High upon the mountains the Black Griffon was laying in its nest. It had lived for a long time, much longer than any of the other beasts confined in this space. Having so much time on its hands it started to grow towards Rank 3.
It hadn't reached that point yet, it wasn't so easy. Still, with its power it ruled over all the areas in this restructed space. It had tried multiple times to break out of this prison to no avail. It wondered how powerful it had to get in order to destroy this place.
Harboring a grudge against the one who put it in here it tried to amass power to break the shackles of this endless loop. Nothing changed in this place, the fake sun in the sky never moved from that spot, the everlasting night was replaced with an everlasting day. To the Black Griffon this was a geniune punishment.
As it was dreaming for a night a sound woke it from its slumber. It was far off, a sound in the distance, just strong enough for it to disturb its sleep. After it stopped hunting the other beasts, fights were a rare occurance in this place. There would only be one reason for such a noise to occur.
No one beast left its territory to risk its life for nothing but a larger territory. There were no mates, no way to increase their family, so what would be the point? Hunting for food was useless as well. Unless it could eat plants all that was to find were other Great Beasts.
The griffon stood up from its nest and looked down the mountains. It had a clear overview on the entire plane. An explosion occured in the area of the Terrabear.
Staring at the aftermath of the explosion, its heart skipped a beat. Memories from long ago awakend again, very rarely did something enter this place. It was always a humanoid being. Having lost touch with time, it couldn't remember the last time a human visited this place.
With the memories flooding its mind again, it realized what this human was going to do. Each time a human entered this place, it fought all the beasts, killed them and vanished. The griffon had strong memories right before its death, only to wake up some time later in the same place as if the human was just a nightmare.
If it was here again only to kill, it wouldn't sit still this time. Serving as a sacrifice for those humans made it extremely angry. Each time a human came to this place it was toyed with, played with, being used in training or experimentation. Not this time, this time, it would snuff out the troubles early on.
Spreading its wings, it lifted itself of the ground and scouted the forest of the Terrabear first. Even if it was angry and wanted to put out the danger first thing, it wasn't so careless. It had fought a lot of battles against humans and almost never won. So this time it wanted to be sure.
Landing on the site of the explosion it found the body of the bear with a massive hole in the center of the beast. Looking at the bear, a feeling it had long forgotten was starting to come back. A strange hunger appeared, it didn't have to eat, but roasted meat was appatising. Shaking it head clear of impure thoughts, it sniffed the ground and inspected the wounds.
Did this human also use a Dark Beam? How was that possible? Besides that, there was fire and some stone manicures in the air, tipping it off. Satisfied with its investigation, it retreated back to its layer.
Watching the human from afar it waited until the predator got rid of the second beast. Dealing with the Magma Turtle in a way that was extremely efficient, memories were flaring up again. The turtle was often killed from far away using different spells, yet this one fought it in close combat. The griffon didn't know if it was meant to be seen as a sign of trouble or if this human in particular was too weak to do it in any other way.
Seeing the human run back to the forest, it spread its wings once more to visit the turtle. The body was just a mass of magma that was slowly returning to the ground or drying up. Scanning it with its eyes, it found nothing of note.
Did it kill the turtle with willpower while dodging and defending from its attacks? The griffon tried a similar strategy while it was flying in the air, but then the volcano would tremble, scaring it away.
The griffon was starting to get a grasp on the human's behavior. It fought in close combat and was able to use spells not too dissimilar from its own repertoire of spells. The question was, why did the human go back to the forest?
Spreading its wings it sneakily flew back to its layer, it could see the human still running towards the forest, so it shouldn't have been seen yet. Still, it wondered why it went back to a prey it already defeated until the griffon saw how he returned. With both decapitated arms in hand, the human visited the lake.
It wanted to get a bit closer to inspect what it was doing, but revealing itself right now would be a waste. Using its great vision from afar, it could tell mana was starting to gather near the shore of the lake. Something was going to happen.
Suddenly a Dark Beam was shot into the lake while a Water Pillar was shot towards one of the mountains. Whether by luck or on purpose, the Water Pillar was close to its nest. Is he already going to start the fight? Now?
Spreading its wings it flew up only to find the alligator of the lake look at it with a certain madness in its eyes. After having fought with this beast so many times, not once had it seen this kind of ravaged look. The reptile opened its beak to fire off multiple water pillars containing enough pressure and power to flatten parts of its mountain.
The Griffin screeched loudly before swinging its wings strongly, creating a massive gust of wind to redirect the pillars away from it. The sound that was painful enough to burst the eardrums of humans didn't reach the alligator.
What was going on with it? Why was it fighting so desperately out of nowhere? The alligator wasn't one for such aggressive actions. Its eyes twitched the moment it could see the entire lake beginning to move.
As the entire lake was starting to circle around the body of the alligator, a strange feeling was welling up in the griffon. Each Great Beast was placed in their perfect environment, giving the turtle access to plenty of magma and the alligator to a surplus of water. It didn't have to create any itself, sparing itself from the energy cost.
The Griffon screeched again, this time in frustration. Something was terribly wrong. The human's presence seemed to be triggering these chaotic responses in the other beasts, stirring them from their typical complacency. But why? The Griffon had witnessed these humans before—powerful, dangerous, but never able to provoke this level of madness.
