CHPT 263: Feral Integration....
The winds were cold. The air was thin. The clouds were close, but Fenrir was closer.....
He could feel it at the back of his neck like outstretched fingers tickling his fur. But he could do nothing about it.
He was a bit occupied to say the least.
BOOMMMM!!!
A club struck the ground, marked with a glowing blue insignia that pulsed with life and sent a torrent of solid rock spikes in Claude's direction.
WoO!
In a rush, he dashed away from the advance of mountainous projectiles, leaping and bounding around spikes that covered the stone ground from the million other slams the creature executed.
He'd dodged again, just barely.
As he stood across from the Troll, his ankles and paws stung from being torn and banged against the sharp monoliths of stone the troll summoned. Opposite him, the gray skinned Troll with hair like moss watched him through one remaining pale blue eye while thin lines of red dripped blood from it's arms.
The creature raised its club, "...HAHA!...You move too much, cub. Stand still so I can let you meet my club." It's words spilled in out in a nearly unintelligible mess due to the over-sized teeth that jutted from its mouth along with globs of dirty spit.
"Only if you do the same so I can get rid of the other one." Claude snarled in reference to the Troll's missing eye.
The Troll let out a booming laugh, "Come try."
And try he did.
He lunged at the creature, zig zagging through the pillars of rock in his path until he was in comfortable striking distance.
The Troll welcomed his advance with a heavy swing that Claude ducked in a flash. In the process he swung his Aura shrouded claws at the creature's midsection. Using his speed advantage to the fullest, he let off three swipes in the same area, wearing down the Troll's thick skin before his hearing told him another strike was coming.
FWOO!
He leaned back just in time to barely miss a wild left hook that would've smashed his snout to pieces.
To create more distance, he leapt and used both his feet to push off the Troll's chest and escape the striking zone with an explosive back handspring.
He didn't cease movement upon landing. Deciding to instead stay on all fours and take the high-ground on the mountain.
The Troll watched with a brain-dead grin as he ran around it like a wolf circling its prey, "Always moving, cub. Always running. Come fight. Come get tired so I can hit you easier..."
Claude let out a roar in response before vaulting a rock for even higher ground and leaping to pounce on the Troll.
Instead of doing what a creature mid-pounce would naturally do, he moved on a different set of instincts. Instincts that told him to reach for the Troll with his left hand.
FWSH!
In a burst of green light, the Malevolence Tether burst to life like a whip and wrapped around the creature's thick neck.
He could almost feel that it was adequately fastened around the Trolls neck as if the chain was speaking to him. He responded to it's words in kind, yanking himself towards the Monster causing his descent to reach blinding speeds.
Before he reached the Troll, he deactivated the chain, giving him the freedom of movement to let his Aura shrouded claws rip through the remaining eye of the Troll. Too fast for it to defend, too fast to react at all.
FWWOSH!
SHLCK!
"AAARGHS!"
He flew across it's face in a flash of fur and claws before landing and dropping to a roll nearby with a eyeball and strip of grey flesh littering the cold ground between them.
The smell of blood brought him closer to mindless ferocity-- a place he'd slowly been pulled closer and closer to with his time spent in his true form.
In fact, he'd been hovering so closely to it, that a small puddle of blood was all it took for him to engage in a violent hunt for more.
He'd attempted to speak words but all that escaped his maw was another wolven throaty roar. The human language had become foreign. So had any sort of reliable or complex fighting style.
What was once his own mix of feral and trained combat had devolved into a primal chain assisted hack and slash.
From above, all anyone would be able to see were green flashes of flame, silver glints of chains popping in and out existence followed by a green eyed black blur unleashing madness on the giant Troll.
The Troll attempted to defend, but he was too fast. One moment the chain was around the creatures neck-- threatening to yank the air from his lungs, and then it disappeared. Followed by the wild shape-shifter ripping at it's face before the chain returned, now triple wrapping around it's wrist to repeat the violent process of maiming a monster.
Just as Claude's speed climbed when he trained with his pack, it did the same within the Astral Realm as the scent of blood pushed him closer and closer to the state of ferocity that was only a step away.
