There is a moment when a person is at their lowest. The pain and sorrow from such events can dull, possibly even suppress, other emotions. From the simplest things, to complicated and even self-preservation. If traumatic enough, death might not look scary, possibly even appetizing.

Tasha believed she had reached such a state. Breaking up with her boyfriend of nine years. Moving to Mercury City together. From low Grade F’s, all the way until they made it to Grade D. In the end, she wasn’t the only one that got hurt. Pain begets more pain.

Exchanging words that point-blank might be true. Life was never that black and white. Thus, all that is exchanged were hateful words that did neither of the two any good. However, it was impossible to stop once it reached that point.

Deep inside, she knew she wasn’t that strong. It wasn’t that she was weak, her strength only truly shined when she worked with others. Like a natural gift, her ability to support someone else was enough to raise their ability above what they were alone.

After exchanging hateful words, feeling like it didn’t matter even if she died. Taking on a Subjugation request, it was a request that had been dropped to Grade E. Knowing as a weak Grade D, alone she believed she could still accomplish the request. Only now did she realize she was worse than those hateful words.

Being overconfident, she believed she could handle the repercussions. Only now did she realize she had bitten off way more than she could chew. Thinking she was better off dead, even if she failed, she would die. That would be the end. Only once she failed, reality sunk in…

She wasn’t ready to die. So she ran. Then kept running.

At the moment, she could feel each breath becoming harder to take. Her lungs were stinging as if they were on fire. Her heart went from a drum beating to the current state. A pain that was causing her to want to cut open and allow the heart more room to beat.

It was then, she knew that feeling. As a support, she was constantly being stared at. Those that didn’t understand her talents gave her looks of disdain. Those that saw her talent gave her looks from interest to jealousy.

Therefore, that slight needle prick that was like a phantom pain. A feeling that came and went so fast you would question if it was just your imagination, or if it was real. With the distance, she only knew its general direction. But, that was enough.

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Frustrating as it was, she needed to slow down. Pain alone meant she needed to slow down before. Having been critically injured. It was honestly either an amazing feat or a miracle the minotaur was still alive.

Minotaur had the body of a large man. Impossibly muscular, the arms and legs of this thing were at least four feet each. The torso was unusually long too, making the arms that were disproportionately large feel not so out of place. Not just long, the overall size gave them a thickness of trees.

Only, from the middle of the waist was a discolored section running up to the neck, cutting into the neck before reaching the ox head, where the ear and horn would usually be was missing as the scar showed it had been lost. There was also a problem with the scar itself.

From the waist, was a small, less than an inch. As this scar came up the torso, it extended to around three inches wide. As if being stretched before stitched back together. The shoulders were not symmetrical.

With some breath back in her lungs, she had no choice but to dodge a large rock. Having just been running for her life, she had been avoiding everything. From trees to large rocks, anything even in the ground could be taken before used as a throwing weapon against her.

Ignoring the pain that didn’t go away when she slowed down. Dodging to the side required her to deal with follow up, as this war machine was able to grab objects and throw them without losing a meaningful amount of speed.

As the black thinly haired, large bronze skin arm slammed into the ground next to her, she was forced to deal with the pain of the small pebbles stabbing into her body from the impact that created a small ditch in the ground.

Using a leap and roll to reach her feet as she created small indents in the ground, she finally made out a being hidden in a tree. At first, she was confused why they had yet to move. While rude, her life was on the line. She would make it up to the other party multiple times over.

She was neither a ruthless person, nor was she heartless. While it was true she was bringing the creature to them, she slowed down to give them time to react. This also meant they could have run. Though if the other side was willing to watch her die without offering any help, she was unsure if she wouldn’t attempt to ditch the creature on them.

While the minotaur often hunted in the savanna, most of the time it would need to chase things into the savanna. As part of its territory, most things wouldn’t be willing to enter it unless forced to. Since she engaged without thinking, her life was over if she couldn’t find something to change the situation.

Thus, even if she didn’t think she was capable of doing something so evil...

When push came to shove, if the other party was willing to abandon her. Having been seen from so far away, they needed to do so before she reached this point. That was as far as she was willing to yield her good will in the face of definite death.

What never crossed her mind was that the person in front of her was Grade E. While that alone wasn’t the thing that threw her off. From this distance, unless someone was using something to hide their mana, she would have sensed them. So this person was alone.

“God damn it…”