Chapter 4: Chapter 3 – Boar’d to Death

I was looking at the boar. The boar was looking at me. Man versus beast. None of us was budging. The only thing you could hear the rustle of the grass as a slight breeze was blowing. Who would make the first move?

I decided it would be me. I could not hold my excitement any longer. I charged at the beast, ready to limit test my body. The beast did the same thing in reaction.

"Hoooooog!!"

"SQUEEEEAL"

I analyzed its body as I was charging. The mid section is the part with the most vital organs and the least amount of bones. This would normally be my best bet, but in this case, the bear-hog was too fat and thick — its thick layer would probably absorb my blow.

I decided to take it head on, test out my brute strength instead. I clenched my fist and prepared myself to throw a punch right on its snout. This should be another weakpoint. Yeah, that is what I would do.

The more I was closing the distance, the more my anticipation was growing. Until we finally reached each other. A forceful step, planting my foot on the ground, helped me turn all this speed into power, making my hit even stronger. I threw my punch with all my force, straight on the beast's snout, and I felt my hand pushing into the animal's nose, almost like punching a hard, pink pillow.

My punch landed successfully, but that was all it did. After that, it was the beast's turn to retaliate. The hairy pig slammed my body with its head, knocking me far back, making me fall with my back on the grassy terrain.

This one single blow broke several of my ribs and I had trouble breathing, let alone getting up on my feet. I tried yelling to maybe intimidate it, but this only resulted in me hurting more and coughing blood on my white shirt.

Fading red color was pulsating at the edge of my vision, creating a crimson circle that was becoming more and more transparent the closer it moved to the center. This was the system's way of telling me that I was low on health.

That thing can make so much damage with a single hit? It made no sense.

I needed to run. And I needed to run now, because the hog was already preparing for its next attack. My punch did not even leave a bruise on its nose. Like I never even hit it.

There was but one thing for me to do. I knew it would not be easy and it would hurt like hell, but I did not really have a choice — I was not planning to die five minutes after being born.

I clenched my teeth and stood back up on my feet with a quick movement. The pain made me lose my balance and almost fall again, as my ribs were not only broken, but one of them that was pressing against the inside of my skin finally managed to pierce through and come out to say hello.

I ignored the pain and run as fast as I could towards the forest, limping, as with every stride of my right leg, my rib was protruding more and more out of my skin.

In retrospect, coming out of the forest was probably a bad idea. I could manoeuvre through the trees much easier than this stupidly strong animal. As fast and strong as it was, it did not seem like sharp turns would its forte. Not with this build and size.

I was going to run into the forest and try to hide, but then I changed my mind. I had an idea.

It can't be that smart, can it?

I went and stood in front of the outermost tree of the forest, waiting for the rampaging pig-bear-lion-thing to come at me. Surely enough, it did. It wanted to make this the final blow, so this time it ran even faster than during our initial collision.

If I wanted to make this work, I needed to wait.

Wait.

Patience.

Wait more.

Moving now would destroy my plan. Wait. More!

Moments before it crushed me into the tree in what would definitely be an instantaneous death, I went out of the way and behind the trunk.

The boar did not have time to turn, stop, or even decelerate, which made it go face first straight onto the thick bark.

We both used our heads, but only one used their brain. That is why I was standing safely behind the tree while the hog had probably split its skull open, dead in the middle.

Before I could complete my thought, I felt something moving. Was it the boar? No, that was not possible — the impact was too big to survive. An earthquake? Possibly. What was it?

It did not take much time to figure it out. I would actually be dead if it did, as what was moving was the tree right in front of me. The damn beast hit it so hard it literally knocked it down.

Thankfully, I managed to dodge the falling tree without much trouble, and I was finally safe; able to rest.

With my remaining energy, I slowly walked up to another tree and sat down, my back leaning against its bark.

And this was a terrible idea.

