Yautja of the Ghost Winds

Dav'ac crept forward.  The storm was blowing first as if the gods were debating their disdain of one another. Nothing but cutting snow and deafening howling winds. The mountain was standing as it has for countless eons, the unblooded may not be at this condition. His underwire popping trying to provide the heat to keep its wearer alive. He must find cover, it is too relentless.

His helmet could see nothing, the vision couldn't pierce thr- 

There.

The Yautja pushed through the mountainous road, using his almost frozen cloak to shield himself till finally pushing into the mouth of a cave. Croaking lowly to himself, Da'vac shook himself free of the ice and checked his systems. His equipment required a moment, his backpack almost overheated in its humble making. Once upon a time, this would be nothing for a Yautja with the right – and proper – equipment. He was but a disciple. One of the few that made it this far and equipment was sparse as it is, even for the forgemasters. They needed to find more of their people's fallen caches and ships or...

Da'vac shook his head. He was thinking far beyond his station. The Elders have already thought of this and more no doubt. The clan have been recovering since the Daedric Invasion two hundred of this world's years now, it was a war honored and bloodied. There are a handful of warriors who speak of that day even now and it stirred Da’vac’s generation to this moment. 

The young warrior looked deep into the cave’s mouth, the permitted visions of life and soul-touched switched. The details of the opening reached, enough to venture and he did. He doubted the storm would stop anytime soon. 

It took minutes of coming through the enlarging cavern. The constant echo of drips falling off stalactite spear-tips. The unbearable cold is still thick in the air. Perhaps, he could make camp, there was enough material for it. Such a thought of sanctum was a short-lived one. The earth moved in the corner of Da’vac’s vision.

Snarling, he twisted in time to see it charge with massive arms of pure muscle. Its rocky hide holding sparse of fur and its three-eyed head opening to scream a maw lined of salivating teeth. A jak’havkho, or troll by the lesser races’ collective tongue. The beast slammed into the Yautja and almost threw the young hunter, instead dragged him back a grinding length of metres. 

Toes biting into the ground, Dav’ac halted the motion and threw the jak’havkho back just enough to flick his ki’cti-pa to bare. The twin-blades punched into the hardy hide thrice before another boot crashed into the monster’s face, loosening one of its massive fangs. Yautja blades would skewer men like mere fish, but the jak’havkho were prey of relentless endurance and worthy strength. Even now, with its ichor spurting and hissing its heat on the cold ground, the wounds were closing. 

The creature roared, swinging one of its claw-ended arms and its power was felt in every travel-weary muscle. Da’vac snarled, returning blow for blow. He moved like a pugilist facing with a creature that matched and almost overpowered him in a face-to-face confrontation. Weaving upon the next strike, the young Yautja plunged his blades into its wrist. The shriek of pain-laced rage rolled through the cave before the jak was hurled from pillar to pillar. Earth shattering, the serrated blades finally pulled sinew free and hurled the beast into the wall. 

Huffing and snarling under his mask, Da’vac roared with blood weeping from allowed wounds and that of his opponent. 

The troll flailed and tore at rock, ice and earth before rolling itself up with spittle-spitting rage. The two appraising each other, circling and the beast charged first. This time, Dav’ac did not take the normal rites of combat. Even a Yautja would be fool to believe they could defeat a jak’havkho in a duel of attrition. When it seemed confident of healing fully again, the young hunter lunged and swept. 

This time, the beast jerked back in dodge. Twin-blades carved by their tips, sending thin arcs of blood. The moment they passed, the jak’havkho roared with its massive limbs swinging to smash Dav’ac with all of its rage. Good, that is what he was counting on. Following his momentum, arms that could have crushed man, slammed hard enough to crater where Dav’ac was. Its three baleful eyes looked over to the Yautja uppercutting both of his blades into its jaw. Fist punching even deeper and uplifting the entire beast off its feet!

With a flex of forearm, the ki’cti-pa extended in full and erupted up the creature’s skull. The jak’havkho shuddered and gurgled, claws holding onto Dav’ac. Even with its brain skewered, it still fought - weaker and weaker. The Unblooded victor tilted his head in amazed curiosity…then a certain weariness. 

Yanking his blades up, already feeling the gore trying to freeze on his face. No more than a heartbeat, the jak’havkho was already rejuvenating its spirit and that is all Dav’ac needed before claiming its head. 

“Is this all of it?” Quartermaster Brietrus as he shifted through the important items in several named barrels, his aide Consen Sexid was turning his back to snatch a couple lines of salted fish, “I believe so, si-” Suddenly another tremor of a roar straight from Oblivion itself shook the room and he could have sworn stone became unloose in the hall.

