Every step I took in the guardsman’s beat brought me closer to a painful end. Finding a way out of his lead seemed impossible, though.

And that’s despite the fact Clay was no faster on his feet than I was. It was the glaive in his hands that made the difference. He was so swift with the weapon that I had trouble keeping track of it.

I still somehow managed, but dodging was getting me nowhere. Escape, which I would choose if I faced a beast, was not an option here. So what could I do?

An attack seemed like an obvious answer. Restrict the guardsman’s vision with orange gas, perhaps even poison him. Then paralyze him with my roar and pounce. Only I wasn’t allowed to do any of that. Well, except for the pouncing part.

Those annoying restrictions left me with a very limited arsenal. All I had at my disposal were speed, claws, and fangs.

Hmm...

Not exactly true. Deckard had been torturing me to ensure my flexibility for the last few days, and despite the pain, it bore fruit. Could the guardsman go as far down as I did? Reason told me that with his training, he should, something in his movements the opposite. His training wasn’t as leg-focused as Deckard’s.

And then there was the [Master’s Shield]. How could I forget this skill? For the first time in all the time I’ve had it, I found it useful in fighting my squadmates. Sure, they were only around level 50, and I wasn’t using it the way I imagined a magic shield should work. In my mind, formed by an imagination based on books, manga, TV shows, and movies, it should have been an impenetrable wall. Instead, it was a fragile sheet of glass that I had to handle with care and great precision.

Fucking challenging to do it during a fight, especially when the bastard wouldn’t even let me catch my breath.

Stepping aside, avoiding the chop only by a whisker again, I took a step forward, shortening the distance between us. I knew the guardsman wouldn’t let it go, and I was ready for the sweep of his glaive. There was nothing easier than going into the split and leaning back. The surprise on Clay’s face was priceless.

Spinning around on my butt, grinding the ground, I hit his ankle with my heel. A solid plan in my mind, the reality left me gritting my teeth in pain. Without shoes, it hurt like hell. But it worked and made him stumble just like I wanted.

So since it wasn’t a complete failure, I went smoothly from the spin to the squat and pounced. Not an ideal position for attacking the guardsman’s hands, thus I went for his legs.

Damn quick with his weapon as he was, he managed to block my strike again. Knowing that a quick counterattack would follow now that he had his stability back, I shifted my focus on creating a shield.

There!

Forming the barrier at a similar angle to how I deflected bolts, I hoped for the same outcome. To block the blade directly would be foolish, as even Freyde managed to shatter it. And my plan...worked. The barrier did crack, but the glaive slid over it and veered off enough to miss my shoulder.

With no hesitation, I struck again.

Surprise was on my side, yet it wasn’t enough. The only thing I hit was the handle of the guardsman’s weapon. It was so frustrating...and so painful, too. Each time, instead of soft meat, I hit the hard pole of the glaive. Seriously, it couldn’t have been made of ordinary wood. That would’ve broken under the force of my punches a long time ago.

At least it was some consolation that the guardsman was having trouble standing my blows. Who knows what would have happened if I could have put more weight behind my fists.

Or if I had a weapon. Honestly, I envied Clay for his, or rather his skill with it. Although he was holding only a glaive, it seemed like he had three weapons, a blade, a baton, and a shield. And even though I didn’t use one myself, it showed how versatile weapons could be. It was just about learning to use them to their maximum potential.

Were my claws the same?

All I was doing was... basically mauling my opponents. Scratches, cuts, slashes, all the same. Was there more to it? I hoped. But who to ask? A terran. Did I know any? I did. Meneur was the closest. Unfortunately, the taurus lacked claws, nor was he a fighter. I wasn’t sure if Zeranyphe had claws, or talons in her case, on her hands as an avier. What I was sure of was that she would not like to see me so soon again. That left me with only one option, Rezso.

Right now, not the best time to take lessons from him, though.

It was hard to find a moment just to think, but I had to. How else was I supposed to figure out a way to defeat him. Mindless attacks driven by my instincts would surely be ineffective against him.

So I was dodging, deflecting his glaive with my shield, and trying to find a way through his defenses while he was trying to cut me to pieces. So far, he had not succeeded, and it was pissing him off.

Honestly, I expected a little bit more from him. Sure, I haven’t managed to hit him properly yet. But that was it. That I, a [Slave] before evolution, saw it as possible at all. He was a trained city guard, for Traiana’s sake. He should kick my ass easily, not going back and forth with me like this.

