NOVEL WEB Chapter 25: Finally! Some Proper Wholesome Violence!
I found myself in a clearing, facing a lone wolf. Not in the sense of people who liked to call themselves that, but an actual wolf that was alone. My parents deemed it to be an acceptable enough target, with Mutations apparently ranging around level 5.
We circled each other, myself and my opponent. It was the animal that eventually made the first move, lunging towards me.
I dodged, with only a slight delay to my reaction. The wolf missed and turned towards me, but my sword impacted against its head before it could make another attack. That move sufficiently stunned my opponent, opening it up for another follow-up slash.
The wolf’s face was gouged out again, and it staggered back. Its instincts took over, and it tried to run away, but I was hot in pursuit. A leg broke with another slash, a kick tripped it up, a stab towards the torso spilled more of its lifeblood, until finally after a dozen more slashes, my enemy stopped moving.
It was probably dead before even that, but it was better to be safe than sorry.
“I did it!” I announced to my parents.
“Yes you did!” Mom chorused. She ran up to myself and hugged me tight.
Dad followed closely behind and wrapped the both of us in a hug.
We ate our packed lunch right after, in celebration of my first-ever successful hunt.
It was… well, I didn’t enjoy it as much as I thought I would. The trepidation and the nervousness also disappeared. I was calm, far calmer than I thought I would be. I’d enjoyed sparring quite a bit, so I thought it’d just be more of that but more nerve-wracking. But as it turns out, once I recognized that I was in real actual danger, the literal years of training took over and I became a machine meant only for violence.
Good to know.
~~~
I breathed out and held my dagger against the wolf’s carcass with the intent to skin it for its pelt. My good mood steadily returned, and it rapidly lifted as I stared at my first-ever kill. The prior fight barely tired me out, so after only a quick rest, my parents offered to teach me how to butcher it. I accepted their offer, because I couldn’t just let good loot go like that, and I wanted gear made from the remains of those that I have killed. That was so metal.
It was a sublime feeling of satisfaction. Subtle, like how a meal I cooked for myself might taste just a tiny bit better, for that simple fact alone. It was by my own efforts that it was made.
“Make a cut like this,” my mom instructed, slicing into the animal’s hide on the other side. “Try not to get too much meat on it, but too much is better than too little.”
I took her advice and promptly made a mistake, making unintended holes in the hide. I went the other direction and left way too much meat that would need to be cut away, wasting it in the process.
It was a frustrating effort as I didn’t know what I was actually doing, and I ended up ruining much of the hide as a result. But my parents were patient, and they helped me every step of the way, which in the end resulted in me getting enough material to make a pair of gloves from the remains of a decently large wolf. What a bargain.
We cooked a little bit of the meat for a second lunch. I also kept the bones, in case I could pester Moonwash to make something of them. I wanted to commemorate my first step into becoming a badass in some way.
~~~
The rest of the day continued, and I managed to fight a few more animals or monsters.
I fought a bushpider, which was basically a giant spider that disguises itself as a bush. I lightly tossed a rock at the thing, to have a more fair fight, especially given that my parents were the ones to spot it. But it still turned out to be a trivial battle. The monster charged straight for me, so I just whacked it with my sword, and then whacked it some more until it stopped moving. It was probably stronger than I, but my equipment was just cheating.
We found a pair of wolves next, and I convinced my parents to let me give it a shot, on account of how easily I took out a single one of them.
This time, their teamwork did make the fight a lot harder, but I managed to dodge and keep the wolves away, relying on my blade to extend my range and limit their movements. I finally caught one of them out when I weaved through the trees, and I struck the animal in the middle of its torso. That slowed it down enough for me to only have to deal with the other wolf, whom I quickly caught with a quick stab, and then tore apart with only one more hit.
The remaining wolf was swiftly executed.
In the last fight of the day, I got to play support. Mom tracked down this tyrnossaurus-bear hybrid thing that I knew was born with level 40 Mutations. We found the warsymbol in a large clearing, with a few pieces of chewed-up bone littering the ground. It was almost as tall as my dad standing on its hind legs, which meant that its total mass was even more monstrous considering that it was quadrupedal. The monster was predominantly covered in thick scales, but there was fur instead for all the joints.
Mom and Dad discussed whether they should even do the hunt. Normally, they were confident in their ability to take such a beast on, and the many body parts that could be harvested sold for a pretty penny. It was considered a rare thing to even encounter one.
