“So, less than 3 hours left until we get whisked off to who knows where, what do you think?” I ask her as well as my Companions.

Artemis and Horus agree to go along with our decision, leaving Belina thinking things over with a furrowed brow.

A few moments pass while she deliberates while I keep an eye on the slithering snake as it coils itself down the tree in short, fast motions before it reaches the ground and slithers its way through the expansive root system.

“I do—” Belina begins uncertainly before suddenly, her decision is taken from her.

A large eagle lands not 20 feet from our place just below the true peak, meaning the bird lands squarely in the snake’s claimed domain…

A loud, ululating roar echoes out as soon as the bird touches one clawed talon to the ground, the loud rustle and crash of a heavy, fast-moving object signifying the Beast heading directly at us.

“Shit, its so fast!” I say in alarm, turning to run as my Party does the same but a loud whoosh and a huge shadow suddenly covering us causes me to skid to stop just as fast.

The snake, chewing casually on the unfortunate eagle, if the feathers falling from its huge maw are any indication, has literally launched straight over us after catching the bird in its jaws and as it turns to return to its territory, we are directly before it!

We all freeze in place, except for Horus who’s still high overhead, while the snake moves towards us until, not ten feet away, its chewing stops abruptly and its yoga ball-sized eyes narrow as it looks at us like a king staring down a pauper.

“You know,” I say in a normal, everyday tone of voice since there is no sense in whispering now, “I usually like to try and get a bit creative but I really can only think of one word to say right now…”

“Fuck.”

We rush to scatter like mice as the malevolent serpent lowers its head and charges us!

“Get to the tree! There has to be some roots blocking off some area enough to keep its bulk out!” I shout over our heavy breathing and the rumbling noise of the massive creature slithering its length over the rocky ground.

We reach the exposed roots and begin threading our way through them, looking for any nook or cranny to fit us.

But my plan swiftly goes up into literal kindling as the snake blows right through a few interfering branches as it hunts for us, sending splinters flying through the air like a multitude of supersonic darts.

“Duck!” I yell as I dive to the dirt, Belina and Artemis sliding to the ground themselves as the projectiles go flying over head with a whoosh.

“What now?!” Belina shouts breathlessly in panic as we jump back to our feet and keep running even as the snake gains on us further .

“Woof!” Artemis barks, gesturing with her head toward a particularly tall root, one that stretches nearly 20 feet higher than the surrounding bark covered tendrils.

Getting a sense of her idea, I rush to the outlier root and look at it closely, seeing the rough surface enough to tell it is climbable.

“Alright, this is where we need to make our stand.” I say quickly as the Beast approaches, asking, “Belina, can you take its attention for a second? Then Artemis can come in from one side to keep it from overwhelming you and I will try to attack from the top of this root right at its eye level.”

Belina, eyes wide, steels herself before replying, “I can do it!”

I give her an encouraging nod as Artemis turns and prepares herself to strike, her acceptance of the plan a foregone conclusion to her, apparently.

“Horus, try and strike as I do and then get back out of range right away, I fear if you try alone this thing will snap you up.” I tell Horus, a warm feeling of acknowledgment sent back in reply.

CRASH!

That loud, echoing crash signals the end of our time to plan, the snake knocking more roots to pieces as it appears from the dust without pause only to charge us once more.

Quickly, I turn and scurry up the chosen root with the help of Huntsman’s Athleticism until reaching its highest point before returning to the trunk itself, waiting in place with Forest Fade activated and my hatchet held in a tight grip as I await the perfect opportunity.

Belina lets out a battle cry as she smashes her spear against her shield and sets her weapon alight in ghostly flame while her shield charges up with a silvery sheen, signaling the use of her Mythril Shield Spell.

The python, eyes alighting upon her, begins opening its jaws as it approaches her in a slithering mass of teeth and scales.

Belina braces, one foot planted behind her and spear poised to thrust ahead, but the snake is just too large and it impacts her with bone-crushing force, knocking her flying even with her Class and ability focus on standing her ground!

Worried, I manage to keep my mouth from letting out a cry of alarm and revealing myself just as Artemis launches her own attack from the Beast’s flank, her talons and jaws outstretched.

She lands on the massive serpent and digs in claw and fang, ripping and tearing in a frenzy as she tries to dig through the tough scales to the tender flesh beneath.

