The start of the fight was strange. It began as we expected, with Rik and Grognar starting to shoot their arrows at the beast. With the small size of the lair, and the static target, they hit the monster with ease. They couldn’t shoot at anything else than the back and arms of the bear, as it was curled together a bunch, but the “Tchok! Tchok!” sound was pretty pleasing.

Then, the bear didn’t move. For a moment, I thought they may have killed it in one (two) shot. But I was quickly led out of that belief as I saw Rik and Grognar cock another arrow on their respective bows.

They threw three more salvoes at the bear before it finally realized what was happening. It got up on its back legs, rising to a very tall and impressive height. It could have beaten the wolf man in size, but I couldn’t be sure with the distance.

Me and my sister tensed up. We were under the treasure pile’s shadow, but with drake fire next to us lighting us up. That was another thing we would need to be careful of, as falling into the fire pits would be our final mistake.

The bear turned around, looking a bit silly, it’s tongue lolling around and it’s black eyes completely void of anything.

I hadn’t seen an animal, let alone a bear, with such a weird expression on its face before, and it forced a shiver down my spine.

As it finally finished moving around, a new salvo striking its belly, the fight truly began.

And it began with horror.

The bear opened up vertically, like a flesh zipper had opened from his head to half his torso. Both sides bloomed open to show a black mess of muscles and innards, covered in teeth.

Human-looking teeth.

Both sides clenched shut, then reopened.

KR KR

Then two tentacle-like appendages emerged out of the innards, with human-like eyeballs on the extremities. They immediately angled like snakes to face us.

That’s when I remembered Grognar’s advice.

The bear had opened.

We needed to run.

I took my sister’s hand and booked it.

“Holy shit, holy shit, holy shit…” She chanted. “Did you see that? Nielle, did you see that?”

“I fucking wish I didn’t!!!”

“That’s not fantasy or litRPG at all?! I didn’t ask to go to Cthulhu’s backyard!”

I looked behind us, and there it was. The thing was more slithering than walking on the floor, not going extremely fast, but fast enough for it to be really scary.

And we were playing a deadly version of tag with it.

This plan sucked. I had to keep an eye on it all the time, to make sure we weren’t going too fast or too slowly, and every time I did that, I risked falling into one of the firepits or just tripping on a rock or my own feet. My sister had made it her job to guide me out of harm’s way, but I would have loved a switch of roles. Looking at the [Tooth-Bear] wasn’t helping with my mental health at all. Then again, I had Lila, so it was better me than my sister.

Sometimes I saw an arrow or two fix itself on the outer skin or manage to pierce the toothy interior, but it didn’t seem to have any effect. The monster wanted us dead, and it wasn’t going to stop for anything.

I don’t know how many rounds around the pile we made, but I had lost count after twenty-four.

My and my sister were heavily out of breath, and I was trying to get a glimpse of Grognar. Had they left us? He had said that he was going to fight with his spear.

“Grognar!” I screamed.

I looked behind, and the beast was gone.

“Shit L stop!”

She did as I said, a crazy look in her eyes. “Where is it!?”

“I don’t know, look in front. Maybe it…” I finally saw Grognar at the back behind a boulder. He was clearly out of arrows, so what was he waiting for, exactly? “Grognar!” I shouted again.

But as I cried out, the pile of treasures behind me came crashing down, and I would have been crushed if not for my sister pulling me away.

The noise blared through the lair, but to my ears, it was nothing compared to the painful cry that echoed next to me.

“L?” She was on the ground, clutching at her belly. I could see teeth piercing her flesh and slowly covering her torn vest with blood.

“Hhh.” She tried.

I didn’t hesitate, taking her over my shoulders as I looked at the former pile of treasure. The door to the station had fallen off, but it was out of reach. Between us and it stood the [Tooth-Bear]. It was currently trying to push away some of the swords and big piles of ores that had fallen on it as he had tried to rush through the mountain of treasure.

I grabbed my sister and ran to Grognar.

He had a very conflicted look and was firmly holding his long spear.

“Elle. You need to leave your sister. Rik got hit by one of the teeth…” I saw the elf sitting behind the boulder, holding his right leg. There was a hole in his thigh muscle.

The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

“I’m not Elle.” I felt something cold reach out for me. I stared at the wolf man, something like freezing foreboding grip my heart.

“Nielle. Sorry. I can’t fight it without it being distracted, if it eats, I will be able to strike its eyes, that will kill it.”

“Use Rik then.” I responded calmly.

“I won’t. He’s the last of my men.”

“And she’s my twin sister.”

“Fucker…can’t…” My sister tried to insult him.

Grognar looked to me and my sister, then behind us.

KR KR

The noise seemed to bring him to a decision.

I saw his eyes. Despite being a wolf man, he really had human-like expressions.

“I’m sorry about this Nielle. I hope you’ll understand…” He brought one of his hands forwards.

He wanted to knock me out.

He wanted to kill my sister, prevent me from holding Lila.

His punch was a bit slower than I would have expected. Just enough for me to step forward.

!?Error!? Magic does not exist.

I pushed my right hand to his neck. I was a bit surprised when I saw my hand pierce it like butter. Gushing arterial blood emerged from the hole and drenched me once again in the warm red liquid.

He seemed even more shocked than I was.

My sister gasped loudly. “Daniel!?”

I removed my hand to give it a quick look, underneath the thick blood, sharp claws had appeared. That was the hand I had seen Benedict work on.

