The monster hunter files.., p.1
The Monster Hunter Files, Volume 2, page 1
THE
MONSTER
HUNTER
FILES
VOLUME 2
Edited by
Larry Correia
Jason Cordova
The Monster Hunter Files, Volume 2
Edited by Larry Correia and Jason Cordova
STORIES SET IN THE BEST-SELLING MONSTER HUNTER INTERNATIONAL SERIES. New stories from Larry Correia, Steve Diamond, Jason Cordova, Mike Massa, Melissa Olthoff, Kacey Ezell, and many more!
FROM THE CASE FILES OF MONSTER HUNTER INTERNATIONAL
For well over a century, Monster Hunter International has kept the world safe from supernatural threats far and wide. Now, join us as we delve some of the wilder stories from the library archives which have never seen the light of day. The Monster Hunter Files Vol. 2 continues the secret lore and mythical battles against the forces of evil, and the fallout from these conflicts.
Deadly mermaids attacking a small northeastern port village . . . ancient Roman heroes . . . combat exorcists . . . Decision Week . . . ancient Greek muses . . . all these and more within, all revealed with meticulous care and research of Albert Lee, MHI’s archivist.
Featuring stories from New York Times best-selling author Larry Correia, Steve Diamond, Kacey Ezell, Brad R. Torgersen, Marisa Wolf, and more!
Complete list of contributors: Larry Correia, Jason Cordova, Brad R. Torgersen, Robert E. Hampson, Steve Diamond, Jack Wylder, Hinkley Correia, Kacey Ezell, LawDog, Marisa Wolf, Mike Massa, Melissa Olthoff, Spearman Burke & Nick Nethery.
The Monster Hunter International series:
Monster Hunter International
Monster Hunter Vendetta
Monster Hunter Alpha
Monster Hunter Legion
Monster Hunter Nemesis
Monster Hunter Siege
Monster Hunter Guardian
Monster Hunter Bloodlines
Monster Hunter Files
The Monster Hunter Memoirs series:
Monster Hunter Memoirs: Grunge
Monster Hunter Memoirs: Sinners
Monster Hunter Memoirs: Saints
Monster Hunter Memoirs: Fever
BAEN BOOKS by LARRY CORREIA
THE MONSTER HUNTER INTERNATIONAL SERIES
Monster Hunter International
Monster Hunter Vendetta • Monster Hunter Alpha
The Monster Hunters (compilation) • Monster Hunter Legion
Monster Hunter Nemesis • Monster Hunter Siege
Monster Hunter Guardian (with Sarah A. Hoyt)
Monster Hunter Bloodlines
The Monster Hunter Files (anthology edited with Bryan Thomas Schmidt)
Monster Hunter Fantom (anthology edited by Marin Fajkus & Jakub Mařík)
The Monster Hunter Files, Vol. 2 (anthology edited with Jason Cordova)
MONSTER HUNTER MEMOIRS
Monster Hunter Memoirs: Grunge (with John Ringo)
Monster Hunter Memoirs: Sinners (with John Ringo)
Monster Hunter Memoirs: Saints (with John Ringo)
Monster Hunter Memoirs: Fever (with Jason Cordova)
THE GRIMNOIR CHRONICLES
Hard Magic • Spellbound • Warbound
THE SAGA OF THE FORGOTTEN WARRIOR
Son of the Black Sword • House of Assassins
Destroyer of Worlds • Tower of Silence
Graveyard of Demons • Heart of the Mountain
DEAD SIX (WITH MIKE KUPARI)
Dead Six • Swords of Exodus • Alliance of Shadows
Invisible Wars (omnibus)
NOIR ANTHOLOGIES (EDITED WITH KACEY EZELL)
Noir Fatale • No Game for Knights • Down These Mean Streets
Gun Runner (with John D. Brown)
Target Rich Environment (short story collection)
Target Rich Environment, Vol. 2 (short story collection)
Servants of War (with Steve Diamond)
BAEN BOOKS by JASON CORDOVA
THE BRONZE LEGION (WITH MELISSA OLTHOFF)
To Tread Obsidian Shores
Mountain of Fire
Monster Hunter Memoirs: Fever (with Larry Correia)
Chicks in Tank Tops edited by Jason Cordova
Dancing with Destruction edited by Jason Cordova
The Monster Hunter Files Volume 2
This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.
Copyright © 2026 by Larry Correia and Jason Cordova
Introduction by Albert Lee; “Albert Lee and the Scroll of Doom” © 2026 by Larry Correia; “Eyes Like Mine” © 2026 by Melissa Olthoff; “Psalm of Vengeance” © 2026 by Steve Diamond; “Teddy and the She-Beast” © 2026 by Brad R. Torgersen; “Friday Night Wights” © 2026 by LawDog; “The Ghost of Bogotá” © 2026 by Jason Cordova; “Land’s End” © 2026 by Marisa Wolf; “Inspiration” © 2026 by Kacey Ezell; “The Hard Earth” © 2026 by Jack Wylder; “Carnage at the Carnival” © 2026 by Hinkley Correia; “Legacy” © 2026 by Robert E. Hampson; “Monsterkommando” © 2026 by Spearman Burke & Nick Nethery; “Pater Monstrum” © 2026 by Mike Massa
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form.
