TARA
I was gathering fire, condensing it into a dense and powerful fireball. I aimed at the eagle carrying Eli. Milo woke up to the sounds and shouting, and climbed out his tent.
“That bird took Eli!” I shouted to him over the roaring of my flames.
“Don’t shoot! You’ll kill them both!” He shouted back. I had to agree. I slowly released the flames and let them dissipate in the air. I heated up the air around us by several degrees.
“I’ll go after him. When Patrik wakes up, head to the city. If I find him, we’ll go after you as soon as we can.” He looked concerned but over the few years while working with me, he learned that if I decide on something, it’s almost impossible to change my mind.
“Fine. But please take care of yourself, and don’t kill yourself for him.”
“We’ll be back before you know it.”
That was what I said, but it was about a month ago since I left. I marched in the direction I saw him taken away, and I was searching vigorously. The chances of him being alive decreased by the day. However, if he was alive, he was surely stronger now than when he first awoke. I was concerned, he was a strange combination of looking like a stray gust of wind could snap him in half, with a crystal so dense it would be impossible for anyone to get to his level.
After countless battles and close calls, surviving in these harsh conditions for weeks, I finally found a clue. It was a small cave that had some sticks and logs built in to resemble a door. This must have been him.
The inside was furnished somewhat, and there were a few clay pots and cups, with wooden carved utensils. He’s been busy. Also, there was a noticeable amount of blood on the floor, which was concerning.
I spent the night at the hideout, and waited for a few hours, but when it was apparent, he wasn’t returning, I set out on my journey again. Now that I had a fresh clue, I could see the very faint xin trace he left behind and started following it. I lost it two times, but somehow found it again. I was walking all day. It was slow, because I needed to use my astral state to find his trail. It was exhausting, but I made progress slowly. I had to continue if I didn’t want to lose him again.
I walked into the nighttime, and the “scent” got stronger. If I was correct, I was getting closer to the sea. Why in the world did he come here? I could now smell the faint scent of saltwater and seaweed. Suddenly the trail I followed got all fuzzy and mushed together. He probably stopped here for a while, maybe even changed directions. It will be hard to determine where he is.
While I was contemplating, I sat down and rested for a while. I was tired and all my muscles ached. The moon illuminated the hilly area I was in, and I could see the sea from here. It was beautiful, the water glittering, the wind carrying the sounds of soft waves and the scent of the sea. Peaceful. I don’t even know when I felt this relaxed, probably years. However, all good things must come to an end.
Somehow, I forgot that they come out at night. I don’t know why, it must have been a while since I’ve been to the sea. I looked around me and noticed just in time, I put all my xin into the muscles of my legs and jumped sideways as fast as I could.
When I looked back, a massive snapping turtle looked back at me. It was at least five meters wide, massive spikes on his thick shell, and a menacing beak ready to attack. I summoned a fireball and shot it at him. As soon as it reached the barrier around him, it slowed down and sizzled out. Shit. It uses magic to turn the air into a water-like substance to swim around freely in the air. But it looks like that also means it has pretty good defenses against fire.
Since that was all I had, and was exhausted to use more advanced spells, I prepared a massive explosion and condensed it into a small orb. I pumped more and more fire in, as much as I could. Maybe it’s good against fire, but this much of an explosion will surely do some damage at least. I could feel my core emptying. When it was only a few centimeters in diameter, I sent it toward the turtle with all my strength.
It quickly put his head behind a latch of some sort in its shell and hid from the explosion. When it reached the watery air, it slowed down a bit, but nothing could stop one of my most powerful attacks. The explosion sent me flying, and after a few seconds in the air I crashed into some stone. I Broke at least two of my ribs, but I was alive.
The giant turtle shook itself, the scales on its body were charred, some were broken, and blood was dripping from its right eye, but like under water, it diffused into small red clouds. It was alive and well. All I managed to do was anger it and take out an eye. This is bad. It let out a shriek and was coming toward me quickly.
I held out my hand and pumped all the remaining xin from my exhausted crystal into a beam of scorching flames. I could feel my strength leaving me with my xin. I stopped my body enhancements and diverted all the xin I used for that to fuel the flame as well. For a while it worked, and the turtle turned away from the heat. But it wasn’t enough. I’m going to die.
