Tian heard the sound of chaos, the shattering of glass and the roar of a beast over his music and knew what had happened instantly. His first response was naturally to run and help, that is what he had always done. But now was different, Tian seemed to realize something as his blood ran cold and he stopped halfway through his turn.

Watching everyone run in the opposite direction, something he had been about to do something he was accustomed to in the past, running towards the fire per se. But he couldn’t bring himself to do it anymore.

‘I can’t believe this…’ Tian was on the verge of cursing out as he stood in silent contemplation. The sound of shouting was almost completely drowned out by the violent howling of the beast and buildings crumbling under its sheer might.

Tian couldn’t see it directly from here but the pressure he felt was at least B class, maybe even A class. He was very certain of this. In the past it was extremely rare for Tian to feel this, in fact even in his prime he might only be able to help those who were hurt or trapped in this situation, there was no way he could ever fight an A class one on one.

His body was strong, but he did not have any skills.

Tian scoffed at that thought, he knew his physical strength was around low C class. That wasn’t nearly enough to combat the beast… But it was enough for him as it seemed as if his feet were already propelling him toward the danger. The drowning sensation of weight coming from the monster caused most to be nearly unable to breath and that was only if they weren’t paralyzed in fear before it.

The light of an explosion flared as he ran forward, it looked like there was already somebody locked in combat with it, although the ranker was definitely falling on his back foot. Tian knew how he felt, probably trying to buy every second possible to stall for backup that may never come.

‘What can I do…’ Tian felt useless, he couldn’t think of anything besides that that could impact the situation.

Without any way to help directly Tian tried to scan the area for anything that may help. As he was doing so he heard a loud CRACK as the ranker flew back whipping through the air and crashing through a storefront.

The ranker was firmly knocked into a wall, landing him on a pile of rubble. The beast did not hesitate to take the opportunity to attack him, swiftly dashing toward the wounded man.

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‘I guess I have one shot.’ Tian felt conflicted as he only had a single use of this item that could potentially save his life in the future.

Tian pulled out a small pendant from his bag, his last piece of equipment from then. He sighed, feeling his heart bleed and activated it, causing a few pulses of light to emerge. Traveling toward the beast seemingly extraordinarily slowly while in reality with a soft ‘crack’ it vanished from in front of Tian in but an instant and lashed against the beast.

Knocking it tens of feet off course and causing a massive burn to be left on the side of it. The scent of charred fur assaulted Tians senses as he ducked for cover, knowing that no savage beast would ever let that slide.

CRASH

As Tian had expected, shortly after he lunged out of the way a massive ball of light had returned to him and hit the building next to where he had been standing, turning the pillar holding it up into ashes and causing the ceiling to cave in on itself, the rubble falling onto Tian.

Tian winced in pain as he rose to his feet, a sharp pain overcame him as he patted the rubble and dust off. Unfortunately, he did not have the luxury of taking care of his wounds. The beast was now returning to a combative posture.

Normally these beasts would be dealt with by patrolling rankers, right now it seemed the one that had initially engaged the beast was in worse shape than he was right now. It looked like he wouldn’t be able to move, the beast was going to capitalize on this opportunity to kill the one that had been troubling it so much before.

He did not have the strength to help now that he no longer had that pendant. Intervening now would simply be throwing away his own life, it was only rational that now that he didn’t have an item such as that pendant.

So why… Why was he rushing at the beast? He knew that the beasts wouldn’t be affected by most anything outside of the portal, but grabbing a piece of metal piping that had been broken off of the building still gave him some piece of mind.

Shouting to get the beast’s attention before it devoured the ranker, he jumped off of a bench that was still intact, thrusting the metal pipe into the open wounds of the beast. The howling of the monster causing his vision to shake and his ears to ring, his heart dropped as it threw him across the room.

Crashing through the front of a building with a loud BANG he slammed against the back wall. If he hadn’t before he now has successfully gotten the beast’s undivided attention.

‘Well at least I bought some time.’ Tian started thinking to himself as his vision was dimming, he didn’t have much feeling in his body, and he most certainly did not have the strength to contend against the beast any further. Most regular people would have been ripped in half by a hit from a beast like that, however one cannot say he was a regular person… Well at least physically now.

With that thought Tian blacked out right as he heard the rubble move and the menacing howls of the beast.

‘Awakening successful. Skill Activated.’