Nick was stunned at the sight of the battling beasts. He had failed to detect the presence of the deadly band of bonecrunchers during his survey of the island, although most of his time had been spent in the southern section of the forest.
There must have been another pack living somewhere in the northern woods. They were either at the border of the highlands when the water caught them, or they decided to avoid the melee between the snake and frogs and circled around to take on a less lethal opponent. He couldn’t predict how events would play out, but one thing was already clear. The time for planning was over. If Nick wanted to survive, he had to take the initiative before death came knocking at his door.
For the moment, the island’s most aggressive predators were intent on destroying one another, but he knew that it wouldn’t last long. Both forces would suffer catastrophic losses if they tried to finish off each other. It was only a matter of time before one of the beast armies disengaged and came charging up the hillside. If it were the komos, the ones in the other valley would join in the attack, cementing the lemurs’ defeat. Not that facing the bonecruncher pack would go any better. There were simply too many of the powerful beasts. The tusked hyenas would charge the lemurs’ line, break through, and then tear into the tribe like a buffet.
It was a grim and frustrating situation. Nick had not felt so powerless since he had arrived on the island. While his efforts had been critical up to this point, his contribution had been one of foresight and provisioning. There was little that he could do to turn the tide in a wide-scale confrontation. Nick doubted that he could handle more than one of the crunchers in a straight fight. A fight that would be a risky venture at best, even if he burned through the charges in his wand and all three Mana Darts.
In the midst of that black moment, he wished that he had invested every free attribute point into Mind, even though he knew that he wouldn’t have survived if he had. Despite his lifetime of gaming and weeks of planning and preparations, nothing that Nick could come up with was good enough. He was only one man, new to the System and stuck on a basic class. There simply wasn’t anything he could do that would matter, and he was running out of time.
While the brutal battle between the komos and crunchers raged across the valley floor, stray lizards began fleeing from the chaos-wracked carnage, racing up the hillside in a trickle that would soon become a flood. Nick desperately wished that he was able to communicate with the lemurs. It was vital that they contained the beasts before they climbed the hillside. If any of the lizards broke through and gained the top of the hill, their presence would draw hundreds more resting in the adjacent valley, trapping he and the tribe in a hopeless two-way battle. Grinding them down like wheat before the millstone.
He was equally terrified that the pack would decide to cut their losses and start heading his way. But there was nothing that Nick could do to assuage that worrisome possibility. However, the scattered clumps of lizards scaling the hill were a problem within his power to resolve.
Lacking time to think the matter through any further, he darted over to where the first komo was climbing up toward a gap in the lemur spearmen’s line, as most of their forces were arranged on the other side of the hillock. He could tell by its frantic movements that the beast was caught in the throes of panic, desperate to get as far away as possible from the ruthless savagery of the pack. Unfortunately, this only made the komo more dangerous under the present circumstances.
Nothing Nick could do would deter the beast from its chosen course. The only way to stop the komo from precipitating catastrophe was to put it down before it darted past. Before the komo was able to pull itself up onto the flat portion of the hillside, he arrived in front of it. He had just enough time to grip his sword in both hands and take his stance before the lizard saw him barring its path. Unleashing a vicious hiss, the komo pounced, intending to tear out his throat without breaking its stride.
Love what you're reading? Discover and support the author on the platform they originally published on.
Although he knew it was coming, the speed of the beast’s decisive attack caught him by surprise. Before he had begun training with the blade, the komo’s assault would surely have claimed his life. But Nick had been preparing himself to meet a strike from any angle and at a moment’s notice for weeks.
As a result, he reacted fast enough to change his grip and adjust the angle of the blade. He braced himself and caught the lizard’s jaws with his sword edge first, slicing deep and widening its smile all the way to the back of its throat. The beast came crashing down in an uncontrolled fall, blood pouring from its ruined face like a sieve.
Nick didn’t wait to see if the blow had been fatal. He raised his blade over one shoulder, took a step to build momentum, and then brought the sword streaking down, decapitating the komo in a single blow. With no time to revel in his victory, he turned his attention back to the hillside, where six more lizards were headed his way. Fortunately, the Elder had spotted the problem as well, directing her elite guard to reinforce the line during Nick’s brief battle. The tribe’s best warriors plugged the gaps in the spearmen’s formation, now outnumbering the charging komos by approximately three to one.
Confident that the lemurs could handle the next part without him, he walked a few paces behind their line, fighting to catch his breath while watching to see how the fight would progress. This was his first opportunity to witness the tribe fight in a proper formation. Every bit of data that Nick obtained would improve his ability to predict and influence what came next, when the battle for the highlands entered its second, blood-drenched phase. Ten seconds later, the panicked lizards barreled into the lemurs’ line.
Two of the komos went down right away, impaled on the tips of the lemurs’ spears. But the other four had either been luckier or were smart enough to slow down because they threaded their way through the wall of spears to launch an attack on the lemurs’ line. The lemur spearmen were unable to pull back and strike with their long weapons. Not with their opponents right on top of them. Instead, the front row leapt back, allowing the handful of club-wielders behind them to face the komos head-on. While the battle raged on, each side scoring wounds on the other, the spearmen regrouped, forming a tight ring around each melee.
At a signal from the Elder, the club-wielders darted back, leaving the lizard quartet caged in a ring of wooden weapons. Acting in unison, the spearmen thrust, striking out from all sides. Crude spearpoints inflicted cuts and scratches until scales gave way and parted, spears biting deep into the tissue below. Once again, Nick found himself deeply impressed by the lemurs’ ingenuity and teamwork. This wasn’t a tactic that would work unless their line was charged head-on by a weaker force. But in this situation, the Elder’s strategy was remarkably effective.
Two of the komos died within seconds, pierced through one vital point or another, but the other pair managed to break free after taking a few painful pokes. Before the tribe suffered any more losses, the Elder ran to throw her might into one of the melees, while Nick sprinted to assist in the other. Despite its diminished state, his sword was better suited to land a killing blow than the coarse wooden spears.
Visualizing the angle of his attack, he darted around to the komo’s blindside and then thrust with his blade, its point cutting deep into its scaley hide. The beast spun to face him, exacerbating its wound in the process, but it was already too late. The tribe’s warriors stepped in to overwhelm the injured reptile, slaughtering it within another handful of heartbeats. Thanks to his precision, Nick was still fresh enough to join in the other fight.
When he looked over, he saw that his assistance was unnecessary. The reason why was simple. The Elder, who was wielding a massive, two-handed club, had already broken her opponent’s back. When she saw him looking, the Elder raised a hand in greeting.
Nick returned the gesture with a wild grin as the tribe reformed their line, ready to meet the next wave of komos headed their way.