Leo snarled as they were surrounded by the smaller predators. Irritation rose inside him: did these canines really think that they could beat the larger lions?
‘Don’t get too cocky,’ his brother’s voice counselled him. ‘They’re smaller, but we know that smaller doesn’t necessarily mean easier to deal with. Are there normally this many of them?’
‘No,’ Leo growled back at him. ‘I’ve never seen this many, and they’ve never been this bold.’
‘Then the System must be affecting them. Be careful, Leo – we don’t know what they’re capable of.’ Leo sent his brother a huff. It wasn’t him who usually jumped into a situation paws first, with no idea what might come of it.
Briefly glancing around the current mess, Leo decided that the first issue was that they were surrounded. It was almost a repeat of the situation with the hyenas – a small group of lions surrounded by a much larger group of smaller threats. But this time he was determined that it wouldn’t end with the lions running away with their tails between their legs!
Sending a telepathic message to the females, Leo had them start pulling together. Unfortunately, the dogs seemed uninclined to allow that to happen, shifting to menace the closest female, growling. The females snarled in return.
Fine: if the dogs weren’t willing to let them regroup in the uneasy calm before the storm which was happening at that moment, Leo would start the storm itself.
Warning his pride to be ready, he stood again and roared. This time, none of the wild dogs moved, but it did draw all the attention to him – and off the females.
Charging, he struck at the canines in front of him, showing that he was a threat to be taken seriously. Though Pounce wouldn’t give him the unexpected bonus with all eyes on him, he still used it for the extra bonus which came from hitting a critical spot.
Tearing out one dog’s throat, a second later he struck with his scythe-like claws and ripped a grievous wound in a second’s belly. The dog whimpered and stumbled away, half of its guts hanging out and dragging behind it.
An unreadable notification flashed up in front of Leo, but he had a feeling he knew what it meant.
‘Dog dead - level 6.’ His brother's words confirmed his guess: the first dog had bled out.
His attacks had been so quick that the dogs around hadn’t even fully reacted yet; he took advantage of the surprise to turn and pounce again, bowling over two dogs and taking turns to rip and tear at each of them.
Meanwhile, there was another notification.
‘Level 5 dead,’ Dominic told him quickly: the dog he had gutted had expired. The two he was attacking were next.
‘Two dead, levels 5 and 6. Nice!’
After that, though, the canines started reacting. Menacing growls rose from the surrounding dogs and they all piled in to attack the threat: Leo. Faced with over thirty canines, even he was unlikely to make it out fully intact. Indeed, he took three nasty wounds in the first second, the dogs grabbing at his flesh and wrenching it away with short jerks of their heads.
Fortunately, he was neither fixed in place, nor alone. Gathering his feet under him, he leapt skywards, taking a leaf out of his brother’s book: when the enemies were all concentrating on attacking one place, don’t be there.
While in the air, he took a moment to shoot a couple of globs of acid at their upturned muzzles. Though he wasn’t able to aim very well, soaring through the air as he was, he still hit one dog in the eye with one of the globs, the second falling into the open mouth of a carnivore beneath.
Then he was past the dogs, coming in for a neat landing. Absorbing the impact of his weight hitting the ground, he used his momentum to spring forwards once again, the two dogs who had accurately predicted where he would land snapping their jaws shut on empty air.
Using his tongue to direct some acid to his teeth, Leo sprang back at them, ripping at their eyes, their jaws, their necks. Anything that presented itself to him got bitten, and his bite left traces of acidic green behind.
Soon, the dogs were howling in pain as the acid ate away at delicate tissues. It wouldn’t last long, but the moment of distraction was all the lion needed. Using Rapid Attack, he struck once, twice, then three times.
‘Aaand they’re down. Level 7, even.’
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The females hadn’t been idle while he was attacking, as Leo saw when he looked up from the two carcasses which fell before him. They had bunched up together, probably either in the chaos when he had rushed the central knot of dogs, or the rest had all dog-piled him.
Moving as a unit, the females were systematically tearing at the boiling pack of dogs who were still trying to deal with the fact that their target had escaped right out of the centre of their pile. Led by Sekhmet and Isis, the females had arranged themselves in something of an arrow shape, and were driving straight into the pile. It wasn’t long before the notifications started piling in.
One, two, three…six dogs fell within the few seconds Leo stood there admiring his females.
‘They’re forces of nature, I get it. Four level 5s, two level 6s down. Now go and grab those stragglers – the dogs are giving ground, but the lionesses will be surrounded if they’re not careful.’
