Chapter 61: Chapter 61: Struggle

Although the young mossbear has found new strength and ferocity, I somehow managed. My speed was enough to avoid the beast's paws and keep enough distance from its maw. I only had to use double speed twice when I wasn't fast enough with the wings and the tail. 

Having extra limbs was an advantage in many situations but also an extra hassle in others.

It was incredibly uncomfortable to have wet wings after a bath, and drying Sage seemed impossible. Whereas, by flapping my wings, I could help myself to longer jumps, faster sidesteps, or propel forward with more speed. The tail helped me turn quicker, to cheer me up when I was down, and together with the wings, were invaluable tools for getting my balance in the air. Yet, they were also extra limbs that I had to be careful not to get too close to the teeth or claws of the mossbear that I faced.

It wasn't long before I found myself in a strange rhythm of evasive movements, unable to find an opportunity to attack. This dance, as Deckard called it, or as he literally said, "Stop dancing around and attack," may not have helped me defeat the beast, but it gave me time to sort out my concentration. It still required some fine tuning, though. No doubt tons of experience too.

I almost thought I found the recipe for Tate's win, as it seemed that the mossbear's lack of nimbleness was their biggest flaw. All the workhand had to do was run. Run as fast as he could, and his luck took care of the rest. How wrong I was, thinking we were in some sort of stalemate where I couldn't find an opportunity to attack just as the beast was unable to reach me.

It was sheer luck when half a dozen shoots burst out of the moss on the beast's back, aiming for my head, and I formed a shield just in time to deflect them before they could gouge my eyes out. I could almost hear in my head Deckard warning me about this very thing.

These green shoots, as thick as my fingers, may not have been able to break my shield, but they were enough to make me stagger.

Spreading my wings was all I needed to steady myself, but it was also something mossbear took advantage of. It pounced so fast that I didn't have time to pull them back and could only watch in dread as the beast bit into my right wing. Watching his teeth sink into it while I was unable to stop it was nerve-wracking. I was just glad the wing didn't have that many nerve endings. It didn't mean I didn't feel pain. It just didn't hurt that much. Plus, there was a slight pain reduction, one particular skill provided me. I didn't even flinch.

But I panicked, wondering how I was supposed to react to something like this. Nobody taught me that or explained to me how to deal with such a situation.

"Traiana's tits, attack! Punched it, girl!" Deckard screamed in my head. "Don't let the beast drag you down!"

Remembering how I had been dragged by one such mossbear through the burning woods and how helpless I was, I suppressed my fear and hurled myself at the beast that had just yanked its head in an attempt to tear my wing off. That wasn't something I wanted to experience again, either.

So, by slashing my claws across its muzzle, I tried to get it to let go of my wing. I would have succeeded if I'd hit its nose, I was sure of that. Instead, I screamed as the mossbear twisted my wing so much that it strained my hip joint. Even so, I stood strong, resisting its efforts to pull me under, knowing that if I gave in, it would be the end of me.

When all the beast accomplished was a few bloody gashes on my thigh, as I failed to jump aside far enough with my wing in its mouth, it decided to ram me to the ground. Good thinking. It had me trapped in front of it, I was just too nimble for it to finish me off. I could only curse its intelligence when the young mossbear lowered its head and sprang forward. 

It was close, so damn close. But I managed to leap up and escape the painful crush. I don't know why I did it, probably some instinct, but I didn't felt on forest floor. To the beast's amazement as well as mine, I landed in a squat on its head. Of course, mossbear took it with considerable displeasure. It was trying desperately to get me out of its head, going crazy like a bull on a rodeo. Me? I held on tooth and nail, desperately trying to get the beast to let go of my wing because if I fell, I was in danger of ripping my wing off. 

"Never again!" I growled through gritted teeth.

Surprisingly, even without a saddle or rope and with a wing in the beast's mouth, I didn't have so much of a problem holding on to its head. My concern was the antlers behind me, which, if I wasn't careful, threatened to dig into my haunches. And, of course, I couldn't forget the shoots sprouting from the moss growing on the beast. Those buggers were back, pestering me.

Though I could allow myself to think that as this was probably the first time, I was able to rely on my shield in a fight. The power behind the shoots was not something I could afford just to laugh off, but it wasn't enough to break through, let alone shatter the shield. Something to marvel at.

Although not right now.

For some reason, the beast refused to let go of the wing. To force it, I moved Sage to its nose and squeezed the last of the venom from his glands, hoping the young mossbear wouldn't like it. 

And I wasn't wrong. It didn't.

