Damon was sweating like a squeezed sponge, and so was Billy, who looked like he wanted to climb the walls.

They were left sitting in the darkness, awaiting their doom.

The exhausted beast had bleated a protest at first—until Damon heaved himself up and crawled in to show there was more room on the other side—then he had to really suck in his belly and push to fit; since Damon had purposely left a hole only small enough for himself to hurry through, and no larger.

It worked out in the end, with Damon shoving Billy’s butt inside just as the hounds picked up their trail and found the cavern.

Now they were stuck in here, but at least they weren't surrounded, and if the hounds wanted to come in here after them, then they'd have to do so one at a time.

The aggressive beast’s had their blood up and didn’t hesitate for long, but Damon was ready.

When he heard the first hound leap at the hole and start to scramble through, Damon shoved upward with both hands forward, feeling blindly at the opening for a first hound to block the rest with. He had to push the first wave back and make it painful-sounding, causing the rest to hesitate outside.

He failed, miserably.

Despite successfully bracing and stopping the first hound in its tracks and only being bitten in the elbow in return, he wasn’t ready for the next member of the pack to tackle the first one so swiftly. It showed complete disregard for its mate and kept shoving inside with ridiculous strength, making Damon fall back from the hole as a result—and putting him and Billy both in lethal danger.

A third and a fourth hound came inside, but by that point it was too crowded and the pack leader sent no more.

Damon got bowled over and felt the sharp claws and teeth all over him, but rather than panic and strike back wildly, he decided to trust in his bones and focus entirely on one target at a time. He was clinging on desperately to the first hound, having successfully located its neck while it was clasped on to his elbow. Now Damon worked his other arm around in a loop and squeezed its neck arteries shut for dear life until it passed out, then ripped that very artery in a surgical display of butchery, just as the unconscious hound relaxed, allowing his fingers to dig in more easily.

The hound woke from the pain, but only had time to whine pitifully before fading away in seconds, as its mates kept on chewing on Damon’s kicking legs. Although only one seemed focused on him now, as he could hear the leonine front paws of Billy tearing into another one, making it yelp in pain desperately. All while the third hound tried to help by biting at Billy’s neck, but it had gotten the wrong angle to choke him off, and the great mane of hair was in the way, allowing the chimera to successfully ignore the lesser beast.

First attacker dealt with, Damon kicked the remaining beast off of him, earning enough room to get up and tackle it—successfully getting into yet another grappling match that the predator was ill equipped to deal with. These beast’s seemed adept at handling blunt force trauma, and working together to make sure you couldn’t fight back, but in here they didn’t appear to have an answer for when Damon grabbed on and refused to let go. Even if he was having to let them chew on his unbreakable bones all the while, they were fighting a losing battle, only realizing it was futile by the time their brains had already begun fading away from the blood choke.

With the second hound dispatched in less than a minute, and the third bleeding out from being clawed to ribbons, Damon rescued his friend from the final threat, pulling it off by the back legs and then leaping on when it tried turning around to change targets.

Once the cavern was quiet again, Damon knew he’d made them hesitate out there, but he didn’t think he’d put real fear in them. As the fourth hound lay bleeding out, Damon fired off another [Identify] at the dying beast to confirm his suspicions, and sure enough they seemed to have sent in the runts first.

[Famished Motley Ridgeback - Level 34]

That explains the question mark levels, I guess I can’t see the level if they’re too far ahead, but the leaders of the pack have got to be only just out of reach.

When the final hound perished, Damon reached a treshold he'd been awaiting longer than he was aware, and the surge of power was far greater than any that had come before.

A brief flash of white light lit the cave, as the mana released into the air from the kills surged inside Damon's physique, suffusing every muscle cell and causing them to overflow, taking on a new flavor, one tinted by Damon's personal Dao.

[Class level collected: +5 Str, +3 Per, +3 Mana - Free Points: +2.]

[******* *** Class has reached Level 26 and commenced awakening.]

[*********** ********: ******* *********** - ********** **** - ******* **** - ****** *** ****.]

Damon's eyes read the System scroll, that very much said something interesting, but his mind only brushed past it in the haste of battle before a scrambling sound alerted him, forcing Damon to focus back on the hole where the next wave of hounds were already leaping through.

