"Told you about my Demi-Beast friend. Before he died, he taught me indirectly his personal magic."
René's body began to change slightly. The skin color went grayer, his veins bulged and his frame seemed to enlarge. The humid air around him and the bits of sweat on his skin turned into steam.
'He emits a inhumanly amount of heat. Is that what his magic looks like? Can I do that eventually, too?'
Mikael took a couple of steps back, as the waves of heat were unpleasant and made breathing harder.
The whole time in this transformation René held his breath, now exhaling deeply, slight fades of warm breath escaping his mouth.
"His method was much more refined, stronger and balanced. This is only a crappy copy, but it works, for me at least."
The others looked at him, for a moment forgetting the approaching Undead.
Mark only glanced at him, mouth opened in disbelieve.
Alf and Herald also gave him a look, but in control of their emotions.
"Well, that much should be expected from the Guild Masters aid." Alf said, returning his eyes onto the enemy.
"That is so freaking cool! Why didn't you do that earlier? How does it feel, what changed, what did it do to your strength?" Sophia grew excited, her face full with wonder and curiosity, even more than Mikael.
Leon tapped on Sophia's shoulder, pointing at the Undead that got into Herald's range, who began to shoot the first bear between the eyes.
"Help them, I'll take that monster."
The nagging feeling Mikael had for a while grew exponentially as René finished his magic.
From between a group of densely grown trees a pair of red eyes lit up, and a growl that seemed to crawl from the depts of hell vibrated in their ears.
A massive paw paved its way and dug into the dirt, followed by a humongous body, covered in a black fur.
"It looks exactly like we encountered it." Mikael was petrified. Not only as this beasts aura flared up again, washing over his own sense making him instinctively step back, but the general appearance.
"Was this thing rotting before, too?"
As the Bear variant was shone upon, a part not visible before was seen.
From its back to the chest, huge pieces of skin was missing, showing its rips and muscles stretching. Half of its mouth was also damaged, the rows of sharp long teeth and tusks clearly portrayed.
"No, this is new. And its eyes weren't as blackish, the aura more feeling like it wanted to play with us, in a bad way. Not this pure hatred and death vibe."
"Well, me hit in a pretty long piece of metal into its neck, that surely accounts for some of it." Sophia commented as Mikael was near her. She also took her stance, trying her luck to damage the Undead with her sling, with no success.
"Tch, hate when my only option is my sword."
"I recommend a good bow, that toy of yours won't keep up with the enemies."
Herald commented, penetrating a skull of the Draén that advanced at the front.
"At least not Undead." Leon added, his hands slightly shaking as he had glimpsed at the Tusk Stalkers appearance.
"An Undeads bones upon death get much harder, more like stone. So unless thw ammunition you use or the draw strength of the rubber increases, there isn't much success."
The enemies now were close enough to engage, and Leon took the first step into melee. His hands tightly held onto his weapon, calving into the neck of an incoming snake. The meter long and muscular beast lifted its heavy body, nearly dragging Leon with him. To his rescue came Alf, chopping into the rotting flesh and hit the head hard enough to knock it away, the sword escaping the trap.
Mark took his position securing his beloved, ready to take on anyone that dared to come close.
Meanwhile the monster facing René slowly circled around him, fetching its fangs and growling threatening.
"I don't like this one bit." Mikael heard his leader whisper, slowly turning with the opposing variant.
"Your report said how severely injured that monster was, and the blade should still be after my estimations in its neck.
Someone must have removed it."
Mikael looked at the monsters neck, and surely, there wasn't any trace of a blade, or the wound it suffered.
"And what does it mean? Maybe a creature removed that for it."
"Maybe, but beasts like that should be to proud after my experience to let lesser species touch it. All I can say is: keep up your guard, anytime and anywhere you are in this battlefield."
He talked no more. With a jump like sprint that produced a small hole where his foot was René closed the distance to the evolved one, engaging it. The tusk stalker raised its massive clawed paw, wanting to strike the human incoming down, but René grabbed this paw, holding it with monstrous strength before making a fist, punching into the rotten flesh, breaking through the rips.
But the variant remained nearly unfaced, using its strong legs and raising himself up to its fu size. It towered over René with nearly 5 meters, displaying all of the rotten or damaged parts. The aura emitted was pure death and hate, choking Mikael who couldn't control that mana yet.
