[img]https://i.imgur.com/yW2VDaL.png[/img]
[h3]Eastern Yharnam, relatively near the Hunter's clinic[/h3]
His eyes kept darting around, carefully taking in every detail of every nook and cranny in the city streets, trying in vain to stop the corners of his mouth to stop twitching as he walked down the cobbled path leading to their destination. The bells had rung. A Night of the Hunt! Tonight of all nights! Victor was close to start literally frothing with sheer suppressed urges, clutching the hilt of his silver sword tightly as he felt every hair on his body stand on end.
When the church had offered to save him by making him a Hunter, Victor had not understood just what being a Hunter meant. Sure, he knew that Yharnamites found the consumption of blood to be euphoric and that he, considering his past, would likely end up addicted to it, but the rest? Like the [I]other[/I] bloodthirst? This restlessness that filled the body and made the mind turn on itself, making him shake as hard as withdrawal ever had? He had known that he would be required to hunt, but he had not foreseen that he would [I]need[/I] to hunt. He had not realized how the desire to maim and slaughter would build inside of him until it permeated his entire being, nor how glorious it felt when he gave in to the murderous intent inside him. The joy of hearing the cries of pain, of feeling warm blood spilled on his hands and face, the ecstasy of stealing another living being's final breath... it was incredible.
Victor had spoken to other Hunters about this, of course, but did not find the agreement or assurances he was looking for. They all initially seemed to confess that they felt the urge to hunt, but they did not seem as consumed by it as he did. The way they looked at him when he described the intensity of his desire said it all: they were disgusted with him. Not even his fellow half-monsters were willing to accept the one he had become. Not even Hunters could understand how strong his pleasure in hunting was... how addicted he had become. How it pained him when he was not allowed to kill.

And now, when a Night of the Hunt finally came about, Victor was stuck on a task like this. Granted, they had already been assigned the task and were underway when the bells tolled, but it was nevertheless nothing short of a travesty. He could get behind going to receive the new batch of freshly turned Hunters – they were to be his brethren, after all – but the context of the task could not possibly have planned to be any more painful or insulting to him. They sent him to escort a Blood Saint – a [I]Blood Saint[/I]! – who was said to have some of the most delicious, intoxicating blood in all of the Healing Church, to keep her safe as she bestowed her “blessings” on the new Hunters. He cursed Dietrich for knowingly testing Victor like this; Dietrich knew that Victor had trouble resisting the temptation of blood and was prone to binges, so he decided to tempt him with the best blood imaginable. She was sacred to the church and as such untouchable, yet so very alluring...
But escorting this Adelicia, as she was called, was not the only potential disgrace he was faced with. Oh no, Dietrich had an even greater insult in store for Victor; that he would be joined by Raine Provostus. Just thinking about this man made Victor want to not only spit in disgust, but dash straight at the sorry excuse of a man and separate the head from his shoulders. A Hunter who had served the Healing Church, then turned his back on them to join the Harrow, of all people, before finally finding his place with Moira's black church. The Harrow and the Black Healing Church were bad enough by themselves, but one who had been both and was also a traitor? Victor considered most Hunters to be his brethren deserving of his support, but this “man”, if you could even call him that? Vermin.

Victor had taken the head of the group on their way to the Hunter's clinic, leading their sorry little trio through the streets, though it had been a while since there was last any need for a leader to guide them. The street had been straight and completely blocked to the sides by tightly packed smaller Yharnam residences, many of which were newly erected after the destruction wrought on the fabled Night of the Blood Moon five years ago. Just several years ago Victor would have taken topology like this as a cue to relax and lower his guard, but facing beasts – real beasts – had opened his eyes so that they could never again truly be closed.
There were beasts outside of Yharnam, of course; few native Yharnamites even seemed to realize this, but the scourge of beasts was found all across the lands, not just in their little city. Prior to the fateful encounter with his first Yharnam-beast, Victor had always assumed that the rumors of Yharnam and its plague of beasts was an exaggeration, since other nations across the land seemed to have little trouble dealing with the beasts that showed up there without superhuman Hunters. He had presumed that Yharnam-beasts were no different from others of their kind and that these monsters were simply more numerous here than elsewhere, but he had been mistaken. The beasts found elsewhere, he had since learned, were actually remnants of old seats of blood healing that had ultimately been consumed by the scourge. Consequently these beasts were typically very old, often sustained well past their natural lifespan by the beast-blood, and far from as dangerous as the vigorous, freshly corrupted ones found here.
Among humans and frail, ancient beasts, streets like this would be safe. But here? Scourge beasts were no trifling matter, Victor knew this now. He had seen them leap from rooftop to rooftop, scale sheer walls and crashing through windows and fragile doors as if it was nothing. A mere building would not stop a scourge beast from reaching them.
And that was not even considering the things out there that were even worse. Victor had yet to encounter a cleric beast, and he prayed that he would never have the misfortune. The Harrow prowled the dark for a way to vent their violent desires, the Followers plotted and schemed, the Fire Dancers could strike at any moment... and the Vilebloods? Who even knew what to expect of those things? The only thing you could count on with the Vilebloods was their hostility towards the church.
Not to mention the Moonborn...

He looked over his shoulder, past the broad frame of the scabbard-blade of his Holy Blade sitting on his back. He had initially been displeased with being forced to accept the scabbard along with the silver sword in his hand, since he found the transformed version of his chosen weapon clumsy and inelegant, but had since come to appreciate the comforting weight of the scabbard on his back. It was like a large shield, like his very own turtle-shell, protecting his back from attacks like the one that had nearly paralyzed him before becoming a Hunter. He exclusively used the small sword for fighting, but the scabbard-blade had its uses.
“It's not far now,” he grumpily told Adelicia and Raine behind him, his gaze darting shiftily to obsessively examine their eyes. The eyes was where the scourge of beasts could be seen first; the pupils broke and irises shattered. As a result, Victor was extremely attentive to the appearance of people's eyes. He liked Adelicia's eyes. “We will have to ride an elevator to get to where the clinic is, and the elevator will be guarded by a couple of... distasteful characters. A servant and a giant. Do not be alarmed when you see them, they serve the Healing Church.”