"He's still alive" Carter said, Olivia though didn't stop crying. Everytime she took a glance at her husband the tears would just flow. It was a wonder how her body could still have so much tears left.
Almost every inhabitant of Nok village was presently inside the village hall. They were all surrounding the body of Owen, who lay motionlessly on the ground.
Everyone was surprised when Carter, the village physician, said that he was still alive. When the men had gone out for the hunt, Carter was in Willow city buying medicine so he couldn't join them.
The reason why everyone was surprised to hear that Owen was still alive was that he only had one leg and one arm left, the left side of his face was also skinned, with his teeth showing even with a closed mouth.
Everyone looked at him with devastated expressions, especially the men. However the most hurt out of them all except Olivia was surprisingly William.
He stood at the window looking away from everyone as a few tears flowed from his face. He was the only man to shed tears in the room and no one expected him to be hurt, they expected him to be actually celebrating.
"Can you heal him?" Gia asked, Olivia wasn't in a state to talk right now so she and Elizabeth were taking her place.
"I have already done all i can, The pills and tonics i have can only heal wounds, they can't regenerate body parts. His face might heal and leave another scar but as for his arm and leg....." Carter sighed.
"Honestly it's a miracle that he is alive, Celestial must be looking after him" Carter commented, unaware of the truth behind his words.
"Why isn't he waking up?" Olivia mumbled "You said he's alive so wake him up!!, Please wake up my husband!" She screamed before breaking down once more.
"I... I don't know how, I've never seen anything like this before" Carter lowered his head. He was also quite close to Owen.
"He saved us, he saved us all" One of the men mumbled, drawing the attention of everyone in the room.
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Two days prior, mountains near Nok village.
AHHHH!
ROARRR!
Hearing the roar, and the ladylike scream, everyone looked up the mountain.
"Wh... what the hell is that" Someone screamed, pointing at the two meter tall beast barreling towards them. The beast was at least 300 meters away but it's size and roar made it easy to notice.
'Mana beast!' Owen screamed in his head. He was also as terrified as the others, but unlike them his mind didn't shut off and his body didn't freeze in fear.
Most people in his situation would kick the dust and run as fast as they could away from the impeding doom, however Owen wasn't most people.
Instead of running, he thought of how he could help everyone else. His first thought was helping others and saving his village instead of his own life.
"It's too fast, we won't escape, running to the village is also not an option, fighting is not an option, hiding is impossible. What do i do what do i do!?." Owen mumbled as his mind went into overdrive.
However that instant he was thinking, the lion had gained a few more meters, and Owen knew this. 'I need to act, now!.
"EVERYONE RUN!" Owen shouted but was dejected after seeing no one listen to him. It wasn't that they didn't want to listen but that they currently couldn't move.
"Fuck!. Run you idiots!"
SLAP!
Owen went to everyone and one by one slapped the some sense into them. It was a tiring task but with the amount of adrenaline pumping through his body, it was as easy as slapping 18 people consecutively.
Thankfully, his slaps were effective and the men woke up and turned tail, running towards the East if the mountain was north and the village south. They also knew that running towards the village would spell doom for their wives and children.
After the last man started running, Owen followed. By now the lion was 200 meters away from them and it turned following William who had also adjusted his heading to follow everyone else.
Owen was running at the rear of the group and every few meters he would turn his head and glance behind him. 'We won't make it' he thought.
He could see that the distance between himself and William was becoming shorter, which meant the lion was also catching up.
Steeling his resolve, Owen slowed down until William caught up to him.
"What are you doing?" William asked, he had obviously seen Owen slowing down and he feared that Owen might throw him into the beast's mouth to buy time for himself.
"I need you to promise me something" Owen said.
"Why should I!?" Even in the face of death, William still didn't like Owen, and vice versa.
"Damnit Will, this isn't the time, fuck!" Owen shouted.
"Fine what do you want that can't wait until we are sure we won't die?" William said with an annoyed voice.
"Take care of my family"
"What!?" William was greatly surprised by Owen's words.
"Make sure my family doesn't lack anything. I want my daughter to go to hunting school and my wife never has to work a day in her life" Owen said with conviction.
"What are you talking about---"
"Promise me!!"
"Fine i promise, what--" William had to stop his words as Owen had suddenly disappeared, actually he didn't really disappear, it was just that he stopped running.
"Owen!" William shouted, but he didn't stop running, he knew what Owen was planning so instead he sped up. "Run faster!" he shouted at the group in front of him.
Owen stood there and turned around facing the incoming lion. When the lion was a hundred meters away, he threw a stone and successfully got it's attention, after shouting a few dozen cat related curses.
When the lion set it's sight on the human who just decided to curse at it's entire species, it surprisingly sped up, one would say it heard and understood his words.
Owen quickly ran in the village's direction before making a quick arc and turning around. He couldn't run in the village's direction and he also couldn't use the direction the group is running to, at the same time not wanting to run up the mountain.
Owen heaved a sigh of relief when he saw the lion chase him, he was worried that it would continue following the others instead. If that happened his plan wouldn't have worked at all.
Unsurprisingly, the other lions also followed the bigger one, it was obviously their leader. 'How is there a mana beast in the safe zone?' Owen wondered as he weaved through trees with absolute precision.
ROAR!
"Fuck it's getting closer" Owen cursed. His plan was to get the lions as far away as possible from the village, but if the mana beast lion catches him that early, his sacrifice would have been for absolutely nothing.
"I need to run faster!" He shouted as he pushed his body to it's absolute limit. Owen had trained his body for a long time back when he wanted revenge for his father. He was about two years of training away from level one Body Cultivation when he stopped training.
"Faster, faster, faster" he mumbled as felt his joints starting to pain, he had never run this fast before in his life.
If one looked very closely at the ground beneath Owen they would see that the earth itself was slightly propelling him forward.
However Owen didn't notice this fact, the only thing in his mind were his family.
"Zane, I'm sorry I couldn't protect you. Zaylee, forgive me, you will grow up without a father. I will watch over you from the other side."
"Olivia, I'm so sorry, I know i promised to come back alive but sometimes we don't always get what we want. Take care of our daughter. I love you all."
Crack!
That was when Owen's left knee completely dislocated, the force was just too much for the joints to bear and the ligaments snapped. Owen fell and passed out before he could even hit the ground.
ROAR!.
And the lion pounced at its free meal.