An hour later, Luan's teeth were grinding against each other in frustration.
The boar had not left!
It had simply been chewing on the vegetation so painfully slowly.
At first, he thought about manoeuvring around the hulking mass of definitely delicious meat, but he couldn't do that either.
If it was a normal boar, Luan would have engaged it without any problem, but this boar, instead of the usual brown or black colour, was silver in colour.
It was either a beast or a monster.
If it was a beast, it would be an acceptable outcome, but if it was a monster…
Luan didn't notice, but his hunger had vanished. He was so focused on the movements of the boar that he neglected other unnecessary sensations.
Unfortunately, he made a mistake.
Beasts and monsters were more sensitive than normal animals, and with the amount of intensity and focus of Luan's gaze, there was no way a beast wouldn't feel it.
Luan's eyes widened when he saw the boar raise its head from the vegetation it was munching on and look at him right in the eye.
In contrast to the brown, beady eyes of the normal boar, this boar's eyes were crimson, but not frenzied.
Cold sweat trickled down his forehead as the boar regarded him.
As someone who had been hunting since he was 13, he could tell when something was totally out of his league.
This particular creature gave him the feeling of invincibility.
It was as if he was staring at a mountain, which was quite a reasonable line of thought since the creature was easily four times his size.
Luan gripped his blade extremely tight and readied himself to attack…
At least he tried to.
The distance of over 30 metres that separated the two of them was instantly covered, with the boar appearing right in front of Luan with its sharp tusk heading towards his chest like the claws of the reaper.
All Luan managed to do was dodge the two tusks by placing himself horizontally right in front of the boar's snout before he was lifted off his feet and was sent flying into the distance with a left arm that now had a black bruise on it.
Luan winced. 'So… strong!'
He couldn't help but cough up blood as his back hit the ground, making him feel as if he just received the full brunt of the boar's attack all over again.
He wasn't sure if he was just imagining, but the ground, particularly where he fell, seemed harder than the other parts.
He shrugged off his stray thoughts and tried to stand up with his broken arm and fractured ribs.
He lifted his austere blade and ran towards the boar with a hint of manic fury in his eyes.
It was as if he had thrown all caution and common sense to the wind after being beaten so badly in a single exchange that didn't last up to five seconds, but that assumption couldn't be more incorrect.
'I can't beat that thing! It isn't even overly aggressive as a beast is meant to be. How did I even end up facing a monster?!'
As he ran forward, the boar stood still, and for a moment, Luan thought he saw the boar's mouth curl upwards ever so slightly.
'Now I'm seeing things too. Ahhh!
'Once I get close enough to a tree, I'll climb it straight away and get the hell out of here!'
As he went over his escape plan in his mind, he came into another 25 metres of the beast.
Then, something bizarre happened.
The floor Luan was stepping on rippled… and suddenly sank, taking his whole body along.
He tumbled, disoriented, when he suddenly felt something blunt knock the air out of him by hitting his chest from below.
His vision darkened for a moment, and when he regained his consciousness, he found himself staring at a 20 metre hole.
Even worse, he was staring at the hole from the same height as the trees he planned on escaping with their help.
'Crap… I totally forgot that beasts manipulate mana too, and even more so for monsters!'
Luan's brain spun as he tried to think of a solution to avoid falling into the newly conjured pillar that had been raised from the ground, right in the trajectory of his fall.
He knew that the pillar might as well have been a spike, but he was thankful that the boar didn't see him as a threat and was taking its time to play with him– like a ragdoll, of course.
Without any way to stop his fall, Luan ended up smashing face first into the pillar.
He blocked it with his left arm, but that only worsened his condition as he felt the fractures in his ribs deepen and widen and his firearm's bones emit cracking sounds.
Before he could take a breather, he felt his belly get pierced all the way to the back in two different places. Hot tears welled up in his eyes as even more blood spurted from his mouth.
When he managed to open his teary eyes, he found himself right in front of the monster's eyes, literally.
In the reflection of himself in those red eyes that seemed totally amused, he could see its two tusks piercing his belly while raising him high in the air.
The blood flowed down the tusks and onto its snout, which the monster licked, its eyes almost taunting.
It flung Luan off its tusks, throwing him into another patch of earth that promptly slammed the latter into another couple of trees.
At some point, Luan's blade had dropped when he was being flung around, but he wasn't able to remember when exactly.
Not that it mattered now, when he was all bruised and bloody.
He crawled up from the ground and tried to stand up, but ended up genuflecting and coughing up blood, dyeing the floor and his vision crimson.
He lifted his head as he stared at the boar that was swaggering towards him with elegance that its bloody snout didn't diminish in the least.
A grin broke out on Luan's face as he saw this.
Suddenly, he stood up.
He actually stood up on his own!
He was still bloody, but there were no wounds present.
Everything had healed completely!
Luan's grin broke out into a wider one that could only be described as manic, then he spoke to the monster who was obviously shocked.
"Not expecting this, huh?"