The others engaged with the Undead into combat, the bigger monsters putting up more of a fight that the smaller ones. But due to the smaller amount they could coordinate their fight better, making use of the terrain and their skills, not getting overrun or surprised.
A explosion coming from behind shook Mikael awake, him turning around to see black smoke and a charred, half destroyed corpse of a bear. It wasn't far from Herald's position, and he looked quite unhappy down at the corpse.
'Right, I have to help them fighting. I can't stand here uselessly, René can handle that. I just need to be alert.'
He exhaled sharply, trying to calm his nerves and stop the shaking that spontaneously appeared.
His hammer in hand he took his first step, then another until he stood next to a big lizard that had the sword of Sophia in its mouth, caring not a bit about the metal.
"Shit, let go you Levitan piece of a dammit ass." she said, slicing through the soft innards and cheek, taking out some fangs.
Mikael had lifted his hammer as high as possible, both hands supporting his downwards swing. With bend back and using all his body, he hit the head of that scaled beast, making it kiss the ground.
They heard the skull break, and its snout bent, making a slight half moon shape.
"Took you long enough, cared so little about me or do you wanted playing the hero?"
They then continued, together facing the big enemies with occasional support of Herald.
He used three more explosions, reducing especially dangerous beasts before they could do serious damage. And with each thrown bomb Herald's expression grew more neutral, opposite to his vivid venting when loosing a simple arrow head.
Alf took a stance near Mark, helping him holding back the Undead coming for them.
Together they managed to hold on, not letting even a drop of blood stain Meri.
Not that any blood was left in these dead bodies, but some flowed from theirs.
Not only attacks from the enemy that only graced them, be it from a tail, claw or fang, but also the environment. Each time they dodged, slid or used some trees they got bruised or scratched.
Not that much time had passed, the sun still high and the air only slightly cold.
But they had to focus so much more, and their bodies hadn't enough rest for previously skipping two nights. They all huffed and bled, but couldn't change their positions, as they all had to fight.
Herald's hands were torn by his bowstring, Mark took the brunt of many attacks as he almost tackled many monsters that dared to move towards Meri, Leon, Sophia and Alf all got injured big or small, with Alf having a cut down his side from the claw of another lizard. He had bled quite a bit, and only due to the rescue of Leon he could bandage himself up and drink a potion of his. After that he came back, but obviously moved more rigid, the paleness showing his excessive blood loss.
Mikael himself was quite fine, only his palm hurt a bit, and no creature managed to land a critiqual strike.
Once a huge boar fell onto his foot, but except from the loss of feeling some toes he could keep going.
'Shouldn't it somewhat hurt?' he had thought, but ignored his inner voice.
That was something to worry about for later.
The most interesting fight was without a doubt René, who wrestled with the variant in close combat. Managing to land many solid hits on various parts of its body broke many bones, resulting in unsteady attacks from the monster. But as the creature didn't feel as he perceived, it countered when René took a chance. Once it had used the moment his fist was stuck between two bones, the strike been too forceful. Charging straight ahead, taking René with it. Tusk Stalker wouldn't stop its rush even when breaking down several trees, even when it had taken previously damage from it. More unexpecting was René in the aspect he took the impacts quite well. He freed his fist, used his legs to propel himself away from this mass of muscles and bones. Which had made an hole in the ground now halted further advances of this thing.
Spitting out blood and removing his outer pieces of heavy clothing, ineffective in this fight, he yelled towards his group:" This beast here is also a Undead! Either it is an lich, even a stupid one, or the master hides somewhere! Either way, when taken these creatures down, we retreat!"
He took also of his sword that proved to only have very little effect on this monster, as the hide was too tough, so where its bones.
Once again Mikael felt a wave of mana erupting, this time from René, who stopped bothering about suppressing his aura. René's felt, unlike his opponent's, a bit wild, full of power and vigorous.
The monster once again charged, which it did out of instinct, and instead of crossing his path, René did what Sophia also had done, jumping up high. But the result differed from hers, more resembling Mikael's hammer striking down.
As Mikael caught a small breather, he witnessed the skill with which René exerted his manoeuver.