Glancing past the curved edges of the eastern-styled, charcoal gray terracotta roofs, Luen covered his eyes as he looked up at the blue sky. The sun appeared to move past the midpoint. To confirm, Luen looked down at the ground. The sun did slightly tilt, casting short shadows on the surroundings.
“Miss, you are correct. It is likely past midday. Let us depart immediately.”
Luen wasted not a moment to reduce the risk of being caught in the dark on their way home. The more troublesome creatures of the night awoke when shadow overtook the lands. Many people were dragged screaming into the darkness before going eternally silent.
With brisk steps, Luen led the three through the crowd as they left the alleyway of the marketplace and walked onto the stone slabs that formed the sidewalks along the busy Main Street. Intending to reach his farm—specifically his fortified cottage manor—before the sun set, Luen turned around and expressed his intentions to the merchant, Leandra.
“I will move quickly. Let me know if you need us to slow down, Miss.”
Leandra nodded her head at the farmer, who would host her stay in the area for two years. “Thank you for notifying me, Luen. I will try to keep up.”
Luen grinned and nodded. “Alright you two, keep close. Do not hesitate to tell me if either of you fall behind.”
“Okay, Dad. But keep an eye out too for us! You always walk too fast.”
Luen smirked at his son. “That’s why I said to call out if you start falling behind.”
With one stride of his long leg, Luen, the tall burly, densely muscled farmer, sped off, weaving in and out of the crowd.
“Damn it, Dad!” Fuen complained as his father disappeared into the masses of people. Luckily, his father’s towering stature allowed Fuen and Leandra to spot his location. Turning to the merchant lady, Fuen added, “Keep close, Miss Leandra.” However, he needed to worry more about himself.
“Coming, Fuen?” Leandra asked, moving steps ahead of him. Fuen sighed, chasing after the two ahead of him.
Speed walking on the elevated slabs of the stone sidewalks, the trio followed the cobblestone road past endless ornate wood buildings, embellished with glass windows and inlaid with large fancy metallic signages. Main Street, the economic life blood of Ardent City, held a variety of thriving businesses and was always packed with people.
Fuen liked to sightsee at the items displayed behind the glass during the weekdays while riding on the Academy’s carriage. At the break of dawn, he would be picked up from his parent’s cottage and bussed through the city before being dropped off for his schooling at the Academy. Currently, however, with his father quickly moving ahead and nearly melting into the crowd, the teenager had no time to dawdle with window shopping.
Making good time, the three followed the road that took them straight to massive drawn barred gates, set within the city’s massive towering ivory walls. With his father slowing down to get in line to leave the city, Fuen glanced up at the small figures of armed city guards, who patrolled the perimeter from the tops of the walls.
Departing was easy, as the line the trio stood in was for those with no cargo, which allowed for quick movement through the gates without being inspected. Exiting Ardent City, Luen took a sharp turn, walking around the exterior of the walls.
Leandra followed close behind and looked far into the distance.
The flat grass plains slowly arched into verdant rolling hills. Small outlines of trees started to push through the hill tops and into the horizon before they all merged and lifted into high mountains.
Heading towards the direction of the distant mountains, the farmer led the group to his farm.
Luen slowed the pace as they three moved past the slowly thinning buildings that began to be overtaken by open lands of verdant grass and other vegetation. The more they walked, the more open fields appeared. Soon, neatly farmed crops began to fill their sights as the man-made stone street abruptly stopped, replaced by a narrow flat dirt road.
Carriages and carts drawn by tamed Beasts rushed up and down the two-way dirt road, sending dust flying towards the traveling trio who stuck close to the vegetation near the road’s edge to avoid being run over.
The sun began its descent to the horizon’s edge, and buildings soon became nonexistent the further the three walked. Even the once busy dirt road where carts and carriages raced about turned quiet and empty. Fuen’s father slowed down even more as lush green crops and vegetation covered the entire scenery.
Blood Stage Beasts now roamed the rural area.
Luen abruptly stopped and raised his hand to halt the movement of the others behind him. Cautiously squinting his eyes, the farmer looked over at the waist-high grass of a disheveled abandoned field to their right. The grass rattled, parting as something moved from within the vegetation. Luen motioned his son and the lady to get behind him. Standing behind his father, Fuen looked on with apprehension as something quickly approached their location.
Leandra observed her new host, waiting to see how he would handle the situation. She looked at Luen’s broad back, grateful for the farmer’s actions of attempting to protect her even though she was a stranger. But the merchant quickly refocused back on the field.
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Something changed.
The rattling movement of the grass stopped and surroundings went eerily quiet. A pair of sharp yellow eyes peered through the tall strands of grass as a thin split tongue flicked lengthily through the foliage.
The creature locked onto the trio.
Suddenly, small quiet movements subtly reverberated from the tall grass, making the vegetation slightly sway in the air. It was as if whatever lurked there adjusted and prepared for a strike.
With an abrupt, hoarse gravelly hiss, a massive snake— the length of three men and with the body the circumference of both a man’s thighs—launched straight through the grass. Its jaw stretched unnaturally wide, able to swallow the scrawny Fuen whole. Baring two dagger-like fangs and a mouth full of serrated teeth, the Snake Beast flew through the air, aiming to bite onto a chunk of Luen’s flesh, which stood in its way.
“Dad!”
