A mass of blackened fur darted through the streets, never staying out in the open for more than a few mere moments before it darted into cover. It felt at home in the shadows, where its colour helped it dissolve and fade away from sight.

Yet there was one shadow it feared, the one shadow that it dared not hide in the bosom of. The Roaming Shadow of Death.

Even though this creature had never met the Roaming Shadow of Death before this day, the fear was ingrained deep within its bones. Its blood churned through its trembling body as they carried dire warnings from ancestors long passed, from those that had met the shadow and lived to tell the tale… and those who had not.

This creature, which was currently sheltered by the corpse of a steel behemoth, was naught more than a mouse. Every part of its body, from its fur to its worm-like tail and even the inside of its ears was as black as night, seemingly designed to help it disappear into the darkness of any hole or crevice.

The only flaw in this masterful design was a wide pair of sapphire eyes. Not just in colour, but in their true appearance as if some almighty being had taken uncut gems and bestowed them upon the lowly creature. Each edge of the uncut gem gave it a new angle of vision, acting as a compound eye much like a fly or insect.

Still hiding beneath the remnants of the behemoth, the mouse inched forward until it came to the edge of the corpse's shadow. Its button nose twitched as it tested the air whilst its beady eyes were on alert for even the smallest hint of movement.

Only when it was sure it was safe, did it start to slowly make its way out. Yet it was not safe enough.

The rocks around it began to jump and dance with glee, as if they were excitedly celebrating the return of their earthen gods and the sun was drowned in darkness. Even though the mouse had left the embrace of the dead giant, it was once again wreathed in shadows.

The Roaming Shadow of Death!

Without a single moment of hesitation, the mouse disappeared into a puff of smoke, just in time for the Roaming Shadow of Death to engulf the position in which it once stood. The terrible creature, the mouse's mortal enemy, slammed into the ground and let out an ear shattering roar of anger at its missed prey.

Whumpf

The death defying mouse appeared once again, not far from where it had once been yet once again in the comforting embrace of the shadows.

However, despite using its most reliable technique, the mortal enemy simply let out a dreadful screech before diving into pursuit.

No matter where it went, no matter how many times it used its sacred escape technique to avoid death by barely a whisker, the Roaming Shadow of Death would always find it. Unrelenting, it hunted the mouse down until it could disappear no more.

The mouse was so focused on the Roaming Shadow of Death, it never saw its true end coming. Not until it was too late.

Its sapphire eyes twinkled in despair as they picked up on the rapidly approaching movement, but it had nothing left. It couldn't disappear, it couldn't run in time. All it could do was close its eyes, as a divine blade carved through its humble body as if it was mere dirt.

The last thing it saw was the gargantuan boot of the god, the one that the rocks had been jubilantly dancing in light of its arrival.

***

Seth bent down, picking up the two halves of the tiny mouse and retrieving the dagger sized feather he had thrown at the rodent. As he straightened up, Omelette landed on the roof of the car, letting out a cheerful chirp and lifting its head, clearly proud of his work and eager for praise.

"Yes yes, You did good. Here, I know this is what you really want."

Holding the tail end of the rodent by, well the tail, he flicked his wrist and sent it tumbling through the air. Before it could even reach the peak of its arc, Omelette snatched its prey from the air and scarfed it down whole, barely even considering the concept of chewing its food.

Something like that was clearly an inferior human trait, but his master was forgiven for his ignorance. Afterall, not everyone could have a flesh-rending beak such as himself.

As Omelette devoured his new favourite meal, Seth removed the glittering eyes from the vermin's skull before tossing the rest to the Wyvern, who inhaled the meat and let out an appreciative burp.

When he first stumbled across the creature he had been somewhat surprised. Not by its colour or by its teleportation ability, but simply by the fact that it was normal sized for a mouse. It seemed like everything in the world was being juiced up and turned into dinosaurs, so it felt quant to discover something as close to normal as he could get at this point. Minus the teleportation, of course.