I started preparing internally for that, and the hassle that would follow… I really would prefer not to die here. But I was weak unfortunately. The last of my xin depleted and left my body, but I left the absolute bare minimum to not lose consciousness. I still had my right arm completely extended, and when all the fire subsided, it was a perfect target for the snapping turtle. I wasn’t fast enough retracting it.
It swooped in, head cocked back like a gun, and so fast my eyes couldn’t even follow, it took my arm. The whole thing, ripped out from its socket. It flew over me and swallowed it, slowly, knowing fully well that I was dead. I heard a blood curdling scream, not realizing it was my own, and desperately fought to stay awake.
The turtle turned around and charged me again.
~
ELI
I started running. I knew it was bad as soon as I heard that horrible scream. A few twigs and some of the shrubbery were on fire, combined with the soft moonlight, I could sort of take out what was happening. A girl lay in the rubble a few meters to my right, a massive snapping turtle above us, circling down, targeting the girl slowly. I didn’t have time to think, so I just used the body enhancement techniques I practiced for a month, strengthening my whole body, muscles, bones, veins. Recently I found a way to make even my mind faster a bit, and when I poured a bit of xin into my brain and nerves, time seemed to slow down a bit.
I put another handful of xin into my legs and jumped with all my force toward the turtle. I strengthened my fist, gathering xin even around it to make it even stronger. It wasn’t a solid metal wall yet, but I would not want to be hit by one of these. I watched in slow motion as I flew up about 8 meters in the air, reached the turtle, it didn’t even see me coming. My fist was like a meteor, and I put all my strength behind it.
Its head cocked to the left so hard it hit its own shell. Double hit. I was slowed down by the air waterification spell it used, but it wasn’t that bad using this much xin to make me stronger and faster. I grabbed the shell behind its neck with both of my hands and sat on top of the giant spikes on its shell. It wasn’t the most comfortable position, but it couldn’t reach me here. I thought about using the heat method again for this encounter but judging by its shell, it was probably thick enough to protect it from extreme heat for long enough to kill me.
All I had was my strength. And to be fair, I became quite strong. So strong in fact, that I constantly had to supply my bones with xin to support them, and even like this at the very quick movements I could feel them creaking and groaning from the pressure.
I hugged as much of the shell as I could, but it was almost three meters wide, so just the top of it, and started applying pressure. It wailed, trying to shake me off, but I held on to the spikes firmly. I heard crackling, and one of the spikes shattered above its spine. The spike itself was grown on top of the shell, so I didn’t break the shell itself, but I was making progress.
Seeing how it couldn’t do anything against me, the turtle changed strategies and charged toward the girl instead.
“No, you don’t! I’m your opponent!” I shouted to it as I bashed its head again with my reinforced fist. It was like a wrecking ball, but the turtle only wailed and shrieked in pain. it didn’t die. So, I put all my force and then some into hitting the back of its shell. I had to push so much xin into my fist and arm muscles, it started to burn. This high intensity was a bit too much, I had to work on moving xin around in my body more efficiently.
I was a bit distracted and almost fell off, but grabbed on the last second, and with a final massive blow to its spine, and a loud crack, the shell finally gave. I punched again and again until I was elbow deep in turtle insides. It was disgusting but finally the shriek of the monster subsided and the dense atmosphere around us started to change back into normal air. We started falling faster and faster.
I knew I was enhanced, but a 10-meter fall was a 10-meter fall. I used the turtle’s dead body as weight, and I jumped off at the last minute. This lessened the impact noticeably, but I still felt it. Me with a thud, the turtle with a loud bang and dust cloud, we landed.
I made sure it was dead then rushed over to the girl. She’s lost a lot of blood. A large pool of crimson liquid gathered below her and grew by the second. Her right arm was completely torn off. Wait… Tara?
I didn’t have any time to waste and focused on her injuries. I quickly used some concentrated, precise heat to burn off the vessels in her torn off arm and stop the bleeding. I was focusing heavily not to do more damage than good. After I stopped the bleeding, I used the technique to gather xin, but in the opposite direction, and tried giving her some of my xin. What I had to do was highly experimental, but I had no choice. She will die if I don’t help her. So, I got to work.
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