The Story of Codename: Hound

 

Act I: The Origin

 

In the beginning, three divine beings rule the Earth: Bathala, Diablo, and Diosa. For centuries, they maintain a peaceful coexistence, even though they possess different affinity: Bathala favors good, Diablo favors evil, and Diosa balances it with neutrality.

 

One day, they question the purpose of Earth and felt the planet is empty.

 

“Napakalaki ng mundo. Ngunit para saan pa kung wala itong buhay?”

 

Each began working on their own living creations to roam over the planet. Molded in their own image and likeness, Bathala created Tao, Diablo created Maligno, and Diosa created Engkanto. They each passed on their affinity to their creations.

 

The three races started to multiply and fill the Earth. Aside from their affinity, each is bestowed a gift. Tao possesses the gift of skill, Maligno holds the gift of strength, while Engkanto has the gift of sorcery.

 

For years, they live in peace. Like their creators, coexistence is their manifesto. Until territory caused a huge conflict—Tao overpopulates and claims for more land, while Maligno refuses violently and imposes their dominance among all creatures.

 

“Sino ba ang tunay na makapangyarihan?”

 

Tao and Maligno start to fight over power and territory. Meanwhile, Engkanto, being the neutral beings that they are, isolated themselves and built their own realm.

 

And so the two races remain. War is waged. Peace is forgotten. Blood is shed. Eventually, Maligno reigned supreme and suppressed Tao. On the brink of extinction, the remaining Tao searches for the isolated realm of Engkanto to seek their help.

 

“Tulungan niyo kami. Parang awa niyo na! Gagawin namin anuman ang inyong nais.”

 

Engkanto hesitates at first, but upon seeing Tao’s desperation to survive, agrees to lend a hand, but not without a heavy price.

 

“Pumapayag kami, sa isang kondisyon.”

 

The deal: every firstborn daughters of Tao will become infertile, in exchange of magical medallions known as talisman.

 

Tao acquires this new power that levels the battlefield against Maligno. The two races become equal and so the war continued, until Tao learns how to harness the true power of the gift bestowed upon them. After years of research and trial, a game-changer is born and became man’s greatest invention: gun powder. In a long-desired retaliation, Tao hunts Maligno armed with their new weapon and targets the beasts to extinction.

 

Raw strength is no match to the speed of a bullet. Guns dominate the chain of power and Maligno is quickly losing by the numbers. To escape their impending extinction, Maligno decides to scatter: some flee and hide to far away places, some pledge allegiance and make families with Tao, who then agrees to crossbreed because of their infertility curse.

 

The inevitable effects of crossbreeding: Maligno’s blood line gradually falters through generations, while that of Tao gains even more strength. But until when will their reign last?

 

ACT II: The Black Book

 

1993

 

A boy is rushing back to the village. Middle of the night. He runs straight to an old wooden house in the corner of the street and knocks heavily on the door. He has an important news.

 

“Mang Raul! Mang Raul! Nakita na ang aswang sa gubat!”

 

Raul Mamaril is the leader of Maligno hunters, a group of sharpshooters founded by Tao ancestors with the mission to fully eliminate the bloodline of Maligno. They hunt for the remaining full-blooded ones who stayed incognito throughout the years. When there are no sightings, they still go after half-bloods, or even those with just a little drip of Maligno blood running through their veins.

 

Fearing vengeance from the defeated race, it is said that the group was formed right after the ancient infertility curse was broken.

 

Mamaril wakes up swiftly as if expecting the call. He changes to his usual checkered shirt, leather jacket and boots; picks up his hunting rifle under his bed.

 

“Nasabihan na ba ang kabilang baryo? Si Juan, papunta na ba siya sa gubat?”

 

Juan Talisman is the leader of agimat experts, and Raul’s good friend. Their groups work together closely against Maligno. Guns and sorcery, where can they go wrong?

 

“Kanina pa ko narito. Akala ko nga ay natakot ka na.”

 

With a smirk on his face, a combat-ready Juan Talisman emerges from a shadow behind a balete tree.

 

Mamaril and Talisman, together with their troops, headed to the woods of Barangay Sansinukuban. Without their torches, it is almost pitch-black in the area. Old trees, big bats and the deafening silence of midnight. No sighting. It is 3:00 AM. Come dawn, all their chances to catch the aswang would be gone. So the troops strategically roam in smaller groups.

 

Mamaril and Talisman go to the direction of the river and followed it, just as the boy said.

 

“Doon po sa may ilog na nangunguha… doon sa ilog kung saan marami nang nalunod.”

 

Upon reaching the river, Mamaril sees an unusual figure in the river. He flashes his torch toward it. There he found something that gave him goosebumps: a Black Book floating against the direction of the river.

 

“Huwag kang lumapit d’yan. Hindi natin alam kung ano’ng kababalaghan mayroon ang librong ‘yan!”

 

Despite Talisman’s warning, Mamaril reaches for the Black Book, and just as he touches it, a colony of bats attacked them. Mamaril still reaches for the book and successfully grabs it. Suddenly, a majestic female dog appeared in front of him. It is regal… as if glowing. Mamaril is mesmerized by its beauty and felt the urge to follow it. The dog lured him farther to the steep side of the woods.

