The blood jaguar turned to face Hans, disregarding the old man. It wasn't hungry. It was bored. It slowly walked towards Hans, much like a curious cat approaching a mouse. It knew it was stronger and Hans did too. He put his hand into his pocket and while maintaining eye contact with the blood jaguar he typed out a message to Jonathan.
'badger forest. rift. people. B rank. help.'
Then it pounced. It was too fast for Hans too see. One moment he was staring it down and the other he was tumbling on the ground with a few broken ribs. The blood jaguar hadn't even taken out its claws. It was not hunting. It was playing with him.
"HANS!" Melanie screamed in fear from behind Ronnie's grave. The little girl looked at Hans with tears in her eyes and was shaking intensely.
The blood jaguar turned its head towards the grave and sniffed the air. Francis signaled Mary to muffle Melanie and take her away. She nodded and slowly sneaked away with the little girl in her arms.
Hans was barely cognisant of his surroundings. The blood jaguars' strike had gotten him concussed but he still managed to stand up. His vision came back and he saw the blood jaguar ready to pounce at Mary and Melanie. Francis was trying to redirect its attention to himself but it was of no use. Its eyes were set on the mother and daughter. Then, a memory resurfaced. A memory from the time he was desperately trying to get stronger.
Hans took a deep breath. His vocal cords started to shake as lightning soared in-between them. Hans let out a scream yet no sound came of it. It was a frequency that humans could not hear yet monsters could. A skill he managed to replicate through blood sweat and tears after being unable to learn it the normal way. A skill that almost left him mute. The tanker's key skill [TAUNT].
Even though it was a phony, improper version of the skill simply replicated through a human's effort it worked. The blood jaguar turned to attack Hans in a blind rage. He couldn't react. It was too fast. Much like a person wouldn't be able to see the bullet that shot them, Hans was unable to see the blood jaguar until its claws dug into his flesh, slashing him across the chest and sending him flying backwards.
Hans was popping in and out of consciousness. He saw the blood jaguar lick his blood off its claws and get ready to pounce yet again. Hans jumped out of its way preemptively yet his side was still caught by one of the blood jaguar's claws which ripped into his flesh and across his ribs. He tumbled on the ground and tried to stand up yet his knees gave out. Seeing the blood jaguar ready to attack yet again he mustered all the courage he could to stand on one knee. He had one last ace up his sleeve.
Hans' body got covered in rampaging lightning that reached the sky, causing the grass around him to ignite and rocks and rubble to be scorched until they were black. Then the lightning started being absorbed and fused into Hans' body, its rampage still fully visible even under Hans' skin. But by the time the lightning had calmed down, his head was already almost fully enveloped by the blood jaguars' sharp teeth yet he didn't move an inch.
-
5 years before his death, a 30 year old Hans was in the agency's lounge room. It was a large room, vaguely reminiscent of a hotel lobby with a patterned marble floor and white walls. He was sipping on an extravagantly large cup of coffee while sitting on a cream coloured sofa across Gabriel. He was older with gray strands in his hair and a scar on his left cheek.
"Theoretically, it should be possible. Assuming I have fine enough control of the lightning, which I do, I should be able to fuse it with my body." Hans said and took another sip of his coffee.
"The keyword is 'theoretically'. But even if you do manage to give your body the properties of lightning, how do you turn back into a normal flesh and blood human being? Don't you need to know at least that much?" Gabriel replied
"If I had figured out a way to turn back, it wouldn't have been a theory by now. I don't think my skill is good enough to be able to use such a complicated technique at will. Maybe even at all."
"Oh stop whining. My overall grade for skills isn't even A-rank yet. I'm stuck being a high B-rank awakened. Many of the skills I've gotten have so little substance. But you have one skill and that's all you need. I'd trade away all my skills for that of yours in a heartbeat."
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"Yeah I know it's a stronger skill but still. I've been trying for years to get another skill but nothing has changed. And my physique has also started plateauing. I barely meet the criteria for A-rank. I don't think I'll ever reach S."
"Quit being a baby and tell me it's name."
"Whose name?"
"That theoretical technique of yours. You have to give it a name."
"Oh that one? I have decided on a name for it already?"
"What is it?"
"Lightning God"
"Quite the vain name. But I like it."
-
The blood jaguar's maw closed around Hans' neck, its teeth sinking into him. Yet it impacted nothing. The blood jaguars' body flew through Hans who was remaining unmoving in the exact same place as before. But something was off. He looked as if his body had static, like an old TV. He had succeeded. His body was one with the lightning coursing inside it.
The blood jaguar that had just passed through Hans was writhing in pain and convulsing. Foam-like saliva was coming out of its mouth as the lightning lingered on the places that had touched Hans' body. After one long minute,the convulsions stopped and the blood jaguar drew its last breath with a squeal, causing the rift to collapse into itself and disappear by collapsing into itself, making an ugly sound between a human scream and mechanical screeching.