You have killed Grognar [Homo Lupus Sapiens] [Level: 104]

10 400 Experience awarded

The dead body of Grognar dropped the ground.

I caught his spear out of his hands before it fell with him.

“What the fuck have you done!?” Rik screamed in a mix of horror and anger.

I gave a quick look to the bear; it was getting out of the rubble.

I glanced back at Rik. “His plan seemed to be our best bet. He didn’t want to sacrifice you and I wasn’t going to let him sacrifice my sister.”

Gaëlle didn’t sound happy. “Daniel? What did you do? Oh Daniel. Look at me please?”

I had no time to look at her, I gently laid her on the boulder, then dragged the body of Grognar closer to the [Tooth-Bear]. When far away from my sister, I took a few steps back.

I waited for the monster to rush.

It didn’t. It seemed a bit hurt, its slithering leaving a trace of dark ooze behind it. Now that it was getting closer, I could see that the arrows hadn’t done much at all, barely piercing the outer skin and glancing off the teeth.

I saw it do one weird movement with a tentacle-eye, and saw it throw a tooth right at me.

I didn’t have time to dodge, and I felt it hit and penetrate my left arm.

I gave a look to my wound, then back to the bear.

My unresponsiveness made it lose his interest in me, and it finally came over Grognar. The eyes lingered over the dead body, then the lower part of the body opened some more, showing another row of teeth, much sharper and shark-like, and a hole that looked like its real mouth.

I waited for it to start eating.

I plucked the teeth out of my left arm and watched the wound close. I would need both my arms.

I would have one shot.

I wasn’t going to throw, I would miss.

I looked at the tentacles. I would never manage to hit them. And even then, wouldn’t I just blind the beast?

No, I wanted it dead. It had hurt my sister.

It was eating Grognar.

His poor wife Anna.

The thought unsettled me, but the coldness in my veins pushed it back. Grognar had tried to kill my sister.

The [Tooth-Bear] had already eaten the wolf man’s left leg.

I waited.

“What the fuck is your sister doing? What kind of sick monster are you two?” I heard Rik shout.

The bear perked up. It looked at me for a moment, then returned to its meal.

“She’s not okay. You don’t understand. Nielle wouldn’t…she’s not…Ah fuck!”

I turned to look at my sister just for a moment. She was hurting, but she would live. She was removing the teeth from her belly.

“I don’t understand!? Then explain what’s happening to your wounds then? Are you disguised monsters? Some sort of sick [Doppelgängers]?”

They were disturbing the [Tooth-Bear]’s meal. But that didn’t matter. It finally opened wide to try and gulf down Grognar’s entire torso.

And by doing so had his whole mouth opened to me.

I didn’t run. I walked.

Slowly.

No need to rush.

The monster was currently stuck on some kind of metal bracelet over the wolf man’s left arm.

I plunged the spear deep into its gullet.

With such strength it went through and pinned it to the ground.

It started trashing. I looked at it for a few seconds, satisfied, then went back to my sister.

“Daniel?” She pried. I couldn’t decipher her expression, which wasn’t something that usually happened to me.

“Is it dead?” Rik seethed with rage as he asked.

“I don’t know. We’re leaving.” I responded as I picked up my sister.

“Ouch. Daniel! Please, you’re scaring me. You’re not acting like yourself!”

I left Rik there and went for the door.

“Where the hell are you going now? You think you can just leave me to die here?”

“You’ll be fine. Your wound isn’t that bad. You could have pushed on the pain and made the distraction for Grognar, and this mess wouldn’t have happened in the first place.” I countered without stopping. The elf choked as if I had punched him in the gut.

“Daniel!?” My sister said in disbelief. Because we were passing next to the [Tooth-Bear] or because of the freezing cold in my voice, I didn’t know. I didn’t even look at the trashing monster, sending teeth and black goo all over the place.

KR KR. KR KR. KR KR.

No teeth were hitting us, so why should I have cared?

As I arrived at the door, I paused as something reached me through the haze. A little clench.

I wasn’t cold.

I was enraged.

Putting a name on my emotion suddenly made it unbearable.

No, not yet, I tried my best to hold on to the cold, and not the remorse, the horror and the madness.

I reached for the door’s handle with my hand, it was trembling. I could barely hold on to L.

“Oh god, Daniel.” I heard pity in my sister’s voice, as if she too, had understood my feelings.

You have killed [Tooth-Bear] [Level 211]

For killing a living being two times over your level, you gain extra experience

Experience is shared with others

7 033 Experience awarded

100 000 Experience awarded

You levelled up

You levelled up

“Exit…” I told the prompt. It had made me miss the door’s handle, and I couldn’t wait, I was going to crumble.

You have unlocked Class: [Berserker]. Would you like to take this Class? Y/N

But I didn’t have time to answer or understand the system, as my hand finally found our escape.

As I felt the cold metallic floor under my feet, I realized fully what I had just done.

My sister screamed as we both went to the ground.

“Daniel!”

“I…I killed him.”

“Oh…fuck…” She winced in pain. “Daniel. It isn’t your fault. It isn’t your fault.”

“How is that not my fault?” My sister was holding me, her belly looked much better, but there was still some bleeding. “You need the silver water…I…”

“I’m fine Daniel. You saved me. He was going to kill me, and you saved me. That’s what happened.”

“I was so angry…I…” I had lost control over myself. I had acted like a cold-hearted killer. I trembled all over, and nausea took over. I vomited on the ground, saw what remained of the meal Anna had given us, and at the horror of it all...

I passed out.