Chapter 135: Piercing Light
Rebecca stood behind the tree, her heart ramming inside her chest, each beat driving hard against her ribs. She breathed slowly, forcing it even, but every time her lungs expanded, a small, sharp sting flared through her ribs in answer. She reached for the arrow behind her, teeth clenched, fingers finding the fletching by feel alone.
She could feel the huge snake growing closer and closer, its hiss rolling low through the trees, the brush of its body dragging against the dirt in long, dry rasps.
*I can't die here,* she thought. *Not like this. No. Not after everything.* Her grip on her bow tightened, knuckles whitening around the wood. Earlier, she had realized that Tyler's scream had stopped. The thought that he had died was extremely unsettling. But it was the only conclusion she could reach for why he'd gone silent.
Either the venom had killed him, or the monster had eaten him and was coming for her next. She had thought she'd found a capable partner, someone she could use to her advantage to fight the guild.
But now he was dead.
*I have to find a way to escape. I can't die. I can't do it. Not until I kill that bastard,* she thought, rage filling her mind, hot and consuming as she pictured the day her parents died. Then an idea struck her.
*Wait... If I activate arrow explosion, shoot the other way without causing a sound, it'll probably turn its direction to attack anything near there. I'll just have to aim for the furthest tree.* Right as the thought crystallized in her mind, she heard a thundering, booming sound followed by an ear-piercing shriek. She groaned at the sound, and meters beside her, she saw Tyler land on the ground. Her mouth parted slightly, clearly surprised.
*He's alive,* she thought to herself, relief cutting through the fear for just a moment. She saw Tyler eyeing her, the first flicker of determination settling on his face, his eyes glowing a faint blue. He redirected his gaze to the snake in front of him. *What is he doing? He shouldn't fight it. We should both find a way to escape.*
She saw Tyler stare down at the dagger, and that's when she saw it too, a small trail of crimson blood streaked across the blade. *That blood. Is that his?*
She remembered the piercing cry of the snake just seconds before, the sound still echoing somewhere behind her ribs. Her breath caught, hissing between her teeth. *No way. Is that its blood?* Just then she saw Tyler stick out his tongue and run it across the blade's edge, licking the entire streak of blood off the metal. She frowned in confusion, her nose wrinkling slightly in disgust. *What? Why would he do that?*
As soon as the system panel appeared in front of him, he saw the snake lunge at him with jaws spread wide, the movement that had seemed impossibly fast before now unfolding like something he could track with his eyes. The energy was already rushing through his body like never before, a current of raw force that made his muscles hum, and he realized it in that single second: not only was he faster, but the snake had become significantly slower and predictable, its massive body unable to keep pace with what he'd become.
He launched himself into the air, his body tilting sharply to one side as he rotated diagonally through the space above the ground, the snake's fangs passing beneath him close enough that he felt the heat radiating off its breath.
The snake's jaws struck the ground with tremendous force, the impact driving straight down through the earth, the ground buckling under the weight of it. Rebecca felt the vibration travel up through her feet, a deep shudder that rattled through her bones.
Tyler landed a few feet away, his boots skidding slightly in the disturbed soil, and he immediately saw the snake's head beginning to lift, scales already rippling as it readied another strike. He exploded forward toward it, closing the distance in two fast strides and swung his blade right down the length of its neck, the Teara Dagger glinting as it fell.
Mid-swing, his eyebrows rose, the scales moved again, a ripple of white rushing to block the path his blade was about to take. But he was faster now. The dagger landed before more scales could complete the shield, tearing through the weakened section and biting deep, and the force of his strike was enough to drive the snake's entire head down into the ground with a force that shock the earth beneath it. It shrieked, a sound that tore through the clearing and echoed off the surrounding trees, its whole body convulsing in response. Then it threw its tail right at him with vicious speed.
He backflipped, his body arcing backward through the air, and he saw the tail pass right below his nose, so close he felt the wind of it cutting the space where his face had been. He landed, boots hitting solid ground and in that same instant, he saw the tail heading straight for Rebecca's hiding spot.
Rebecca saw it coming and she jumped, throwing herself clear just as the massive tail struck the tree trunk she'd been pressed against. The impact was catastrophic. The wood exploded into splinters, some pieces flying through the air like shrapnel, and the tree groaned as it began to lean. She tumbled onto the ground, groaning in pain as her ribcage and shoulder flared hot, the injuries screaming with each movement.
"Here!" Tyler said, he threw a potion in her direction. She immediately caught it, her hand closing around the vial just as her fingers wrapped around it, she saw the snake's tail return straight for her again from her right, already in motion before she could move a muscle.
But then Tyler launched himself. Mid-motion he turned, using the full force of his speed and the momentum he'd built, pivoting on one boot. The iron boot materialized on his other leg with a solid materialization, and he kicked the snake's tail with everything he had. A large clanging sound erupted from the impact, the noise ringing out across the clearing like a bell struck with a hammer and white scales tore loose from the collision, scattering through the air like snow caught in wind.