Luen remained calm. The Creeping Earth Python was a standard pest of the Blood Stage that he regularly dealt with while working the fields.
Lowering his stance, Luen evoked the power of his Beast Spirit, the Blazing Fire Ox. The farmer’s burly body burned with a fiery white blue aura that flared into the air and manifested the outline of a gaint ox with rippling fire as its fur. The spirit of the Fire Ox bellowed into the sky, standing over the three and stomping the leg of its right front hoof by Luen’s side as it readied for battle.
The already hulking muscles of the farmer bulged with thick protruding veins as Luen let the Ox’s power course through his body. His wavy black hair turned shades of orange and red as fire shot out of the nostrils of his stout nose. Crouching down to almost all four of his limbs, Luen kicked off the ground and rushed forward, choosing to fight the python head on as his Beast Spirit so greatly desired.
Scales of metallic black, yellow and brown glimmered under the light of the sun as the snake used its body of pure muscle to flail madly in the air. Each jerking, swishing motion pushed the huge snake faster through the air as it lunged at Luen. The giant snake’s open mouth snapped at the farmer, ready to crunch down on flesh and bone.
Although not as strong as the Mighty Earth Ox, the Blazing Fire Ox made up for it in speed. Luen’s flaring yellow aura brightened as he activated the first ability of his Beast Spirit: Speed Burst.
The heavy burly man flashed, leaving behind a blazing afterimage as the snake bit nothing but air. Luen reappeared behind the python and wrapped one arm around the snake’s massive mouth, sealing it shut as he wrestled the python to the ground. Enhancing his strength, the farmer pressed down his massive hand on the Beast’s snout while freeing his wrapped arm. The creature squirmed, slithering erratically all around while its head was held down. It coiled itself around Luen and began tightening its hold on the farmer.
Luen was not concerned. He began pommeling the python’s head with the massive fist from his free arm. After many years of absorbing the essence of cores, Luen and his Fire Ox were now at the Intermediate Stage, granting Luen the strength of almost ten men. The scales of the python were strong, but each pounding fist to the snake's head chipped off pieces and left the snake dazed.
Yet, it struggled to fight, tightening its bind around Luen’s body. The tenacious python was used to being a predator, not prey. It chose not to run away. With Luen wrapped around itself, the snake was not going to give up a meal.
However, a depression in the solid dirt began to form underneath the snake’s head. The repeated blows to the creature left it slightly disoriented. The python moved only by instinct and muscle memory at this point, but it was soon losing that as well.
Feeling the snake loosen its hold, Luen pulled back his thick muscled arm into the sky for a critical strike. Fist clenched, Luen leaned in, dropping the heavy weight of his body along with his enhanced strength of ten men, landing a fatal blow that cracked the snake’s skull and damaging the brain. The python unraveled and went into full seizure, spasming uncontrollably. Luen kept holding down the snake’s head but straightened the body.
“Dad, why didn’t you just burn the snake?”
Pulling out a dagger, Luen cut precisely through flesh and the neck joint, lopping off the snake’s head. Luen kicked it away, rolling a good distance from the trio. However, although even without a body, the snake head snapped and flipped around, still not dead.
Luen ignored it, focusing on the body and bleeding it out. As the body wiggled frantically, undergoing shock, Luen replied to his son, “And let such good meat go to waste? Roasting the snake with its guts still inside leaves a terrible stench. You know that. Come here, Fuen. Help me lift the snake to quickly drain out its blood. We will haul it back home and cut up the body once we are safe at home.”
“Do we have to, Dad? You know I don’t like snakes.”
“You like eating them, do you not?”
Fuen huffed but reluctantly walked over to assist his father in holding up the snake, although his arms and hands trembled under the weight of the Beast and also from fear. Fuen’s body shivered from touching the long scaly creature. The teenager especially disliked working with anything snake related. Even the soon-to-be-dead carcasses. Their appearance alone sent his neck tingling and the small hairs standing straight up. He tried to think of the soft flesh that tasted best deep fried to give him motivation.
As the blood slowly dripped to a stop, Luen said, “Okay, Fuen. That is good enough. Stand back for now.”
Fuen immediately jumped aside, getting away from the massive snake as quickly as possible. As his son stepped away, Luen used another one of his Beast’s abilities: Molten Body. Focusing the ability only to one of his hands, it glowed a brightly heated red, whistling as Luen seared the open flesh of the neck to stop any remaining bleeding. Lowering the snake to the ground, he also burned away the coagulating blood that pooled on the dirt. The blood boiled and steamed, before completely turning into black ash.
Knowing his son could not carry such a heavy Beast, Luen lifted and wrapped the upper part of the python around his neck like a scarf and dragged the rest of the body as he walked ahead.
“Let us continue, you two. Fuen, your mother will be most surprised! With his snake she might shorten her lecture.”
“You better hope so, Dad, or your ears might fall off.” Fuen enunciated so his father could hear him, keeping a good distance from the corpse of the snake. He preferred to touch only the cooked tenderized meat and avoided the body in its whole form. Ironic, but his generation was as such.
Luen grimaced at his son’s words, thinking about his wife’s likely reaction, maybe overreaction. Bringing home a pretty lady was likely going to leave him sleeping on the floor tonight. Luen prayed his wife would not assume he tried to bring home a mistress or concubine. He was a faithful husband.
Sighing, Luen could only hope for the best and prepare for the worst. “Alright, let us go home and get this over with.”