The thing that was racing toward him looked like the bastard love child of a T-rex and velociraptor, or at least the movie versions Terry had seen of them. He’d read somewhere on the always-factually-accurate internet that real velociraptors had feathers. While he knew that there was some relationship between birds and dinosaurs, he just couldn’t shake the images from those films that had burned themselves into his adolescent consciousness. Every time he tried to imagine velociraptors with feathers, his brain always conjured something that bore an uncanny resemblance to a certain oversized muppet from that children’s show. The monster bearing down on him like a runaway train or a homicidal isekai-ing delivery truck had shorter arms and a bigger head than the movie velociraptors, but it certainly moved with the same kind of terrifying speed.

Of course, the resemblance was imperfect. What looked like a layer of dark leaves had taken the place of leathery skin. Claws and teeth had been traded in for what looked like particularly vicious black thorns. The eyes of the thing resembled some kind of luminescent moss, although Terry had never before seen anything in nature that had that particularly disturbing purple glow to it. The monster might not have worried him if that had been all. Unfortunately, the thing was giving off a kind of invisible pressure that seemed designed to slow his movements. It also seemed to be dampening the warmth in his stomach. Terry hadn’t been giving that warmth too much thought, but it didn’t take a lot of thought to figure out what it came from. He assumed that it was some kind of mana core or whatever those things were that the cultivators all had. Donteens? No. Dantens? That's not it, either. Dan-somethings, thought Terry.

He hadn’t been particularly relying on that core thingy in any of his previous fights. He usually wound up hacking things to death or beating them into submission with brute strength. But a little boost from that core had served him well in a couple of clutch situations. Now that something was exerting some kind of skill or technique on it, he wished he’d paid more attention to it. His sense was that the monster wasn’t suppressing it entirely, but that he wasn’t going to be able to rely on it for some massive burst of power either. Great, thought Terry. That’s just fucking peachy. Like I don’t have enough challenges in front of me. He glanced back at the chicken-lizard with at least a sliver of dim hope that it might, just maybe, be preparing for battle. That dim hope was snuffed like a candle in the wind. The chicken-lizard was visibly shaking in terror with its beak half-open like it wanted to squawk-roar in fear but couldn’t make the noise come out.

So much for backup, thought Terry. I get an animal stalker, and it’s a coward. I guess I’ll have to do this the hard way. He’d dismissed any thoughts of running away. This new body of his was durable and had a lot of endurance, but the… Terry wasn’t sure what to call it. Plantoraptor? Vegetation Rex? Foliasaur? Yeah, foliasaur sounded good to him. He couldn’t hope to outsprint the foliasaur. If he had enough of a head start, he might be able to outdistance it, but there was no chance of creating that kind of distance. He’d just have to deal with it the way people have dealt with unruly plants since the dawn of time. Hack and slash. God, what I wouldn’t give for a flamethrower. He just hoped that the thing had poor lateral movement skills. He thought it probably did. Anything traveling that fast in any direction shouldn’t be able to turn on a dime. If it could, he was well and truly screwed.

Drawing his one remaining sword, Terry faced down the charging monster like he meant to meet it head-on. It’s what heroically heroic types usually did in these situations, always to their detriment. They overestimated their newfound strength, picked a fight they could only just win, and took some debilitating injury in the first five seconds that made victory even more difficult. He did not intend to help the world do him dirty like that. He didn’t need to barely scratch out a win to feel good about himself. He would happily kill his enemies with the death of a thousand cuts. Even if that meant dealing out a thousand literal cuts. Full frontal assaults were for monsters and morons. Still, timing was critical. Move too soon and he’d miss his chance to deal out one, hopefully, serious injury. Move too late and he’d fall right into that moron category as this monster trampled right over him.

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Terry narrowed his eyes in what he thought of as his best Clint Eastwood expression. He lowered himself slightly. The monster was close enough that he got a real sense of how big it was. It was at least as big as the chicken-lizard and heavier to boot. Everything in him was howling to get out of the way, but he made himself wait. Just a few seconds longer and… Now! He jumped sideways and lashed out with the sword. He felt it connect, slow, and then burst free. The foliasaur let out a weird, warbling cry that made his skin crawl. Still, he’d dealt it an injury without taking one himself. A bit of pride swelled up inside of him and was immediately squashed when the monster’s tail swung around and slammed into his ribs. The pain was incredible. He didn’t know if any of his ribs were broken, and he stopped caring when a tree came out of nowhere to stop him cold in mid-flight.

He flopped to the ground and, in a moment of clarity, realized that this thing could actually do him in if he let it. It probably wouldn’t even take that long. All he had to do was nothing. Visions of being sent home, or at least to somewhere slightly less awful than Chinese Period Drama Hell, swam through his mind. He felt his body start to relax into acceptance of this plan. Other-Terry was screaming at him, but the haze in his mind largely muted those words. Yes, he thought. This is my way out! Even if he didn’t get isekai-ed to some other world, maybe he’d get reincarnated as a baby back on his world. Sure, it would suck to have to do puberty and high school again, but it’s not like he’d remember anything anyway. Alternately, he might wind up in Heaven. He had to have paid off most of his sins just by being in this terrible place. No matter what happened, though, he’d be free. It was perfect.

Then, he heard the chicken-lizard let out of squawk-roar of what could not be mistaken for anything but pure terror. Terry forced his eyes open and looked in that direction. The foliasaur was lurching in a decidedly menacing way toward the chicken-lizard, but Terry could see that his one attack had done some real damage. One of the faux-dinosaur’s legs wasn’t really carrying its weight anymore. I must have cut something important, thought Terry. It was the only explanation. As fast as the thing had been moving before, it should have been able to pounce on the cock-a-whatsit in a heartbeat. He was sorely tempted to just let the two monsters settle things between themselves. It was a nagging sense of responsibility that kept Terry from just closing his eyes again. He didn’t like the chicken-lizard, but it had also been the only thing in this whole damn forest that hadn’t attacked him immediately. He also supposed that it might have scared some things off just by being big.

“God damn it,” wheezed Terry as he pushed himself up into a sitting position.

Everything hurt. It was hard to breathe. He looked down at his chest. There was no blood, but he was just certain that he had to have some internal injuries. I guess this is where real heroes dig deep or some garbage like that, thought Terry. It’s the whole “time to unlock your potential” trope. Except, when Terry tried to dig deep and find some more potential, he mostly just found a strong will to quit. He hadn’t wanted any of this, especially not some cowardly monster stalker. But he didn’t want the chicken-lizard to die. It almost certainly wouldn’t have come here if it hadn’t been following him. Plus, bit by bit, there was some of that warmth trickling out from his stomach. He didn’t feel good, or even particularly better, but he did feel marginally less terrible. I guess I’m healing a bit. Suppressing pitiful groans, barely, he got back on his feet. He limped over to where he’d dropped his sword, cursed the entire world a few times, and then bent over to pick it up. After nearly passing out from the pain, and catching his breath again, he managed to straighten up. The chicken-lizard was steadily backing away from the foliasaur, but it clearly didn’t dare turn and run.

With a sigh, Terry hefted the sword in his hand and said, “No insight or enlightenment to fuel some OP moment? I guess I’m just gonna have to do it anyway.”