At first, the snake keeps moving toward the fallen Belina but as canine weapons finally draw blood, it lets out a hissing cry before lashing its heavy tail at its unwanted passenger!

The truck sized appendage bats Artemis from the Beast and sends her flying through a number of roots before she lands heavily, unmoving.

I feel her barely conscious in my mind as I leap to attack with a wrathful heart, her mental presence reassuring me at least of her survival as I swing my hatchet for all I’m worth, Wild Rampage in full effect.

I come down on the Beast’s oversized snout, bringing my weapon blurring down to strike at one of its eyes as I do and catching Belina rushing back into the fray out of the corner of my eye.

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Unfortunately, the cold-blooded bastard blinks just as my blade lands!

Instead of blinding the Beast, my hatchet embeds itself in the thickly scaled eyelid and sticks fast!

I wildly try and pull away but it's locked in place. Belina is about to attack it from the side, and I realize I need to hold its aggro for her.

Releasing my hatchet, I raise my hand to punch it instead but the slimy creature has wised up, abruptly whipping its head to the side and launching me at the tree trunk with a thud.

“Ahhh!” Belina yells as she strikes, one of her channeled spear Spells allowing her to just barely penetrate into the muscle of the creature’s side.

Whipping its head back around, the snake opens it jaws wide as Belina hunkers protectively behind her shield, causing me to actually cry out in alarm this time as I notice a salient detail about pythons that I should have seen before…

As I feared, the Beast unhinges its jaw, making it now large enough to swallow a sedan easily, and closes thoee savage teeth around Belina, swallowing her whole!

“No!!!” I yell, gritting my teeth as I rush back into the action, Artemis growling loudly in her own cry of loss and fear.

Glowing hatchet held at my side, rage colors my vision a violent blood-red as I let my Style begin to build inside me and begin striking again, landing shallow or glancing blows off of durable scales while barely managing to dodge its swiftly snapping jaws.

Artemis, on the other side of the Beast meanwhile, worries away with claw and maw at the slowly widening wound she had made in her first frenzied attack before she was thrown off.

But the damage is just not enough, the Beast ignoring it as it continues to attack us, narrowly missing snagging a diving Horus from the air before he changes direction just in time!

At last, my Style begins to really ramp up, my mind entering into the nearly battle trance-like state that signifies its growing power, my hatchet beginning to dig deeper as I draw from the weight of the very mountain we stand on to increase the penetration of my blows.

As scales shatter and fall to the ground under my increasing attack power, the snake hisses in rage, its eye glaring down at me as it raises itself up onto its body to tower nearly 40 feet into the air!

“Uh-oh…” I mutter, turning to dive away as far as I can.

As the Beast’s jaw unhinges once more, its great gaping mouth closes in on me and I fear I will get the Jonah and the Whale treatment too…

ROARRRR!

I turn from my prone position in the dirt at the loud, pain-filled roar from the Beast, seeing the business end of a spear sticking out from the inside of its sinuous length!

As the spear pulls back through the hole, I indicate for Horus and Artemis to take the creatures attention right away, Horus diving down to harry around its eyes which it blinks repeatedly in attempt to defend the sensitive orbs. Meanhile, Artemis sends claws of ice again and again at her constant target, the wound now reaching below flesh, into the muscle and even bone!

As the Beast turns, leaving me momentarily forgotten, I rush at the small, yet deep hole Belina’s spear made!

“Move further down!!!” I shout as loud as I can as I draw near.

I continue to channel my Style until I reach close enough and, as I raise my hatchet in a huge, leaping swing, I let it all flow out and through me, my hatchet alight with a greyish sheen as I drive my blade right at the gaping wound.

Kra-koom!!!

The loud, thudding crash echoes out through the World Treeling andshoots a shockwave of dust, broken scales and blood out into the vast open sky above. As the cloud disperse, my weapon, imbued with the mountain, is embedded all the way through the Beast’s huge spine only stopping just on the other side, not much further from Artemis’ targeted wound.

The snake, now lying trembling, bisected and mostly paralyzed, breathes heavily but remains prone as I cautiously approach the head, Artemis joining me as we each take an eye and dig gruesomely until the breathing stops.

Backing away and shaking off some gross fluids in the process, we quickly rush in concern to our subsumed teammate’s last location.

