Monster Hunter

It is said that there are new worlds out there,  hidden from the perception of our senses.   In this particular new world, humans co-exist  with a wide variety of large and savage monsters.   There's also a mystical tower in the middle of  the desert that is always surrounded by black   clouds and lightning, and that's where a sand  ship led by the Admiral is currently sailing to.   Their trip is suddenly interrupted however, when  they're attacked by a monster that lives in the   dunes called Diablos. It tries to knock over  the ship by pushing it with its giant body,   so the Admiral rushes to the wheel and tries  to steer the vessel out of the monster's way.   The escape is successful, but sadly, when trying  to rescue Handler from falling off the ship,   the Hunter falls instead and is left behind in  the desert. On Earth, Captain Natalie Artemis   and her security team formed by Lincoln, Marshall,  Dash, Steeler and Axe, are searching for a missing   team of soldiers in the desert. The only clues  they have are a recording of their SOS message   and the wheel tracks on the road that suddenly  come to a stop, as if the vehicle that left them   had disappeared in thin air. There are also some  mysterious rock markers near the road with symbols   they cannot read. Suddenly, a dark storm appears  in front of them, moving at a frantic speed.   The team gets on their vehicles in order to escape  as the storm hits all the mysterious markers with   lightning, making the writing on them glow up.  No matter how fast the team drives, though,   the storm is faster and soon reaches their cars,  engulfing them inside a portal as the vehicles   fall off the edge of a canon. The cars are pushed  by the wind - they roll and turn over and over,   throwing the people inside off their seats. When  they finally land and the soldiers come out, they   notice the storm has backed off and is floating  above a mountain area with various structures   that aren't on their maps. This desert they find  themselves in is full of sand dunes as well,   which should be impossible because the nearest  dunes should be twenty klicks away. All their   electronics are fried, and not even their compass  is working, so they decide to try to return back   to base by navigating using the sun. Axe tells  them to wait, however, when he finds something:   it's the cars used by the lost team. There are  bodies next to them, burned to such an extreme   that couldn't be accomplished by a flamethrower.  There are other things around: glass shards, which   indicate something exceedingly hot having melted  the sand; and empty bullets, which means the dead   soldiers defended themselves from something. Yet  whatever it was, it hasn't left marks on the sand.   Getting worried about whatever it is that caused  this, the team gets back on their cars and leaves   the area, unaware that Hunter is watching them  through his spyglass. But they stop again when   they find one more mind-blowing thing: a giant  animal skeleton, bigger even than a dinosaur.   Taking advantage of their stop, Hunter shoots  an arrow at them, and the soldiers respond by   opening fire until Artemis grabs the arrow and  asks them to stop - it only has chalk on it,   a warning signal. At that moment, Diablos surges  from the sand and begins chasing the squad as   they try to escape on their cars. No matter what  they shoot at it, it is impervious to all of it,   and eventually it comes close enough to hit one  of the cars and knock it over a couple of times,   killing Axe. Steeler manages to run away before  the car gets crushed and jumps on the jeep with   the others, but they don't manage to get too far  before Diablos knocks over this car as well and   impales Steeler with his tusk. Right before dying,  he throws a couple of grenades at the monster,   which don't hurt him but offer an opening for  his team to hide among the rocky formations.   As Hunter shoots a smoke arrow at Diablos to slow  it down, the squad enters a cave with an entrance   too small for the monster to follow them, so  it gives up for now and leaves. Dash starts to   panic about their situation, but Artemis, as a  leader, gives out orders and tells them they'll   be good soldiers and survive as such. Her words  are interrupted however, when she's suddenly taken   by a spider-like monster called Nerscylla, which  stings her and injects her some paralyzing venom   before dropping her and running away when the  soldiers start shooting at it. Marshal and Lincoln   try to give Artemis CPR to no avail, and Dash  begs them to get going, because more Nerscyllas   are coming out now that night has fallen. Assuming  Artemis is dead, Lincoln, Marshall, and Dash leave   the cave as they continue to fire at the monster  with the help of Hunter, who is shooting explosive   arrows from atop a cliff and must run away when a  Nerscylla comes after him. Dash trips and falls,   delaying her group's escape - this gives one  of the monsters the opportunity to attack from   above and capture Marshall. While Hunter hides in  his secret cave lair, Artemis wakes up, feeling   rather dizzy. She can hear her teammates' screams  coming from outside, but she soon is knocked out   again when a Nerscylla finds her. The next time  she wakes up, Artemis is inside a cocoon in the   Nerscyllas' nest, which luckily is thin enough for  her to tear off with her bare hands. Once free,   she notices she is surrounded by bones and more  cocoons holding the bodies of Dash and Marshall.   