Did he go easy on me after all the talk? No, the focus in his eyes and frustration were genuine.

Perhaps I was that good? A notion I didn’t believe myself.

It eased my worries a little, though. So far, I had the mindset of a loser. Nothing bloody good to have in a fight. Now, I saw I had a chance, just like Deckard said, a tiny one.

A chance I almost lost when I poorly deflected the guardsman’s blade. He aimed at my shoulder, and the glaive slid higher toward my head. My reaction was swift, yet I still lost the tip of my ear.

Hiss from me, first blood for him.

Of course, it brought a grin to Clay’s face. Something I couldn’t just let go, so I responded with bared fangs of my own. Fortunately, despite what the novels and manga tried to feed me about beastmen’s ears, mine were not so sensitive. Certainly not to the point where a stranger’s touch would bring me pleasure.

Not that it didn’t hurt. Much more annoying was the throbbing of my heart that I could hear much louder now. For a moment, it even drowned out the cheers of the city guards standing around.

Encouraged by this success, the guardsman twirled the glaive in his hands and went for a stab. Hard to say if that was the intention, but it was too obvious, easy to avoid without having to use a shield.

This time I didn’t counterattack like I usually did. That’d turned out to be a wasted effort. No...given the chance, I grabbed the handle of his glaive and pulled.

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“Nice try.” His smirk didn’t bode well, and since he didn’t budge an inch when I pulled, I let go of his weapon immediately. And it was close, damn close. Do it a few seconds later, I’d be the one pulled in. That or I’d have my palm cut open.

Actually, if it weren’t for my claws, I’d end up with a wounded hand, anyway. When the blade slid across them as Clay pulled, they turned out to be harder than I expected. In fact, to the point where the glaive didn’t leave a scratch in them.

And I wasn’t the only one who noticed.

“Fuck me! They’re not just for decoration.” His taunt fell on deaf ears, so to speak. In my time at Eleaden, I’d heard too many insults and ridicule to be provoked by a mock of this level. And if he thought I’d be naive enough to immediately rely on my claws to stop the blade, he was damn wrong. I might as well have ended up with cut claws and a bleeding wound if I were to do that.

A bit of tug-of-war back and forth ensued, neither of us able to hurt or gain an advantage over the other. I was a hair faster than the guardsman’s lunges, and his defense was too good for me to overcome. I was at my wit’s end as I tried everything I could think of. Like Deckard wanted me to, I gave it my all, even started using [Indomitable Will]. The sheer volume of focus I had to pull off, and for such a long time, was killing my head. Skill didn’t take away the pain, but it reduced the pressure concentration brought, making it a bit easier for me.

What little good it did me when one hesitation was all it took for the guardsman to take advantage. I reacted too late to his movement and thus failed to step aside in time. His aim was high, at my heart. The bastard got me in the ribs. The blade cut across them just below my armpit, slicing the skin, thankfully hardly any muscle.

Still, it forced a pained roar from my throat.

There was no doubt. If I didn’t want to lose, and I was under no illusions, I was losing, I needed something more, some edge. So far, I only received two minor injuries, not something that would lose me a fight, but every one of them counted, slowing me down just a bit. What’s worse, I didn’t go into this battle at full strength.

So...the [Beast].

Did it really come to that?

Was that the only way?

Damn it, I really didn’t want to have to do that. At least not now, when I wasn’t sure what the change would bring.

“Just believe in yourself, girl.” Deckard saw my dilemma despite how fast the battle was going. “...and in me. I’m here if anything goes wrong.”

Yeah, I knew that. He said he’d beat sense into me if I lost it. But even so....

Was it this fear that the terrans had? Why did they hate being compared to beasts and resented being called beastmen? Fear of becoming one. What about their Status Screen? What did it say about their race? Was it Terran or Beastman?

Hmm...

Why was I afraid, anyway?

The beast was what I already was.

Esu showed it to me, and apparently, Deckard saw it that way too. Why else the theatrics with the reward? He wanted me to give in to the beast inside me. Only he knew I’d be hesitant to do it on my own, so he gave me a little push, a reason to do so. Bastard!

But was I pissed off? No.

Actually, I was grateful as he wasn’t wrong. Despite my acceptance of what I was, deep down, it still scared me. I needed that push, perhaps even take a little leap of faith, to believe in myself.

So I took Deckard’s words to heart and believed.

At first, I felt nothing. Then a rumble escaped my throat. It was a low warning growl, carrying no presence. Yet, it made Clay stop his attack and take a wary step back. Then came the changes, and it was not without pain. It hurt so damn much it brought me to my knee, and to keep from falling all the way down, I had to brace myself against the sand we fought on.

