CHAPTER 211: CLAWS, FANGS

The first beast lunged in a flash of claws and fangs. The air itself seemed to tear apart around it. Zirel did not step back an inch. His sword—an extension of his arm—slid from his back in a fluid motion, too fast for the eye to follow. The grey blade struck not at the beast, but at the space before it.

A metallic clang rang out—the creature’s claws meeting steel. Zirel pivoted on his lead leg, harnessing the shock’s momentum. Like a lightning-striking serpent, his sword shifted course and sliced clean through a tendon in the beast’s front right leg.

An inhuman howl burst from the creature as it stumbled, its charge broken.

Maggie was already moving. Her halberd, heavy and deadly, swept in a wide arc before her. She wasn’t aiming for the wounded beast, but for the gap between Zirel and a boulder to his left. A second creature—smaller, faster—leapt from the rock’s shadow, aiming for Zirel’s exposed flank. The halberd’s razor tip pierced the beast’s shoulder with a wet sound. Maggie dug her boots into the red earth, put her whole body behind it, and wrenched back. The impaled creature was torn out of its leap and hurled against the rock wall with a sickening crack of bone.

It hit with an odd, damp thud and went still.

Elisa, meanwhile, had already turned on her heel. Her spear, gripped with both hands, was not a thrusting weapon in that instant—it became a lethal staff. A third beast, low to the ground, was trying to flank to the right, heading for the ranks of regular soldiers who had begun forming a shield wall.

Her spear whipped down like a lash, the metal shaft smashing into the beast’s snout with a cartilage-cracking blow. The creature reeled back, howling, blinded by pain. Elisa didn’t stop: a swift reverse strike with the butt of the spear smashed into the monster’s forelegs, knocking it onto its side. She raised her weapon to finish it with a killing thrust—but a fourth beast, silent and fast, crested a ridge and dove at her.

Elisa felt the danger—not with her eyes, but with that honed awareness her latent essence gave her. She sprang sideways, barely in time. The claws tore the air where her throat had been a fraction of a second earlier.

She landed off balance, her spear too low. Instinct screamed to unleash her psychokinesis: to hurl the beast, to disintegrate it—something. Her grip tightened on the wooden haft, her stigmas flaring briefly beneath her armor. She caught herself by rolling over her shoulder, narrowly dodging a snapping maw. Rising in a single fluid motion, her face set, she leveled her weapon—but not fast enough. The beast was already on her.

A sharp whistle cut the air. The point of Maggie’s halberd shot between them, slamming into the beast’s chest with a force worth ten tons. The impact halted the charge mid-stride, flipping the creature onto its back, its legs thrashing. Maggie—who had hurled the weapon with both hands—was already on it, her belt knife drawn. She knelt on the beast’s chest, drove the short blade into its throat, and cut the scream in half. A jet of black blood erupted.

"Behind!" Zirel shouted.

Two more shapes charged down the slope—larger, heavier. Their roars made the stones tremble. The first wave had been only scouts. The real attack was beginning.

Zirel stepped to the fore of the clustered Awakened, sword low, point angled to the ground. "Maggie! Flank them! Elisa—cover the soldiers’ right side!"

No further orders were needed. Maggie wrenched her bloodied halberd free with a deft kick. She quickly shifted left, using a rocky outcrop for cover. Her weapon’s long reach gave her the edge in open ground. She swept the space before her, forcing one of the big beasts to halt. The creature, intelligent, stepped back, hissing, looking for an opening.

Zirel charged the other large beast—but not head-on. He sprinted, then at the last moment dove forward, rolling under the beast’s belly hung with claws. His sword, reversed in his grip mid-roll, slashed deep into a hind leg’s muscle.

The beast roared in agony and spun with surprising agility for its size. Zirel was already on his feet, his back to a rock. A claw strike slammed into his back shield—the metal screeched and bent, but held. He countered instantly, his sword cutting through the air in a flurry of lightning-fast strikes, aiming for eyes and muzzle, forcing the beast to retreat, shielding its weak points. He wasn’t looking for a quick kill—he was holding it, locking it down.

Meanwhile, Elisa obeyed her orders. The soldiers’ right flank—thirty men packed tight behind shields, spears trembling—was under threat. A pack of three smaller, vicious beasts was trying to sneak through a narrow ravine. Elisa planted herself at the choke point, her spear horizontal. The first beast lunged.

She pivoted on one foot, sidestepping its claws, and brought her spear down in a diagonal slash, catching it mid-leap in the flank. The blow knocked it aside, sending it slamming into the cliff wall. The second came in low, aiming for her legs. Elisa vaulted over it, landing behind it, and smashed the spear’s butt into the back of its neck. The creature collapsed, dazed.

The third, more cunning, had been waiting. It charged while Elisa was still recovering from her jump. She blocked desperately with the shaft. Claws scraped against metal, the raw force driving her back two steps. Pain flared in her left wrist. Too much brute strength. The temptation to crush the creature with her mind, to slam it into the cliff, was almost unbearable. Her stigmas flared again, pulsing. She gritted her teeth, ignored the pain, and planted the spear’s tip firmly into the ground at an angle.

The charging beast couldn’t avoid it. The point drove into its shoulder. Elisa heaved with all her strength, using the leverage to twist it in pain, exposing its belly. A soldier, seizing the chance, hurled his spear from the shield line. The weapon pierced the beast’s tender gut, and it collapsed with a pitiful whine.

Maggie, locked in combat with her large beast, used every inch of her halberd’s reach—strike, withdraw, strike again—targeting tendons and joints. The beast, frustrated, roared and spat froth. It tried one last massive leap to crush her against the rock. Maggie didn’t retreat. She braced her rear foot, raised her halberd like a pike, and aimed the blade skyward.

The beast’s falling weight drove itself onto the weapon. The impact was brutal. Maggie was thrown back, the shock numbing her left arm, her grip torn from the haft. The beast, impaled, let out a rattling death cry and collapsed, pinned to the ground by the weapon.