Hans was exhausted, beads of lightning charged sweat fell on the ground and scorched anything they touched yet his static covered body remained motionless and not at Hans' own volition. He didn't have control over his movement. Lightning God was a state that needed absolute stillness to achieve so any movement excluding his heartbeat and his breath were ceased. Yet that was not the main issue. The main issue was that he could not get out of it. He was locked in his own body which slowly ate away at his already depleted stamina reserves.
The shape of a circle with ornate shapes drawn in and around it appeared on the ground. The circle lit up and rose up from the ground until the two dimensional shape was suspended in midair. Its shape contorted and changed, becoming the size of door and getting a third dimension to it as it started exuding a dark blue mist that covered its entirety.
Seven government hunters emerged from the mist. They were C rank hunters Hans had previously seen. They were all armed in their usual gear of medieval weapons made from monster parts. One of the hunters ran towards the old man and put his hand on his wounds which slowly started to close. Two other hunters went to assist Ronnie's family while the rest started confirming that the monsters were dead. Following the hunters was Gabriel. He was dressed in casual clothes and was spinning a revolver on his finger. He looked around and seeing the corpses of the monsters, a smile formed on his face.
"That's quite impressive. If you did that before signing the contract we'd have to pay you more for that signature. I guess good things happen to good people huh? The budget is saved yet again. So, how are you feeling?" Gabriel said nonchalantly as one of the hunters approached him.
"Sir. Is it true that he just got awakened?" The hunter asked
"Of course he is. Why would I lie about that?" Gabriel replied with a hint of annoyance in his voice.
"One of the blood jaguars sir. It was….it was a healthy one." The hunter continued.
"What? Are you kidding me? Let me ask him." Gabriel pushed the hunter to the side so he could see Hans.
Hans was being approached by the hunter who had just helped the old man. She was a young girl who was still attending highschool despite serving as an active hunter. She knelt on the ground next to him and smiled at him widely. Hans couldn't make out her face, even with his eyes wide open.
"Don't worry. Everything will be okay." She said, "When I touch you, you might feel a little weird and itchy but it's a good feeling. It's the feeling of your body being fixed so please be patient okay?"
Hans tried to scream at her not to touch him. That it was dangerous. But his lips couldn't move and he had no control of the lightning that had become one with body. He was helplessly looking at the young girl reaching to touch his wound. An action which would cost her her life.
As he saw the hand getting closer to his wound he begged his body to move but it didn't budge. And as if fate was having a laugh at his expense, the lightning that had merged with his body made him perceive things many times faster, meaning he could see the thing happening before him in slow motion.
A mere moment before the young girl's finger made contact with Hans' body she was pulled back by a man's hand. They exchanged words but Hans couldn't understand what they were talking about.
The man leaned forward to take a better look at Hans. The few facial features Hans could make out reminded him of one man. His dead mentor, Gabriel. In his delirium, Hans thought he was about to die. And then everything went black.
-
I'm a large office on the top floor of the most expensive building in the entire city. Christoffer Herring was looking out of his window wall into the city. He was an older man with long gray hair, a well groomed full beard and was wearing an extremely expensive suit. His eyes had an almost bioluminescent silver colour and were sternly overlooking the world below.
Bowing across from a large mahogany desk was a meek looking employee holding a stack of papers.
"Sir. A rift opened near Badger station." The man said in a trembling voice.
"How many casualties?" He asked without even bothering to look at the man's face.
"None sir. A new awakened that just signed a contract as one of the elimination agency's enforcers happened to be there and managed to stop it. He is currently in a coma under intensive care."
"Hmmm. Interesting. What is his name?"
"It's Hans Baker sir."
"Very interesting. You are excused."
"Thank you sir"
The meek man quickly made his way out of the office while Christopher remained in place. Once sufficient time had punched for the worker to leave the floor, Christopher turned and punched a hole through his window wall, causing shrapnel to go everywhere. He then snapped his fingers and everything went back to normal in a moment.
"Hans Baker is it? Very interesting."
-
The annoying noise of constant beeping filled Hans' ears. He opened his eyes and saw that he was in a hospital room. A middle aged with the look of a retired cage fighter was at the foot of his bed with his hands glowing in a warm white tone.
"Where am I?" Hans mumbled
The man looked at Hans and pushed something that was out of Hans' line of sight. A few minutes passed with nothing happening before Peter entered the room.
"Welcome back kiddo."
"Peter? What's going on?"
"Well. You fell in a bit of a coma after using a weird skill. At least that's what Gabriel said.
"Can you not tell my parents about it? I don't want them to worry. I'm fine anyways aren't I?"
"Buddy. I just notified your emergency contacts that you woke up. You've been in that coma for a little over three months now."