A Baen Books Original
Baen Publishing Enterprises
P.O. Box 1403
Riverdale, NY 10471
www.baen.com
ISBN: 978-1-6680-7317-9
Cover art by Alan Pollack
First printing, March 2026
Distributed by Simon & Schuster
1230 Avenue of the Americas
New York, NY 10020
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Printed in the United States of America
Electronic version by Baen Books
www.baen.com
To everyone in the Monster Hunter nation.
You made this second volume possible. Thank you.
INTRODUCTION
The following reports have been compiled from the archives of Monster Hunter International, as well as items which are believed to have leaked from the United States Monster Control Bureau, the Oxford University Supernatural Archives, the Blessed Order of Saint Hubert the Protector, Special Task Force REDACTED, other miscellaneous monster-hunting organizations, and individual records.
Though I can’t verify all of them, I believe that these accounts are for the most part accurate and should be useful for all of our Hunters in the field. But as always, when dealing with unearthly forces it is best to tread carefully. Like Earl Harbinger says, keep a flexible mind.
—Albert Lee
MHI Archivist
Cazador, Alabama
Okay…this is awkward. I’ve compiled a lot of stories over the years, from other Hunters, from various organizations—both rival and friendly—from witnesses, and even some accounts from the very monsters we hunt, but I’ve never written one myself based on my own experiences. I’ve read thousands of records like this, but telling the story about one of my experiences is different. I’m a librarian, not a writer.
—A.L.
Albert Lee and the Scroll of Doom
Larry Correia
I suppose I should do an introduction. I’m Monster Hunter International’s archivist, Albert Lee. Not to toot my own horn, but I’m likely one of the world’s leading experts on monster lore. I don’t claim to be a brilliant scholar or anything like that, it’s just that the more academic types who do what I do for a living keep ending up cursed and insane, so I’ve outlasted the competition. It’s all that insatiable curiosity, delving into forbidden mysteries thing. It gets them every time.
Oh look, here’s an ancient Sumerian tome of rituals bound in human skin and inked in blood. Most paranormal archivists would be pumped at such a find and immediately read it. Me? Though tempted I’ll take a quick look, make a note about the contents for the catalog, and then toss it in the safe with the rest of the haunted crap that whispers it wants to be read, to be saved for a rainy day if/when MHI runs into something pissed off from ancient Sumeria. I’m pragmatic like that.
It’s not that I’m incurious. On the contrary, I love this stuff. It’s that I’ve seen firsthand the costs of curiosity when it comes to certain haunted subjects, and that price is way too high for me to mess around with that sort of thing willy nilly. That’s how you get your Martin Hoods and Ray Shacklefords. Specifically, Julie’s dad, not the several other Ray Shacklefords who turned out sane and uncursed, but that family does love to recycle their names through the generations.
One downside of becoming the de facto company historian is learning that guys like that—who got corrupted or driven crazy—aren’t that big of an anomaly in this business, and some topics are forbidden for a reason.
Generally speaking, knowledge is good. As we were taught by the greatest philosophical work of all time, knowing is the half the battle. There’s nothing more satisfying than pinning down the details that allow us to banish or kill the latest evil beastie.
But when it comes to magic, oh hell no. Do not screw with that shit. Humans messing around with magic is like giving a toddler a stick of dynamite to play with.
As company archivist, I’m basically the guy who hands out that dynamite. Well, I guess it’s more like metaphysical dynamite. Milo Anderson’s the one who hands out the real dynamite. Not that I’m a slouch in that department either. When I was recruited by MHI I was working as a county librarian, but before that I was a 1371 Combat Engineer, United States Marine Corps. Books and bombs are my favorite things.
But anyways, back to the evil magic stuff.
Long story short, MHI has accumulated a lot of wicked, nasty, possibly haunted, sanity-devouring tomes over the last century. When you off some necromancer or mad scientist, you can’t just leave their grimoire or lab notes lying around for normies to mess with. And we can’t just get rid of them either, because, as we’ve seen repeatedly, those things can be super useful. So part of my job is to make sure dangerous knowledge is only used responsibly in the proper circumstances. It’s like don’t drink and drive, don’t take this medication and operate heavy machinery, don’t commune with the wrathful spirits of the dead and open portals to hell, that sort of thing.
Years ago when my leg got badly injured and I had to go off of field duty, I volunteered to fix the MHI archives. Back then the place was a disorganized mess. It was more of a fire hazard than a proper library. Arguably the third or fourth best collection of monster lore in the world looked like something off a reality TV show about mentally ill hoarders. The state of the MHI archives offended me to the core of my librarian soul.
It took years to get the place up to my standards, with everything properly labeled and cataloged. What used to take weeks of combing through dusty tomes to find some nugget of monster trivia, now takes minutes. Hunters call in, wanting to know about some odd creature they’re up against, and I can send them copies of everything we have fast. I might not be out in the field, kicking doors and blowing shit up anymore, but I still help save lives.
