The sound of shouting, swearing, and gunfire filled the air, followed by ghastly screams and more gunshots. The distant sounds reverberated in my ears; they rang through my whole body as if someone were hitting me repeatedly over and over again, each blow sending a dull pain through my skull and ringing in my ears.
I tried to open my eyes, the sounds proving more harmful to my sleep than the cold and damp floor beneath or the pain and cramps that wracked my entire body with every movement. It proved a challenge until my mind organized and recognized all those sounds adding to it the last memories before going to 'sleep', terrors immediately jolted me awake as the noise became so much louder and clearer as if the filter maintaining it away was lifted off and allowed the reality to come crashing back down on me like a tsunami.
Screams?
My heart beating quickened abruptly, going from zero to a hundred in one instant, pumping blood and adrenaline through my body, diminishing the pain's intensity and giving me enough strength to move. My breathing hitched in my throat as I clenched my hands and pushed the ground. I felt a cold and squishy substance in my left hand and a rigid cylindrical object in my right.
I forced my eyes open, my vision blurry at first but coming into focus gradually. I stopped moving as my brain processed how much fucked I am.
Not far from me, to the left, the jeep in a not so good state; overturned on its side, windshield cracked open, windows shattered leaving small pieces of broken glasses on the snowy and muddy ground. Multiple long scratches, dents, and marks littered the vehicle, some on its roof or hood, some on its doors. Some were only shallow to scrape the black painting off of it, while some were so profound that the metal was spread open.
Bell was to the side of the overturned car, her sniper rifle in hand with its bi-pods resting on one of the jeep's front tires. With her back in my direction, her eyes seemingly looking through the rifle's scope, focusing on some target ahead of her.
A bit far ahead, in the direction Bell is pointing her rifle, where an orange light is coming from, and where the screams are coming from; the battlefield.
Battlefield is the only word that comes to mind at this point in time. Guff cries, standing men, gunshots flash, terrifying monsters, guttural screams, and flames a lot of flames... is that a flamethrower?
Men on one side, monsters on the other.
Separated by a river of fire.
The bald, buff soldier, Bart with an oddly shaped weapon in his hands, which is fashioned similarly to a standard grenade launcher seen in movies, but has four long cylindrical bottles attached to it from all four sides. And the odd part of it, however, is that it doesn't launch grenades but wide orange flames are spewed from the muzzle reaching a distance of 30 to 35 meters.
On both sides of the flamethrower soldier, are two other soldiers; Alec and Zane. The two of them holding automatic rifles pointed in the same direction as the flamethrower, yet according to the gunshot sound, they are not using their rifle on automatic firing.
On the receiving end of the fire are, not one but two hairless, dark red humanoid things, each with two lengthier arms, shorter legs, a small head, and a height of approximately two meters. Identical to the abomination that killed the hunter; Shredders.
The Shredders frantically paced from left to right but only one step forward at a time, alternatively, ejecting a scream from their beartrap like mouths. The wide wipes of flame seem to be doing an excellent job of preventing them from dashing the three little humans in from of them. Unfortunately, despite the fact it kept them at bay from the trio, The flames appear to have no damaging or destructive effect on the Shredders.
Not even standing up and remaining in a supported prone position, I took a deep breath calming myself or trying to, while I thought of what I should do.
Running away?
Simple, easy, and logical, the most effective preservation plan. It is also the most cowardly. Yet, if the challenge is more than you are able to shoulder, there is no shame in admitting it and throwing the towel, rather it is a great sign for someone to know their limit, some will even say it is a mark of wise people.
Stumbling forward blinded by pride, ignorance, or arrogance would never ever lead to satisfactory results. You will always need to halt your pace from time to time and assess your route by asking if this is the right way.
In my case, I am not confident. I did kill a Shredder, alone, by myself, with two bullets, a bayonet, and a lot, a lot of luck. Will I be able to do it again? Yeah, probably if you give me the same amount of luck, which honestly if not absurd, is unrealistic.
But hey, I am not alone, there are four armed and trained soldiers with experience in fighting such monsters, isn't that better than luck?
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
Yeah... no.
From what I am seeing it is more stalling than fighting. The flamethrower is doing extremely well keeping the monstrosities from getting closer to Alec, Zane, and the flamethrower wielder, Bart, yet it is doing no damage whatsoever. The Shredders seem more afraid of the appearance of the fire rather than the temperature or the fire itself. It reminded me of the people who are afraid of cockroaches, screaming wherever they see one. Sure cockroaches are disgusting but what the fuck are you afraid they will do to you.
The comedic image of a Shredder with a pink apron seeing a little cockroach then screaming atop its lungs from the top of a chair, like a teenage girl who got to see her favorite boy band, formed in my mind but shook it off due to more pressing matter.
