Earth: The Second

A Man, Stand Against the Beast

“We pray for the light protection to slay darkness. Blade of Light!” 

Kiki chanting an enhancement spell for Izanagi’s long sword. The warrior himself, runs past Chap’s shield and swinging a s***h toward the Dark Monster. It was a hit, and one of the monster’s feet is split open, emitting a black-colored substance that looks like blood.

Mila also giving support from behind. She shoots three arrows at once, attempting to blind as many eyes as possible. The creature itself, showing signs of pain every time Mila accurately shot the pupil, it also shifting it attention to the archer, giving Izanagi a lot more time to inflict damage, or dodging the monster’s attack.

“It’s getting hurt, aim for its eye!” Mila shouted, her shots are limited, so she has to make sure that every arrows are counted.

“Aegis!” Chap replied with another magic protection shield. It is a little bit difficult because he can not taunt the monster’s attention, but as long as Izanagi paying attention to his distance, Chap is able to shield the incoming attack. “Izanagi! I can’t cast protection forever! we only have three chances left!”

“I understand!” Izanagi stepping backward as the Dark Monsters lift up its claw, and slam it into the floor. He exploit this advantage with a spiral s***h, that once again, split it feets open. “The light magic is working! We can do this!” he screamed.

The Dark Monster is shrieking and struggling with every attack that Izanagi and Mila make. But suddenly, his gaze fixed toward the farthest member of the adventurers. Dark Monsters did not have the same vision as human, instead, it sees ‘Mana’ that been emitted by living being.

Kiki is the last mage, and her incantation makes the Dark Monster sees her as a huge source of Mana. Just like it previously attracted to Yulia, it now makes Kiki its primary target.

GRAAAAAAA!!!

The beast growl even fiercely, and it banging its head into Chap’s Aegis multiple time. Chap grinding his teeth, nervous by the creature’s change of behaviour. Its no longer change it’s aim back and forth for Mila and Izanagi, all it want to do is reach the only point where it can receive lot of Mana.

It growls again, and keep pushing Chap. The man is struggling hard against the beast. “Can’t… Hold on…” until finally, his magic wear off, and Dark Monster’s whole body shattering his defense, running on Kiki’s direction.

It mouth is opened, sharp messy teeth are formed around the hole that end inside the beast’s stomach. Kiki herself just opened her eyes in the middle of casting magic, and her body just freeze.

“Kiki!”

“Watch out!”

Screamed both of the adventurers. 

Kiki, who is still unmoved by the terror in front of her suddenly feel an impact from her right side. Her vision then gets blurry, and she can feel the wind on her body as she fly few feet to the side, and hits the ground. 

“Urgh…” Kiki feel the pain on her body, but it was unmatched to what waiting when she open her eyes.

The Monster’s huge mouth and teeth are now painted red, as it gushing massive blood from the body of a person. It was Mila’s. Her stomach is now between the teeth of the monster, and her expression is locked in an awful state, eyes opening wide, and blood coming out her mouth.

“Mila! Nooo!!” cried Kiki. The beast munching her for the last time, along with the crackling sound of bones, Mila’s life ended as an appetizer for the monster.

Chap and Izanagi, then hastily coming to protect Kiki. Again, they did not expect that the situation would worsen, because Dark Monsters seems far more attracted to humans with strong magical attributes.

“It’s no use... We can’t win...” Izanagi is already out of breath, so do with Chap.

“If only… If only we have the last Quanta stone…” mumbled the shield wielder. From the corner of her eye, he can see Kiki is trembling in fear. “We can only hope for a miracle. Izanagi! You have to attack him with everything that you got!” Chap screamed as he smashes the bottom of his shield to the ground.

“This is the last one! Aegis!”

Once again, Mana that emits from Chap transforms into a magic wall in front of his shield.

Izanagi stepped his right foot forward, and left foot backward, his stance is steady, with his longsword positioned on his left hip. Mana flowing from his body to his hand, and ended up on his sword.

“Tallow of Dragon!” 