Nowadays I’ve got a pretty good system. Regular records on the shelves. Creepy books under lock and key. Since if you let just any random Hunter dick around with sensitive information, there’s going to be bad results, I’m extra careful with the forbidden knowledge. Barring a few unforeseen complications early on in my career, I’ve managed to keep those particular scary records accounted for, to only be checked out in case of emergency—with MHI leadership approval—and brought back and stored safely as soon as the crisis is averted.
Everything was organized, accounted for, and in its place.
Or at least it was, until Owen Z. Pitt held a giant fucking gunfight in my library.
I’ve put up with a lot of indignities since joining Monster Hunter International. On one of my very first hunts, my buddy Trip left his tomahawk buried in a master vampire’s head, and the vampire returned that tomahawk by throwing it through my leg. More recently, I caught a .357 Magnum bullet to the chest, fired by some poor bastard who’d been possessed by an Adze.
Surveying the damage to my beloved library was worse.
As broken glass crunched underfoot, I saw that there were spent plastic shotgun hulls everywhere. Shelves had been knocked over. Books had spilled in every direction. Some of them had been turned into confetti from buckshot. The ghostly projectiles fired by the army of Drekavac had started several small fires, but at least their corpses had dissipated upon death. Tiles had gotten knocked out of the ceiling and most of the lights had been broken. The walls were puckered with bullet holes and scorch marks. The glass wall was in ten million jagged pieces.
I’d stacked a bunch of Drekavac monsters myself during the battle, but I’d had the decency to do it out in the hallway like a civilized man. Z had gotten chased in here, hosed the place down with a full-auto shotgun, and even tossed some grenades for good measure, like a barbarian.
Z was a good friend, teammate, had saved my life upon multiple occasions, the entire Earth at least once, and in his defense had been trying to protect a girl from the hell-spawn clone army of an undead witch hunter…and even considering all that if he’d been here right now I still would’ve beat him over the head with my cane because look at this place. He was lucky he’d gotten teleported to Brazil.
News on that front was still spotty, but Earl Harbinger was leading a quick reaction force of Hunters to South America. We didn’t really know what was going on down there, but apparently millions of lives were at stake. So, the usual. Those injured in yesterday’s battle—and there were a lot of those—and those of us who weren’t physically up to fieldwork anymore, were left here at the compound cleaning up and waiting to be called on for our expertise. Which was supremely frustrating, but again, the usual.
My bad leg was really bugging me, and I would have sat down to take in all the destruction, but a spectral sword had sliced my nice office chair in half, which was just adding insult to injury at this point. Rather than stand there angry, I went to the closet and got out a broom and dustpan. Somehow even the dustpan had a bullet hole in it.
I’d spent the last day helping to put out fires and ferrying the wounded to the orc healers or the hospital. Between Silas Carver’s dark magic and Milo’s defense system, we’d torched or blown up half the compound. This had been the worst monster attack on our headquarters in MHI history.
But now that the immediate damage control was done, there was some unholy threat out in the jungle, some of MHI was on the way to deal with it, and in the process they might need me to look up some useful lore on whatever they encountered. I wouldn’t be able to do that very efficiently with all our original reference material lying on the floor covered in broken glass, so I got to sweeping.
It was after a few hours of righting shelves and restoring books to their proper homes that I found the secret compartment.
That particular bookshelf was some early 1900s, Bubba Shackleford-era furniture. Which still worked great because they built things to last back in those days, and all the new shelves I’d built from Ikea were flimsy in comparison. The sturdy old shelf covered one entire wall and had caught a Drekavac ghost bullet in the top corner. I had to stand on a ladder to inspect the damage, and it pissed me off to find that some of the original Professional Monster Killer journals had gotten hit by flaming shrapnel.
Hannah Stone had been the most prolific writer of the Hunters from that early period of the company’s history, and it pained me to see one of her journals had gotten shredded by splinters. That was over a hundred-year-old, irreplaceable, historical document, obliterated in an instant by some undead asshole Puritan. That really pissed me off.
Except when I started pulling out the burned chunks, the wall behind it shifted. At first I thought it might just be a loose brick, but when I poked at the edges with my pocketknife, I discovered a hinged mechanism had been holding it place. It was well concealed and had been plastered over sometime in the distant past, but the Drekavac’s bullet had cracked it open.
Finding a long hidden compartment wasn’t too strange, as there were secret doors and tunnels all throughout the MHI compound, which is what happens when a bunch of militant paranoids do renovations. But when I used my flashlight I saw the hole was small, and the only thing inside was a sealed metal tube.
“What’re you doing?” someone asked from below.
I looked down to see Trip Jones standing there. “I found a secret compartment or something.”
When you see Trip, the first thing you think is tough guy, because he’s this really buffed black dude, who was a high-level athlete and still carries himself with that kind of physical swagger that only really confident jocks have, but Trip is one of my favorite coworkers because he’s just genuinely an all-around nice guy. Except right that moment he looked weary and in pain.
“You’re limping bad as me, Trip. What happened to you?”
