CHAPTER 147: POWER OF A CHTHONIX

The beast struck first... its tail whipping forward like a scorpion’s sting. Jayden barely raised his forearm in time. The impact sent him skidding back, his large feet tearing furrows through the dirt. Pain flared where the spiked ball had connected, but he grinned through bloody teeth.

Then he feinted left, and drove forward with a crushing right hook. The Chthonix shrank itself immediately... allowing Jayden’s fist whistling through empty air, then it reappeared at full size mid-lunge, horns aimed at his ribs.

Jayden twisted, taking the blow across his meaty shoulder instead. The horn tip scraped bone, sending white-hot pain down his arm. He answered by grabbing the beast’s snout and heaving, flipping it onto its back with a ground-shaking crash.

Before Jayden could press the advantage, the Chthonix’s tail lashed upward... not at him, but at the ground. A shockwave of displaced earth knocked him off balance. The beast rolled to its feet and immediately shrank to half-size, darting between his legs.

Jayden whirled, but not fast enough, the Chthonix regrew behind him, driving both horns into his lower back.

Jayden roared as he was lifted clear off his feet. He barely managed to grab one horn before the beast could fling him away. Muscles straining, he wrenched sideways, using the horn as leverage to slam the Chthonix face-first into a boulder.

BOOM.

Rock shattered. The beast staggered, its metallic hide flickering.

Jayden saw his chance. He grabbed the dazed Chthonix by its tail and spun, building momentum before releasing it like a hammer throw. The beast crashed through three trees before skidding to a stop.

It rose slower this time. Blood, thick and black, oozed from cracks in its armor.

The Chthonix shrank to pebble-size and shot between Jayden’s legs again. But this time, Jayden was ready. He stomped down just as it regrew...

CRUNCH.

His massive feet pinned its tail to the ground.

The beast shrieked, thrashing wildly as Jayden reared back his fist.

BAM!

One punch dented its skull plating.

BAM. BAM. BAM!

Two cracked it. Three shattered through completely.

Jayden’s fist connected with a thunderous CRACK, the impact rippling through the Chthonix’s metallic skull. A web of fractures spread across its armored plating, the silver sheen flickering like dying embers. With a sound like shattering glass, the beast’s metal hide collapsed inward, reverting back to its natural, earthen form.. rough brown skin exposed, cracks oozing thick black blood.

Jayden didn’t wait. He reared back, both massive fists raised high, muscles coiling like loaded springs. The Chthonix was dazed, its crimson eyes glazed over... this was the moment to end it.

He brought his fists down on it’s skull like twin meteors... only for the beast to shrink to the size of a pebble an instant before impact.

BOOM.

Jayden’s fists cratered the empty ground, the force of the blow sending tremors through the earth. His eyes widened as he noticed the beast’s disappearance.

"Shit."

A rustle in the dirt behind him was his only warning.

The Chthonix regrew in a violent explosion of displaced air... but not to its original size.

It grew bigger.

Its body swelled to twenty feet tall, its limbs thickening into monstrous pillars of packed earth and stone. Its horns elongated into jagged spears of obsidian, each one as long as Jayden was tall. The spiked orb of its tail expanded into a wrecking ball of condensed bedrock, studded with sword-length protrusions.

The beast stomped, and the ground beneath Jayden’s feet caved in, swallowing him to the knees.

Before he could wrench free, the Chthonix’s tail swung at him.

The impact sent Jayden flying his body carving a trench through the dirt before smashing through a tree trunk. Splinters rained down as he gasped, ribs screaming in pain.

He snapped his head up... just as the beast charged towards him, its horns aimed like battering rams.

Jayden barely rolled aside, the left horn gouging a furrow through his side. Blood sprayed, but he dug his fingers into the horn’s base and heaved, using the beast’s momentum to flip himself onto its back.

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The Chthonix bucked, its massive frame twisting violently. Jayden clung on, knuckles white, as the beast slammed itself against rock formations, trying to crush him.

CRACK!

A rib snapped, Jayden’s vision swam, but he held on, dragging himself up the beast’s spine until he reached its skull.

He reared back and slammed his fist down with everything he had.

BAM!

The beast roared. But Jayden wasn’t finished, he raised both fists and slammed again.

And again

And again

The beast staggered, but it didn’t submit. Not yet.

Jayden’s fists hammered down again and again, each blow cracking the Chthonix’s earthen skull. The beast roared, its massive body swaying—but it wasn’t finished.

With a sudden, violent shudder, it shrunk to the size of a football, sending Jayden tumbling from its back. Before he could recover, the beast regrew instantly... its massive hoof already raised above him.

Jayden saw the giant feet coming straight at him, but it was too late.

BOOM!

The impact drove Jayden into the earth, his ribs screaming as dirt exploded around him.

BOOM!

The beast slammed it’s feet again.

BOOM!

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And again.

BOOM!

And again.

Each stomp crushed Jayden deeper into the crater, his hybrid form collapsing, his bones groaning under the pressure. Blood trickled from his forehead, his vision swimming as the system’s warning flashed red in his periphery:

[-70 Hp]

[-150 Hp]

[-200 Hp]

[Warning! Host condition is Critical]

Jayden coughed up blood as he stood up, trying to regain balance. But the Chthonix wasn’t done with him. It reared back, its spiked tail coiling like a scorpion’s sting.

Jayden barely registered this, before...

WHAM!

The spiked tail sent him flying like a ragdoll, his body carving a fifty-foot trench through the forest before smashing through an oak. Wood splintered like gunshots as he tumbled to a stop, tasting copper. He spat blood, his muscles burning, his breath coming in ragged, wet gasps.

[Hp: 20/500]

"Fuck." he grunted, seeing the system’s notification.

The beast charged, its obsidian horns aimed at his heart. It was ready to finish Jayden off with one final, finishing jab.

Jayden saw the beast coming. And he knew he was totally screwed. He had no fight left in him. No strategy. No trump card... except for one.

The Lycan form

Without hesitation, his fingers twitched, giving way for his claws to unsheathe.

But as the Chthonix horns lanced toward him, a blast of arctic wind howled through the clearing.

CRACK!

Ice exploded across the Chthonix’s legs, freezing it mid-charge. The beast roared its momentum yanking it forward, but its frozen hooves held fast, anchoring it in place.

Jayden’s furrowed his brows.

A shadow moved at the treeline, before emerging. Jayden eye’s widened as he saw it’s features clearly... white fur, blue tribal markings, frost steaming from its paws. There was no mistaking it, this was none other than...

The Winter Wolf.

She stepped forward, her glacial eyes locked onto the trapped Chthonix. The air crystallized around it, frost spreading in jagged patterns across the ground.

Jayden coughed a laugh, blood flecking his teeth.

"Took you... long enough."