Yet the beast didn't let go of my wing either. It just swung its paws at my tail to chase it away, sneezing. When that didn't disperse the venom hovering around its nose, the beast took off. Its frantic dash got rid of the poison, not me on its head. 

I could, so I used [Tail of Poison Empress] again, this time not caring about the gasps that came out of my throat when Sage took another chunk of my mana and aimed my claws at the mossbear's eyes, which were mere centimeters away from my feet.

Though, to hold on to the running beast and accurately hit were two completely different things. That's what I learned when I missed the eye again. After that, all the beast had to do was toss its head at the right time. Worse, right after my failed attack, I watched in my domain as the moss covered his eyebrows. 

"Tss," I hissed when the shoots shooting out of that moss deflected my hand, and I missed for the third time. Not wasting my energy with more attempts, I changed my target to the beast's snout, especially its nose. It was not a part of the mossbear's body protected by fur and tough skin. The only thing I had to worry about was its mouth full of sharp teeth. Teeth that were currently sunk into my wing and why I was doing this in the first place.

This time when I swept my hand, I felt my claws dig deeper into the flesh than usual. The blood that stained my face and the painful howl of the beast were proof of that. What's more, my wing was finally free. Torn, bleeding, limp but not stuck in the jaws of mossbear.

I saw an opportunity, so I attacked this delicate part of the beast again. Mossbear stopped, howling in pain, tossing his head in an attempt to shake me off. Then to prevent me from turning its nose into mincemeat, the beast resorted to something it hadn't done before. It rolled over. 

Not wanting to get crushed under the massive beast, I jumped. Soaring high, and surprisingly, despite a limp wing, keeping my balance so well that I landed smoothly in a crouch on the ash-covered forest floor. 

The young mossbear may have been my rival, yet my eyes fell to my left, where, from the ashes raised by my landing, a man stared at me. His gaze, distorted with pain, almost made me scream. 

One of the Shadowbreakers archers. Except that the bow and the hand that held it, which I found lying in the ash, were unnaturally far from the rest of the body, and the expression on his face was deathly stiff. I quickly averted my eyes from the fallen Shadow who had lost his battle, glad the sight didn't turn my stomach inside out.

Still, it left a nasty taste in my mouth.

Glancing back at the mossbear, which was already on all fours, I stood up, spat, and dreaded another round. The odds were not in my favor.

A few scratches the beast had, were hardly something that affected its fighting capability. The worst of them all were lacerations on its nose, but the mossbear had it buried in the moss growing on the forest floor. It glowed faintly.

Even I could tell it wasn't normal.

I was much worse off. Scratched and bruised back, deep but no longer bleeding gashes on my thigh and the lame wing. My claws were not that sharp and large to penetrate the beast's tough skin and fat deep enough to do more damage, my poison seemed ineffective, and I had less than half the mana.

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I took a deep breath, almost choking on ash. Then clenching my fist, I pondered what I should do, how to attack next. If there was any way for me to wound the beast mortally, I didn't see it. To do that, I'd need a weapon, not my claws.

"For Traiana's sake, why do you hesitate? Go for it!" shouted Deckard through the connection. I didn't blame him for being confused by my behavior. Mossbear didn't move, and I just stared at it instead of taking advantage of the situation. I just didn't know what to do.

Kicks and punches, lots of them. That's what Deckard said.

Well, I wasn't sure about the kicks. All my knowledge of them was from TV, but I could give the punches a shot. So I clenched my fists even tighter, realizing that the claws weren't digging into my palm like they did when I fought the horned rabbits. Did I lose them? What's changed? Questions flashed through my mind. Using [Inner Perception] was enough to find them retracted in my fingers. A useful change, yet pondering the further consequences of my surrender to the [Beast] had to wait until later.

Darting forward with my eyes fixed on the mossbear, I searched for spots on its body to bury in my punches. The head of the beast whose snout was now sunk in the moss was out of the question. I had no intention of going anywhere near those teeth. The rest of its body seemed too massive for little me to do any damage with my fists, though. I could be much stronger than when I was a florist, even faster, but what could I do if my punches didn't have the necessary weight behind them? It was like a toddler trying to hit an adult. Quite discouraging thought.

Still, I had no choice but to try, so I chose my target. Left hind leg. Not the best target, I know. Yet, the safest I could come up with with the best chance of harming the mossbear. 

As I approached, the beast raised its head from the moss. There was hardly a trace of the wounds on its nose now. It was hard to believe that a moss that could eat an adult human in less than a minute could also heal. For just a second, I considered throwing myself into it to heal me, just to remember what it did to the two who were now fertilizer. I had [Never-Dying] for healing, and even though the moss seemed to be faster at the job, I couldn't complain about my skill.

