These stories first appeared in Hunt's Book of Weapons, an in-game collection of found documents curated by an unknown researcher. They are replicated here in their original format. This means that many of the stories are not presented chronologically, or in one grouping, and it is left to the reader to put together the puzzle pieces and determine to what extent they contain fact, fiction, or fable.

Prior to the launch of Hunt: Showdown 1896, the Frontier 73C was named the Winfield M1873C. The Vandal 73C was formerly called the Winfield M1873C Vandal. The Our Variant terminology was also simplified. We have updated the names where relevant, but you may still see the more period accurate names within the lore texts.

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Frontier 73C

WINFIELD M1873C "FRONTIER 73C". (See also, RIFLE, WINFIELD REPEATING ARMS COMPANY) The Winfield rifle's namesake, Oliver Winfield, began his career as a clothing manufacturer, moving into the arms business, at first, as an investor in the Lava Repeating Arms Company. Lava's rifles were technologically advanced, but performed poorly because of a badly designed cartridge. An improved cartridge—brass-cased .44 caliber rimfire—was the company's first big step toward success. Winfield eventually took over ownership of the company, changing its name to Winfield Repeating Arms Company in 1866. Though most of the firearms that would make the company a success were designed by engineer Henry Tyler, the most iconic repeating rifles of the time would bear the Winfield name. The company became well known for its high-quality arms and sold its rifles to both American hunters and pioneers, and armies around the world.

The Winfield M1873 was one of the most iconic rifles manufactured by the Winfield Repeating Arms Company, and the Winfield M1873C is a slightly smaller version of that first big success, measuring four inches shorter than the original model. Its lighter weight makes it easier to handle and store, though otherwise the design does not differ from the M1873.

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Unpublished manuscript, "Bad As They Seem"
Author: Hayden Collins
Undated
Bleached paper, typewritten, 8.5x11 in

-6-
They bathed in gold; they bathed in blood. By day they worked on horseshoes, pots, and pans, and once the smith was closed, they chose their weapons and headed out into the swamps. They were silent, and ruthless: a perfect team of two, able to communicate without speaking, and they killed almost as many Hunters as they did creatures, clearing the field of every kind of evil.

Lynch opened up a world of connections. Superintendents, government men, captains—men who the day before wouldn't have given them the time of day. Now, they were eager to meet the infamous twins. Dispatch them. Pay them, on their return, handsomely. This society of Hunters, it seemed, was more a loose band of greedy ruffians than the tightly knit society Lynch had described, "led" by the self-important and power-hungry. The twins' reputation spread, and as it did their own heads became a much-sought bounty. They each slept with a Winfield beside their bed, now.

It was a Sunday when they found the woman's body, nailed to a tree beside a dilapidated cabin, rotting, and missing the right leg. Fin nodded towards it, both an acknowledgment and a question. Monster or human? the nod asked.

Jos shrugged. The answer was monster either way. The woman's corpse—pile of rotting flesh, marshy vessel for flies and maggots—had obviously been tortured, used for target practice, and my God, had she still been alive when she had been nailed to the tree? Fin shook her head and pointed toward the door, which hung open. Inside they found a man—dirty and covered in weeping red boils—asleep on a cot. They both raised their rifles and waited. They would learn his victim's name before he died. But as Fin leaned down to shake him awake, a Meathead broke through the front door, spraying leeches in every direction from the open sore of its neck.

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Unpublished manuscript, "Bad As They Seem"
Author: Hayden Collins
Undated
Bleached paper, typewritten, 8.5x11 in

-7-

Salter awoke to a floor awash with leeches, a Meathead stumbling against the wall and then the small table, knocking papers and pistols to the floor. He awoke to two strangers, two girls, standing beside the fireplace, guns raised, weapons strapped at every possible point across their bodies. One signaled to the other, who took something out of a pouch tied to her belt and threw it through the paper tacked to the window. Outside a cacophonous racket began and the creature began to throw itself against the far wall with renewed force.
One slung her rifle onto her back and took up a sledgehammer that she wielded with a strength unseemly for a woman, let alone a girl. Who were these intruders?

