Title: My First Trading Partner is An Awaken
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"You shameless old man! I never thought that a Babaylan like you is using a talisman from water buffalos!" The gabunan growl from anger.
The old shaman laughed and said, "Why not? This kind of talisman is truly helpful with my age right now. How can I continue helping my people if my body is weak?"
Henry was confused. He did recognize that Mang Dondon had placed his necklace and wrapped it to his right hand but he thought that it was just part of the chanting process.
"Are they referring to those teeth in his necklace a while ago?" Henry asked himself.
"You old thing! You're the most annoying kind of enemy that I have ever encountered!" The gabunan takes action and then just like what Mang Dondon did before, he also appears right in front of the shaman at a faster speed.
However, just before he punched, Mang Dondon's chant had finished as it had created a visible shielding around him.
In the common eyes like the group of mayors who observed the fight, they can't see it.
But in the eyes of Henry and the rest of the Aswang and even the Gabunan, he clearly saw the spiritual ward around the old man when the gabunan attacked the ward which distribute the impact to the arch shaped wars.
Yet, with the sheer force of the gabunan, the old man still slides two meters back and smirks as if he was not hurt from the punch.
"That punch is the punch of eight to nine people combined. It's just like what Tyler had said, thy seems to have the strength and speed of an entry level F-rank awakened regardless of their monstrous appearance,"
Henry still manages to observe. Yet was interrupted by what the old shaman said.
"Hey young man, do you seriously want to just observe? If you don't want to kill them, just help out this old man like me to defend at least," the old shaman said.
"Hahaha," the gabunan laughs, "kill me? You're trying to make me laugh and it really was annoying!"
The gabunan readied himself to launch an attack against the old shaman as he finds that the shielding will be broken for at least another three punches from him.
He focused himself with the punch but he had never expected that before it connected to the ward of the old man, he was punched by someone.
He then stumbled on the ground and rolled around it. The dust can be seen in his clothes even if it was night time.
"Nice punch young man! Now deal with him and I will fight with the rest as we had planned!" The old man taps Henry's shoulder as he runs towards the shocked Aswang who is still trying to rack his brain out on what made hims tumble and feels the pain in his head.
The other aswangs felt threatened with Henry's action and they immediately transform to their visage monstrous self. This is their way to directly increase their strength, speed and even enhances their senses.
However, one of them is already incapacitated by the old shaman while their leader, the gabunan, is still on the ground yet recovered from the shock.
"You! Who are you?" The gabunan asked as he also transformed himself to his first form, growling towards Henry. This form can now be seen by common people like Mayor Sales and the rest of the people inside the villa.
"I'm the one who cured your target," Henry said, which made the gabunan stunned from the claim.
"You're kidding me?! I'll kill you young man for making fun of me!" The gabunan exclaimed.
In his lifetime, this kind of claim is laughable. No one can even reverse his rituals when it comes to increasing the number of their people using his black chicks.
It can only be done by the old man who is of higher healing power, not with such a young man.
"He seems to not listen to my claim," Henry thought. "Well, good thing that I have already controlled my new strength, he might really be dead if I punch him with my fullness."
The gabunan sped up but in Henry's eyes, it was just like in slow motion. When the gabunan tried to punch him, he dodge and used his 10 percent of strength to punch too.
Bang!
Bang!
Oughhhh!
It was two consecutive punches to the gabunan's stomach. The speed of Henry is so fast that the gabunan was left stunned in surprise and in massive pain that stretched out all over his body.
'This is fun! I'll never knew that the boxing that I trained will be use to these kinds of creaturess,' Henry thought.
"Heck! That hurts!" The gabunan exclaimed as he had difficulty breathing with the two punches alone.
As for Mang Dondon, he literally moves around creating chaos in the ranks of the Aswang na lakad. With a punch, he renders the Aswangs mobility and he immediately uses his bronze knife to bleed his adversaries to death.
The Aswang can't see the movement of the old man who had the talisman from the water buffalos. A punch that was augmented by this talisman made them stunned for many seconds.
Along with the said talisman, he also has the oil talisman that keeps on boiling and heating up making the Aswang agitated from heat they felt in their body.
"Ahhhhh!"
Punch!
It was one -sided bullying. Although the Aswangs have greater numbers, they seem to be bullied by Mang Dondon and Henry.
"You're strong, young man! Let's see if you can manage to land an attack in my second form!" The gabunan said.
Each controlled punches from Henry made the gabunan stunned, making his appearance miserable. However, as a prideful race of Aswang, he doesn't want to retreat without putting up a fight.
"Oh, what was that?!" It was Malou. The people inside the ville is also surprised by the malevolent appearance of the Gabunan
"It became a giant!"
One of the bodyguards saw it and he knew that after they survived this, his world opens from new things that the spiritual world can only offer.
Henry was just standing there and waited for the gabunan to complete its second form. He had already adjusted to the monstrous form of his opponent and calmly waited.
"Henry, be careful! The strength of that thing is greater than me without my spirit familiar!" Mang Dondon said as he glanced at the changes that are happening to the gabunan.
"Roar!" It was coming from the gabunan.
Unbeknownst to many, changing forms with or without the assistance of their oil concoction or with the assistance of the full moon, it was rather painful.
The pain multiplies especially when it comes to gabunan like them. However, the more pain they usually felt during the transformation, the greater the power.