Leo sent a mental sense of gratitude – he saw what his brother meant now it had been pointed out to him. The females had driven into the knot with such force that the stragglers to the side had been driven backwards – in a prime position to attack the females from behind. Indeed, Leo could already see some of the dogs eyeing the lions to do just that.
Unfortunately – for them – that was where Leo came in.
Running lightly across the ground, he leapt the last distance, landing right on one of the unsuspecting dogs.
A notification came up immediately: he suspected an instant kill thanks to the bonuses of Pounce coming into play. Using the dog as a launch pad, he leapt to the next.
This one was more aware of his presence, so didn’t succumb immediately, but its smaller size and weaker attack was no match for his acid-laced Crushing Bite. Nor was the next any better when facing his Powerful Swipe and Sharp Nip, again acid-laced.
Noting that the green was starting to become less prevalent in his bites, Leo took a moment to recharge his teeth. The pain of the acid was a good distraction even if at this point it seemed unlikely to kill any creatures by itself.
Still, when the lionesses succeeded in killing three more dogs, their impact on the pack was evident: more than half the dogs had been killed in just a few minutes.
Showing more self-preservation than most of the predatory creatures Leo had encountered since the establishment of the System, the dogs seemed to realise that there was no way of them winning this: they had lost more than half their number while only managing to inflict a few wounds on the lions. Looking at the health bars above the females’ heads, Leo could see that none of them were any lower than half health.
With some barks and growls, the dogs evidently decided to withdraw. Not that they would be allowed to do that unmolested: with their prey now in full retreat, the females broke formation, each chasing a dog.
Before the dogs got away fully, they lost five more of their members, only one of the new females missing her attack.
Coming back to lick their wounds, the females of Leo’s pride quickly demonstrated to their new sisters exactly how they kept their skin intact. One by one, they shimmered in a level up. Unsurprisingly, the two new females did the same a moment later.
Leo reckoned that he wouldn’t be ready to level up himself, something unfortunately confirmed by his brother a moment later.
‘A hundred and nineteen Prey Points gained there – almost our best hunting trip in this area to date! But we’re still not quite to our next level. Let’s go and find another wild dog pack,’ he suggested, though Leo could tell it was less than serious. ‘No really, good job there. Good use of Abilities. The lionesses did pretty well too, didn’t they?’
‘They did,’ Leo agreed thoughtfully. ‘Perhaps your suggestion about going for the Place of Power isn’t so ridiculous if this is the kind of teamwork they can achieve.’
‘And with Sekhmet now probably Tier 2, it should only get better,’ the human agreed. ‘But we still need to do a bit more training first, I’d say. If we can get at least two thirds of our original pride to Tier 2, it should give us a much better chance of succeeding. Besides, all my practice on Abilities paid off, don’t you think?’
It was true that his Sure Feet enhancement was probably part of the improvement of his ability to be in the right place at the right time, and his ability to seamlessly switch from one Ability to another had definitely increased. Leo grumbled but admitted to himself that maybe Dominic had been right to take the time to strike at trees and grass and dead carcasses. He didn’t have to tell his brother that, though.
‘Too late,’ sing-songed the irritant. ‘Did you forget that I can read your thoughts like this?’ Leo had, but giving the human an inch would make him take a mile, so Leo did the mature thing: he ignored his annoying companion.
Eyeing the females he waited until the blurring had finished. He was waiting for one of the females in particular: soon, he should be joined in Tier 2 and he was excited to see what the differences in a ‘normal’ lion might be.
After all, his own experience had been rather affected by connecting with the mind of his brother: he’d been thinking in proper thoughts long before he’d reached level 10. He wasn’t sure if the female in question was the same. She had got better at communicating after she’d reached level 6, for sure, and she’d also clearly grasped the idea of hunting for power. But would he be able to communicate properly with her now?
And how strange it was to think that ‘proper communication’ now counted as words for him. Clearly he’d been around a human for too long. But they were just so versatile. Body language and sounds of different pitch and intensity could only really deal with the now. The emotions of the present, the danger and objectives of the situation they were currently in.
Words, however, could form dreams and aspirations, hopes and regrets, philosophy and curiosity. Frippery, pointless things for the most part, but they did have some purpose. After all, it would definitely help them if they could send a Tier 2 with a group of females so that they could run two hunts simultaneously, especially if they managed to combine the prides.
But he would have to wait and see. She should be done within the next few seconds.