Flapping its wings with a mighty force, the Griffon prepared to dive in and put an end to this ridiculous spectacle. It wasn't going to let the Alligator, its equal in strength but never a real rival, wreak havoc unchecked. But before it could dive, the water beneath the Alligator surged upward, forming massive tendrils of water, reaching for the sky like grasping claws.
The Griffon banked sharply to the left, narrowly dodging one of the watery claws. Retaliating immediately, it unleashed a powerful blast of wind and fire with a flap of its wings. The gust collided with the water tendril, scattering it into rain and mist. Fire wasn't its strongest element, but after living for years next to this beast, it had developed its abilities further.
The Alligator roared, undeterred, as more tendrils lashed out at the sky.
The Griffon folded its wings and dove toward the Alligator, its beak glowing with a familiar dark energy. It would strike fast and hard, put an end to this madness before the human could make another move. Right as the griffon found the perfect angle, the entire lake moved upwards, forming the jaws of a massive alligator.
Without having any other way to disperse of the gathered energy, it unleashed the Dark Beam straight into the jaws only to be met by a geyser of pressurized water. It knew right away this would only result in a loss of energy if it kept going.
It swiftly brought its wings down to gain air, speeding up to dodge the attack, it flew elegantly through the sky. But even with its impressive flying skills, the alligator simply had to lift the massive jaws of the lake slightly to catch up, hitting it in the side.
The Griffon veered off course. It screeched in pain as the water slammed into it, the sheer pressure sending it spiraling upward. For a brief moment, disoriented, losing sight of up and down.
Recovering midair, it flapped its wings with renewed vigor, glaring down at the battlefield below. The Alligator was now fully enveloped in the swirling lake that formed the head of an alligator. A lot of water was already used up, but there was plenty left. The alligator was barely visible through the wall of water it had summoned.
Suddenly the ground started to shake, in the far distance down south, a tornado of sand was growing in size as it was slowly approaching the lake. The griffon didn't know what to think of it, the equilibrium that was held for such a long time was thrown into chaos.
The alligator showed a hint of hesitation, enough for the griffon to take a deep dive. As it glided down it pulled itself upwards the moment its claws touched the water. Bolts of electricity shot off the claws, spreading in the water. Gliding just above the water, it was able to damage the form of the watery alligator's head.
As the water dweller focussed on reforming the head, the griffon was able to take a good look at it again. The strange glint was missing in its eyes, it was back to normal! All that was left was to calm down and break up the fight.
While the griffon was fighting the alligator, not once had it forgotten about the human that was prowling the lands. If they could combine their strength, then it was clear who the victor would be in the end.
Flying high it screeched loudly to attract the attention of the alligator. It didn't assume an offensive position, simply flying in place as it stared at the tornado in the distance.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Lucas was sitting at the bottom of the mountains with a massive grin on his face.
While hastily put together and filled with holes and possible failures, his plan was working. He wasn't proud of the plan, but he was happy with the results.
Right as he was about to try to incite a war between the different beasts he thought back on his aura. After seeing the tendrils in the attack his other side conjured he started to think about other uses.
He still remembered his confrontation with the golden and black sun within him, he had the tools, but was just not using them correctly. That stuck with him for quite some time. The issue was that he couldn't use it carelessly and using humans for experiments wasn't good for his image right now.
Lucas knew from the fact that these beasts were able to form spells on their own they must've taken their time with their limited intelligence. If that was the case, how long had these beasts been living off of magic?
He had planned on using the limbs to make them panic and come out to check the situation or protect their territory, but for all he knew, they would simply eat it and move on.
Carving his personal rune into the flesh of the meat and infusing his aura in it, the pieces of meat were nothing more than triggers to unleash all that pent-up rage and anger.
After his experimentation on the nobles he received from Thurin, he knew what his aura did when exposed to it. Lucas was able to find three separate stages, first they froze in place, scared for their live.
Images of their own personal despair seemed to show, pulling them from reality. The second step was one of rage, the hatred and anger from such a situation boiled up and made them go crazy with malice. After the nobles spent all their energy they fell limp and fell unconscious.
The Great Beasts wouldn't be afraid of his aura, or that was Lucas's prediction, they would be wary of it, nothing more. But if it was infused in flesh, wouldn't they let their guard down for a split second?
Now he was reaping what he sowed, a rampaging alligator was fighting with spells he hadn't witnessed before. Taking his time to burn every image into his dome, he tried to gain as much as he could from this single encounter. If he could even come close to replicating these spells, he would be a step above the rest or in worst case equals.
Lucas was, if anything, a conniving bastard who used everything at his disposal to reach his goals. He was already looking forward to the other beast joining the beat down of the griffon.
Suddenly the Black Griffon flew up high and screeched loudly. The alligator was already out of its rage, giving Lucas some inclination of how powerful his aura was. Perhaps his power was too much for the nobles to handle, but when used on such a monster, it dealt with it differently?
He would have to experiment a lot to figure out the finer details, luckily, beasts were in ample supply and nobody would care if he used them for his own experiments. The third beast was still in an uncontrollable state, making sure the fight wasn't about to end now.
Even from far away, Lucas could tell that both the griffon and the alligator were settling down on their fight. He couldn't have that, since it would ruin his plans. Still, if he entered the fight now, that would only muddy the waters for himself, it was best to wait a few more seconds.
Seeing the growing tornado in the desert Lucas was starting to enjoy the scenes. He didn't know what kind of monster resided there, but he was glad he didn't have to deal with it in the first place.
'Hey, I don't think I'll be able to make it.'