[h3]Below the southern mountains, southeast of Yharnam[/h3]
The Hunters moved on in tight formation, darting from cover to cover and keeping as much to the shadows as possible as they crossed a relatively open expanse forward. Moira seemed to be leading them directly toward the spot where the great form of Crowmother loomed, its pale head occasionally sweeping from side to side as if gazing out over the landscape and scanning for threats. Their movements were made up of brief, desperate sprints interspersed with periods of patient sitting in place and waiting for the opportunity to move – when Crowmother looked away or a cloud passed in front of the moon – , which made progress quite slow. It took them nearly twenty minutes to cross just a little over a hundred meters to reach the foot of the mountain, where they finally arrived at what had appeared from a distance to be a simple large cluster of trees. As they reached the treeline, however, they soon discovered that to be something of an illusion.
In truth, what they had reached was a wide semicircle of tightly grouped hardwood trees, just two or three trees thick, beyond which it almost seemed that they stepped into another world entirely. Here in this isolated little space behind the thick trunks and dense canopies of the trees, nestled into a subtle recess into the foot of the mountain, it was actually easy to forget that they were only a matter of hundreds of meters from the city of Yharnam.
It looked almost downright idyllic: a dozen or so small gardens separated by narrow dirt paths, each growing its own kind of vegetable, fruit or berry. A small enclosure with a single cow, sleeping soundly. Another enclosure with a henhouse. And furthest back, past all these little domesticated bits of nature, sat a cozy little log cabin with a single shuttered window and an open door facing them, past which they could see the faint flicker of candlelight. And all of it was bathed in pure, peaceful moonlight... and not a single censer in sight, even on a Night of the Hunt.

What was perhaps particularly interesting to the Paleblood Hunters was one specific circular garden out of all them others, taking up a central place of pride in the clearing that happened to be almost directly between the Hunters and the cabin, was not growing anything of practical worth, but purely aesthetic flowers white flowers. But not just any flowers: the exact same kind they had seen several times before, as they were all over the Hunter's Dream. And standing perfectly in the middle of this little patch of flowers was the equally familiar sight of a post with an unlit lantern.
They would also unavoidably notice that scattered across the area, sitting among crops, flowers and weeds, crowding around the cow and peeking out of the henhouse, were Messengers. Little ones were all over this place just lounging around lazily... yet seemingly being aware enough to notice and watch their group's arrival.

But before any of them had much of a chance to react to this deeply unusual scene in any meaningful way, they would almost certainly be distracted by first a faint thud, then a louder one followed by a crashing boom as something huge bounded down the mountainside and directly toward them, only to suddenly come to a halt in the rocks directly above the cabin. Because here, finally, a mere forty meters or so away, the party got their first good look at Crowmother.
Though the creature staring at them from the rocks was huge – its posture was hunched over, but it looked to like it would be at least eighteen meters tall if it stood up straight – they realized up close that its body and limbs were actually quite long and thin. Rather than the birdlike wings it appeared to have had from a distance, they would realize that it was almost just long arms with enormous wing-like feathers growing from them; they were structured more like the wings of a bat than those of a bird, with bestial fingers adorned with long, murderous claws. These arms and its torso were both clad mostly in black feathers in varying sizes, though among the feathers they would also see fur, which became the dominant growth on its belly and legs. The legs were also disproportionally short for a creature of its size, and looked more like they belonged on a lycanthrope than any kind of avian.
By far the most shocking part of its appearance, however, was definitely its head. The front of its chest, its neck and its entire head lacked fur and feathers alike, being entirely bald, and was wrinkled and scarred. Dark, sunken eyes glared at them from above the monster's maw... for it was a maw, not a beak. Though it had looked like it from a distance and it did have a shape reminiscent of a beak, it had opened to reveal that that protrusion was merely a small adornment on its upper and lower lip, respectively. Its lower jaw looked to be unhinged like a snakes and opened impossibly wide to reveal jaws full of huge teeth like daggers, clearly meant only for killing.
[url=https://images-wixmp-ed30a86b8c4ca887773594c2.wixmp.com/f/c10b162b-749d-4db8-b8be-af47136e2712/dcbfahc-803581d4-bba6-4416-9fa0-b008b9c04282.jpg/v1/fill/w_1024,h_716,q_75,strp/crow_beast_by_mobiusu14_dcbfahc-fullview.jpg?token=eyJ0eXAiOiJKV1QiLCJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiJ9.eyJzdWIiOiJ1cm46YXBwOjdlMGQxODg5ODIyNjQzNzNhNWYwZDQxNWVhMGQyNmUwIiwiaXNzIjoidXJuOmFwcDo3ZTBkMTg4OTgyMjY0MzczYTVmMGQ0MTVlYTBkMjZlMCIsIm9iaiI6W1t7ImhlaWdodCI6Ijw9NzE2IiwicGF0aCI6IlwvZlwvYzEwYjE2MmItNzQ5ZC00ZGI4LWI4YmUtYWY0NzEzNmUyNzEyXC9kY2JmYWhjLTgwMzU4MWQ0LWJiYTYtNDQxNi05ZmEwLWIwMDhiOWMwNDI4Mi5qcGciLCJ3aWR0aCI6Ijw9MTAyNCJ9XV0sImF1ZCI6WyJ1cm46c2VydmljZTppbWFnZS5vcGVyYXRpb25zIl19.EKMw1f9pYd6qwy4EWzuYu5uI3CVRAZIpXUIogteH02c]Crowmother[/url] glared at them from its perch for a second... then it spoke, its voice harsh and loud, as inhuman vocal organs strained to form human speech:
“You have visitors.”