She swung the hammer through the air and into the spine—assuming it had one—of the creature. The sound it made, that wet thud—a noise that every being of flesh and bone must loathe to hear—echoed in his ears, though he was glad to see the thing floundering on the floor where it heaved and writhed. The girl struck down a second time with the added force of gravity, crushing its leg, but she had not accounted for the leeches, which had, in the meantime, found their way to her feet. She gasped and screamed as their sickening tendrilled suckers found purchase on her flesh, and they began to feed.

Frontier 73C Silencer

WINFIELD M1873 "FRONTIER 73C" SILENCER. (See also, ONE IN A THOUSAND, RIFLE, WINFIELD M1873, WINFIELD REPEATING ARMS COMPANY) The same as the base model Winfield M1873 in every way, with the addition of a sound suppressing device for quieting the sound of each shot.

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Serial published in the Tulane Phoenix
Author: Hayden Collins
Publication date: 1907
1/2

The Supernatural Library Sunday Edition
FEATURING Lynch in THE STOLEN CORPSE

She taunted the law at every step. Every moment she was just one false step away from being...LYNCHED

South of New Orleans, and to the west, the land veins with water, congealing into bayous and swamps, tupelo and cypress trees protruding from the still waters in a chaotic fence, branches sending a play of shadow and light down onto the waters below. Wild and savage, it is this country in which our story takes place, and a country more water than land, a people less civilized than they like to think.

She had caught the fugitive by boat and saved him from an alligator about to rip his throat out so she could do it herself. He had stolen a kill from her, and that could not be tolerated. She didn't need the cash, but she needed the kill, a new shuffle of the deck to bring her clairvoyance back into its full power.

When they landed on firmer ground, she set a bear trap and forced him to step on the pan at gunpoint. Then she cloaked herself in a heavy robe and led him toward the city market on the end of the trap's chain, a Winfield hung from a strap across her back.

Frontier 73C Poison Ammo

RN: Curious to discover in hindsight that Leroux found more loyalty for his father's firearm than for either the "Irish Woman" or the Association.

Frontier 73C Marksman

WINFIELD M1873C "FRONTIER 73C" MARKSMAN. (See also, RIFLE, SHARPSHOOTER, WINFIELD M1873) The original Winfield M1873 was known for accuracy, long range, and quick fire, and the Winfield M1873C Marksman refines those capabilities with a lighter weight and the addition of a scope for more accurate ranged shots.

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Serial published in the Tulane Phoenix
Author: Hayden Collins
Publication date: 1907
2/2

The Supernatural Library Sunday Edition
FEATURING Lynch in THE STOLEN CORPSE

They were a sight: him bloody, wounded, and moaning; her, cloaked and mysterious; soon a crowd had gathered to find out what was to become of the unfortunate prisoner.

"Who is he?" one yelled from the crowd.

"Who are you?" yelled another.

She hesitated. Then, with a swift, graceful movement, she flung aside her muffling robe, cast off her hat, and stood before them, transformed. She was fully five and a half feet tall, straight as an arrow, superbly powerful of development, and morosely, though pallidly handsome, with straight hair, white as sea foam, pulled back at the nape of her neck, and piercing black eyes.

She was dressed in dark-blue cloth, cut and made partly in the fashion of men, the edges of the coat reaching her knees. Her feet were incased in high boots of rugged leather, while her belt was well supplied with cartridges, and a trusty revolver reposed in its holster on her right hip, a machete hung from her left. Across her back a Winfield hung in a sling.

In her hand was a metal chain, connected to that gruesome metal bear trap that held the man. He moaned loudly and more spectators gathered. He was a man illiterate in speech, ugly in features, and ungainly in form. A laugh ran through the spectators, and she called loud and clear into the crowd, "Enough! Would you know this man's crimes? Or shall we hang him immediately?"

"Gosh all hemlock! Has he done ye wrong?"

"He has. He took something that belonged to me."

"Then hang him. Hang him," the call echoed around the crowd. "Hang him now! We want for a hangin'!"