While Bart forced the Shredders to halt with the flamethrower, the others kept firing with their rifle, but that too doesn't seem successful since there is neither a body in the ground nor the monster seemed to be injured.
I counted Bell firing six shots since I woke up, and knowing her skills after experiencing it firsthand, her equipment, and the distance between the monsters and her, which might be a ninth of what I experienced. And yet she hadn't succeeded in taking down any. And the less said about Alec and Zane, who had switched their automatic firing to semi-automatic, the better.
All of this doesn't reflect any positivity in this crisis.
Granted, the monsters might not make big progress moving forward, but they are swift and agile jumping from one side to the other without bumping into each other, like two crickets on caffeine. In other words, locking the target is not easy. Adding to that the lack of visibility thanks due to the flame, and here you have it; two non-stationary obscured targets.
Therefore the situation may seem at a stalemate or even on the positive side for the military team, however, it is only the case while the flamethrower is still operating. But the question is for how long.
Taking the flamethrowers from my previous world as a reference. The portable type for reference ranged from about forty meters and had enough fuel for about 10 seconds of continuous firing.
The shape of the flamethrower is different from the portable ones I am familiar with, and it is way more advanced than those of my previous world. One thing, however, I am certain is the same no matter the world, and that is; fire needs fuel and fuel is consumable.
Thus if I have to give a wild guess it would be less than ten minutes, but no more, to run out of fuel and the flame to die down.
So I need to decide on a plan in half that time.
The two other options, other than fleeing as far as possible are, of course, either do nothing and cheer for their success from the sideway. Or I could try to help and kill the two Shredders.
Doing nothing is the worst option, I don't even need to think about the results or their logic. I would rather be called a coward than a spectator. All of my beings are rejecting and loathe such a plan of being no different than grass, just waiting there either to get cut by others or to get walked over.
So I am only left with two opposing choices; run or fight.
Run. Said the voice, I recognize it, I know which voice this is, the voice of fear. It is not as prominent as last time when I faced a Shredder alone, but it is still here. It wants me to turn around and run. Run, leaving this military team to delay the monster. Run before the monster takes notice of me. Run before the flamethrowers run out of fuel. Run while I still have time. Run...
... to where?
I immediately understood it when asked that question... Fear only sees the moment.
It does not know where I should run. It does not know if I will be safe if I run. It does not know if it is right to run. All it knows is that the monsters are capable of causing me harm and that I should get away from anything that would cause me harm.
Of course, I am not saying I should never listen to it.
After all, fear is like pain. If you feel pain while you put your hand on fire, it means it is harmful to your body and you shouldn't do that. Feeling pain while doing something is often your body signaling you to stop doing what appears to be harmful. However, your body doesn't know if it is genuinely harmful to you or not. Exercising your muscle for instance, from your body's perspective is quite harmful, but it is not.
Therefore, it is said you need to conquer your fear and not let it conquers you.
Thus the answer to should I listen to my fear right now is closely tied to what are the outcomes. Running away seems reasonable at first glance; going against two unreasonably fearsome monsters that can shake off scorching hot flames as it is snow bolls, is foolish. Sure I might gain some bad karma for leaving this squad fight alone, though we only meet for less than four hours, I did get attached to some of their members. But we are stranger, and I will do what I need to do to survive, and that is the goal, surviving.
But would I survive if I run from here?
I clenched my right fist around the cylindrical object, the tactical knife Bell had given to me before the jeep got overturned.
NO.
Running away is a good plan only for short term survival, and that is what a short-sighted person will do.
If I want to survive longer, I need to follow long term plans. They are more difficult and more exhausting than the short term plans. And the gains might not be apparent. But it is the only way. And who knows how many other monsters in this forest are or even outside of it?
I took another deep breath as I looked at the fight, it hadn't changed much. Bart still keeping them away, Alec and Zane on his flanks firing, while Bell from a distance tries to pinpoint their landing.
We can do it, with my gift we can do it. There are only two of them and the only reason they aren't down yet is that they are fast and are moving randomly making them hard to target.
But with my ability, I can do it, register their movement, find their patterns, calculate their course, and fire at their small fish-like heads. If two bullets aren't enough, three or four will make a hell of a difference.
I just need to find my rifle, and two seconds to activate my gift.
I made a plan on how things would be going, the only issue I can think of is; the rifle location, the time duration of my gift, and the reaction of the monsters after I hit them.
So things won't avert by much from the plan since I prepared myself for the way things would go...
SHOULD! SHOULD NOT WOULD!
I cried in my mind as I felt one level of intense pain I have never felt before, coming from my right shoulder. I didn't even have time for confusion before a screeching scream right beside my ears deafened me.
SGUHHAAAAA
A third Shredder joined the game, spilling blood as soon as it did.