Izanagi shouted, and run past Chap, with the mana-imbued sword, he moves his hand and attacks the Dark Monster with one big s***h on its neck. His swing is fast as if he’s not cutting anything at all. For a moment, the Monster seems quiet, but it then started wriggling again, looking at Izanagi with menacing eyes.

Izanagi on the other hand, looking at the monster with dissatisfied eyes. Tallow of Dragon supposed to be his strongest technique that able to s***h anything no matter how solid, is it. But again, his effort seems no match for the monster. 

Again, tentacles started to come out from the Dark Monster, and one of them impaling Izanagi, right through his stomach, all the way to his back. Izanagi did not have any strength left to feel angry or afraid. He just surrendered to the Monster’s whim.

Another tentacle flew right to Chap. It destroyed his magic barrier, and pierce through his shield, armor, and end up destroying Chap’s heart altogether. The old man then died on the spot.

With all of her teammate dies and incapacitated. Kiki can only see death through her eye. The Dark Monster pull back its tentacles and leave both of the body thumped down. It walk slowly, taking his sweet time toward the girl who can do nothing to protect herself.

Kiki’s tears started to roll down as she crawling back. 

“I will… die here…” she said to herself.

Teeth are appearing, and its mouth split open for the grand feast.

Until suddenly, it’s not.

A huge impact, out of nowhere hitting the Dark Monster from the side, causing it to flew and crashing into the wall. 

Kiki lifts up her face, and what she sees is a figure of an adult man, who is standing right on where the Monster previously stood. She does not notice, but it has been some hours since they are fighting. The sky turned to dusk, and the sun is setting right behind where the man, creating a majestic silhouette.

Growl can be heard from the Monster. For some reason, it struggling hard to get up.

***

“Alien organism detected. Analyzing... Matching to the database… Entry not found. Tagging unidentified organism as Subject X.” 

At this moment, the man hasn’t achieved full control of his body. Like a normal person who just awoke from slumber, his mind is hazy and half-asleep. Right now, his whole body is being operated by the machine-like voice inside his head. 

On the other hand, the beast has finally gotten back up on its 4 feet. Eyes that cover all over its body looking at the mysterious man with a new expression. Furious, but at the same time, terrified. It howling, growling, and showing the claw and teeth that previously succeed in giving fear to Kiki and her team. But this ‘human’ does not give any reaction that it enjoys.

“Sign of intelligence is minimal. Rate of aggression is high. Subject declared as hostile. Proceed to annihilation.” 

Kiki hear the words coming from that man, she never heard those words or those languages before. 

He then runs toward the monster. The Dark Monster slams its claw at the man, but he successfully dodges it and slips under its jaw. With just one upward swing of his fist, once again it flew to the air.

The Dark Monster angrily launches a tentacle that aims to pierce his chest. It does hit the man, but weirdly it can not pierce through his chest, as if protected by the most powerful armor in the world.

“Damage to the body unit: 5%,” said that man again, which actually is the other ‘voice’ inside his head.

Meanwhile, confidence has completely lost for the Dark Monster.

HAUUUU!!! GRUAAAAAAA!!!

After growling and howling, it once again launches a barrage of tentacles toward the man, aiming to strangle and shred him, pieces to pieces. They got his arm, body, and legs, but for some reason, they can not budge him even a little.

“Critical action needed. Decision: Use Void Canon to exterminate subject.”

Said the man, as something happened to his right arm. His hand that previously looks like a normal human hand suddenly split open. His palm and finger rearrange themselves around his wrist, uncovering what looked like a muzzle.

The man lifts that hand and aims right at the monster. At that moment, a sphere-shaped purple object starts to form between the man and the monster. Suddenly, a huge force pulling everything near the sphere, including the man and the monster. 

The Dark Monster can feel its body dragged bit by bit, as it does not have solid form. The beast needs quite an amount of mana to maintain the wolf-like body, If not, it will return to the original dark-goo slime body. It no longer gives an otherworldly evil presence, as it yapping and howling, like a poor creature in the eyes of a predator.

It takes only 10 seconds, for every ounce of the creature’s substance to be swallowed by the man’s mysterious magic.