When my hand shot up, it was instinct. An instinct that was completely out of my control. But it did stop the blade from cutting me deep. The bastard kept his word, and despite his initial faltering, he didn’t let me get away with the change so easily. I didn’t hold it against him. He warned me before the fight, let me prepare. It was my fault for hesitating to use the [Beast] to its fullest for so long.

Too late for regrets, yet I couldn’t help but have some as the agony ripped through my body. For a brief moment, I thought I was going to pass out. It would be so easy just to let my mind drift into oblivion. Only it was bloody risky too.

I could feel it, those instincts fighting for dominance, clouding my mind, shouting at me. Tear him apart, taste his blood! Savage impulses on the surface of the less rugged ones, like licking my wounds or establishing a territory. For the first time in my life, I had the urge to piss on a tree. Luckily there weren’t any, and I had [Indomitable Will] to quell similar cravings.

Seriously, at times I felt like a mind mage was digging around in my head again. So I fought back hard.

If the instincts could be this strong at level 29, it was no wonder that people who tried to master this skill ended up going feral. On the other hand, it could have been a quirk of mine, let’s say it’s my nature that gave the instincts their strength.

On the contrary, my strength was being taken away by crippling pain. Something I hoped wouldn’t come with every time I go full beast, that it would be more like muscles and tendons when I practiced splits. At first, I had to hold back my tears. Now I was doing them with relative ease. It was a matter of training.

Because if that’s not the case here, there’s no fucking way I was going that deep with change ever again in my life.

The beastification itself was more than I expected. My feet had changed beyond recognition and were now similar to terran anthro legs. Fucking weird feeling. There was no better way to describe it.

Hmm....Except maybe it was like standing on tiptoe. What weirded me out was that at the same time, it felt natural.

And it wasn’t just my legs. Every bone in my body changed, grew. It wasn’t just a feeling. I gained another pair of ribs, and my wingspan stretched from three meters to four. When I faced the guardsman before, I had to raise my head, but now our eyes met at the same level.

What I thought was impossible had happened, and my fur got even thicker, thus hiding my swollen muscles, their chiseled features. No kidding, when I looked underneath it in my domain, I had some serious six-pack.

Unfortunately, the changes had not spared my face either. My nose flattened, nostrils widened, and black skin like a dog’s covered the tip. The only thing missing was whiskers.

Then there was my mane. If up until now I could pass it off as ordinary hair, now that was impossible. The mane extended deeper into my forehead, so deep that the long thick eyebrows even blended seamlessly into it. The usually tiny sideburns now reached halfway down my cheeks and the mane shoulder length. Some of it was growing all the way down between my shoulder blades.

Only an idiot wouldn’t think I’d be stronger with the transformation complete. So Clay was trying his best to put me down while I was in the middle of it and not so focused on the fight. Oddly enough, surrendering to the beast made defending against his attacks easier. Not thinking about how to react, what to do next, allowed me to respond quicker, more fluidly.

I went with my instincts, or as Deckard would say, went with my guts. And it worked like a charm.

“Fuck, what are you?!” Clay cursed when I grabbed his weapon again. It wasn’t so easy for him to get me to let it go this time, and it wasn’t until he twirled the glaive in his hands that I let go.

For the first time since my transformation, I moved, slipping back into a crouch. He asked, what was I? “Beast!”

Of course, all the stupid human heard was just a growl.

Poised in his fighting stance, he stood with the blade of the glaive pointing to the ground, scowling. “I belittled you for looking down on your mates, and yet you didn’t even take me seriously.”

“Do you hear them?” He motioned with his head to the city guards.

How could I not? Their shouting was bloody annoying. Though that didn’t mean I knew what they were hollering at us. I tried to keep it just on the edge of my hearing.

“They’re laughing at my expense, want you to kick my ass. You made a fool of me!” He spat on the ground in outrage. “I don’t take kindly to that.”

As much as I would have loved to explain this misunderstanding, I could see that he was in no mood to listen. Not to mention he wouldn’t even understand me right now. So I shrugged it off.

A gesture that made him even more furious. His following attack was more out of anger than a serious attempt to hurt me, easy to follow, even easier to avoid.

Interesting, it was...mind-opening seeing him like this. As long as he had the support of others and saw himself as a winner, he was calm, collected, acted cool, and flirted with me. Now? I doubted he still saw me as cute.