Chapter 5 – The Abomination of a Monster

The beast that had just ripped the door off the hinges as it crashed in was an abomination by all measures. It was a quadruped beast that looked as if a skinned wolf twice the average size could be alive. It had muscles and red flesh sticking out with no skin or fur to cover. The vertebrae embedded in its back could be clearly seen, around its four legs' joints bone shards were coming out, and instead of paws it had black-reddish claws. Out of all its body parts, Its face was the most horrendous, flaps of flesh hanging around and its maw was barely covered by tissue, showing its uneven barbed teeth.

Luckily for the group arguing downstairs, they had stood a tad bit to the right, so when that abomination came crashing in, it didn’t hit them. But unfortunately for them, they were the first target.

Turning its body towards them, the beast released another ghastly screech then charged.

The one who was the first to take action was Cathelyn. As she unsheathed her sword with her right, she shouted, “Everyone around, either hide or run away, but most importantly, don’t let the ghoul see you or it will immediately attack.”

When she took out her sword, her scabbard flashed a silvery light, and another sword similar to the previous one appeared inside the scabbard, which she then took out with her left.

Right before the beast smashed into the mayor and his group, Cathelyn jumped in its path, crossing her sword in defense. Ramming into Cathelyn, the beast opened its maw and tried to maul off her head, but the crossed swords pushed against its mouth as it bit down.

Not giving the beast the chance to respond, Cathelyn drew her swords out of the ghoul’s mouth, cutting the edges of its maw. She then kicked the beast’s head which surprisingly sent the ghoul a few steps away.

As Cathelyn engaged with the ghoul, running away did cross my mind, which I despised myself for soon after. I wasn’t equipped with any experience to battle such a thing; I wanted to run away and leave this for someone who knew what she was doing. But as the fight ensured downstairs, I wanted to help; I didn’t like the idea of running away one bit.

I reckoned If I was going to help, I needed to make it count. Jumping in just for the sake of it would make me a burden and an idiot. I needed the best opportune moment to jump in.

As the beast charged in again, Cathelyn pierced a sword in the wooden floor, which caused a string of jagged blades to rise from the ground towards the ghoul, forcing it to stop mid charge and alter its course.

When the beast changed directions, it came near the staircase. This was my chance. Taking out my sword, I vaulted over the stairs and dropped on top of the ghoul. Over its head, I impaled the sword where I assumed the brain was.

Contrary to my imagination, the beast didn’t drop dead but released another harrowing screech and furiously flicked its body. Unable to hold on, I was hurled into the nearby bar.

Finishing its shriek, the beast jolted its head towards me and pounced. My instincts kicked in when I perceived its stare. I used the stone bar as support with my hand and leaped over the other side of the bar, making use of it as a blockade.

The ghoul came down on the stone with tremendous force, smashing the stone to bits and rubbles using its claws. Before it could attack me again, Cathelyn assaulted the beast's back by sending another trail of blades from the ground, this time injuring the beast’s hind leg.

When it jumped away to avoid further attacks and turned towards Cathelyn, I quickly rolled through the gap it created in the bar then created a bit of a distance away from the beast.

Although Cathelyn injured the beast, and I was safer distance, I was a bit dismayed; I had lost my weapon and didn’t know what to do. My worriedness and confusion seemed to have shown on my face because Cathelyn, who was circling around the beast as it gazed at us, shouted, “Don’t you have traits, you moron, use them.”

I wanted to bang my head against the wall. I fought with the wrong mentality from the start; I had gained supernatural abilities when I first came here, which I should have been using. If I remember correctly, I had four traits, one that let me conjure a weapon, another that allows me to stun an enemy, a multilingual one, and finally, one that I had no idea what it does.

The current viable traits were stunning and conjuring. I tried to remember what the explanation said about conjuring a weapon. The trait’s name was [Weapon of Judgment]. When I concentrated on the trait, I had a vague feeling of what to do. Concentrating on the name of the trait, I began to imagine a weapon forming in my hand; of course, the first weapon that popped in my head was a gun.

A sudden sensation similar to my muscles being exerted came over me. I felt streams of air were inside my body, moving and squirming towards my arm. A blue hue appeared around my hand, gathering to the center of my palm to institute the image of a gun; however, the moment the image formed up, it cracked and split into numerable shards.

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Instinctively, I knew what happened. My trait was unable to form such a complex structure. Taking a few steps back, I decided to create something simpler. Concentrating again, I imagined making a longsword. This time the image formed up, then materialized to form a translucent sword in my hand.

With a weapon in hand, I gazed at the beast that was creeping sideways, looking for an opportunity to attack us.

The one to break the silence was Cathelyn. As she was circling the beast, she suddenly rushed forward in an attempt to flank the beast. When the ghoul turned its attention toward her, I immediately assaulted it from the other side to corner the beast.

