When I turned around, what stood before was a towering beast-man with blue-gray hide and a thick mane of white chest fur. Four curved horns crowned its bovine head, two sweeping back, two jutting forward. Massively muscled arms ended in clawed hands, each finger thick as my wrist. Red leather bracers bound its forearms, suggesting primitive intelligence.
On the ground was a massive primitive axe that had bitten into the earth. This monstrous thing looked like a minotaur that had been bred for the purpose of war but was fighting on behalf of nature. The creature’s eyes glowed with faint green light and it stood undoubtedly nine feet tall, gorilla-proportioned.
Particularly, it looked like it had a bone to pick... with especially.
The beast looked like it was pissed at for trying to break its toy. For a mont, there was silence between the two of us. In the whole forest, silence reigned like a tyrant, and then, as if that tyrant had never existed to begin with, the creature broke into a vicious run forward.
Nothing could have prepared for speed like that. It felt so out of place that a creature that large and packed with muscle could move so fast. They usually didn’t get both ends of the stick.
But this one did. My eyes hadn’t even blinked, my body hadn’t even twitched, none of responded until I was grabbed by the torso, the creature’s massive arms closing around like a vice. It lifted and slamd into the ground so hard I felt the earth crater beneath my back.
Air ripped out of my lungs. My vision swam, my consciousness right behind it. The next thing I registered, I was already moving again, being hurled upward, the forest spinning around .
At that mont, I knew with absolute clarity that if I got slamd into the ground again, I was either going to die or be rendered so useless I wouldn’t be able to fight another impact, let alone maintain consciousness. I thought about summoning Maggie in that instant.
But I clenched my teeth stubbornly. Yes, I was being stubborn. Monts like this ant everything. It was monts like this that I had to change the outco.
’I don’t even need to break off to fight you!’
That was right. The minotaur creature was only holding my upper body. It wasn’t like it was restricting my essence or anything, and if there was anything I had in surplus right now, it was spirit essence.
A red aura exploded out of . The beast was already hurling down when the threatening presence overwheld it.
Its speed died. It staggered back, throwing loose and releasing a roar that was equal parts ferocious and uncertain. My body ragdolled through the air and cracked against a tree trunk before I rolled down to the base. Bark rained down on . But it was better than being pile-driven into the earth with that thing’s full force behind it.
I stood, wincing as checkpoints of pain fired alarms across my nervous system while I straightened. My ribs protested every breath.
A dirty grin climbed my face as I t the beast’s boiling gaze. Breaths exploded from its flaring nostrils, fuming with every exhale.
"What? Are you scared? Are you finally rethinking your life decisions?"
I dropped the Frostfang sword and looked at the beast with a dark glare. The beast returned it. Its eyes flicked to the axe beside it, and then it used one leg to kick the weapon away. With that single kick, the axe went cartwheeling through the trees, splitting one apart and burying itself into another with a crack that echoed through the forest.
I grinned viciously when I saw this.
"Ahh, aren’t you being overconfident?"
I extended my hand like Ealdrim’s Jesus, and flas, white flas, manifested from my palms, spilling out and falling like liquid but blazing the mont they touched air, threatening to drench the forest in smoldering heat. The fire spread all around , covered my hands like boxing gloves while dancing seductively across my fingers. The heat alone made the air shimr and warp.
I leaned forward, both flaming fists clenched, surrounded by a ground of flas that burned the trees, the leaves, everything around . The trees were holding, but only barely. Only for now.
I cocked my head at the beast.
"Do you know, I’m only still an F rank summoner?"
The bastard let out a terrifying growl, the most revolting sound I’d heard in a while. It was almost as if it was daring .
It glared one more ti, and the next thing I knew, a sickly purple wave slamd into . I knew I was about to move, but the mont the wave hit, my legs refused. Sothing cold crawled through my chest, settling into my bones.
Instead, I stepped back and looked down, then around .
’All these flas... and it’s still not going to be enough... I’m going to die.’
That was right. The master of the forest standing before was a ferocious thing, true and true. To not fear it was to be oblivious to power. If one ever wanted to wield power, one would know how to recognize and fear power.
I stood there calculating any possibility of an opening. There was none. The atmosphere thickened with a strange pressure and everything seed to press down on violently.
I was going to fail. It dawned on as I looked at the beast standing in front of , fifteen feet tall now, impossibly tall, towering over the forest like a verdant tyrant.
’Cade. Snap out of it!’
My thoughts froze. I blinked, shook my head. Felt slightly dazed.
’Kassie?’
That was certainly Kassie’s voice. I tried calling her again ntally but there was no answer. Again, I couldn’t even bother to wait for one, because now that my eyes had opened back to reality, and I could see the creepy violet energy like wet smoke that had slamd into and was clinging to everything around , I knew exactly who the bastard was that had been using fear to warp my perception.
The creature wasn’t fifteen feet tall. It had never been fifteen feet tall.
"Who would have thought that you were a cowardly, mind-controlling freak and a gym rat. Just look at you, you have it all going well for you, huh? I’m going to sort your fuck up today."
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