Jacob held his breath, wincing in pain as he was once again reminded of the wound in his side.
He stayed prone as the beast slowly made its way about the area, sniffing some of the corpses in search of him.
Jacob could roughly tell where the beast would go based on its current searching pattern.
From that, he began his next plan (again, playing fast and loose with the term 'plan').
As the chimera began to sniff another wreckage a good 10 meters from him he slowly and carefully wiggled out from under his corpse concealment.
He forcefully suppressed a grunt as his battered body and flesh wound protested against him.
Keeping his breathing low, he began to cautiously retreat from the monster which had its back turned to him.
Coming out of his hidey-hole gave him a better perspective of the size of the chimera than before, it was huge.
He had already known it was massive but seeing its tails less than 4 meters away despite its head being nearly 10 away let him know just how big it was.
He was making his way back to the front line slowly, turning away from the beast as he judged that being able to see where he was stepping was more beneficial than keeping an eye on the chimera.
Only to feel a massive impact on his back.
It sent him flying a solid 5 meters, then he hit the ground. Rolling as his ragdoll of a body slowly came to a standstill from its fleeting attempt at aviation.
He forced his arms under him, thankful that while he hurt all over nothing seemed broken, at least not badly.
As he mustered up the strength to stand he also turned to see what had hit him.
And was greeted with the culprit instantly as it wrapped around his body with ease.
The culprit was the chimera's tail, one of them at least.
He had noted that there were many tails, but he had assumed it to be similar to most animals, unable to be manually controlled.
A deadly assumption it seemed.
Two of the tails joined together to coil around him, lifting him to face the chimera's maw directly.
He stared the beast in the eyes chuckling slightly at the message he had just gotten.
[Mana under 10%. Deactivating overclock]
Its Cheshire grin resurfaced just like before as one of its claws was raised slowly, right in front of Jacob.
Then…
Pain.
'HOLY FUCK, FUCK, FUCK, FUCK, FUCKING MAKE IT STOP, AHHH, FUCK, fUCK, IT HURTS, FUCK AHHHHHHHHH, FUCKING HELL FUCK FUCKING CHRIST IT FUCKING HURTS FUCKING DOG FUCKER FUCKFUCKFUCKFUCKFUCKPLEASESTOPFUCKINGFUCKGINGPLEASEPLEASESTOPPLeASEStopPleasStopSPlease…Stop….Pleas…e…
Scorching pain coming from his head, pain so bad it put his broken arm, stab wounds and every other facet of agony he had ever experienced to shame.
Time seemed to slow to an eternity despite the complete disengagement of overclock.
And then as quickly as it slowed it resumed, ebbing back into reality along with a realisation.
His left eye was gone.
Pierce by the chimera in an act of vengeance.
Tears of blood streamed from his left eye while more normal ones came from his right.
Mucus and spit occupied the lower portion of his face as his nose and mouth seemed to have decided to eject their primary occupants.
The chimera on the other hand sat on its hindquarters. If Jacob didn't know any better, he would say it was laughing.
'Guess I got cocky…' He thought listlessly.
He had honestly thought he was special, that he could somehow breeze through his quest with his wit, ability and uniqueness. Just because he got lucky fighting on a couple of occasions, just because he was 'different'.
Well, he was different all right.
He was shit.
Shit at fighting, shit at socialising, shit at trusting people and shit at taking things seriously.
'…Yeah, I'm shit. So what?'
If he was shit at fighting he would rig the battle so he could win anyway.
If he was shit at socialising he would lie his ass off until everyone played to his tune.
If he was shit at trusting people then he would learn all their secrets to the point trust became irrelevant.
And if he was shit at taking things seriously then he'd just get so overpowered to the point where he wouldn't even need to try.
'First of all though'
He had to teach this massive feline fucknugget a lesson.
His arm came up again, holding the gun in hand.
The chimera scoffed at him, it knew it couldn't be used again.
Jacob grimaced slightly, he had hoped the bluff might work twice. Instead, the creature practically pressed its head against the pistol's barrel, as if daring him to prove it wrong.
Jacob gritted his teeth in rage.
'Cocky shit, I'm working with nothing but a pistol and a prayer and you're gloating over beating someone a 10th of your freaking size' Jacob thought with indignation.
It was that same indignation that made him pull the trigger in futility.
*BANG*
A shot rang out, both to Jacob's and the beast's surprise as the chimera dropped him in shock.
Jacob almost collapsed to the ground as he held the hole that used to hold his eye.
As he looked up, he was shocked by what he saw and soon his signature shit-eating grin was painted on his face.
The chimera's other eye was gone.