Grigory

Outside of view of the others, I clutched at my side, and did everything I could to keep myself from throwing up.

The poison may have been slowed significantly by cauterizing the wound, but it was still there... and potent.

I pulled myself together, fixed my posture, and strode out to our new archery range, which used the hide from the strange arachnoid we had fought, thrown over a couple cacti.

The hide was completely butchered, as none of us knew what we were doing.

There was at least a couple individuals who had been hunting as a hobby, so weren't completely in the dark, but the anatomy of the beast offered... challenges; such as three stomachs, two of which we pierced before we even realized it had happened.

That coupled with the fact that the hide was so difficult to cut in some places, while requiring almost no force in others meant our cuts were more like tears at times.

When we tried to come to a conclusion on what to use it for, the idea of leather armor came up, because of its difficulty of being cut.

I argued that we weren't sure if the leather was strong enough to withstand weaponry, which lead to our current system... and not just because we wanted to stick it to that damned spider for having such an annoying hide.

Our accuracy at present, was poor, which is to be expected with only a few days of practice.

Even the previously mentioned hunters hadn't used such primitive weapons before.

A moment later, I was broken from my rumination by Atticus.

"Grigory, the spider meat is confirmed to be safe to eat."

That immediately got my attention. "How did you test it for poison so fast?" Then a thought crossed my mind and I felt a pain begin to split my head. "Someone ate it already didn't they?"

Atticus nodded sympathetically. "Apparently they couldn't wait, so they cooked some up and ate it last night."

"Any symptoms?"

Atticus shook his head. "Fortunately not, it looks like they lucked out."

I nodded. "In that case, tell them to carefully see how much is edible, and share the meat around to those who want some... I assume it'll boost morale significantly."

"I agree, the smell was heavenly... which is also how I found out it happened in the first place."

I sighed. "As stupid as the method was, we're going to use every advantage we find."

At that moment, James jogged to the two of us. "Grigory, there's a problem."

"Did the meat poison them after all?" I asked.

James gave me a confused look and then continued. "No. It'd be easier to just come look."

Atticus and I gave each other a sidelong glance, and then followed James.

The three of us came to an overlook, and James motioned for us to get low, so we crawled to the edge and looked down.

What we saw reminded me of a wrestling match between forces of nature.

Four creatures fought each other for dominance.

Some sort of corpulent amphibian chewed on something with unnervingly human-like teeth.

[Zileepay The Gourmand]

Danger Level: High Threat

An insectoid much like a centipede, except with only twelve legs, six of which ended in hands. It carried a number of thick tree branches and rocks, which it used as weapons.

[Suul The Classical]

Danger Level: High Threat

A creature which looked like a heavily armored prawn with talon-like feet and a massive right claw.

[Blavax The Sharp]

Danger Level: High Threat

Just then, it closed its right claw so fast it sounded like a whip-crack, followed by the words: "[Wave Extension]!"

This caused a gout of explosive fire to raise toward another figure, who barely dodged the attack.

A winged anthropomorphic snake, whose mouth was filled to the point of spilling with poison of some kind, dove under the massive attack, countering with an impressive volume of poison spit.

[Ques The Slaverer]

Danger Level: High Threat

The Sharp dodged with more agility than I ever expected was possible for it, which left the amphibian in the path of the poison spit.

The Gourmand opened its frog-like mouth and belched so hard that it deflected the poison before it could reach.

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Using this distraction to its fullest, The Classical brought three two-handed clubs down on The Gourmand's head.

The Gourmand's body fat was so thick however that it did precious little other than make the creature ripple like a pond.

The Gourmand then hit The Classical with a backhand that slapped him into a nearby rock outcropping.

Then James' voice brought my focus back to the topic at hand. "What do we do? If they keep going, they might find our encampment."

I nodded. "We'll evacuate, there's no need for us to get caught up in the middle of... what is that one doing?"

The Gourmand started sniffing the air, seemingly having picked up some sort of scent, and then started turning in our direction.

As casually as possible, I picked up a tiny pinch of dust and let it fall just in front of me... which caused it to lazily drift toward the creatures, then as it went a little past the end of the overlook, it was violently sucked downward as though caught in some sort of whirlpool in mid-air.

The Gourmand reared back for a leap.

"Get away from the edge!" I yelled, pulling myself up and yanking my two companions to their feet.

Getting up so fast made me violently nauseous due to the poison still in my system, I powered through it, but it made me a step too late.

The enormous amphibian landed on the cliff behind me and lashed out its tongue.

However, it seemed that the cliff was not as strong as either of us thought, and it gave way.

James and Atticus looked on in horror as both The Gourmand and I fell down the ten meter drop.

As we fell, I angled myself to land on top of the lump of fat which got us both into this mess.

Upon impact, I bounced off of it like a massive trampoline and was sent flying sideways.

I tumbled, then righted myself and skid to a halt.

For an instant, all the fighting stopped and everyone looked at me.

I dodged to the left just as an explosion and geyser of poison destroyed everything close to where I had just been standing.

As I ran perpendicular to the threats, I checked myself for the weapons I had on my person.

All I found was a stone knife I used to skin the arachnid... I must have forgotten to remove it from my pocket before going to sleep.

I brandished it and considered my next target as I dove under another pressure hose of poison.

I ran at The Classical and lunged as soon as I was in striking distance.

It responded by blocking with one club, and swinging the other two at my midsection.

I jumped back just as another explosion ripped the centipede off of its feet.

I then leapt on top the creature and drove my knife into its neck between the plates.

As it turned into dust, I took its satchel full of rocks and a single club.

I forced myself to a stand again, barely dodging The Gourmand landing on top of the gray dust that was once The Classical.

