Without breaking his stance, his sapphire blade moved in a continuous, quiet circle, leaving nothing but clean, headless heaps of at in the mud.
Suddenly, a massive, suffocating pressure broke from the ferns.
The Layer 3 Alpha Blood-Hound finally entered the fight.
The beast stood at least twenty feet tall, its skin a scarred, blackened crimson, covered in deep grey bone-ridges that ran down its spine like a row of broken spikes. Its jaws were wide enough to crunch a human torso in half, and its heavy breathing forced hot, bloody vapor out of its nostrils, lting the morning frost on the ferns.
"Holy ancestors..." Bran stamred, his leopard-spirit traits firing erratically as his legs twitched to run. "That’s a full pack. If they all howl at once, the main Zerith camp will hear it before we can take ten steps."
"No worries," Sol said, his voice turned into an exciting register, that instantly froze the panic in the boys’ chests.
He didn’t show a single line of fear. Instead, his silver-crimson eyes locked onto the massive horde, his hand resting firmly on the hilt of his sapphire blade. "If they are threat. We just have to slaughter the entire horde right here, and we have to do it fast."
"How do we silence so many beasts at once?" Kael whispered, his knuckles white around his dagger hilt.
"Well, it’s easy, we just don’t let them open their throats," Sol growled. "Torin, Bran, Kael... you three use your wind-speed to form a tight flank-wall on the left. Don’t try to kill them with deep thrusts, and waste ti, just Use your spear-butts and daggers to break their lower jaws and crush their windpipes the second they leap.
Kira, target the ones in the rear who try to lift their heads to howl. Throw your arrows straight down their open mouths. Zeyra, you stay with Tala on my right flank. And keep them from running away. I’ll take the center line and drop the alpha."
"They’re preparing to charge!" Tala hissed, dropping onto attack posture, her hands tightening on her bone-needles.
Ignoring their preparations, Alpha looked at the silent slaughter of its pack, its massive chest expanding violently as its throat began to click. It was preparing to unleash a high-volu, pack-wide alarm roar to command the horde.
"Kira! Stop its chest!" Sol called out, his boots already launching him forward.
Kira pulled her bowstring to its absolute limit, her muscles straining as she loosed her heaviest arrow straight at the alpha’s throat.
The arrow flew true, but the alpha was a Layer 3 beast; its reaction speed was too fast.
With a quick flick of its massive head, it caught the arrow with its thick jaw, snapping the bone shaft into splinters before the point could pierce its hide.
Sol had already anticipated this outco, and wasn’t surprised, as his goal from start was to stop it from howling.
Sneering, the alpha’s chest expanded further, its jaws opening wide to release the roar.
But Sol wasn’t slacking around, he had already appeared directly in front of its face before the sound could even leave its teeth.
He poured all his sterngth into his left arm. He didn’t use his blade, he shot his bare hand forward, his fingers digging straight into the alpha’s upper and lower jaws, clamping the massive mouth shut through sheer, physical strength.
BOOM!
The alpha’s charging montum slamd directly into Sol’s chest armor. The impact was massive, the kinetic force enough to shatter a boulder, but Sol’s black Rockhorn carapace absorbed the shock completely.
His boots slid back two inches through the mud, tearing up the wet ground, but his knees didn’t buckle. He held the beast’s mouth closed with a death grip, completely stifling the roar into a low, muffled rumble inside its throat.
The alpha went wild with rage. Its massive front claws, ripped across Sol’s shoulders, the sharp bone-spikes grinding against his Rockhorn armor with a horrific, screeching sound. But the carapace held firm, leaving nothing but shallow white scratches on the oily black shell.
"You’re too loud, mutt," Sol growled, his smirk completely cold.
He twisted his hips, utilizing physical redirection chanics. He didn’t try to push back against the alpha’s weight; he guided its forward tension sideways, leaning his shoulder into the beast’s neck and executing a brutal, heavy hip-throw.
The massive, eight-hundred-pound alpha was violently lifted out of the mud and slamd face-first into the petrified root bridge with a dull, wet CRASH.
The impact left the beast dazed, its limbs twitching as its internal essence wavered.
But just as he was about to go and finish it for good, suddenly three hounds leaped at his chest simultaneously, their jaws wide, eyes filled with sucudal loyalty.
Sol sighed and shot his left arm forward in a wide, sweeping horizontal arc, his thick forearm smashing directly into the open jaws of the two left flankers. CRUNCH. The sheer strength of his physical power shattered their skullinstantly, driving their bone-teeth deep into their brains.
Before the third hound could sink its canines into his shoulder armor, Sol’s right hand reached up, his fingers clamping onto the beast’s throat. With a sudden, heavy twist of his wrist, he ripped the hound’s windpipe completely out of its neck, silencing it permanently before it could emit a single whine.
As the three carcasses hit the mud, Sol didn’t waste a second. He pulled deeply at the cold, viscous silver liquid sitting stagnant within his chest cavity.
A freezing, heavy vacuum effect flared through his arms. The silver liquid reacted instantly to the fresh deaths, reaching out like invisible hooks to violently pull the core souls and unrefined spiritual residue straight out of the three falling hounds.
More, Sol thought, a dark, hungry smirk pulling at his face as his silver-crimson eyes tracked the next wave. I need more.
On the left flank, Torin, Bran, and Kael were fighting like wild animals. Their Wind-Leopard spirits were fully engorged, their legs moving in blurred transitions as they dodged the snapping jaws of the side-flankers.
A massive hound leaped at Bran from behind a thorn-bush, its red eyes full of bloodlust.
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