That roar is a roar of pain from the transformation and from the recent punch he recieved from Henry. Yet, still succeeded in changing appearance.
Henry, who is a newbie, doesn't know this. He just waited and wanted to see the difference that the changes had made to the gabunan's side.
"Roar!"
It was another roar, but the difference is that the gabunan readied his attack against Henry and he immediately appeared beside Henry.
"Yeah, it seems that he really did become stronger and faster, but in my eyes, you appear to be only that fast," Henry thought as he caught the fist of more than 2 meter giant.
"Ah what?!"
The gabunan was surprised by what Henry did. However before he can even further react, he felt pain from his fist.
"Ahhhhh!!!"
"What did you… ahhhh!!!" The gabunan further shouted from pain.
Mang Dondon saw what Henry did. The Aswangs against the old shaman too felt fear when they saw that the arms of the gabunan are separated from the rest of the arms that are now dangling while blood splatters in the ground.
The gabunan knelt down from pain, while Henry retreated as he found that the foul smell immediately assaulted his sense or smell when the blood of the gabunan started to appear.
"Ahhh. You're going to regret this!"
"You are going to regret this!"
It was the shout from the gabunan.
Yet before anyone could react, Mang Dondon used his bronze short sword and the borrowed physique from the talisman of carabaos to immediately run towards the gabunan and separate its head to its body.
The gabunan can't even say another single word when Mang Dondon put him to death.
"Run!"
Whoever it was, it surely comes from the ranks of the Aswang. The suppression of the blood coming from the gabunan is gone when the head is separated and rolling in the ground.
That's why they can now command themselves to retreat. In their minds, they would not dare to do things in the presence of an experienced Babaylan like Mang Dondon. They were forced to do it, in actuality.
So immediately, when they regained control of themselves, they didn't hesitate to run as they knew that they didn't stand a chance against the renowned Babaylan.
Much more to the young man, who subdue the gabunan and easily made the same render powerless and killed in the process.
"Aren't we going to chase them?" Henry asked without care of the three corpses around them. It was the dead bodies of the gabunan and the two Aswangs.
"Let them be. They were just here because they were asked by the gabunan. I bet without the gabunan, they will not have the courage to operate in my turf," Mang Dondon said.
Henry nodded. Mang Dondon called the attention of the body guards of mayor Sales to collect the corpses in one place to be burned.
Again, the Shaman chanted forbidden words as he called it and Henry didn't know where it was being used. He was just there trying to recall his first ever Aswang battle.
"Young man, you have really surprised me with your strength. That second form of the gabunan is literally powerful and I know for sure that even with these two talismans activated, I can't compete with its power. I might need to call my spirit familiar," Mang Dondon explained.
They are waiting for the corpse to be incinerated to dust as it was the only safe way to totally destroy an Aswang specially for a high ranking kind of Aswang.
"You know that I can't talk about how I manage to have this strength, right?" Henry said. "But what do you mean by spirit familiar?"
"Ah see. Here, I let you meet one of them," Mang Dondon said. Mang Dondon made another series of latin words and in his shadow, another creature emerged.
"This is Banoy, he is a tikbalang. Say hi Banoy!" Mang Dondon said.
"That's… the heck. Why not surprise me once and for all?!" Henry wanted to land a punch to the face of this old man. However, he managed to control himself.
He was already stunned by what he had experienced in a single day and here he comes again, another surprise that made him numb from it.
The creature that seems to be summoned by Mang Dondon has a horse head and the body of a man, and it has a horse tail too.
"Henry here. I never knew that you wanted to befriend this old man,"
"Hiye. Hiye. Yeah nice to meet you too, Henry. Dondon is a nice guy. He just became old," the tikbalang replied telepathically.
"Why do you glow so much, Henry?" It was still asked by the tikbalang telepathically.
This then again surprises Henry. "You're talking in my mind! How did you ever do that?"
"It was just our way to communicate, young man." The tikbalang replied.
"Hey, Dondon. Didn't you teach him how to control that glow? He is literally a walking flashlight and many creatures on the left side will see him in a single glance." The tikbalang pointed out to Mang Dondon.
"Yeah, I'm about to teach him how to control his light, anyways." Mang Dondon said.
"You should, it seems to me that this light is fairly different from what I know. However, he really need to hide it well," the tikbalang said and noticed the difference of light emitted by Henry in the spiritual world.
"I know. I know." Mang Dondon replied.
"Also, Dondon, why didn't you call me when you had a fight with these creatures! You also fought a Gabunan! Aren't you hurt?"
The tikbalang asked after it recognizes the corpse being incinerated in front of them.
"No. Thanks for asking, Banoy. This young man fought with the gabunan while I had killed the rest. So, your assistance will be reserved for the next battle." Mang Dondon said.
"I see. With his light, he can truly subdue a common kind of gabunan," the tikbalang replied as he finds it normal for someone who can subdue higher rank kinds of Aswang with that glow that Henry emitted.
As for Henry, he understands the tikbalang's concern. So, he did want to learn the trick of hiding his leaking aura from the old man as they wait for the corpses to be done and dust on the ground.
He too can see his aura, thanks to the forceful opening of Mang Dondon of his spiritual eyes. His aura had a combined color of green and gold and a bit of a blue color that were thinly layered to his skin.
He had estimated that his aura is about 1.5 inches thick which is by far a thick one as compared to Mang Dondon and the Tikbalang's aura.