The problem this time was of course that I was with them. They were loathe to put me in any kind of danger.
“I’ll be fine!” I protested. “I wanna see you guys being cool too!”
My parents exchanged a look, but that gave them the push they needed. Mom told me to stick right next to her as she cast spells, while Dad took on the brunt of the beast’s aggression.
I managed to negotiate a slightly more active role for myself.
~~~
The battle began after we had each positioned ourselves properly. I and my mother were far behind the warsymbol while Dad approached it from up front.
He bellowed out a challenge, and the beast roared in response. Its steps resounded loudly across the clearing as it charged with a surprisingly sleek grace. The monster immediately lunged in a bite once it got in range, and Dad dodged to the side. Attacks from the front claws followed, and my father’s sword met the natural weapon in a heated exchange that pushed him back but drew blood against his foe’s scales.
The warsymbol roared again without a trace of pain. It was a primal sound that invoked the terror of every animal that could ever be a predator. My dad slashed at its face during the time it took to bellow, leaving a deep gash across the scales and drawing further blood. The monster however only grew more enraged, uncaring for the damage and hammering into my dad in the same exact clash. Sword against claw.
It was a frantic exchange that was hard to even follow, creatures that big should not move that fast. Every strike of the enemy was faster and heavier than my father’s, and for the first time I saw the impossibly large man be pushed back in an exchange of attacks. I could feel the pressure from where I stood as the air whined upon the forces involved. A few made it through my dad’s guard, raking across his drake leathers and heavy mythril. The blows staggered him into an even more disadvantageous position.
My father switched strategies, instead choosing to be more defensive, deflecting and redirecting the beast's thrashing strikes. The maneuver worked, and faster trickles of blood began to pool down the warsymbol’s paws. A spear of earth struck the enemy in the face at an opportune time, and the beast was thrown off, allowing Dad to land a slash on the exact same spot. Mom readied another projectile as the monster began to be pushed back. She signaled me with a nod, and I immediately fumbled for my wand, preparing and then launching my fireball. I was barely on target, and I only nicked the enemy by the shoulder. The flames lingered for a meager few seconds, before they were put out by the sheer motion of battle. More of Dad’s strikes began to land as Mom’s spells began coming. Her flames stayed longer, however they still rapidly cooled down once the mana that remained to fuel it ran out, leaving the blaze with only the level 40 hide to fuel itself with. She only sent a few of those fire spells out as the bulk of her offense relied on rock bullets further propelled by the wind.
The attacks of my parents drew a rich harvest of the warsymbol’s lifeblood, and I liked to think my own spells at least caused a distraction.
My dad ran around the front of the enemy, keeping the warsymbol off balance, and minimizing the risk to himself. He ended up backing away into a copse of trees, and I saw how the creature’s attacks managed to uproot and snap their trunks.
I realized that my father’s movements were being limited by wanting to keep the monster’s attention off of myself, unwilling to move towards our direction. It made me redouble my own efforts, and I ended up emptying my wand, and then my spare within minutes.
Mom switched to fire at one point, she took precious seconds to gather it into a coherent fireball, one so hot it was mildly painful just being close, but I said nothing in fear of distracting her. My mother loosed the projectile a few moments later, and it landed squarely on the warsymbol’s head.
The monster roared in pain, the agony of flames too much to ignore even for something so bullheaded, and Dad took the opportunity to get a couple of slashes on its chest. Unlike my own fireballs, the fire from this one did not so easily dissipate on its own, staying on our opponent’s face. The bear became enraged even further, if that was possible, and my dad was forced to hop away from the bleeding and dying creature. Thankfully, while its swings were stronger, they’d also gotten a lot more sloppy and imprecise. I figured that the fire on its face was also hampering with its vision some.
Mom dragged me around the cover of the trees a few times to make sure we kept away, but soon the battle was finally over. It did not end with any dramatic final attack, the beast only whimpered as it finally could move no longer. Dad hurried the process along, and the beast died soon after, beheaded after several strikes on the neck.
I let out a breath that I did not know I was holding. The tension left me, replaced by a sense of accomplishment and cheer. I celebrated, jumping around, and Mom lifted me up to her shoulders, like I was still a baby. I didn’t mind, and we made our way back towards my father. He was sitting on the ground and breathing hard, sweat pouring over his form, but in a way that said he could’ve kept going for much longer if it were necessary.
