Worry does not empty tomorrow of its sorrow. It empties today of its strength.
Corrie Ten Boom:
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The sky shifted from the amber hues of dusk to the deep indigo of night, and with the darkness came life. The forest awoke in an unsettling symphony: the chittering of unseen creatures, the rustle of countless legs, and the sharp crack of twigs underfoot. As the boy ventured deeper, the ground beneath him seemed alive, writhing with movement.
From the underbrush emerged a sea of spiders, millions strong, their grotesque forms varying in size and shape. Their eyes glinted like scattered stars, tiny reflections of the dim light. They surrounded him, a living tide of chitin and fangs. The boy stood still, unperturbed, a faint smile playing on his lips.
"Surely, this isn't all it can do?" he mused aloud, directing his words toward the largest spider among them. This one stood apart, towering above the others. Unlike the hybrid monstrosities he had encountered before, this creature was almost pure in form—a massive arachnid, its body the size of a four-story building, its spindly legs stretching out like skeletal towers.
As if in response to his words, two unique spiders leapt forward from the writhing mass.
These newcomers were unnervingly large, their bodies akin to oversized felines, with legs spanning several feet. Their limbs were thick and powerful, covered in sinewy fur and ending in claw-like appendages designed for gripping prey or scaling vertical surfaces. Their mottled exoskeletons shimmered faintly under the dim light, patterns resembling leopard rosettes pulsating like living veins.
The grotesquery didn't end there. Their abdomens were sleek, almost feline, contrasting starkly against their hardened, chitinous limbs. From the center of their cephalothoraxes emerged grotesque, semi-humanoid faces. Large, multifaceted spider eyes were accompanied by smaller, disturbingly human-like ones beneath them. Their mandibles, sharp and spider-like, merged with jagged, humanoid teeth, dripping venom. A pair of elongated, human-like arms jutted from their sides, ending in clawed hands that twitched with an unnatural rhythm, as though battling against their own existence.
The colossal spider stepped back, granting the smaller ones room to engage.
As the boy prepared to face them, a sudden pressure gripped his mind—a psychic attack, emanating from the depths of the monstrous creatures' hive-mind.
A mind attack, he thought with faint irritation. It's always the same fucking thing with these fucking things.
The pressure intensified, clawing at his thoughts, but his expression remained calm. No fear darkened his gaze, no hesitation slowed his step. Instead, his eyes gleamed with unbridled excitement, a predator's delight at encountering worthy prey.
He raised his hands to his chest, clenching them into fists. Blue flames flickered to life, dancing along his knuckles, casting an ethereal glow against the encroaching darkness.
As the boy moved, so did the two spider-leopard hybrids, mirroring his every motion. When he leapt forward, they did the same, their grotesque forms twisting through the air with uncanny precision. The boy's fists, cloaked in swirling blue flames, met their claws mid-air. Remarkably, the creatures turned their claws into hardened fists, striking with enough force to rend the very air.
The collision shattered the sound barrier.
As the two forces landed, the smaller creatures that had gathered to witness the clash froze in eerie silence. For a brief moment, there was only the visual chaos of a circular shockwave rippling outward, displacing air and sending debris flying. Then, with a thunderous "BOOM!", the delayed roar of sound caught up. The blast was so intense that the weaker creatures were crushed under its sheer pressure, their fragile forms obliterated by the sonic force.
But as before, the monstrosities did not die. They scattered into trillions of tiny, writhing fragments, each scurrying toward safety before merging once again into their grotesque whole.
Half the realm where they fought lay in ruins, but the forest, as was its nature, began to regenerate unnaturally fast. As soon as one blow tore it apart, the next wave of regeneration followed, an endless cycle of destruction and renewal.
The combatants exchanged blow after blow, each strike reshaping the landscape. Trees exploded into splinters, and webs dissolved into ash, only to reform moments later. The air was heavy with the sounds of collisions—deafening, rhythmic, and unrelenting.
From above came a thunderous strike. The boy tackled it head-on, dodging a barrage of simultaneous punches from all angles—above, below, and behind. Each strike carried the same bone-crushing intensity as the first, but the boy's laughter echoed amidst the chaos.
To him, it was nothing more than amusement—a chance to toy with his foes. He could have dispatched them swiftly and cleanly, as he had done with the monkeys, but where was the fun in that?
The boy's icy flames began to freeze the momentum of the punches. With each collision, the hybrids' strikes lost power, their movements growing sluggish under the creeping frost.
One of the creatures attempted to flank him, delivering a devastating punch from behind. The boy responded by headbutting the incoming fist, shattering it into shards of frozen chitin. As the creature staggered back, the boy unleashed a flurry of strikes.
Each punch landed with brutal precision, faster than sound itself. By the time the resulting shockwaves caught up, the creature had already been reduced to a glacial sculpture, its form cracking and crumbling into icy remnants. Without pausing, the boy turned toward his remaining prey, his flames burning colder, his amusement unshaken.
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The beast observing the battle was not merely intrigued—it was captivated. Its master had warned of an unpredictable being setting foot on these lands, one capable of upending the natural order and finding amusement even in chaos.
Never in its millennia-long existence had it encountered someone who could venture so deep into the forest, let alone approach the heart of Arlam's Atoll itself. Yet here stood this boy, defying all expectations.
Now, as it watched him engage in combat, the beast felt a rare excitement stir within.
"This will be fun," it thought, a wicked anticipation building.
But for now, it would wait. It needed its target to waver a little, then it will strike….
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