It was day like any other, pretty close to noon, and I was just walking toward North like always these days. That day, I decided to turn my music off. You know, its nice to sometimes listen the silence and sound of nature. I was also thinking about my old world. Heck, I am already in the mindset of thinking like this. Ahh, I would like to play some game sooo much. For example Pubg!

Ahhh, that was nice, I can clearly remeber some Epic victories with many kills, ohh, where are these times?

Suddenly, something interrupted my contemplation about past in a very bad manner. Something landed on my head.

"Wtf!?"

I was wearing cap and yet, I felt its talons sharply stabbing in my head. Surely, it also scared me, so I freaked out and shaked that thing down from me.

When I calmed myself, I saw some pretty big bird sitting on the ground and chirping happily. When I took a close look, I saw it had still considerable amount of down feather.

So this one had to be youngling.

"Heh, what the hell are you doing here, little one? Where is your mum?"

If I were girl, I would surely say yeah, its sooo cuuute. But I am not, so I didn't, nevertheless it surely was cute.

And then it hit me.

[If this cub is so big, how big must be its mom!?]

And mom didn't let me wait.

*Graaaa*

Assailant was owl. Fuckin big owl. Exactly the specie, I had already once fought with.

However, its noteworthy, that the one I fought was hunting, but this mom is protecting its offspring. There isn't anything worse in the whole world, than mom pretecting its young ones.

I tried calm her down by showing her fists, because animals tend to see protruding thing from palms kind of dangerous, they think its talons. And talons mean fight. So I showed her fists, but it surely didn't seem like it worked. The owl was so furious, that she didn't even notice that.

[Ok, do I have any options?]

At that time, I was on the other hand much stronger and powerful, than I was when I came here. I could just take staff or sword and bash the owl. Yes, and even though it is owl as big as pig. Just don't let it use its talons. Or I could just use one or two bullets...

But I don't want. Maybe I am too soft-hearted or I maybe do not feel so endangered but I don't want to kill her. So I decided to retreat. Retreat while swiping with the staff all around me. Unexpectedly, this tactic worked. Owl wasn't able to get closer, and slowly but surely, calmed down.

I could have went away after a while just if that didn't happen.

*grhaaawwww*

Inhuman, or rather completely unnatural, disgusting noise interrupted both of us, me and owl.

The vegetation was rather dense, so my traveling was like trying to find sparser parts of forest to go through.

And thanks to this, I wasn't able to disguise what was there.

However, it, or to be exact them, didn't let me wait. The bushes moved away and showed some creatures. It was wolf and something like gelatine ball. Slime it is.

Yeah, wolf and slime, you've got a damned gun, so what the hell would this fight be about? Yes, I agree, except that... these weren't normal. The wolf wasn't like those invisible ones. It was about half bigger and wrong somehow. Like the fur was sparser, skin torn somewhere, yet, no blood. And what was worse, it had some cancerous-like parts. For exapmle limbs, they looked like someones', who really overdid it with steroids. And that slime also wasn't better.

Like, I have never met slime, but if I had, it would surely not give me such disgusting feeling. Its body was somehow, oily. Like black with some rainbow colors here and there. I didn't know, what these were, but they were able to give me serious mood and impresion.

As soon as the monsters spotted us, me and owl, they attacked. I was glad, that owl also didn't hesitate and counterattacked. But, it went terribly wrong. The movement of the wolf was completely unnatural. It looked so heavy and immobile, but its agility was as high as monkey. What monkey, I have never seen such robust creature being so agile.

It freaked me. The owl avoided wolf's mighty leap even with burying its talons deep into wolf. Even though, it was clear, that she have also had problems and have been able to do this by sheer luck.

And it wasn't all. The wolf might be terrifying, but the slime targeted me. They cooperated. That fact is pretty freaking, if you consider it being monsters, and slime being without any CNS. Slime's fighting style was maybe even worse than wolf's. It discharged a small ball of liquid. It was like mixture of pure base with flacks of dark.

I evaded, now covering myself behind a tree.

I heard uncomfortable sound.

*Tssss*

I looked at place of impact. The liquid hit ground where were some plants. Now, they weren't there. They carbonized, evaporing gases. And to make it even more funny, even the place which wasn't hit directly, now suffered under these black flecks. It literaly sucked life from them. Plants either lost its chlorophyle allong with other sign of life or they started to grow cancerous tumors.

It was disgusting. But the thought of me being hit was even worse.

[Can somebody fucking tell me what I got myself into. What the hell is fucking going on? It is like nightmare, like creappy horror game]

I was glad I had some self-possesion in myself. I tossed rifle, selected burst and immidietely opened fire. But the self-possesion probalby wasn't so high.

5,56mm bulets did literaly nothing to ball of jelly-oil in size of Smart car.

Just in time, I fell back behind the tree, just to hear splash right on the other side of this bole.

[Shit, shit, holy shit. What now, what now?!

How to fucking damage it?]

I didn't now. I just looked on the wolf, being fully obsesed by the owl. Owl disctracted it but it was seemingly exhausted. And that cursed creature was comletely fine.

