Survival (2)

George took a few steps back from the creature that looked like a mix between a tiger and a rhinoceros. It was almost as tall as him, around 183 meters with a sturdy body. It had yellow fur with black stripes on its back and the rest was a thick grey hide. Its four legs had quite the threatening looking claws and its tiger-like head that had a mighty rhinoceros horn on top of its nose revealed unnatural sharp fangs.

George caught its muscles tensing up with his eyes, that was everything he needed to start moving aside. The beast pounced at him a second later, narrowly missing him when it tried to bite him.

He felt the Flux inside his body starting to move faster when he countered with a punch. A loud sound echoed through the deadly silent desert when his fist hit the side of the head of the beast, making it stumble a few meters to the side.

The beast shook its head for a moment before locking into him again, its blood-red eyes lit up with madness.

George looked down at his fist for a second in shock, 'My punch was a lot stronger than I expected. I can easily destroy walls with this much power but that beast just shrugged it off...'

He avoided a claw attack this time before punching the beast multiple times on the head.

"Such a thick skull!" Cursed George but then a thought crossed his mind and the way he looked at the beast which was still recovering from the barrage of punches changed.

'This thing is different from the Inferno Dragons I fought against, it's like a mindless killing machine, not able to learn from failures...I noticed that a few things are different from the time I was inside the Gate of Beast. This stupid thing is the best testing dummy!'

That's how he started to toy with the mindless beast. It didn't matter how many times it pounced at him, how angry it got or how much faster it became. None of its movements escaped from his focused gaze on it.

The beast finally fell down for the first time on the sand after another barrage of punches to its head.

George retreated quickly because he knew that it would be up again in no time.

He fought for over half an hour against it and gained a good grasp over the situation of himself and the beast, 'There is no doubt now, the power I had inside the Gate of Beast was only around 1/10 of what I can do now. The Flux flooding my body is clearly empowering me in every aspect. My strength, speed, reflexes and endurance have been improved to an inhuman level!'

He looked at the beast which began to stand up, 'That thing is phisicaly superior to me but it's dumb, that's why I have no problem beating it up. I only need to be aware of the sand beneath me as it slows me down a bit...Also there is a problem with the way I fight, it's too uneffective...' Analyzed George calmly.

He recalled the various times people approached him to convince him to start martial arts under them...He never felt the need for that because he mostly stayed out of trouble and he could handle the idiots who tried to fight him. But things were different now, he had to fight against a beast.

A bold idea flashed through his mind, 'Let's try it...'

The Flux in his legs followed his intention and began to flow faster, the white sand under him was violently kicked up when he dashed towards the beast.

The beast wanted to pounce at him but it had been hit so often on its head that it was stunned, making its response too slow.

Its sluggish response didn't go unnoticed and George used his momentum to grab the head of the beast, smashing his knee into its head. The beast howled in pain and was about to fall down again as its legs gave in but George planned to end it now.

He grabbed its longhorn, delivering a vicious uppercut to its jaw that sent it up again. George generated new momentum by making a spin and slamming his elbow against its jaw.

A blood-freezing cracking sound echoed through the desert, followed by a dull sound.

The beast lied powerless on the sand, spurting blood from its mouth that looked out of place.

George took a deep breath while looking down at it, it was still alive...He climbed on its massive body, jumping over 5 meters high while grabbing his ankles in midair and fell on the head of the beast with his knees, delivering a deadly attack.

Another vicious cracking sound was heard through the area while George rolled to the side, gazing at the deformed head of the beast.

'It worked...It's finally dead! Thank you Ong-Bak!' Thought George as he relaxed, feeling that while his body wasn't as tired as his mind was.

Most people would be able to tell that George had just used Muay Thai to kill the beast if they saw him. He had never trained or used it before but he had watched the movie Ong-Bak often, alone or with friends. He only dared to try it because the beast was already weaker from his punches to its head.

George was now able to relax, noticing that the white desert was surprisingly rich with Flux that his Astral Star was constantly greedily absorbing it and distributing it to him and his dragons.

That was the reason for his lack of exhaustion, the question about what he should do now had entered his mind when he heard a familiar sound from his side.

He turned his head, and his eyes widened.

The head of a beast was sticking out from the sand, its blood red eyes staring at him with madness. It was the same head from the beast he had just killed. He was about to jump up when suddenly to his horror another head popped out from the sand.

That head was different, it was the head of a bat but had 6 small blood red eyes that all stared at him with bloodlust.

"F*ck!" Cursed George who barely managed to roll away in time to avoid the jumping attack from the tiger with a rhino body. He stood up just to jump to the side again when he saw a claw incoming.

'What type of sh*t is this? I just killed it and now another one popped out!' Cursed George who saw something move in the edge of his vision.

He had just enough time to take a defensive stance when he felt like a truck hit him.

His vision was spinning when he flew through the air, landing hard on the sand where he rolled further away, leaving a tick trail behind.

"Urgh..." Groaned George in pain. He looked in the direction where the two beasts stood, seeing the whole body from the second beast with the bat face.

"Oh Jesus..." Muttered George after seeing the muscles exploding body of the ape with a bat face and six eyes. That thing was at least 3 meters tall and one of its arms alone was as thick as his whole body. What shocked him further was how fast it was despite its bulky body build...

He only had one thought, 'Can I survive this?'