Chapter 13

Deep in a forest shrouded by the night, three powerful beasts were confronting one another. The reason for this was a bright blue glow radiating from the core of the crater they were currently in, which was left by the very same object.

Not far from them, Ariel was hiding behind a big rock, waiting for the right time to strike, if such time actually comes. However, if the last remaining monster is not exhausted enough to lower its strength, he will only be able to leave and give up on acquiring that item, since he knew his own level of power well enough to understand his limits.

While Ariel was thinking about the possible outcomes of this battle, the monsters made their move, first one to attack was the night panther. It quickly came in for a swipe at the iron hide wolf’s neck, trying to finish it in a single blow but unfortunately for it, the wolf dodged to the side, making the panthers claws, to only lightly graze his side, leaving little actual damage, thanks to its toughness.

The wolf instantly retaliated by trying to bite into the panther, widely openings its mouth, almost as if wanting to eat it. When its fangs were almost close enough to bite down on its enemy’s flesh, the panther moved back in lightning speed, leaving the wolf biting into its afterimage. This time it was the wolf’s lose, but it didn’t take long for them to once again go at each others neck, forgetting the silver scaled viper that was still so close to them.

It seems that these two monsters were old time rivals and hated each other to the bone. This is not that abnormal, since the stronger a monster is the more intelligence it has, which can lead to them having personalities. However, it was definitely a mistake of theirs to not pay any attention to the poisonous snake, right next to them.

Just as another confrontation between the two beasts ended, the viper in a fast manner bit into the wolf’s, back leg when it just close enough for the snake to reach. It was so fast that the wolf didn’t even have any time to react, and when he finally noticed it, and wanted to strike back, the viper has already backed off a decent distance out of the wolfs reach.

Seeing this, the wolf was extremely furious. The flesh wound itself was not that important, but he could feel that the poison, which came with it, was very deadly.

The wolf soon went into frenzy, knowing that even if it was the last one standing, it still wouldn’t take long for it to die. Strangely enough, the first one it attacked was not the viper that brought its doom, but the panther which was the wolf’s long time rival, as if it wanted to drag it down to hell, together with itself.

Soon they engaged in a battle to the death, which will put an end to their long lasting conflict. The biting and clawing of the struggle between the two, left numeral wounds on each of their bodies, furthermore, some of them were quite deep. Luckily for the panther, the poison injected in its opponents body, circulated even faster thanks to it moving around so much, which lead to the wolf suddenly losing all of its strength to defend, and letting a lethal strike hit its body, that ended up finishing him off.

When the first of the three monsters died, the viper once more sprang into action aiming to kill the panther in its moment of weakness. However, it has already learned from its past mistakes of when it ignored that snake, so when the viper has already gotten extremely close to it, the panther managed to dodge its attack and in return bite down on the snakes long body.

The panthers fangs easily ripped through the vipers scales, thanks to its higher rank of power, but the viper was not so weak, and it instantly reacted by swinging its tail towards its head. Not having time to react to this sudden attack, the panther was sent flying towards a tree, but not before gnawing off a piece of the vipers flesh.

With fury in its eyes, the snake quickly coiled around the beast, taking the chance before it snapped out of the daze, it tore through the panther’s neck. With such a heavy wound as well as the vipers poison, the night panther soon breathed its last, and the battle ended with an unexpected lower rank victor.

Thankfully, the silver scaled viper has also received very heavy injury, which even for a resistant snake, were painful to the extreme. At that time, Ariel’s eyes, who was hiding behind a rock, lit up with determination, which was much stronger, than any time in the, past.

However, even this weakened monster still possesses a high level of danger towards him, because of how weak and inexperienced he is, but he can’t let go of this chance of acquiring that unusual treasure, which is sure to be precious.

Manifesting a single ice spear, he carefully aimed it at the snakes wound, which was left by the panther, since it was the only place he was sure, that the ice spear could pierce as well as do enough damage to increase his chance of winning. After aiming it he started waiting for the right time to strike, because Ariel didn’t have any room for mistakes, or he would die.