"And no one will speak for him?" Her voice was hard and certain as it asked the question, challenging the crowd to speak against her will. "He cannot speak for himself as I have cut out his tongue." Each moan spilled another river of blood from between his damned lips.

"I will." A man whose suit was adorned with diamond buttons stepped forward from the crowd. "I believe that he has not had a fair trial."

But you surely know yourself all too well that this world was not built on foundations neither fair nor good, no matter what we might tell ourselves as we count sheep in our beds. For she had raised her Winfield to her shoulder before the newcomer had finished speaking and had shot him dead, and the crowd hung her poor prisoner, his neck snapping in an instant as the weight of the bear trap clamped to his leg pulled him down toward Hades.

Vandal 73C

WINFIELD M1873C VANDAL "VANDAL 73C" (See also: WINFIELD M1873C, RIFLES) is a shortened variation of the Winfield M1873C. While the regular M1873 necessitates complex adaption, the C model's already reduced magazine length allows the barrel to simply be sawn off. Suited for confined spaces, the rifle proved popular with those seeking further range than could be conventionally provided by a revolver.

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Letter, Gus Leroux
Handwritten, 8.5 x 14 in.
1/3

When I read my story, published in today's paper, I hardly recognized myself. I imagine the recently deceased must face a similar moment of reckoning when, rising from their deathbed in astral form, they might ready themselves for the new day, yet unaware of their fate. Only later to realize their candle had been snuffed out, their fate transpired. I thought not idly of ghosts, for the paper spoke of a phantom, a specter, terrorizing the French Quarter. It had not occurred to me that my pursuit of errant justice would be considered supernatural.

People were abuzz with excitement that something other-worldly walked among them. Yet, if that Irish Woman can be believed, there truly were such creatures among us, and it was fear and caution we should cultivate. As I walked among Bourbon Street's crowds, I considered the irony that people should not recognize me as the phantom, for they certainly recognized me otherwise. Memories of my humiliation haunted me.

At the farrier's, I collected my order. My father's Winfield, cut down to size so that I could still fire it with my good arm. He'd taken off the stock and shortened the barrel. Gripping it, I found it suitable. When I turned to leave, the smith asked why I'd not bought a pistol. Some things should be done the old-fashioned way, and my father was nothing if not old fashioned. I did not answer him.

The letters had by then made the rounds, and I knew my father's hand would soon be forced. If the Irish Woman had her way, I feared for the fate of the city more than the fate of my kin. The Winfield was concealed easily enough in the sleeve of a long dinner jacket, and my scar with a mask. Its flamboyance was not out of place in the French Quarter.

The plan had been to wait for the crescendo of the piece, but my patience was not what it was, my penchant for drama eroded by my desire for revenge. The orchestra were still tuning their instruments and the crowd still settling when the Winfield barked. Father tumbled from the box, and I receded into the dark labyrinth of the theater.

Frontier 73C High Velocity Ammo

RN: We have more than enough testimony of the Twins, the Salter place has been documented, and there's something listed here as the Meathead sketched out by Black. Only fools insist it is all the invention of Collins. One mad writer could not conceivably start a faith, let alone lay this out.

Frontier 73C Incendiary Ammo

RN: I long considered The Phantom another invention of Hayden Collins. Yet, as so many others, eventually fate has shown its hand, in this case, the whole arm—and—a direct reference to the “Irish Woman." The more cross references I discover, the more worried I become

Vandal 73C Striker

WINFIELD M1873C VANDAL "VANDAL 73C" STRIKER (See also: WINFIELD M1873C VANDAL) is a shortened Winfield M1873C with an attached blade for proficient melee combat. The modification makes it a competent all-rounder, with a decent range, stopping power, rate of fire, and handiness in melee.

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Letter, Gus Leroux
Handwritten, 8.5 x 14 in.
2/3

Weeks ago, while searching the attic for the letters, I had come across a book of medical anomalies. I'd since kept it in my pack, turning to it in quiet moments. Today, I read a chapter about the "phantom limb," a phenomenon discovered in the Civil War, and an affliction of the mind that tantalized those with an amputation with fleeting corporeal memories.

