The massive ratcoon ferociously raked and slashed at Oyintsa; and he kept on provoking it. With its sheer size, its paws were easily as large as Oyintsa’s torso. Oyintsa had long since fell over. With one strong swipe from the ratcoon, it flung Oyintsa into the air headed deeper into the weeds. He rolled into the brush some distance away before he could gain his bearings.
The ratcoon followed him. It knew he wasn’t dead. A few seconds, and the beast was on top of him again. Biting, scratching, pouncing, it did whatever it could to beat Oyintsa. As a response, Oyintsa put his hands in a practiced defensive posture to absorb the ratcoon’s attacks.
His thick plated armor protected him from the onslaught. It was enchanted armor. Over the years, enchanters and armor-smiths perfected methods of making armors like his; Sanity’s armor-smiths and enchanters were the best. It was metal when he needed it to be and cloth at other times. It also had a few surprises.
Occasionally, he could predict where the beast’s paw would land. In those places, he produced small sharp spikes on his armor. Upon attacking him, the beast would impale itself. Instead of causing fear, the pain only made the beast angrier. It tackled him again trying to cause whatever kind of damage it could.
Royal rejoined the battle following the loud blasts of Oyintsa’s combat shotguns. Even in his odd position, he found ways to target and shoot the beast with the large barrels and unique ammunition. Instead of metal pellets, Oyintsa used odd shaped scraps and needles as shot. As a result his powerful blasts caused the beast enough pain to stay focused on him. The ratcoon tried to finish him while Royal caused quite a bit of damage to its hind legs.
AD7 couldn’t see a thing! She knew a lot was happening though. She wanted to join in the battle as well. She remembered having great advantages and being nearly invincible in combat. She also remembered having complete knowledge of things in a battle, even things she couldn’t see directly. These weeds were frustrating!
Instinctively, she started swinging the bags around. If anything came out of the weeds, she would throw their weight at them. She paused to think, then face-palmed realizing she was only holding bags of sandwiches.
Before long the beast was trying to crush Oyintsa. It was putting all of its weight on him and jumping. It yelped again as it pounced directly onto a barbed spike.
Royal’s jumping Hanja had faded back to black; it was usable again. She used this perfect opportunity to cause fight ending damage. She leapt at the ratcoon. She took as much thermal power out of her frost blade and put it into her flame blade.
She landed on the ratcoon with a downward stab directly into its left hind leg. The ratcoon howled as her burning blade sunk to the hilt. She immediately withdrew it with a jump off of the beast. The fire was extinguished badly burning target.
The fire blade was used. However, with almost no thermal energy in it, her frost blade was most dangerous now. Royal used the dash enchant on her other leg to rush the beast while it was still reeling from her first attack. Less than a second after landing, Royal dashed through the weeds and slashed the inside of the beast’s other leg.
The blade was colder than ice. As she cut, the beast’s blood froze. The frozen slash was deep but the frozen wound didn’t bleed right away. It sure did hurt though.
Still growling and swiping, the large ratcoon still had the will to fight but lacked the ability to move. It was bleeding quite a bit from the horrible wounds. It could no longer keep up with them or move without great pain. Soon it realized that it could no longer fight. So, it used its front legs as best it could to crawl back to its den.
Royal and Oyintsa seeing the battle was finished decided not to press the attack any further. On the contrary, Royal performed several of her most powerful delayed heals on the beast as it retreated. Their goal was not to hunt a ratcoon, only to travel safely.
By the time the travelers would get back to their ship, the damage they caused the ratcoon would be healed. Unfortunately, this ratcoon would have very defining scars for a lifetime. It was already showing signs of improved movement as it got up and limped slowly away.
It took a few minutes for them to get back on the path Oyintsa created earlier. They signaled AD7 to follow and they all headed back to the ship. “Well,” Oyintsa started. He sounded normal though he was covered in the beast’s blood, “Now we know why the rats moved to town.”
The ladies nodded in agreement.
“The ship’s not far. Best get going.”