The hog was not dead. In fact, it seemed to be alive, well, and mad as can be. Sure, there was a teeny tiny crack on its skull and a bit of blood coming out of it, but nothing too serious, really. Even if it was, the wild animal was so mad it seemed perfectly fine with the idea of ignoring the injury until it was done with me.

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As much as I wanted to move, I couldn't. All I could do was sit down and watch this ugly beast as it charged towards me one last time.

That is when I noticed to my right an elven girl, around my age.

Was she always there? How did I only notice her now? What was she even doing out here, in the middle of nowhere?

It did not matter. What mattered was that if she stayed there, she would be in grave danger. The beast would probably hunt her down too once it was finished with me. I was done for, but she still had time to escape.

Instead of doing that, she slowly walked in front of me. She turned her back to me and her face towards the charging animal.

What was she doing? Was she crazy? Suicidal maybe? Whatever the reason was, she had just made the biggest mistake of her life, as the animal was running towards us once again.

The beast was getting closer and closer and I could not bear it. Dying was already bad enough, but taking an innocent girl with me was even worse. I could not stand this! I needed to do something!

Moments before the collision, I screamed at the top of my lungs

"Gendor! No! Run awa-"

The mysterious girl gave softly touched the beast's head with her elbow, right where the crack was, and, despite the gentleness of the touch, it stopped the beast right in its tracks, nullifying its attack. The hog immediately fell down and stopped moving. It instantly died. Right then and there.

How was this possible? It was the softest of touches and yet it killed it immediately. Was it that close to death already? I could not fathom what was going on.

The girl, after making sure that the beast was not breathing, turned to me and crouched to get on my level.

"Who is Gendor?" she asked.

That was a good question. Who was Gendor? I remembered his name and recalled his face. I knew deep inside that he meant so much to me... but... who was Gendor? It came out of my mouth instinctively. Maybe it was the pain and exhaustion doing their thing.

"I do not know," I said. "Thank y—"

A hard slap on my right cheek made me lose consciousness before I was able to complete my sentence.

 

---

 

I woke up to the view of a violet sky and the warmth of a dancing flame next to me. The grass I was lying on was cold and damp, and it would make me freeze to death if it was not for the fire next to me.

I got up, holding my head, trying to realize what had happened. As I turned from lying down to now sitting cross-legged, with the fire's heat almost burning my face in the best way possible, I realized I did not hurt. My ribs, which were supposed to be broken, now felt as good as new. My wounds were closed. As if the fight never happened. This was something I further realized after I lightly punched myself to test it out.

Lifting up my head, I saw her on the other side of the flames. The girl who had just saved me. Well, maybe not just, it was already getting dark, so I was probably passed out for a few hours already.

She was sitting down as well, holding what seemed to be a wooden bowl with some sort of liquid inside. It was either tea or soup.

I was too busy trying not to die earlier on and did not notice, but she had long, straight black hair coming all the way down to her waist, and was wearing an even longer white shirt, looking almost like a ghost or a spirit when I looked at her from afar. She noticed that I woke up, but she did not take her eyes off her bowl for a second.

"Hi, I'm Jinden," I said.

She did not respond. Not the slightest flinch. Maybe she could not hear me? Could I be speaking a different language from her.

Was she indeed a spirit or a ghost? Or maybe I was the spirit... Was I... dead?

"Was it you that fixed me?" I gave it another try, without really expecting much.

Somehow it worked. This time, she turned her head and looked at me through the translucent flames. She closed her eyes and gave me a warm smile.

"'Fixing' is a strong word," she said softly, almost whispering. So silent that I barely heard it over the crackling of the burning wood between us.

Out of seemingly nowhere, her bowl landed on my forehead, knocking me back on the ground and leaving me with a small bruise. Looking back at her, she was now standing up and facing towards me, panting from what seemed to be lots of concentrated annoyance.

"'Cause I'm pretty sure something is still wrong inside that thick skull of yours!"

What did I do? What was going on? This world was getting more and more weird...

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