As I ran, I threw a rock at The Gourmand behind me.

The rock simply deflected off of its teeth harmlessly.

The Slaverer dive-bombed toward me, poison erupting from its mouth the whole time.

I took another rock out of the satchel.

I leapt out of the way of the poison and threw the rock in my hand as The Slaverer tried to turn for another attack.

The rock punched a hole through its wing and it plummeted to the ground.

The Gourmand turned its back to me, and started a leap toward the downed target.

I jumped onto its back.

As both of us sailed through the air, I slashed open as many holes in the creature as possible.

Unlike the last time I landed on this strange amphibian, this time instead of rebounding, a huge wave of blood shot out of the holes as though it were a water balloon slammed into pavement, sending the satchel of rocks from my body.

As all of the red on me became gray, The Slaverer, still barely alive, got back up.

I tossed another rock at it, and it dodged using its good wing to augment the jump.

I closed the distance and stabbed into its heart.

The Slaverer screamed in pain.

Suddenly clarity filled its eyes and it sprayed me point-blank with its poison.

It hurt more than I can even describe.

I could feel the flesh on my face rapidly decomposing.

I wiped at it frantically using the inside of my shirt, but was too late.

Even if the poison wasn't eating away at me anymore, I could still see through holes in my closed eyelids.

During my panic I had forgotten that there was still an enemy remaining... and at that moment they caught up to me.

"[Wave Extension]!"

I turned my head to see The Sharp standing to the right of me just as the explosion slammed into my side.

I felt my ribs shatter as I was lifted off of my feet and slammed into a nearby rock outcropping.

I vomited a mixture of red, purple, and green as I stood shakily to my feet.

The fact that I was still alive surprised me... maybe it was because of the soul of Rasputin inside of me, or that [Hazard] title I had acquired all that time ago.

I pushed all the irrelevant thoughts out of my head as I stared at the prawn-like being across the way from me.

I forced myself to think about the situation at hand.

Why isn't it firing again? If it did, it could end the fight right here and now.

Maybe it takes time for it to reload its shots?

I put my faith in whatever was still keeping me alive and dashed toward the The Sharp.

About a third of the way to it, it shouted the name of its attack again.

Using that as my signal, I dove to the ground, missing the fire by centimeters.

I pushed myself to my feet again, causing my head to spin, and pushing vomit up my throat again.

This was no time to look pretty, so I just spewed it out as I ran.

The Sharp began running backwards to try and keep the distance between us.

Despite everything, I was still gaining... which told me that it was never meant to move this way.

The halved the distance again when it fired another time.

I was in the middle of a stride, so I couldn't dodge it completely.

My left arm was scorched, and both my shoulder and elbow were knocked out of their sockets.

Instead of screaming like every fiber of my being wanted, I picked up one of the scattered rocks from the satchel I had lost.

I threw it, knocking The Sharp's feet out from under it for a fraction of a second.

That was all I needed.

I raised my stone knife over my head as I threw my body at the prawn.

It raised its giant claw at me.

I miscalculated!

"[Wave Exten-] Argh!"

An arrow seemingly from nowhere slammed into The Sharp's back, causing it to flinch.

The claw jerked to the side, and exploded much less violently.

I sank the knife into the creature's head, and then ripped it free and stabbed two more times for good measure.

Suddenly, I felt significantly better and two messages appeared in my vision.

[You have killed 5 Champions, your title 'Hazard' has been revoked]

[New Acquired Title: Nemesis]

And then the second, much more confusing message:

[Gained the Skill "Iron Will", while active, your Fortitude is replaced by your "Willpower" Ability score. This Skill is an Artifact weapon and is only active while equipped.]

Before I could even consider what that meant, my mouth moved almost as if possessed.

"[Iron Will]."

A mask appeared on my face and all of the injuries I had accumulated felt as though distant memories.

Suddenly, a fifth creature appeared from the surface of a nearby cliff, it had what appeared to be a cuddlefish as a head, the body of a chameleon, and a large pair of leathery wings.

[Shia The Imperceptible]

Danger Level: Moderate Threat

It dove toward me, a well-crafted spear in hand.

I outstretched my hand, and the spear deflected off of my skin.

As it rebounded, I grabbed it, and then pulled it out of the creature's hands.

I lunged with the spear, before it dissolved from my hands.

The pseudo-chameleon kicked at my face, but I blocked its strike.

I then wrapped my arm around its leg and forced it to the ground.

I was about to stomp down on it when a flash of light came from its entire body.

"[Blinding Flare]!"

Despite myself, I cowered from the light, still unable to completely block it with my eyelids.

The creature then kicked me in the right side while I was distracted, which caused me to drop its leg.

I leapt backward in anticipation of another attack, but it never came.

I heard the sound of hurried footsteps jog up to me.

I turned to see James, Atticus, and a few others armed with bows.

James was the one to speak first. "Sorry it took us so long to get over to you, the cliffs are a slog to get around. Tell you what though, I can't believe I hit that shrimp-thing from all the way from the cliffs! That was amazing!"

I looked over at Atticus, who nodded in confirmation. "It was pure luck, but impressive."

"Hey!" James exclaimed.

The others burst into laughter as I looked at the palm of my hand where the spear struck, which by now had a purple bruise forming...

Another injury to add to the pile.

I noticed Atticus staring at me, so I looked back at him. "Is there something the matter?" I asked.

He hesitantly shook his head. "I suppose the whole thing about being a reincarnation isn't totally insane."

I glared at him. "What do you mean by that?"

"When I look at you, it says [Grigory The Immortal Rasputin, Nemesis First Stage]."