#bezerkers

Before Andy was even properly in through the bar’s doors, Quinn was already motioning her over. “Let me guess,” she began as she sat across the bar from the elder vampire, “Your contacts found nothing and I’m just crazy after all?”

“Not at all. As a matter of fact, even from your initial description something seemed familiar, but it’s been so long...anyway, I had to be sure. So, I went to the Keeper of the Tomes-”

“The who-of-the-what now?”

Ice blue eyes fixed her with a look that made it clear interruptions weren’t appreciated, but Andy couldn’t help if she was a curious person by nature....and currently her brain was working at like half capacity max.

“Oh! Yeah, her. I think she just goes by ‘head librarian’ though...” she added, “Sorry, continue.”

“Right. So I spoke with The Keeper of the Tomes and with Ripley, the Guild member that tried to help you with your little issue.”

It was Andy’s turn to look less than impressed. That nigh had caused nothing but headaches, though she couldn’t bring herself to fully regret it if it meant Miles was no longer a threat.

“And?” she prompted for Quinn to continue.

For her part, the elder vampire brought out a book and turned it to a marked page. Tapping it she asked, “This look like what you saw?”

Andy could only stare at the page, her mouth slightly agape. The images were faded from time, but they were in fact exactly what she’d seen in Caspian’s lab. “Yeah...uh, the wolf looking one they had was emaciated and missing large patches of fur, and the other one was also emaciated and its wings were all fucked up. Like someone had taken a knife or scissors to the webbing to....”  Her brow furrowed as a realization dawned her, “...to keep it from flying away.”

Without further prompting Andy turned the page and read the entry on these creatures:

𝕭𝕰𝖅𝕰𝕽𝕶𝕰𝕽𝕾

The term Berzerker is used to collectively refer to any werwolf or vampire of a feral nature. However, the term was originally coined in reference to the original werewolves and vampires from which modern werewolves and vampires descend from. The overlap in the terms, comes in the fact that the original creatures afflicted with the respective curses of lycanthropy and vampirism were in fact basically feral creatures themselves.

𝔚𝔢𝔯𝔢𝔴𝔬𝔩𝔣 𝔅𝔢𝔷𝔢𝔯𝔨𝔢𝔯

An original werewolf bezerker differs from its modern descendants in the fact that a full moon is what triggered the original curse; however, these creatures did not have the choice to revert back to their human self once the moon passed. Their transformation was also not as close in resemblance to their animal counterpart, which was intended so that they would be easy to distinguish from regular wolves and be easily picked off by hunters.

 Unfortunately, this also allowed them to be more dangerous as they tended to move around upright and had the dexterity to hide both among the trees of the forest, as well as up high in its branches. This would allow a wolf bezerker the unique ability of not being restrained to just one approach when going on a hunt.

Wolf bezerkers -and modern ferals- are known to be the only werewolves that still hunt for sport. The only way for more wolf bezerkers to come to be is by mating and birth as they are not known to leave any of their ‘prey’ alive. It is believed that a cursed werewolf managed to leave his human lover pregnant leading up to the full moon, but prior to their complete transformation, thus passing along what is now known as the werewolf gene.

True wolf bezerkers are something a guild hunter will rarely come across, as corrupt hunters have dwindled the population down over the many centuries.

𝔙𝔞𝔪𝔭𝔦𝔯𝔢 𝔅𝔢𝔷𝔢𝔯𝔨𝔢𝔯

An original vampire bezerker differs from its modern descendants in many ways, though the most obvious is appearance. As pictured above they are rendered to a hairless, humanoid form with talons replacing fingernails on each hand, eyes that are attuned to actually see the blood of its prey (as opposed to just smell as a modern vampire might), a jaw capable of distending like that of a pythons, and a mouth full of razor-sharp teeth and two longer fangs (which are not retractable). Perhaps the most distinguishing features are the two bat-like wings that protrude from its shoulder blades allowing it the ability of flight.

Other notable differences are that they are bound to the curse that created them, and thus feel immense pain when hunger is denied and not sated immediately, their healing factor is affected by the blood they consume, making it to where a steady diet of human blood will guarantee near immediate healing, animal blood will slow it down, and supernatural blood will allow for healing on the spot. As such, it does make human blood their preferred diet and supernatural blood practically addicting.

They do still have heightened strength and speed, along with other senses; however, they are susceptible to sunlight. It is believed that modern vampires were the result of a feeding frenzy that was interrupted by hunters. This would have led to bezerker bloodshed on or near a human that was on the brink of death.

There have been no known survivors of a vampire bezerker attack in modern times, due much in part to the creature’s tendency to rip off their prey’s head before feeding.

Much like with true wolf bezerkers, true vampire bezerkers are something a guild hunter will rarely come across, as corrupt hunters have dwindled the population down over the many centuries.