After every landed strike, he padded deeper and deeper into the mental domain. More blood spilled in response to his claws digging deeper into old wounds, grey pieces of Troll flesh littered the stone floor like the tattered remains of clothing left to soak up the increasing amounts of blood soaking the floor.
"More.....More..." The only words that made it to Claude's mind as he moved as a blur all around the Troll who swatted at him as if he were an oversized gnat.
After a few seconds, the Troll completely ceased attacking and was left to stumble and defend the wolven onslaught. A sign that the win was leaning in Claude's favor.
Fenrir took notice from his place at the apex of the mountain. He could feel the god's eyes burning holes into his neck no matter where or how fast he moved.
"HAhA!....YES!....JuSt LiKE ThIS! YoU FiGhT JuST LIke THiS!....Rrrrr...EmBRaCe The MadNesSsss!" His booming voice rattled it's way down the mountain like an avalanche as lightning split the clouds and lit up the night sky, shedding light on the horrifying form of the wolf that rested on the mountains peaks.
The Troll roared in pain and panic before beginning it's feeble attempt at fleeing all while he continued slashing and swiping the Monster to shreds. With no eyes, it seemed to have no clue that it was heading right off the mountain....
During it's run, he slashed open it's ankles, ribs, stomach and arms until the once grey skin was now died with crimson.
He would've kept going if the Troll hadn't spun around and began slamming the floor with it's club.
BOOM!....BOOM!...BOOM!
Cascades of stone spikes rumbled across the floor, forcing Claude to avoid attacking and focus on not being overwhelmed by the small mountains of rock.
He continued to sidestep and leap over the attacks, unaware of the Troll's mischievous grin as it closed off more of the floor.
It was zoning him. Forcing him to work with less and less angles of attack until it had only one.
Claude dodged a final attack, now standing across from the Troll with the mountain drop-off to the right of them.
To him, nothing changed. It was still standing, so he hadn't ripped the creature open enough. He planned to do so with his next attack to end the blind the Monster. No longer thinking of the reward it would bring from Fenrir and now focused instead on the hunt.
FWSH!
His Malevolence Tether shot across the distance between them and snaked around the Troll's neck. Before he could pull himself to the creature, the Troll grabbed ahold of the chain and used it's monstrous power to swing him right off the cliff.
As he flew further from the mountains edge and the ground sunk deeper below him, he could hear the Troll speaking under the loud sound of cold winds in his ears.
"Bye bye, cub...haha...."
Claude snarled and yanked the chain with both his hands, pulling him closer to the cliff while also pulling the Troll off with him.
"OH--"
Fwoo!
The sudden scent of fear that wafted from the blind Monster as it's feet left solid ground was enough to make it all feel worthwhile.
He snarled and reached for the Troll as they fell to their deaths, still to mindless to care that he'd failed. Still to feral to understand that his landscape would change drastically as soon as his back collided with the cold stone earth below.....
***
Still too feral. A sentence that rung true even as his large body smashed into cold ground and everything went black including Fenrir's rage filled words as he fell.
In a matter of seconds, the feeling of cold was gone, and the warmth of sunlight fell on his fur. In a burst of new sounds and scents he exploded to his feet with eyes scanning the area in a rush to understand his surroundings. Still too feral. Still too feral to understand that he'd woken up from the Astral Realm and occupied the real world once again.
None of that mattered in that moment. For the moment, he was too far gone. He looked the way he had when he faced the HellBreeder again. Muscles bulging with power and adrenaline, fur standing on end to make him look even more imposing. And eyes devoid of humanity, glowing purely like two green suns.
He currently only had one instinct to carry out as the scent of honey and flowers hit his acute senses. Protect the newly changed.
The wolves that surrounded the newly changed stood erect with their snouts aimed behind him.
He spun around and found a man wearing baggy dark clothing and a blindfold watching them, watching the newly changed.
In that moment there was nothing left to do but what his instincts deemed fit. And they currently told him to erase any threats in the area.
The man that watched them in the distance was a threat.
So, there was nothing left to do but act
He charged, uncaring of the magical fizzle that occupied the space between them. All that mattered was protection...
"Monsieur?....MONSIEUR WAIT!"
CRASHHHH!!