 

That is the last time Talisman saw his friend.

 

Act III: The Vengeance

 

Present time

 

Ezekiel Dogma, 23, grew up with almost no memory of his parents. He lost them early, when he was around 10 years old. He remembers though, it was a sunny day, when his parents just did not go home. He concludes that he was abandoned. He had no known relatives. He lived alone almost all his life. The only memento he has of his parents is a Black Book, and the words of his father:

 

“Ang itim na librong ito ang nag-iisang alaala ng lahi ng iyong ina. Kaya nitong palakasin ang anumang natatanging kakayahan ng sinumang gagamit nito, ngunit, kaakibat ng kapangyarihan nito ay isang sumpa.”

 

The curse: whoever uses the dark magic contained in the Black Book gives up the chance for their soul to go to heaven after death.

 

“Ipangako mo sa akin, anak, anuman ang mangyari ay huwag mong gagamitin ang libro.”

 

Those words are the only vivid memory he has of his father. He knows he is not normal. Because the blood that flows through his veins is not pure. He is one of the few remaining half-bloods—50% Tao and 50% Maligno.

 

He doesn’t fear a guaranteed one-way ticket to inferno, however, for he has lived a dark life his parents disappeared. No past, no future, no purpose. Simply put, he is just waiting for his life to reach its end.

 

Until he meets Angela.

 

He finds a purpose in her. He wants to protect her. He feels a cosmic connection, and she reciprocates it.

 

Angela is the only daughter of a rich and powerful businessman. She is the heiress of their jewelry business, and is pressured by his dad to learn the business at an early age. She feels she has no identity—merely a shadow of her father. Deep in her heart, she doesn’t want to deal with stones and jewelries, rather, she wants to be a surgeon.

 

She met Ezekiel in the most unexpected way. Feeling all the pressure and burden from her family, and not being allowed to live the life her heart truly desires, she had been contemplating to end her own life. When she was about to jump off a building, she heard a voice. Turned out, Ezekiel was sitting on that corner of the rooftop all this time.

 

“Tatalon ka? Hindi kita pipigilan. Pero ipapaalala ko lang sa ‘yo, kapag nagpakamatay ka, hindi ka mapupunta sa langit.”

 

Angela saw loneliness in his eyes—a kind of loneliness that even her own misery could not compare to. She stepped back from the edge of the building, and sat down with him.

 

“Bakit mo gusto mapunta sa langit?”

 

That was where they started. A suicide attempt. A life-long desire to find a purpose. In that rooftop, they found a connection, and a reason to go on living.

 

Until one fateful night.

 

Ezekiel is walking Angela home. Two blocks away from her house, four men in black suit got off a car and followed them. They beat him up, stabbed him and left him to die, before dragging her into the car. They are going to take her. And he cannot move. He is gasping for air; his body almost covered up with his own blood. Then he remembers the Black Book. He gathers his strength and reaches for it in the inside pocket of his jacket. He pulls it out and hastily opens it. To hell with going to heaven. The irony.

 

“Unum ad tenebras… levis est periit!”

 

Black out. After blurting out the spell, Ezekiel goes berserk and loses all control. He transforms into an aswang—his half-Maligno blood surges and fills his entirety. He has nothing on his mind but a natural instinct: to kill. Like a hungry beast, he jumps to his enemies to devour them. The four men retaliate with gunshots, but to no avail. He rips their bodies into pieces. He kills them, then turns to Angela.

 

But it might be too late.

 

Angela is badly wounded, almost dying. One of her attackers shot her, right before Ezekiel turned to save her.

 

“’Wag kang malungkot, Ezekiel. Hindi man tayo para rito, hihintayin kita. Magkikita pa rin tayo… sa langit.”

 

Ezekiel froze—he knew that would not happen. He knew this might be the last time he sees and hears Angela. By trying to save her, he has given up his only chance to see her again, even in heaven.

 

Grief-stricken and unable to think clearly, he carries Angela who has just lost consciousness. He transforms back to his old self, and with every step, he too is blacking out due to all the gunshots he took. He is slowly fading away, but one thing remained in him from thereon—vengeance.

 

***

Epilogue

 

Rushing to the crime scene is a man on his 50s. He gets off his car with his bodyguards, looking for his daughter, only to see her unconscious, not moving, in the hands of an aswang. Appalled with what he saw, he pulls his gun and aims at the beast, but as he is about to shoot him, the aswang falls down on his knees…and transforms into a human.

 

He has seen wilder things than what’s right in front of him. He is, after all—Juan Talisman. He is not new to this kind of sorcery, but it has already been more than 20 years since he retired from this kind of life.

 

Devastated and confused, Talisman rushes to his dying daughter. He vows to seek the truth, not only about who did this to Angela, but about this creature he just saw transformed from aswang to human—and the familiar Black Book he is carrying with him.

 

 

TO BE CONTINUED