I took a heavy breath and knocked my temple.

[Slime, jelly, acid, oil.]

Those were my thoughts.

"Oil !!!"

I took molotov in its neat ceramical flask from Inventory.

[Fire, I need fire !!]

But I had none. I cursed myself for spending all my matches and not creating lighter, such simple device. Normally, I produced fire by

Shapeshifting and friction. It took some time, yet I had always a lot of it. But not that day.

The slime also didn't stood there. It moved towards my tree.

"Fuck it !!!"

I also saw the wolf bitting owl's leg. The owl tried to defend, frankly using every body part and attacking the wolf. It looked like a furious

goose. Every other animal would feel pain and reflexively, they would release it. But this monstrosity had no feelings. It was like a robot. No more like a zombie. It just did the first thing it wanted, not caring about anything else. The slime was dangerously close. Just 20 or so meters. If it comes closer.

"FUCK IT !!!"

I was desperated. I didn't know what now. How to damage it. It spews freaking acid, is as big as car and made from soft yet firm material. It just fell into stated of panic.

Wolf slammed the owl into ground, and aimed for vitals. Owl will probably resist for several second, but its already done for. And if I didn't do nothing, so am I.

"What, w-w-what n-now?"

I just hung my head down, reality fading away, my mind in panical state.

"No. No. NOOO"

[I am fucking not dying today! Heck, never!]

"Think John, think!"

I focused my gaze again. As I did it, my eyes fell on my vest, on my knife and mags, on my grenade pouch.

"Grenade pouch?"

"Grenade. GRENADE!"

With tremor but happy expression, I unlocked the pouch, opened it and took its resident out.

In my eyes, it almost looked like a holy apple. Holy but lethal. As I did many times, as I drilled it, I looked behind me after tearing safety pin out. I maybe said it, but always look behing if you are throwing grenade. There could be something you can hit and release the grenade behind you. I could happen even if it is a grass. Why? You saw me and my state of mind right? If soldier is pissed, scared, he can drop the grenade anytime.

So behind was nothing. The slime was so close and so big, that I cannot miss.

It flew in nice accurate arc. And the hit the slime. But I didn't stop and continued right ahead. The slime devoured it.

"Holy shit, what now?"

It was horrible. How could I harmed it if even greande doesn't help?

"I, I am screwed"

The slime was now very close. So close that...

*BOOOOM*

Deafening explosion cut my thoughts.

The oily goo was everywhere, splashing all around. No slime was seen.

"Eh"

In a second, my autistic surprised expresion was replaced by sheer euphoria.

But the battle haven't been won yet, nor lost.

As expected, the wolf was completely fine and unsurprised by the explosion. But the death of slime forced it to reconfigure its strategy. It evidentely harmed the owl, which lied on the ground.

*click*

Full auto

Aim

*tadadadadadadadadadadada*

I attacked first, sending a spray of bullets right into the enemy. The wolf was not so far away, so every bullet hit its target.

You know, 5,56x45 doesn't kick a lot, its easier to control full auto.

That monster started to shake violentely, as if its nerves were wrongly connected. But even that didn't stop its leap.

Evasion. It landed right behind the tree.

Three meters. That was the range separating me, puny bipedal with no strength and the mountain of bulking muscles which came from some nightmare.

No reaction time. It really didn't wait to anything. It leaped againg. Only thing I was able to do, was to move my rifle with bayonet before me. And then, impact. I felt like being hit with a car. I fell and lost my mind for fraction of second.

When I came back to myself, I saw a disgusting, half torn face of mutated wolf.

Only thing that stopped it from tearing my throat was my beloved weapon. Its buttstock was under my armpit, leaning on the ground. On the other side was a wolf, with my bayonet in its lower neck. Like this, it was not able to come any closer. I somehow set my knife free from my vest and stabbed it several time into its hip and ribs.

No effect. So I left knife in its ribs and took out sword from inventory.

It was casual sword in european style, normal guard, blade made from several steel rods, twisted around themselves and hammered into the blade. Swords are good for their blade, but also hit from their pommel is pretty dangerous and great for very close distance.

With one hit, I knocked wolf down on left side.

I was astonished, that its skull resisted.

However, this gave wolf some freedom and it immidietely buried its fangs in my left hand.

"Arghhhhh"

If it werent for all that adrenaline in my veins, I would probably pass out. But, with last remnants of self-possesion, I started to slowly push the sword into its eye. It started to shake and tremble, then begun epilepsy attack and then, it finally ceased to move completely.

"Huf, huf, huf. Screw yourself in the hell fucking bitch. Tell them my heartfull regards, bastard"

And then, adrenaline started to rapidly run out.

*gulp*

When I healed myslef with juice and got back my composure, I retrieved back all items.

Also dismissed all notification, except one.

"You were poisioned by dark magic"

That scared me. But not for long when next notif. told me, that the blessing I have, got rid of it similary as with the juice. But no heal.

Dark magic. It is surely pretty dangerous stuff.