The tail was sent backward with so much force that it slammed into the same tree again, but this time it rammed straight through, splintering the massive trunk as though it were kindling and the tree's crown began to fall as the snake's entire body tumbled under its own velocity, dragged along by the momentum of its own tail.
Rebecca watched, wide-eyed in amazement, as Tyler stood before her, his leg still raised, his chest rising and falling heavily with each ragged breath. He put his foot down and looked at his own leg, his strike had punched clean through the iron boot itself, a jagged hole torn through the metal where the impact had been too much for it to hold. The boot, having taken more damage disintegrated into a fine spray of blue dust, drifting away and leaving his leg bare in the aftermath.
A moment later, his leather boot materialized in its place, settling back into form around his foot. They both watched as the tree let out a long, splintering groan and began to fall, its massive weight dragging the canopy down in a slow, inevitable collapse.
Rebecca quickly brought the potion to her mouth and gulped it down without pause. As soon as she'd finished it, her skin began to glow a faint green, and a wave of relief rushed through her as she felt the bones in her ribs start knitting themselves back together beneath her skin.
Her dislocated shoulder shifted and repositioned itself on its own, and she felt the grind of cracks sealing deep in her bones, the sensation somewhere between violent and strangely relieving, like a massage carried out by something far too rough to be gentle.
Suddenly, the system panel flashed in front of Tyler:
[WHITE FANG HAS ACTIVATED SKILL: COILING STRIKE]
He saw the snake slithering toward him with incredible speed, its whole body compressing and surging forward in one motion. In response, he launched himself forward to meet it, another iron boot materializing around his right leg in a flash of blue light. He knew the sheer ferocity of the strike barreling toward him, but he also knew his own strike carried enough force to pulverize one of the massive trees around them.
He was confident he could counter it head-on. Rebecca nocked her arrow, drawing it back and aiming it at the snake as she activated her new skill, her eyes glowing a faint white as she felt mana pour out of her body and flow into the arrow itself, gathering at the tip.
Tyler and the snake clashed. He jumped, flipping diagonally through the air and landed the kick square onto the snake's jaw. A deafening clang tore through the forest, the sound alone enough to send birds scattering from the canopy above, and a shockwave rippled outward from the point of impact digging a trench into the ground and tearing tree roots up out of the earth as it knocked both Tyler and the massive snake backward.
Tyler tumbled across the ground, the iron boot on his leg crushed flat and useless. He felt only a dull ache where the force had traveled through his leg.
The snake writhed across the ground, rolling over itself like a crocodile in water as it hissed in pain. Its long body twisted violently against the earth, coils folding over one another as it struggled to recover from the blow.
He groaned as he pushed himself up, but then he felt it, something radiating energy to his left, a pressure in the air he could feel against his skin before he even turned to look. As he turned his head, he gasped.
"What the..." he breathed.
He saw Rebecca holding her bow with the arrow nocked, but the whole arrow was radiating a blinding white light, a thin, almost audible pulsing steadily sound from it, growing louder with every passing second. Small cracks were already spreading across her bow, branching out like spider webs racing to cover the metal. Behind them, the snake turned over and shook its massive head, shaking off the last of its daze.
The system panel flashed before Tyler:
[REBECCA ACTIVATED SKILL: LIGHTPIERCER]
She loosed the arrow the instant the panel faded. It crossed the distance in an instant, already inches from the snake's head before Tyler could even react to it. It ripped through the creature, tearing through flesh like a bullet through glass, the sheer force barely slowing as it burst out the other side.
It kept going, punching clean through a tree beyond, a thin streak of smoke trailing behind it and a glowing hole scorched amber-red into the trunk where it had passed, the arrow continuing on through the forest, farther and farther, until it was lost from sight.
Tyler blinked, still catching up to what he'd just seen, when a distant explosion rocked the air, an extremely bright beam of light flashing somewhere far off through the trees. The earth shook beneath his feet from the force of it, a deep tremor he felt up through his legs.
"Damn..." he breathed. He turned his head toward Rebecca, only to be hit with a different kind of shock. She was already collapsed on the ground, unconscious. He hadn't even seen her fall. He was up and running toward her before he'd fully registered moving, dropping to his knees at her side.
"Rebecca! Rebecca, wake up!" he said, turning her to face him. He watched her chest rise and fall, slow but steady, and a small wave of relief loosened something tight in his chest, she was alive.
He slid his arms beneath her and lifted her up against his chest. Looking down, he saw the bow she'd been holding had already fractured into pieces, the cracks finally winning out. It glowed a faint blue, then crumbled into fine blue dust that drifted apart and faded from sight, as if the air itself were swallowing it whole. *What kind of skill was that?*
A small system panel appeared floating above Rebecca, and his eyes went wide.
[REBECCA: LEVEL 83]