When the silver scaled viper finished its rest after the battle it finally moved claim the prize. Casting its eyes towards the core of the crater, a look of desire appeared in its eyes, as it instinctively knew that the object had magnificent power, worth risking its life for. At this time, the snake let down its guard just for a mere second.

Unluckily for it, that single moment was all that was needed for Ariel to take action, as he let loose his spell towards it. The ice spear travelled at very fast speed, when the viper actually noticed what was happening, it was already too late, and the spear had already pierced into its wound coming out the other side.

A painful hiss rang through the night, making all of the small animals around, run away. Being ambushed by Ariel, the snake was critically injured, reducing its ability by a large amount and making it hard for him to actually lose now.

The infuriated snake, blinded by its anger, charged towards Ariel who had already gone out of hiding and casted an ice shield, which was currently protecting his body. The viper head butted the icy shield shattering it into peaces, but still resulting in several cracked scales on its head, as well as being pushed back a little.

Ariel took this opportunity to manifest another ice spear and stab through the monsters right eye, trying to quickly finish it, before the viper could compose itself. This attack made the snake let out another ear piercing sound of agony, proving that it took serious damage.

When he had thought it might be over, the snake once more, just like against the panther, used its tail to attack Ariel in its last desperate struggle to live.

Being caught by surprise, he barely was able to put up an ice shield in time, and even then he was sent flying a small distance until he hit a tree. Only now, the silver scaled viper finally breathed its last breath, as the life inside its eyes faded and it fell down on the hard ground.

Seeing this, Ariel could barely stand up with his trembling body and look towards the corpse, with slight fear in his eyes. He was injured too much in that last hit, as it will probably hurt for the whole week, but thinking about how he almost died because of a small mistake, made horror squeeze into his heart. Thankfully it was only painful for him, and nothing happened to his bones or inner organs.

After some time of trying to calm down, Ariel finally got his mind together and raced to get whatever it was inside the crater, which he fought for with so much difficulty. He wanted to get it quickly and run back home, since his Mana was already at its limits.

When he got closer to the source, he noticed that the glow emitted from a small, icy blue orb that was hovering slightly above the ground. ‘Is this what landed from the sky, and also made all of these monsters kill each other for it?’ With slight hesitation, he finally resolved himself and went to pick it up.

Suddenly, the orb charged towards him, and before he could do anything, pierced into his left eye. This turn of events left him completely dumfounded.

He didn’t understand what happened just now, but soon, an unbearable pain started to be felt in his head. Ariel fell to the ground gripping his left side of the face, and wiling for some time, before losing his consciousness. It was the most agonizing pain he had ever experienced, as it was so painful, that even his strong will couldn’t take it.

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When Ariel woke up, a large amount of time has already passed, indicated by the descending moon, it took a while for him to put all of his memories together and remember what happened.

As soon as he finished recalling it, he realized that the sun will be coming up soon, forcing him to run back home as fast as possible, before even trying to understand the previous event.

Getting back into his room on time, Ariel let out a sigh of relief as he remembered his dangerous adventure, while also being glad that he made it in time before warranting some suspicion. He decided to take a quick bath, before going to meditate for a while, to search for any clues, which might tell him what did that blue marble, do to him.

After few minutes of inspecting his body, he still couldn’t come up with any answers of what happened to that marble. However, form his instincts he knew that something had happened to his body, which he is yet to notice.

He didn’t know what that something was, but he had a feeling that it will help him in the future. Also, he will probably learn about his changes, as time passes, so there is no reason to rush it. Making up his mind, he started observing the moon outside his window, as it is his favorite pass time.

Unknown to him as he was relaxing by watching the moo, in the reflection of him in the mirror, you could see Ariel’s left eye was glowing blue, and had a strange symbol, which emanated power. However, this will stay unknown for him, for quite some time in the future.

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If you want to read further, visit https://verathragna.wordpress.com/ I will always have an extra chapter there