faintly as its runes died one by one.

Zephyr stood over the corpse, scythe resting against his shoulder, its blade slick with blood but darker and stickier— black ichor.

He turned his head and spat to the side, then swiped the scythe in a wide, practiced arc, flinging the residue off the edge with a wet hiss. The blade sang in the air, sharp and proud.

Then he looked down at the ruined body, his voice calm but cold.

"That’s how you use Border Jail."

The wind stirred the trees above, as if in answer. There was silence before his stomach betrayed him with a loud embarrassing sound.

Zephyr stretched with a satisfied grunt, the adrenaline ebbing from his limbs. He patted his stomach with a small smirk.

"Don’t worry, Papa got meat. No more pancakes."

The words echoed into the stillness as he looked up— the sky was darker now. The pale sun barely pierced the dense canopy of the cursed forest, orange smeared with the ink of creeping dusk.

It had been three long, failure-riddled hours since he’d entered, and only now did his hunt yield results. The body of the riftsprawn lay still, the moss beneath it stained dark from its blood, its once-glowing antler now dim and lifeless.

Zephyr knelt beside it, brushing a few stray leaves from the riftsprawn’s chest. The creature’s body was still warm, its strange biology slowly cooling. He gripped the scythe and sliced a clean line down its breastbone, the muscle parting with a wet sound. Steam and the dense metallic scent of it’s blood billowed upward.

He dug his fingers into the chest cavity, pushing aside thick membranes and fibrous tissue until he found it—nestled right where it’s heart was supposed to be, suspended by tendrils of pulsing Aether veins—

The Aether Hearth.