The beast reacted too late, so I reached its flank before it could pounce on me. I literally elbowed it at full speed, and all I accomplished was a not-so-painful whimper from the mossbear. A bit disheartening, to be honest, as I was hoping for a more raw reaction. Still, it didn't change my plan.

Since I was on the spot, I pummeled its left hind leg with punches. The result was what I had feared. Even at double speed, putting my muscles and limbs under extreme stress, it looked more like I was giving mossbear a massage. So quickly changing tactics, I extended my claws. A new experience, a rather strange sensation at the tip of my fingers, kinda disgusting to watch it by [Inner Perception].

Slashing my claws like a madwoman, I tried to inflict as much damage as quickly as possible. Still, my progress was slow. It wasn't easy to stay by his back leg while the beast tried to get rid of me at all costs and fend me off with shoots.

I managed to draw blood, get through the fat to the muscles, even damage them. But at that moment, the beast reacted as it did when I squatted on its head. It rolled over. 

A frustrated growl escaped my throat even as I jumped back. All those efforts to cripple the beast were for naught. I tried to get back and finish what I started, but the mossbear rolled over every time I did. That I had once again plunged us into a cloud of poison gas had no effect on this struggle. And it didn't matter whether it was the size of the beast or the weakness of the poison that was the reason for its ineffectiveness.

It made me desperate. I had no idea how to fight on anymore, what more I could do to defeat the beast. I felt like everything I've done so far has been a colossal waste of time.

So it's to be expected it was only a matter of time before I made a mistake, and it came when the massive beast rolled over again. One of the shoots of moss on its back cut through my defenses. I didn't form a shield in time. It wrapped around Sage and pulled me towards the massive beast.

"Don't get trapped under it" Those were Deckard's words that flashed through my mind as I watched in the perception, screaming in agony, the bones in my legs crack under pressure. Pain reduction? What the fuck was that? I needed morphine. Worse, [Indomitable Will] wouldn't let me pass out even though I wanted to.

When mossbear finally got off me, tears were streaming down my cheeks, my throat was sore from screaming, and my body from the waist down was strangely numb. I didn't check them all, but it felt like all the bones in my legs were crushed, including my pelvis.

Even without looking up, I knew that the head of the beast was now above me. I could see it in my domain, feel its breath on my fur, smell it too. Oddly enough, I felt relieved. 

I didn't try to roll away, to escape his teeth or claws. What would be the point? Even if I succeeded now, what then? I couldn't run with my legs the way they were. So yeah, I gave up. Glad I got this farce over with, just like the archer lying somewhere beyond the orange mist.

Smirking, I mused. "Warrior or coward, huh?"

What was I? I stood up to a beast I didn't stand a chance against, did what I could, knowing it wouldn't be enough. Yet now, I couldn't stop the tears even as I faced certain death, unflinching and with my eyes open. 

The beast took its time, enjoying its victory, and I could do nothing but watch its drool drip onto my chest.

"Get on with it!" I growled when I couldn't take it anymore.

It happened in a blink of an eye when a young mossbear bit into my shoulder. His teeth sank deep into my flesh. The pain came shortly after, though it was nothing compared to what I felt from my lower body earlier. Jerking its head, the beast sought to do even more damage. When it stepped on my stomach, its claws digging into my chest, it took my breath away and crushed a few organs.

The roar resonating in my bones, which came shortly after that, was highly unbearable, causing me even more pain, but it also stopped the young mossbear's attack. For a moment. After a brief hesitation, the beast bit into my good shoulder and started dragging me who knows where. 

It took ages for it to let go of me, and felt like I was being dragged all over the clearing. 

A faint moan escaped my throat as I hit the ground. As if in answer, a more powerful grumble echoed above me. "You fought, you lost. You have a lot to learn."

Did I? I found Esu's words amusing. He wanted to train me, but I wasn't sure if I had learned anything from this fight. To me, it served as a demonstration of how pathetically weak I am compared to them. 

Then I flinched.

Not in pain, but when I noticed the moss in my domain that began to cover my body. My initial shock quickly turned to understanding. Esu had no use for a weakling like me in his family, so he decided to feed the forest with me. I sighed in resignation. At least it will save me a few unpleasant days that I would otherwise have to spend healing.

"Deckard, I-" I said through the connection, my feet already buried under the man-eating moss. "I don't have family here, but could you please tell Enola that she was the closest thing I had to a friend, that I'm sorry I won't be able to play with Tia anymore."

I could already feel a slight tingling on my toe tips as the moss began to nibble at them. 

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