Holding open the skin around the massive entry point of my strike, I yell down its inside, “Belina! You okay in there?”

I keen my ear toward the opening and wait a moment until I hear, to my stark relief, a few quiet coughs and a soft groan echoing out from somewhere down the snake’s perforated gullet.

Thinking quickly, I shove the business end of my axe head into the wound and run it down the snake’s belly like pulling down a zipper. It requires some solid elbow grease to get going through the stiff scales but it gets easier once I get some momentum, managing to open a 10 foot long slit down its central length.

The vaguely surgical looking opening reveals the green-blood spattered form of Belina, curled into a ball and still moaning in apparent pain, pain I soon realize is coming from the thing’s blood as it begins smoking in the open air which worryingly showcases its strong acidity!

Alarmed, I try and wipe the offending gunk off but any of her skin I wipe comes away with my hand and begins eating into my own skin!

Panicking now, I try and wipe with some scrap furs and cloths I have accumulated but all I do is reveal more and more of her red flesh and exposed muscle as the surface skin sloughs off.

“No…No….No…..” I moan in dismay as I continue to scramble to save her, Artemis whines and adds her own pain to mine as she puts her head down on her paws near the suffering Belina’s head and sniffs her to show what love she can.

I wrack my brain for a solution, any solution. My ability to heal is only for myself or my Beast Companions. We have some basic health potions too which I hastily dump down her throat but any skin that heals begins to slough off right away again.

Horus, coming to land on my head, peers intently down at her, sadness shining in his small eyes at the sight.

“I….Its okay……” Belina manages to weakly mumble as I scramble to help her in any way I can, “It’s my time, I guess….”

“Don’t say that!” I tell her frantically as I try and hold her together by my hands alone, tears beginning to well in my eyes, fear and pain warring inside me in a maelstrom of agony both remembered from my parents’ deaths and newfound from the unique relationship Belina and I have developed together in our training and battles.

Most of the poison has dissolved in the air or fallen off with her skin by now, revealing the angry red color of the slick muscle beneath as she shivers at the cold air on her exposed flesh, only her face remains mostly untouched, where she must have used an arm to protect it.

“Really, its okay….Thank you for letting me be a part of your journey,a… a part of your family….” She whispers weakly as a small, pain-filled smile stretches her lips.

“Of course! What will we do without you?? Please, please stay with us!” I plead as I grip her hand gently in mine to try and urge her to live on.

“You…you gave me something to hope for again…I never really talked about it but I lost my parents that first day…I didn’t think I would make it much longer and I didn’t really care to beyond helping people of the Village in those first days…. And then, I saw you, making the most of the System, fighting for anyone or anything in need. You brought hope alive for me and many others too and then helped it to grow…..Your power will someday shake the very foundations of this new, far wider and far more wondrous universe.” she tells me with a sweet smile between pain-filled breaths before breaking off to cough weakly.

“You gave us just as much. Your determination, your protection, your kind heart, they all made us so much better, the world so much brighter. The System gave you the perfect Class… you are a Bulwark against our enemies but also, against our fear, loneliness, and despair.” I tell her with heartfelt emotion.

“Thank you….Nova…Artemis…Horus….Please, never stop fighting, growing, advancing….You can save everyone….I just know it…..” she finishes just loud enough for me to hear but with an evident conviction of belief far louder than any voice could be.

As the last word escapes her lips, she falls limp in my arms, her eyes falling open to stare at the star-filled sky hanging in the heavens high overhead.

Any casual observer of the mountaintop that night would first see the vast panorama stretching out from the peak to the distant horizon but their eyes would irresistibly be drawn to a far more magical spectacle this night, that of three forms: a man, a dog and a hawk, wreathed in brilliant auroras of greenish-gold, blue, and bright white respectively, all vibrant manifestations of their power as they voice their emotions to the world at large.

ROARRR!!!!!!!

From the forest floor far below to the far stretches of the desert in the distance, all manner of creatures, big and small, predator and prey, freeze alike at the triplicate, echoing, outbursts of emotional power, even the largest most dangerous Beast feeling a cold chill at the sensation!

A moment later, I come back to myself, tears dripping from my cheeks in ignored streams as I hold our fallen teammate.

Artemis leans over to rest her head against Belina’s, Horus hopping over to her shoulder to nuzzle her hair gently one final time….