Taking a glance at me, the ghoul realized it was getting pincered. It crouched, and the second we were almost upon it, it launched itself forward. Me and Cathelyn weren’t going to let it slide away. While she threw a sword towards the ghoul, piercing its behind, I stopped mid-rush, extended my hand, and whirled my sword at it, managing to barely make a cut on its side.

However, I couldn’t be elated as my sword shattered into tiny shards upon collision with the beast's body. I didn’t have time to think about what happened as the beast turned around and winded up for a lash with its claws.

Hastily, I conjured a blue translucent shield right before its claws reached me. Again, my conjuration shattered on impact, which earned me gashes on my arms as the claws tore into my skin. Fortunately, I was able to minimize the extent of the injury as I jumped backward with the time that the shield had brought me.

As the ghoul followed up with a bite, a figure wielding a sword and a shield that had rushed into the inn rammed into the ghoul with his shield, reeling himself and the ghoul away. I recognized the figure's blonde hair; it was the knight I had met outside of the prison.

As the knight darted back a few steps after the impact, Cathelyn extended her empty hand forward, and the sword that was embedded in the beast’s behind flashed in a silver light then disappeared, appearing again in her hand.

She then jerked her head towards me and shouted, “Of course your weapons will break you, Knob. You can’t expect a faith core trait to work when you have no faith.”

Somehow, I understood what she meant. I needed to have some type of faith as I conjured a weapon; whether it was in my weapon holding up or in my actions being right, I needed to generate faith.

The beast got up, and the knight joined Cathelyn and me standing beside us. The beast seemed angry, growling as it stared us down.

In the split of a second, the ghoul was in the air lunging towards us. The knight stood in front of its path then stomped his feet to the ground as he raised his shield. A blue transparent arched screen similar to a dome covered our front with the knight’s shield as the center. Clashing against the screen, the beast sent ripples across the barrier but was unable to breakthrough.

I Focused on conjuring a weapon. Taking Cathelyn advice, I added faith as I created the weapon. I had faith that I needed to fight this beast off, that my weapon wasn’t going to break, that fighting and not hiding was the right thing to do. A staff began to materialize in my hand, but, unlike the previous times, the blue hue was mixed with a tinge of yellow. The staff materialized utterly opaque. It was colored royal blue with intricate yellow lines.

When the beast seemed to realize it would be unable to break through the barrier, it backed a few steps away. As if in sync with each other, the arch dissipated when the ghoul took those few steps, and all three of us attacked. I flanked it from the right, taking a full swing at its front leg. I realized that using the sword was impractical since I didn’t know how to use it properly, so I opted for the second most familiar weapon, a rod. I would have chosen the dagger, but I wasn’t confident in dealing with this abomination in close range.

While my attack definitely inflicted significant damage as I had heard a crack after impact, the other two definitely did better. The knight had bashed the ghoul's head when it attempted to bite his shoulder, and then with the opening, he proceeded to make a wide cut on its neck with his sword. Unfortunately, it didn't die from that, although it started spurting huge amounts of red-blackish blood. Cathelyn, with the other side completely open, inflicted a multitude of cuts on the ghoul's torso as her sword blurred in a silver flurry of attacks.

The ghoul shrieked louder than ever before with distinct pain in its voice. It barged its way through us and seemingly headed towards the open doors to escape. While I turned towards the beast, I locked eyes with the knight for a second, and we immediately understood what the other wanted.

The knight hunched down as a more compact, pointed arch covered his front. He then erupted in tremendous speed as he caught up to the ghoul and cut off its path. Turning around to face it, he stomped a foot forward, and the arched screen expanded to cover the exit, giving the ghoul no way to go.

As I chased right after, I discarded the staff, shattering into light shards upon touching the ground, and conjured a sword. Catching up to the beast, it turned its head towards me and attacked with its claw. I didn’t clash with the beast; instead, I slid beneath its claws and right under its body. Coming out from the other side, I used the barrier that the knight was keeping up as leverage and leaped above the beast.

Landing on top of the beast, I pierced the sword right into its head, crossing my original sword. Holding both swords, I attempted to loop off its head by using the two swords as if they were scissors.

Right when I was about to take off its head, the swords wouldn’t go further, as if I had hit a hard surface. While trying to drive the swords further in, I suddenly felt the hard surface moving. My instincts flashed complete red, and without thinking, I immediately jumped off the beast.

Straight after touching the ground, black bone spurs rose from all over the ghoul’s body, turning similar to a hedgehog. Two bone spurs in particular abruptly extended from the ghoul’s head and violently struck against the knight’s barrier. Although the spurs didn’t manage to destroy the barrier, they managed to push the knight out of the inn.

With nothing finally hindering it, the ghoul rushed out of the inn. It didn’t take me a second to realize I needed to chase after it, whether it was for finishing it off or knowing from where it came. So Immediately, I dashed out of the inn after it.