Speaking of which, It was only after he had slain his first one that the entry for it appeared in his journal and gave him the name of the space warping rodent. Despite being a mouse, the rodent was named a Blink Rat.

He hadn't noticed before, but some creatures' entries came already assigned with a name while others remained blank. Many basic or 'common' creatures already had their names, such as Zombie, but others like the Fog Prowler, only gained their names when Seth filled it in himself.

Naturally, he had asked Angel about this.

[While the majority of the data without the knowledge gift comes from your own sources, it is at its core a compendium of knowledge.

There are many beings throughout the realms, and even more being born. Those which have been discovered already are given their names, which are translated to the most appropriate dialect, to allow for prosperous communication and knowledge exchange. This was decided after many beings spent hours arguing over the traits of the Grutivark, only to discover they had been discussing two completely different creatures named the same thing.

An important discovery to make as one Grutivark was docile and friendly creature that could be domesticated, while the other was a horror from the depths that dissolved its victims insides with acid and slurped them up like freshly squeezed orange juice.]

It was clear that, whomever named the Blink Rat, was not the best at identifying rodents. But, to be fair to the amateur zoologist, it wasn't the worst name he had come across.

One of the creatures he had previously slain, a disgusting cross between a spider and a human that still gave him the heebie jeebies just thinking about it, was named 'What in the everloving fuck is that thing?'

In all fairness, however, that was a very appropriate name.

Thankfully, Blink Rats were much easier to hunt and surprisingly common. Whether they were from the same brood or it was just another case of parallel evolution, it was unclear and ultimately didn't matter much to Seth.

It wouldn't surprise him if many creatures didn't have a variety of possibilities for their evolution paths. Such was life.

Omelette in particular loved to hunt the Blink Rats, as they had quickly become his favourite food. They had done it so much in the few hours since leaving the clothing store that they had the technique completely down.

Even though Omelette took every bite of their succulent meat, at least that's how it was in Omelette's opinion, Seth was not left out in the rewards of their simple hunts. The eyes weren't true sapphires but they were some kind of gem, he just wasn't sure what kind. Whilst they might not have monetary value he was sure they had some use.

Even if they didn't, he still got one useful thing out of it.

As he gazed at his status screen, he absentmindedly rubbed his thumb against the pitch black ring he now wore on his middle finger. A continuous line of azure writing surrounded the band of the ring, although the text itself was indecipherable as it was in the same unknown language that made up Angel and his tattoos.

[Name: Sephtis 'Seth' Quinn

Species: Gaian Human

Biological Score: 73 Elemental Score: 61

Spiritual Score: 135 Psychic Score: 50

Mutation - Puppeteers Thread, Spirit Animal

Requitals: Life Lantern, Ravens Raiment, Expeditious Ratreat

Bonds: Omelette]

'Ratreat… Rat-treat… Really?'

He could actually feel the shit eating grin Angel had at that name. It seemed that dreadful names were destined to follow him everywhere, as if some all powerful being found amusement in cursing him with them.

He had been expecting a weapon or another piece of armour, perhaps something to go underneath his cloak. But the ring was a lovely surprise. It allowed him to mimic the Blink Rats ability, a short range teleportation with a limit of 3 uses per day.

Lifting Omelette, who was now roughly the size of a chihuahua, off of the car and depositing him onto his shoulder, Seth turned to face the rest of his companions.

Following close behind was Bob and a dirty dozen of his newest puppets, a mixture of mannequins, skeletons and half eaten corpses, not all of which were human but all were humanoid, restricted to two arms and two legs per body.

The muscle bound ghoul that Bob had viciously snapped the neck of was front and centre, connected directly to Seth as it led the rest of the Spirit Animal controlled puppets like a drill sergeant in a boot camp march.

They had picked up any available puppets they stumbled across, replacing mannequins with more durable bodies whenever they could.

Unfortunately, a dozen was the most the Spirit Animal was able to be linked to at once.

But even with his small army, Seth couldn't help but smile as he saw something glistening at him from further down the road.