Fighting off the dizziness and the pain, Artemis  picks up her teammate's fallen pouch and retrieves   two flares, an oxygen can, and a bunch of bullets.  Using one of the flares as both defense and light,   she walks down some kind of hallway made of  spider web and is suddenly startled by Lincoln,   who can't feel his arm and is suffering from  chest pain. Unaware that the monsters are   following them, Artemis helps Lincoln walk  towards an exit when her flare goes off.   In the time it takes her to turn on the other  one, a Nerscylla appears in front of them,   which Artemis keeps at bay with her new flare.  Things get complicated, though, when Lincoln feels   more pain on his body and tears off his shirt only  to find out there are hatching eggs on his wound.   The Nerscylla grabs him and takes him away,  and when it tries to do the same with Artemis,   she lights it on fire by combining the flare with  the oxygen can, causing the whole nest to burn.   Artemis starts climbing towards the exit and she  almost makes it when a Nerscylla grabs her leg   and drags her back in, so she frees herself by  throwing the bullets she salvaged into the fire,   making them explode. When she finally comes out of  the cave, it's morning, and the sunlight prevents   the Nerscyllas from following her. After having  a freak-out about the crawling sensations on her   body, she cuts open a bullet she finds on the  ground and pours the gunpowder on the wound   on her ankle, then she hits two rocks together to  create a spark and ignite the powder, effectively   cauterizing the wound. Afterward, she goes up the  hill to get a better understanding of the area,   but she only sees desert all around her and the  storm that brought her here far on the horizon.   That could be her key to returning home, but  there's something she needs to test first:   she throws a rock and throws it in the sand,  causing Diablos to come out with a furious   roar and leave quickly when he doesn't see her.  Artemis continues her exploration of the rocky   area while Hunter follows her from afar and finds  a shipwreck, which for a second makes her think   she may find water, but the keg only has sand in  them. When she enters the remains of the ship,   she's jumped on and grabbed by Hunter from behind,  but she reacts quickly and begins a hand-to-hand   fight. Both of them are incredibly skillful  fighters that keep each other on their toes,   but while Artemis manages to stab Hunter on his  shoulder with his own knife, he still manages   to overpower her and win the fight. After tying  up her hands, he takes Artemis to his cave lair,   trying to make her walk faster before night falls  and the spiders come out again. Artemis falls to   the ground and picks up a glass shard without him  noticing before she's picked up again and taken   away. At the cave, Hunter drinks some water from a  special contraption he made and eats moss from the   rocks, but he doesn't share anything with Artemis,  and when she tries to talk, he makes her stay   silent because the Nerscyllas are outside, trying  to dig their way in. Afterward, Hunter makes a   special salve for the stab wound on his chest and  prays to two little figurines he carries with him,   unaware that Artemis is only pretending to be  asleep and is actually working on cutting the   ropes on her wrists with the glass shard. The  next morning, Hunter goes out to check on the   storm and the monsters, and when he returns,  he doesn't find Artemis where he left her,   falling for her ambush. After hitting him and  tying him up, she tries to drink from his water,   but he kicks off the contraption so she can't  have it. They cannot communicate because they   speak different languages, so Artemis  responds by destroying his little altar,   which makes him furious. Hunter jumps on her and  they begin to fight again, and all the moving   around and rolling takes them out of the cave.  Since they can't control the rolling, Hunter falls   into a hole that takes him to the Nerscyllas's  nest, but Artemis catches him just in time and   drags him back up before cutting the ropes that  tie him off. Trying to show she isn't his enemy,   she offers him some chocolate as a peace offering,  which he tries and loves the taste of. In return,   he lends her his waterskin, which she drinks from  before following him to the edge of the hill area.   