Commission from  Yivah of my Arhulian in a war morph. This came out so badass!

Arhulians possess a 'living metal' inside of them called Arhdrargyrum. This material is able to be sculpted and manipulated by the Arhulian that created it. (This is "tamed" Arhdrargyrum where it's all but impossible to manipulate by anyone that is not the creator. Untamed Arhdrargyrum can be produced, but it is rare, and often used as a gift or ceremonial purposes.) This living metal can be used for a variety of dynamic morphs, blades, shields, reinforced bones, sub dermal armor, etc... how much Arhdrargyrum and Arhulian can control and how quickly they can morph it depends on their psionic ability and training. Blade morphs are regarded as the easiest combat morph due to their simple function and lack of reconfiguring more complicated parts of the vessel.

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It would have been simple to terminate their sentry and slay each soldier in their sleep. But optimal was not on this Arhulians mind. They had watched it all from the distance, They had a vow to observe theriantropes quietly from a distance to avoid undue panic and fear. A vow they now regret adhering to so strictly. Although Vorandrus had no formal connection to the hamlet in the tundra, the remnants of the hamlet and its inhabitants, filled the Arhulian with a maternal rage. What was this decimation for? If there was no language barrier, the truth would have done nothing to extinguish the Arhulian's anger, perhaps even inflaming it all the more. The villagers had been reporting of "monsters" yet these soldiers took such offense to the contradiction of their state sponsored truth, these people were put to death to silence their dangerous ideas. After all, if monsters were real, a missing hamlet would be perfectly ordinary.

Three. Those would be the allotted witnesses. The other twenty-seven would be slain, and they would be made sure to see their end coming for them. The assault had started slow and conspicuous at first, to ensure this collection of soldiers could bring their full might to bear - so they may be confronted at their zenith, and struck down for an ever louder statement. Rifle bolts clicked into place. The Arhulian could sense the spatial position of the bones in their arms as each shot was readied. For a fifteen foot long beast, the Arhulian were a damned hard shot as they dashed, leapt into the air, and even bounced in between the trees. A lavender halo shimmered behind their head. Vorandrus' veins tingled, - stung even - as power coursed though their body. Unlike magic, this power came from within. The soul. This power fed into the vessel to overcome the physical limits of the body and pushed it beyond. The comparatively few shots that would find their mark would be hollow victories, for Vorandrus had no vital organs to hit, each punctured vein pinched itself shut, the flesh itself defiant to damage as solid wood.

The Arhulian forelegs had been morphed into scythes that slice flesh and bone with cold indifference. Every slash would render its quarry cleaved in twain, and every thrust impaled as deep as the Arhulian could reach. The strikes were as precise as they were devastating - each felled soldier had their brain or heart destroyed with each attack, sometimes both. Their deaths having swiftness equal to their ferocity was the only mercy afforded to them.

The soldier's morale shattered completely once they were composed enough to recognise that half of their number was already dispatched in brutal fashion. They began to retreat on their snow mobiles, but those that were not quick enough found their means of egress tipped over or impaled through the engine with a mighty lance of tungsten. Others found the Arhulian's tail or a thrown object hurdling towards them at a deadly velocity. Eight managed to speed away on their snow machines.

There will be three, and only three that remain.

Vorandrus was fast and agile, unnaturally so even, but these noisy contraptions had the Arhulian beat in a straight line on deep snow while lacking the burden of stamina. Even with channeling psionic energy - power of the will and soul - into their vessel to draw upon impossible reserves of vigor, they still could only run down one target at a time. Wounding their pride somewhat, Vorandrus picked up the rifle of a dispatched soldier. The weapon seemed almost toy like in the Arhulians' large, three fingered hands. This particular rifle had been reloaded just before the skull of it's wielder had been pulped by a blunt strike. From how they counted shots in between reloads, this bolt action rifle had five shots with the assumption that it matched the others. The Arhulian operated the mechanism, and aimed. They hoped that this range and the steadiness of their large frame would compensate for any defects in the weapon. Fortunately the men had begun accelerating away in a straight line with little angular velocity. The first shot missed. Just a bit to the left of the windpane of the four seat vehicle. That was a close enough visual cue to compensate. The second shot found its mark in the back of the skull of the driver. Seven.

Without a second breath, the Arhulian turned to the other vehicle while the first one veered off its trajectory. The third shot missed. The Arhulian cursed in their mind as their hand was operating the mechanism, the brass flying through the air seemingly in slow motion. An Arhulians nervous system normally signaled and received information about ten times faster than that of a therianthrope, and hyperexertion pushed it even further beyond that. Unlike the Arhulian 'guns' that accelerated an inert projectile across a series of rails or coils, these weapons operated with comparatively unpredictable combustion. The fourth shot wounded the driver and their recoil of pain spelled doom for their transport and they collided with a tree. Before the tree even finished rattling and creaking, Vorandrus moved position and advanced to regain line of sight of the first vehicle. It had come to a stop, and it's three living passengers were just finished heaving the deceased driver. One shot left. They aimed for the center of mass of the group. Two of them were wounded. Lunging at full speed, the snow machine's cast iron engine casing was smashed open. No escape.

The two with wounds already were fully extinguished. Five. Vorandrus circled back to the crashed snowmachine as its occupants scrambled, leaving their wounded compatriot to die alone, as their mouth shouted shrill venomous sounds that could only be curses. The Arhulian's six eyes locked with his fearful two. Vorandrus could not admit to pity... but, this one has endured enough. The three dashing on foot shall only have one of their kin spared as a reward befitting their bravery. Three.



Although officially not acknowledged by the military, this incident has been declared the Mincemeat Massacre of West Pass. The accounts of the three men were written off as a vivid hallucination brought about by trauma, yet those in the field - those who saw the aftermath - knew deep down there was no state provided answer that could explain the situation with any satisfaction. Animal attack? The damage inflicted is consistent of an edged weapon. And what animal could take on thirty men with rifles? 'Self defense' from hostile locals? The idea that a hamlet with only hunting equipment to their name at best could inflict devastating nintey percent losses on trained soldiers would be a hideous emberassment. Militant hostiles? Nevermind the impossiblity of damage inflicted, there was nary a single casualty of the enemy or even a damned boot print at the site of the incident.

Perhaps most concerning of all, even if extremely hypothetically the military did entertain the idea of the culprit being "not of therian nor nature", the wounds were too targeted with a startling amount of decapitations and punctured hearts, along with the snow mobiles having their engines singled out. However, this refusal of the truth had a different undercurrent than incidents before. Those were simply not belived. This incident, did not want to be belived, for what it would mean. Either their idea of monsters - if they existed - was completely wrong... or more distressingly, there was something other out there that was beyond even the monsters.

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