Chapter 22: Hunting A Beast Part 3
All the Arrows stopped running when they heard a commotion behind them, they got shocked when they saw another beast biting the neck of the Land Dragon.
“Why is the 3-Eyed Snake here?” one of the hunters asked the question that all the Arrows had in mind.
“This is an emergency! Arrows bring those injured to Berus, then come back here, we are going to change the plan! Armani Give your suggestion!” Vir gave multiple commands.
“For now, let us hide and observe the situation, I need to think of something.” Armani said,
Some of the Arrows carried the injured. So, they can bring them to Berus, and get back as fast as they can. Thankfully, Berus’ location was near to them, they don’t need a lot of time to go back and forth.
The Land Dragon was surprised by the ambush of the 3-Eyed Snake. However, the Land Dragon was experienced enough when it comes fighting another beast. Therefore, the Land Dragon instantaneously responded by clawing the 3-Eyed Snake’s body.
The 3-Eyed Snake released the neck of the Land Dragon when it got injured. Afterward, it cautiously got back to gain some distance to the Land Dragon. Because the Land Dragon was already enraged it didn’t care about its injury, hence, the Land Dragon madly charged at the 3-Eyed Snake.
The 3-eyed snake became vigilant when it saw the Land Dragon charging madly. The 3-eyed snake was smart enough to know that fighting head-on would be a bad idea. Therefore, it used its massive tail to attack the Land Dragon this time.
The Land Dragon perceived the strike, nonetheless, it didn’t try to avoid and entirely endured it. At the same time as the strike landed, the Land Dragon bite the tail, then vigorously swayed its head left and right to worsen the damage it inflicted.
The 3-eyed snake screeched in pain, it attempted to set its tail free by pulling it persistently, but to no avail. The 3-Eyed Snake has no choice but to fight head-on, it bit the Land Dragon to its left head aiming at its injured left eye.
The broken stone spear that was impaled on the left eye of the Land Dragon sunk deeper into its eye. The Land Dragon let go of the tail clearly in pain because of the bite. The 3-Eyed Snake already learned its lesson thus it release its bite on the Land Dragon and withdrew for a few meters.
Both beasts glared at each other, even though the 3-Eyed Snake suffer a much more severe injury, the Life Energy Enveloping its body was still strong and energetic. While the Land Dragon was clearly more tired, furthermore its energy was receded so much that it almost can’t be seen.
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Meanwhile, Berus and Alfred already knew that the Arrows were close to their location because of the loud noises. Berus can’t stop walking back and forth, clearly worried about the Arrows, while Alfred was just sitting beside a nearby tree, deep in thought.
Suddenly, they heard sounds in the neighboring bushes, Berus immediately jumped in front of Alfred to protect him from whatever monster inside the bushes. In the next second, it finally came out, to their surprise the one who showed up was not a monster but the Arrows.
Berus let out a sigh of relief. However, he realized something was not right. Berus felt something was wrong not because of the injured Arrows, he knew that hunting a beast would be difficult, so, having an injured Arrows was normal.
The thing that puzzled Berus was, the Arrows being here without finishing the hunt, besides that, Vir and the other Arrows were nowhere to be seen. Berus became distressed thinking that something happened to Vir and the others.
“Why are you already here? Where are Head Arrow Vir and the others? Did something bad happen?”
The Arrows put the wounded down on the ground and spoke a few words before they left again.
“Berus, look after the injured, we do not have time to explain we need to go back.”
Berus became even more anxious seeing the Arrows leaving hurriedly without explaining anything to him.
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When the Arrows came back after delivering the injured to Berus, they saw both beasts were just glaring at each other without doing anything.
“What are the plans?” one of the Arrow who just came back asked.
“For now, we will observe and let both beasts kill each other, if we saw an opportunity we will attack” Armani replied.
The 3-Eyed Snake noticed the Land Dragon was already tired and can barely envelop its body in Life Energy. The 3-Eyed Snake felt that the Land Dragon was just buying time, so, it can rest. The 3-Eyed Snake doesn’t want the Land Dragon to regain energy even for a bit. Therefore, this time the 3-Eyed Snake initiates the fight.
The 3-Eyed Snake tried to bite the Land Dragon, but the Land Dragon used its tail to deflect this attack, even though the Land Dragon was exhausted it still has enough energy to counterattack. However, since the Land Dragon was very tired, its counterattack was not powerful enough to scare the 3-Eyed Snake.
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The 3-Eyed Snake was stunned when its head was hit by the tail. Because of the low strength of the strike, the 3-Eyed Snake instantly recovered its awareness. The 3-Eyed Snake became even more fierce when it grasped the remaining strength of the Land Dragon. For that reason, the 3-Eyed Snake repeatedly attacked the Land Dragon using its tail.
After a while, the Land Dragon finally recognized that it won’t be able to defeat the 3-Eyed Snake. So, it turned its back and tried to flee. However, why would the 3-Eyed Snake let this prey go? Therefore, it quickly chased the Land Dragon. In no time the 3-Eyed Snake caught up to the Land Dragon with ease.
The 3-Eyed Snake coiled its long body around the Land Dragon’s body. The 3-Eyed Snake instantly tightened its grip on the beast to kill it. The Land Dragon cried in agony, it tried to struggle with all its strength using its claw and sharp teeth, but these actions were fruitless.
Regardless, if the 3-Eyed Snake was getting wounded because of the struggle of the Land Dragon, it didn’t loosen its grip around the body of its prey, instead, the more its prey struggled, the more it tightens its grip.
The Land Dragon let out a sorrowful howl before it passed away.
“Head Arrow, we should not let the 3-Eyed Snake swallow the body of the Land Dragon, if we let it devour it, there is a possibility that the 3-Eyed Snake will be satisfied and just ignore us, then this hunt will truly fail.” Armani informed Vir.