There, they manage to communicate a little: they  both want to go back into the storm, but Diablos   is in the way. Artemis thinks they should go back  to her military cars and retrieve their weapons,   but Hunter disagrees, guns are useless against  monsters. Instead, he takes her to the entrance of   the Nerscyllas' nest to explain his idea: if they  can kill a spider and take its poison, they can   use it to defeat Diablos. Artemis agrees, calling  it using a monster to kill another monster,   and reluctantly accepts to be bait. As the sun  goes down, she moves to stand in the middle of   the rocky area and sings an army song to attract  a Nerscylla's attention. The plan works, and when   a spider shows up, Artemis runs in the direction  of the trap they had set up. The Nerscylla steps   on a rope that captures her, and Hunter uses the  chance to jump from above with her giant sword   and cut its head in half. They also cut off its  stinger, which they take back to the lair before   more Nerscyllas come after them. At the cave,  after sharing a little silly moment, Hunter   explains to her that the figurines represent  his family, who are now dead. The next day,   they start getting their plan ready. The insides  of the Nerscylla's stinger are wrapped around   an arrow, they build a trap at the shipwreck, and  Artemis is given armor and weapons to train with.   One is similar to a grappling hook, the other  one is a set of dual blades that can be lighted   on fire when pressed together. When the time comes  to execute the plan, it goes quite well at first.   They release a makeshift catapult that sends a  keg flying and it lands in the middle of a dune,   causing Diablos to come out at a safe distance  from them. Artemis and Hunter start running   towards her army vehicles with Diablos chasing  after them, but they are forced to stop when the   monster hides under the sand. Hunter decides to  act as bait while Artemis goes to retrieve her   weapons, but during his run, he accidentally  drops the pouch with his family figurines.   When he comes back to pick it up, Diablos  take the chance to come out and knock him off.   Hunter wastes no time and shoots the venomous  arrow right into its eye, this enrages Diablos   and makes it go faster after him, but Artemis  distracts it by shooting the car's machine gun.   Diablos is starting to feel dizzy because of  the venom, but bullets are still not enough   to hurt it, so it comes closer and knocks  over the car after Artemis hides in it.   The monster continues to follow her when she  gets out, and Hunter takes advantage of this   distraction to jump on its head and impale his  sword in the middle of it. Sadly, it doesn't go   deep enough, so Diablos shakes him off his body  and sends him flying until he hits the other car.   There's still a chance to finish it, though, so  Artemis shoots her hook at Diablos' head so when   it moves, it raises her with it, helping her land  on top of it. She pushes the sword and finishes   what Hunter started, effectively killing Diablos  at last. Since Hunter is still unconscious,   Artemis picks up as many supplies as she can  find from the cars and cuts off a piece of the   monster's hard skin to make a makeshift stretcher  and drag Hunter across the desert with her.   After many hours, the wind starts picking up and  gets them in danger, so Artemis puts up a tent   around them and uses the emergency army kit to  keep his heart beating. The sandstorm eventually   goes away, leaving them buried in sand, but thanks  to the tent, they both survive and easily get   out of the resulting dune. After another long  walk, Artemis and Hunter make it to an oasis,   so they decide to stop to take a break. The area  is populated with tortoise like-creatures called   Apceros, which Hunter explains are herbivores, so  they don't need to fear them. When Artemis comes   closer to the water to drink, another monster  called Cephalos comes out of it to attack her,   but Hunter kills it with a swift swing of  his sword to later roast it over a fire.   Night falls after the pair have had their dinner,  and they are startled by a sudden fire burning the   oasis. There's another monster attacking, one  bigger than all the ones they've seen so far:   Rathalos, a fire-breathing wyvern. A group  of scared Apceros comes in a stampede,   trying to escape from Rathalos, and Hunter manages  to sneak away, but Artemis falls to the ground in   the middle of them. She thinks she's going to  be crushed when suddenly, a figure appears in   front of her: it's the Admiral, swinging a sword  on fire to keep the Apceros from coming closer.   