Since the loss of my arm, I had struggled to put a name to a certain sensation of uneasiness. I would awake with a start, and reach out to grope for the light, only to realize that I was reaching with the arm that had been taken. When shooting the shortened Winfield, I propped the barrel on my forearm. Yet still I had the sensation that my missing hand was gripping the gun's own missing barrel.

I'd had a revelation on what I had assumed would be the eve of my death, the day that the Irish Woman found me. After the incident in the theater I had headed north, travelling at night, evading her Hunters the best that I could. At some nameless crossroads, I came across a veteran of the war face down in the dust. I relieved him of his uniform and covered my face with dirt, walking by day now thus disguised.

My revelation was thus: the justice I'd fought for did not exist. Not on the road. Not anywhere. The rule of law was farce, nothing more than an illusion. I starved and I begged and then I robbed. I reached the state border but turned back. There was nothing on that road for me. I fixed a blade to the end of the Winfield to make it more fearsome and dreaded the day I would use it. When that day arrived, I felt no different.

They have called me so many things. Terrible names. Ridiculous names. One that stuck out was vandal. There was still something of the lawyer in me that took affront to that; for all the crimes I'd committed I was no vandal. But the phantom and the vandal had a ring to it—the same appeal the scandalously titled Dime Novels bore, their characters equally ridiculous. I could not relate to the name, but perhaps I could play the role. Perhaps I already was.

Winfield M1873C FMJ Ammo
RN: There were ghosts that walked the streets in these times—the hollowed husks of so many who'd heeded the call to Hunt. Somewhere amongst these ghosts—already only memories in their own time—must lie the answers that will pierce the heart of the matter.

Vandal 73C BULLSEYE

WINFIELD M1873C VANDAL "VANDAL 73C" BULLSEYE E (See also: WINFIELD M1873C VANDAL, RIFLES) bears an attached scope, enhancing its ranged capabilities. This increases the weapon's competency at medium range, enabling the target to be sighted, then brought down with rapid fire shots.

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Letter, Gus Leroux
Handwritten, 8.5 x 14 in.
3/3

Perhaps I was drawn back to the bayou by the realization that I was still flesh and blood. Perhaps, I—like the ghost I felt I had become—was unable to truly depart until some matter was resolved. It didn't take long for the Irish woman to find me, for she could commune with the unliving, and surely I belonged to their numbers.

For my last stand, I chose a barn with a hundred points to shoot from. To its rear was a vast pond in which something dwelt, something I witnessed dragging all manner of creatures beneath the bracken surface. To the fore lay a field which I burned, and then illuminated with electric lights. Downstairs, a generator hummed. There was enough fuel to run it for three nights. I'd affixed a short scope to the Winfield, which allowed me clear vision across the area. I paced the barn until I could walk it with my eyes closed and not make a sound.
She had sent three after me. Through the night, we dueled from the distant tree line to the barn. With my good eye, I was just able to catch the glint of their barrels. I think by dawn two of them were dead. The standoff ended then.

At noon, the Irish woman herself stepped from the tree line, her shock of white hair concealed under a wide hat, carrying a wooden case. Watching her through the scope, she seemed wryly amused. I waited for her to call out, but instead she just set the box down and left. She returned to the tree line, and then turned. My eyes flicked nervously back to the box, expecting it to explode. When I looked back, half a second later, she was gone.

When dusk fell, I judged the light reduced enough to risk checking the case. Lighter than imagined, it was engraved with the letters "A.H.A." I mulled for a long time over whether I would open it, and eventually curiosity overcame me. Inside, a letter. I scanned it briefly.

"After the efforts we had gone to secure him, the death of your father was most inconvenient for us. But revenge would be an over-commitment of our limited resources. Instead, we offer you a token of peace, in the hopes it will better help you settle your debt. Now you may find yourself in ours.

Regards,
L"

Alongside the letter was a beautiful prosthetic arm. I turned it over in the light, I'd never seen such craftsmanship, such attention to detail! I put it on, and, turning it over, saw written in tiny letters the word Phantom.

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