“All Arrows attack!” Vir commanded.
The 3-Eyed Snake was about to eat the Land Dragon but was interrupted by the sudden pain on its tail. The 3-Eyed Snake inspects its tail to discern what was the cause of this pain, then he saw a group of hunters stabbing its wound using a stone spear.
The 3-Eyed Snake was a little annoyed. So, it hissed at the hunters but other than that it didn’t do anything. The 3-Eyed Snake was afraid that if it let go of the prey something might snatch it under its nose. Therefore, it ignored the hunters for now and focus its attention on devouring the Land Dragon.
Vir noticed that the 3-Eyed Snake was ignoring them, so, it can focus on swallowing the Land Dragon. Vir barrow a stone spear to one of the Arrows. After that, he used the body of the beast as a footing and run towards the head of the 3-Eyed Snake.
When Vir was close enough to the head, he enveloped his whole body together with the stone spear using his remaining Life Energy, after that, Vir jumped with full force. While mid-air Vir aimed the stone spear at the eye of 3-Eyed Snake, he used the momentum of his falling, also the weight of his body to increase the power and penetrative of the stone spear.
The stone spear pierced the 3rd eye of the 3-Eyed Snake with no resistance. Vir wanted to pierce the 3-Eyed Snake’s brain, but the angle of his fall was off. The 3-Eyed Snake howled in pain and finally released the body of the Land Dragon.
The 3-Eyed Snake trashed its body everywhere as a consequence, a lot of Arrows including Vir got struck because of the unpredictable body movement of the 3-Eyed Snake. The remaining 5 Arrows including Gunnar and Armani back off, they waited for the 3-Eyed Snake to calm down before they attack.
After a while, the 3-Eyed Snake eventually settle down. Gunnar charged at the beast straight away, Armani tried to stop Gunnar, but Gunnar didn’t pay attention to him. Gunnar was so angry when he saw Vir get hit, that he punched the body of the 3-Eyed Snake multiple times. The 3-Eyed Snake retaliates against Gunnar using its tail.
Gunnar was able to evade the first 2 attacks of the 3-Eyed Snake, but he didn’t get lucky on the 3rd one. Gunnar flew away but one of the Arrows was able to catch him. However, they didn’t expect the 3-Eyed Snake will follow Gunnar.
When the Arrow who caught Gunnar noticed the 3-Eyed Snake it was too late, the 3-Eyed Snake’s mouth was already open and was about to devour both of them. The Arrow made a last-second decision to use all his strength to throw Gunnar out of danger.
“NOOOO!!!” Gunnar Screamed
“Gunnar stop I have a plan, you need to buy me some time, please listen to me just this once! if you do not want all of us to die here!”
Gunnar was about to charge again but he stopped when he heard Armani.
“All of you buy me some time, the success of this hunt will rely on this final plan!”
Gunnar suppressed his anger and follow the plan. Even though the 3 remaining Arrows were very tired and injured they still try to distract the 3-Eyed Snake as much as they can. Armani run beside the Land Dragon, took out his stone knife, then coat the knife with Life energy. After that, he used the stone knife to cut open the stomach of the Land Dragon.
Even though the Land dragon had very tough scales, its stomach was rather soft in comparison. After a while, Armani took out something inside the Land Dragon. This thing was a circle in shape, with a very dense Life Energy coming from it, and the people of the tribe called this thing the Life Stone.
Armani saw the 3 people were already bloodied, so, he raised the Life Stone to Garner the attention of the 3-Eyed Snake. When the 3-Eyed snake felt the dense Life Energy coming from this thing, it immediately rushed to Armani and ignored the 3 Arrows.
Armani run when he perceived that the 3-Eyed Snake was heading in his direction. He used all his remaining Life Energy on both of his feet to lure the beast to the last place. Nonetheless, the 3-Eyed Snake was closing the gap bit by bit.
Armani knew that if this continue the 3-Eyed Snake would catch up to him. So, he let out the Loudest scream he can make.
“BERUS! COME HERE!”
When Berus heard Armani scream, he sprints toward the cloud of smoke in the distance. In a few seconds, Armani saw Berus running towards him.
“BERUS! CATCH THIS! NO MATTER WHAT LURES THE BEAST TO THE PLACE!”
Armani threw the Life Stone to Berus. The 3-Eyed Snake was about to devour Armani, but when it saw Armani throwing the Life Stone to the other person, it changed its mind and chased the Life Stone. Armani jumped to the side to not get run over by the 3-Eyed Snake, but he got still hit by its tail and flew away.
After catching the Life Stone, Berus immediately changed his direction to run back to the final place. Berus’ speed was not comparable to Armani’s. Therefore, the 3-Eyed Snake was able to close the gap much faster. When Alfred saw Berus running from the biggest Snake he has ever seen, his heart beat faster because of the anxiety.
The injured Arrows forced their body to move, they equip their bow and started shooting to give support to Berus. The arrow didn’t even leave a scratch on the snake scales. the 3-Eyed Snake was continuously closing the gap to Berus.
Berus was still at the 2nd stage of Energy Manipulation, that was why he can’t cover his feet with Life Energy. Berus can already feel the presence of the 3-Eyed Snake behind his back. However, he didn’t let this discourage him, instead, he became more determined. The determination on his face became even more noticeable.
When the 3-Eyed Snake finally caught up to Berus, it tried to devour him. Berus covered one of his feet with Life Energy to boost its power. While running, he finally saw a marking on the ground, and then he used all his strength to jump over the marking.
The 3-Eyed Snake’s mouth was only a few centimeters away from Berus. All the Arrows including Alfred was clenching their fist and holding their breath while watching Berus. When the 3-Eyed Snake was about to eat Berus, it suddenly fell.