Artemis stands up and activates the fire on  her dual blades to follow his example while   Hunter makes it to the edge of a cliff. He also  almost gets run over if it wasn't for Handler,   who appears hanging from a rope to pick him up and  take him away from the edge. When all the Apceros   are gone, Artemis thanks the Admiral for his help,  and he surprises her by speaking English right   before knocking her out with a punch. She wakes  up moments later inside a cage in a ship while   the Admiral's crew watches her. They're sent away  by Hunter, who obviously feels guilty about her   confinement, but there's nothing he can do about  it. After he's gone too, Artemis notices there's   a hatch on the floor of her cage, so she uses the  bench to destroy the lock, open the door and sneak   into the kitchen. When she tries to steal a knife,  she's startled by the Admiral's cat-like companion   and official chef, the Palico, who doesn't let her  take anything. It is then that Hunter arrives with   good news, Artemis is free now. He takes her to  see the Admiral, who apologizes to her for the   misunderstanding and removes her shackles before  explaining why he did so in the first place.   The Admiral is afraid of her world and what it  could do to this one. Artemis isn't the first one   that has crossed over, and it was from previous  visitors that he picked up her language. The   thing responsible for all this is the Sky Tower,  which lies at the peak of the mountain surrounded   by the storm. It's a remnant of an ancient  civilization, pretty advanced and dangerous.   These ancients knew how to travel between worlds,  but they're extinct now because technology turned   on them, and the Admiral suspects Earth may have  something to do with it. They're on their way to   investigate the tower, but Rathalos is a dangerous  obstacle - the Admiral proposes that if Artemis   helps them defeat them, they'll help her get  home in return, so of course Artemis accepts.   The crew leaves for the mountain at dawn,  and they make it to the tower after a long,   arduous climb. The Sky Tower is standing on  lava, and they think that's what powers it,   allowing it to control the storm and create a  gateway to her world which looks rather unstable.   As soon as they take some steps towards the tower,  they find glass shards on the ground, meaning   Rathalos is close. After the Admiral reminds them  the wyvern is weak right before it breathes fire,   the team splits and gets ready to fight. Rathalos  burns some of the members of the crew before   landing between them and the tower. The Admiral  is the first one to go after it, with Artemis and   Hunter following him closely, all of them having  their weapons on fire to be able to do any damage.   Other crew members try to help as well but  Rathalos pushes them away while the tower   starts lighting all the special markers around  it, matching the ones Artemis had seen in her   world. While they do manage to land a couple  of hits, their damage isn't enough to take   down the creature. Rathalos chases Artemis with  fire until she's forced to jump off the cliff,   only to fall into a portal and land back in her  world. An army rescue group appears to help her,   claiming they've been looking for her unit for a  while. After putting her on a stretcher and taking   her to their plane, they take off, but they don't  manage to go too far: the storm appears above   them again and Rathalos comes flying into this  world. The monster destroys the plane and makes   it crash before going after the other vehicles,  not being bothered by the shower of bullets the   soldiers are shooting at it and killing them all  by breathing fire on them or even eating them.   Artemis, who's managed to survive the crash, sees  all this and comes up with a plan. After grabbing   two flares from the wrecked plane, she runs  towards Rathalos and shoots her hook at its wing,   stabbing it with his knife when she is dragged  closer. This enrages the beast, which is about to   breathe fire on her for what she did. Artemis uses  this chance to light the flare on fire, burning   her hand on the process, and tosses it into  Rathalos' open mouth, burning it from the inside.   Sadly, this is still not enough damage to kill the  monster. It raises again, ready to attack Artemis,   but it's interrupted by Hunter, who starts  shooting some of his explosive arrows. One   of them manages to get inside Rathalos' through  a wound left by the flare, and this is the final   hit needed to kill the beast at last. The Admiral  arrives after that, telling her they came because   they couldn't let the monsters destroy her  world. The Sky Tower has opened another portal,   and there is a creature called Gore Magala on  top of it, so Artemis decides to go back to the   other world with them to destroy the tower and end  this cycle once and for all. She, Hunter, and the   Admiral go after the new monster, pushing it back  into its world as the chef Palico joins the fight.   Unknown to them, a mysterious cloaked figure  observes the battle from the top of the tower.