“Gods save us, damn the Thalmor and their need for a show!” The Quartermaster snarled, he've been uneasy since the elves were bringing back prisoners from their raids as of late and most recently – and most horrendously, with the aid of that old fool Brucorallen – they tortured and dissected a creature unlike anything he've seen before.

He saw it when they brought it in, twice the size of a man with a snake-like hide that gave Brietrus in the mind of a tailless Argonian but something, in the most animal part of his own mind, he knew; that was no Argonian. It was wounded and easily chained by metal and magic, even then – it was a struggle for its captor. Perhaps that is why its long death was more painful than needed.

When the Imperial veteran looked up to the table, seeing the bones of what remained; still 'moist' of its extraction, from its thickly crested skull and massive ribcage and spinal cord. With it was a large chest in the process of holding its wargear. A wrist-mounted blade the length of his own arm, gauntlets, a odd assemble of overlayed plates and body netting, and a pair of helmet. One wasn't belonging to it. One was 'plain', if one could call it that. Undecorated yet well-used. The other remained him of an iron helmet made from nordic craftsmen - jutting horns with nordic pictographs along its cheeks.

As he started to look back, the Quartermaster immediately snapped his head to see it missing. There was a bladed staff among the evidence! Instinct cultivated constant battle between himself, the damned rebels of Stormcloak, and the war that saw the Empire humbled and leashed by the Thalmor – whether anyone disagree or not, its the truth – he threw himself to the floor, rolling from a frustrated, fearsome roar just over his head.

“Quartermaster!” Consen cried out, pulling his iron gladius out and met the creature in combat. Brietus didn't even look back as he scrambled to the table, the lacking weight besides his thicker armour told him enough that his greatsword was behind him. Snatching the wristblades from the table, with steely nerves recognized and snapped the open port around his own forearm. The scream of the younger Cyrodillic man gurgling and wheezing his final death, the Quartermaster couldn't give a quiet prayer in his own head as he lunged out with a warcry of his own.

The monster, just like the other one – this Yautja as said in the accounts that were also on the table from the Thalmor agents – hurled an ax end-over-end from across the room and slammed Brietus into the shelves. A wheezing gasp of shock, dribbling pain and looking down – found him staring at the angled heft, its bearded head punctured through armor and ribs. It was growing increasingly hard to breath, a quivering hand reached and gripped at the axe-heft.

The Yautja was approaching, quivering with a quiet rage as it looked over at the remains of a fallen companion and back on the dying Imperial. The bladed staff dripping with Consen's blood. Its face was...hideous, like a mudcrab achieving the gods' blessing of standing upright. Fanged mandibles flexing and curling out to reveal the sneer of predatory fangs. Eyes that shone like wolves' gold glared from the pit of its crested skull, long hair in Redguard-dreads flowed over shoulders and back. The glint of piercings on its ridged brow.

The monster came out of nowhere. Twice the size of anyone I've seen and stronger than any orc, appearing like a whimscal Hircine-conjured nightterror before kicked Somuscus' chest so hard I thought his bones were brittle of a man thrice his age! That was the mildest of this predator's killings.

With a serrated blade the length of nearly two of my own arms, he split Voga from her legs from the rest of her before hewing down Letranni and Jharron like deer.

Gods, I never...that daedra was killing us like it was a mere annoyance and tried to escape but we couldn't - I couldn't let it get away.

If it wasn't for the battlemages throwing their magicks at it and Lieutenant Gorgzul...not even he could stop it from damn near tearing his skull and spine out of his own back. I have heard tales of things in the wilderness...things that hunt man like sport. I thought it was mere bandits or madmen of the Reach, but that thing is no man. I seen the skulls on its belt...the sabertooth fur on its waist. The pure 'ease' of its fighting...

Thank the gods that that treacherous Ulfric couldn't tell friend from foe in the chaos.

The Thu'um he unleashed knocked it. I wanted to kill it but it seemed the General have other plans. I don't like it but orders are unfortunately orders. May it be banished to whatever daedric hell it crawled out of.

This was recovered from the Darkwater Crossing, pried off that creature we've captured among the Stormcloak rabble. It bears Nordic similarity or...perhaps we bear similar to it. There have been accounts of these creatures scattered and recorded by survivors, fortunate scholars and madmen.

These predators of man, mer and beast. We know not why it was there, perhaps the gods just saw fortune to see it in our grasp...nevertheless, it will be executed like a daedric-cursed Argonian and body sent to our mages.

Its equipment will be categorized and studied. The metal made to shape this abominable Predator is most curious; it appears like steel yet far greater than ours. Not even the magics of our battlemages worked its work as surely, but we dare not damage it or the Inquisitor of this matter will no doubt have our hide.