He got into position and threw his hands up protectively, feeling his fingers brush past a wet nose and then teeth and fur, but before he could react and grab onto the head, the mouth snapped and bit down. A normal person would have just had their hand severed in half, but instead there was a terrible gnashing as the metal in his hand resisted the biting force.

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While his hand was being gnawed on, Damon knew precisely where the neck must be located, his other hand struck hard with his four fingers splayed, using the sharp finger bones inside as penetrating incisors, making enough room for his stubborn, bleeding fingers to wriggle inside, causing terrible damage.

The resistance was far greater this time, as this beast was not yet unconscious, but his surging strength was up to the task, expanding the wound until his fingers felt the flood of an artery bursting. By the time the second incoming hound forced him to fall back again, enough damage was caused that the beast bleeding out was a mere matter of time.

[Famished Motley Ridgeback - Level ??]

This second hound was far larger, but Damon could only barely see an outline despite how his eyes had gotten used to the darkness by now. A third hound was coming in, but failed to properly enter the safe room before Billy’s roar stunned the two beast’s with its debilitating echo in the enclosed space.

Damon was not as badly affected with his vastly inferior hearing, and the opening gave him the opportunity to try and rip out the throat of another victim; but the beast kept dodging, forcing Damon to corner it with sweeping, brutalizing kicks until it got stuck against the wall, where rather than go for the neck he aimed carefully and shoved his two front fingers into its eyes.

The whining beast tried to pull out, but couldn't find the hole leading out in its panic, as Damon took the opening to spin around and plant a heel in its neck to finish it off.

The third hound who’d been about to leap inside instead changed its mind, swiftly turning in the opening and fleeing for dear life and limb. Billy swiped at the cowardly tail but failed to grab onto anything, suddenly spoiling for more fight.

That’s when the alpha arrived.

Damon only just spotted the same scarred eye from before, then the shadowed fangs lunged for his face—but it was only a feint.

As Billy tried to come in from the side to provide a distraction for Damon, the great hound turned and swiped its claws at the chimera’s eyes, successfully lacerating Billy's face and making blood spray.

Damon meanwhile refused to stay idle—when he was forced to lean away from the bite, he'd simultaneously kicked upward, striking booted toes into the abdomen and making the beast grunt—and not much else.

Avoid blunt force, the big ones are too powerfully built, damnit. The beast was still going for Billy, but Damon wasn’t about to let that happen unopposed. As he grabbed the tail and pulled, the hound was forced to turn and get him to let go or risk it tearing off, which was when Damon tried the same technique again; hopping on like a climbing monkey, locking his legs around the midriff.

It was not nearly so restrictive on a specimen of such size, but it still effectively got the brute off of Billy. If Damon hadn’t just leveled up again he doubted his Strength would've sufficed, but he’d felt a another surge when they killed the 2nd wave of higher level hounds just now, and his whole body was flaming with power as he pulled deeply from his every reserve to match the intensity of his higher level opponent.

By now Damon was bleeding all over.

Billy was down for the count, stemming the bleeding of his wounded face—all while Damon failed to match the strength of the beast. The crazed creature dove into the walls, beating the air out of the clinging ape, time and time again—yet he refused to let go.

Just when he thought his body would give him up for dead to avoid the pain, the hound suddenly leapt up toward the opening again, using the ledge to scrape Damon off and escaping back outside.

Suddenly everything was quiet again, and they had some breathing room, which they both used well to recover—lungs working like bellows.

A minute passed.

Then two.

After three it became clear the pack was not pressing them any longer, but Damon still waited another fifteen to be fully convinced they’d given up the fight.

When he finally crawled out to have a look after an hour must have gone by, he spotted nothing and no one. The whole pack was gone, and the only sign left was the mess of paw prints in the sand.

That was until Damon stepped outside and looked up at the dune, then he saw the leader of the pack again—staring down. It had the same scar across the eye that had distinguished it since their first clash—yet somehow its rib cage was totally fine. Regeneration too?

Damon was perplexed, but refused to let it show, instead attempting to stand strong, staring up at the leader defiantly. It matched him unblinkingly, until finally breaking off to go after the pack that had already left to secure a safer source of meat for dinner.

That’s when Damon finally allowed himself to collapse.

Only for the same System scroll from earlier to slowly come hovering into view, clearly insistent he learn what it had to say.