Chapitre 25: Forest Guardian
Running through the forest was great training for Rackshar to get used to his new body. At least, that's what he kept telling himself over and over again, as he ground his teeth in frustration.
The forest floor was overgrown with ferns, bushes and shrubs making Rackshar feel like he was wading through water. There were roots sticking out of the ground trying to snag his feet and hills and dales to cause him to slow down. Even when all that was absent there was the ever-present slick mud to trip him up.
Overall, the whole process of running through the woods drove Rackshar insane. It was such a waste of energy and effort. For someone who could fly in the past, it was like his legs had been cut off and he was now trying to acclimate to dragging himself around with his arms.
After tripping several more times, Rackshar was very ready to find his prey and rip them apart with nothing but his teeth.
He arrived at the base of the hill the athonexs were heading to after an hour. Without even pausing Rackshar dashed up into the grove at the top.
The trees of the grove were young, only reaching around 7 or 8 meters high and were fairly slender. They were packed so close together that Rackshar could easily reach out and touch two of their trunks without even fully spreading his arms.
As Rackshar neared the top of the hill he came to a clearing at its crest. The clearing was rather small, only around 5 meters wide. Both the athonexs were laying in the clearing seemingly asleep.
Rackshar held in his chuckle as he snuck toward the closest beast, a loud snap echoing from his movements.
He glanced down at the dry branch he had just stepped on as both athonexs came to their feet, glaring at him.
Grunting "I hate humans...", Rackshar threw himself to the side, as several spikes tore through the air where he had just been standing.
Taking the time before they could adjust their aim. Rackshar quickly climbed one of the young trees on the edge of the clearing, although halfway up the tree began to bend under his weight, and he was forced to stop.
Rackshar paused for a brief moment and waited until the athonexs shot another volley of spikes at him, before he tried to jump off the tree to land on one of their shells.
Unfortunately, the tree, already bending under his weight, simply bent more and robbed him of all his momentum. His assassin dive quickly turned into a sprawling drop. The only good thing that came from his lack of grace was that, while he didn't manage to jump over the spikes, he did manage to fall under them.
Though, Rackshar failed to see the bright side as he landed face first in the dirt of the clearing. He didn't let his frustration cloud his battle instincts, as he rolled to the side several times, spikes appearing behind him each time.
Taking the pause when they had to recharge their spikes, Rackshar lunged to his feet only to trip again. He saw several vines had coiled around his ankles as he had been rolling around.
"Creeping vines!" Rackshar exclaimed through gritted teeth.
Knowing he had no time to pull out his knife, Rackshar simply put his right hand where the vines were emerging and shot off an explosion. Though the vines were destroyed and Rackshar was free the sound of the explosion made Rackshar pause.
The sound Rackshar expected was a muffled thud of dirt being compressed and thrown around. What he heard was more of a tearing sound, like one would expect when wood was being torn apart.
When Rackshar heard that sound he immediately knew that he had miscalculated.
He quickly stood up and began to weave his way between the trees dodging spikes as he sprinted down the hill. He seemed to have lost all interest in the fight with the athonexs.
As he ran the ground began to shake, throwing him to the ground, and a deep groan echoed through the area.
Rackshar clenched his teeth trying to steady himself.
"Dammit!" he hissed, struggling to get to his feet as he watched the bottom on the hill get farther and farther away from him. The hill was rising into the sky.
All the trees around him shivered as if coming to life. Then, the one next to him suddenly bent in half, as if made of rubber, smashing toward him.
Rackshar, who had yet to regain his balance since the hill continued shaking as it rose, simply threw his arm behind him and sent himself soaring off the floating hill with an explosion.
Once he was about to hit the ground Rackshar fired off another explosion to cushion his fall. The impact still knocked the wind from his lungs and, although he couldn't confirm it, he guessed that he had cracked a few ribs.
Slowly dragging himself up from the ground to look at the hill he had just plummeted from, disgust painted across his face.
The hill was the back of the shell of a huge athonex! Its shell was 20 meters in diameter, and it stood on long stilt like legs that jutted out of the shell on the sides at a 90-degree angle, flaring out several meters before a joint brought them to the ground. These stilts held its body 30 meters off the ground, just above the tree line.
Its bear face was tilted down, glaring at Rackshar with furious green eyes.
"Why is there an Elder Athonex this near the tomb?" Rackshar asked to no one in particular.
Though, even if there was someone to answer him, he never would have heard them as an earth-shaking roar tore from the Elder athonex's mouth.
Rackshar actually staggered under the force of that roar, before he quickly collected himself and began to sprint away as fast as he could.
"I have 6 explosions left." Rackshar growled as he glanced down at his right palm.
His explosion core could store enough energy for 10 explosions at a time and it took an entire day to recharge to the max. In other words, it would recharge an explosion every 2 or 3 hours.
Rackshar had used 3 charges since he started this suicide run, plus another one an hour or so ago to get down the crag, which was where he was headed back to right now.
One of the major weaknesses of the athonex was its mobility. It strode above the tree line on its stilt like legs but if it came across something like a cliff, it would be stranded since not even a high-level creeping vines core could pull its weight up a rock face with so little to hold onto.
That was Rackshar's only goal as he felt a pressure on his back and without thinking sent himself hurling to left. One of his precious explosions throwing him out of the way as one of the supposed saplings from the shell-hill tore a crater where he was just running.
'Won't take more than one of those to end this hunt.' He thought bitterly as he continued his escape.
État de l’alimentation hebdomadaire
-- Classement
Power Stone 
-- Power
stone