Jasper stood up quickly and tried to get an eye on the powerful spirit. When a spirit tear happens, the last spirit to exit is the strongest. Since this was a stage 4 tear, the strongest would be a powerful Beast tier spirit. Jasper wondered what the battle would look like, though he doubted he wanted to be close enough to watch. He shifted his feet while debating in his head.
In the end, he decided to get a little closer to search for leftover cores that haven't been grabbed yet. Horrible screeching dominated the air as the spirit screamed. The scream sounded almost like a human woman screaming in desperate fear. It was unnerving.
Jasper walked forward regardless and checked the bodies of spirits for their cores. Most had been picked clean, but he found a few neglected Pygmy spirits that had probably been killed by a higher-level tamer. A few minutes passed as the screams intermittently broke the sounds of battle. Most low-level tamers had wrapped up their battles and couldn't find any opponents. All the spirits that slipped through the cracks had escaped into the wild and would not try to attack the successful tamers.
The Core spirits that Weston had lent to Jasper followed behind him with tired looks. They'd gotten into a few fights with some powerful spirits. They seemed a little tense and uncomfortable. There was a loud explosion from the main fight that shook the ground beneath Jasper's feet. He looked up with furrowed brows as a smoking object flew through the air and landed in a pile of bushes a few hundred meters from him. He ran toward the landing spot as well as a few other tamers in the area. He was the third to arrive and observed a surprising sight.
Weston lay in a deep crater. He was curled up in a ball and damaged. His eyelids fluttered as he looked up at the people looking down on him. Jasper hopped down into the crater and helped Weston to his feet. "Are you good?" Jasper said as he pushed Weston out of the crater. One of the other spirit tamers grabbed the hurt man's hand and pulled him up.
"Yeah, it caught me with an attack. I gotta hop back in though, we can't lose the upper hand." Weston grunted.
"Are you guys struggling?" Jasper asked.
Weston winced and shook his head. "Not really. These asses from a clan around here are trying to get some of the spirit. I don't want to leave the group down one." He explained. He glanced to the side and smiled. "You've brought my spirits to me." He said. His hand reached out and touched each of his powerful spirits. They disappeared into his body. He seemed visibly stronger with them inside him.
Jasper let go of the man as his back straightened. "Stay safe. We should be done soon." Weston said before shooting off into the air. He was soon out of sight and back in the fray. Jasper trudged after him. He wanted to see what this fight looked like. How far did he still need to go to reach this level of strength? After a minute of walking, he crested a small hill and saw the broken landscape.
There were huge craters and chunks blown out of the earth from the intensity of the battle this close to the tear. Scorch marks lined the ground as well as small ponds. Then, he saw the spirit.
Just laying his eyes on it made his spine squirm. It had a long, squirming tongue that was covered in large bumps. Its saliva flung to the ground as it panted. Its jaw was long and wolf-like in nature. Its fur was dark grey and seemed to darken the space around it. Patches of its fur were missing from serious injuries that covered its body.
Most of its body was wolf-like with the exception of its tail and eyes. Its tail was made of what looked like black metal interlinked by chains. Each link had a long blade that fell over the lower link. Its eyes bulged out of its head and had a pink spiral pattern that seemed like its pupil. The spirit was about the size of a pickup truck and had unnaturally long legs with one more knee joint than it should've had.
Its body was riddled with lean muscle. It's 4 legs raised it 7 feet in the air. It held its head low and eyed the surrounding spirit tamers with a murderous glint. Jasper was silent as he watched. He was surprised to see it was a darkness spirit. This spirit was one of the most disturbing he'd ever seen.
12 spirit tamers were spread out in the field in front of it. They all seemed exhausted from the extended fight, and a few had some pretty serious-looking injuries. Luna was healing the redheaded man from Arya's group. He had a pretty big wound in his shoulder. Jasper could see 5 tamers that were clearly the group Weston had been talking about earlier. They stuck pretty close together and watched the spirit, as well as Arya, closely.
Jasper narrowed his eyes. They were watching her too closely. He pulled his eyes from the main stage and looked around the battlefield. Other lower-level spirit tamers watched the battle from safe spots far from it. As Jasper's vision scanned the landscape, he noticed a figure standing upon a large rock. It was on the perimeter of the main stage. He had a 7 foot tall long bow drawn fully with an arrow.
They aimed toward the battle and shook from the effort of holding the string. Jasper turned to the battle with his brows furrowed. He wasn't certain, but the man looked like he wasn't angled for the beast. He was a few degrees to the side, so unless his arrows curved, he'd hit Arya.
Jasper's eyes widened as he took a deep breath. He cupped his hands around his mouth and screamed as loud as he could. "ARYA!!" His throat hurt immediately as his voice carried the hundreds of meters to the boss spirit. As he screamed, the archer released. They glanced toward Jasper before looking back at their target.
Arya turned with a look of confusion before noticing a speeding arrow out of the corner of her eye. Electricity arced off of her body as she used a spell. Her body flashed forward and deflected the arrow with the power of her spirit energy. The arrow whistled before striking the ground next to her. She turned her head sharply to the archer, who quickly ducked behind the rock.
There was a thunderous boom as an orange-haired man streaked across the battlefield. Brackton had made a beeline for the archer with his sword raised. "Wait! Stop!" A man with the clan shouted commandingly. Brackton proceeded forward, his eyes glowing with energy. He roared as he brought the blade down on the other side of the rock. The large boulder split as his spirit energy reverberated through the stone.
The archer screamed as the ground split beneath his feet. As he fell into the crack, his voice was cut short. Just as quickly as the hole appeared, it disappeared. The earth swallowed him as the spell completed. Brackton's teeth gnashed as he flexed and shattered the earth around him. Within seconds, Arya's attacker was killed.
During those seconds, the darkness spirit had acted, and charged toward the other clan. It disappeared as it ran into the shadow of a tree. Jasper's eyes darted around. When he blinked, the Beast spirit had stepped out of one of the people's shadows. He had no idea how it fit inside such a small shadow. Its long tongue wrapped around a man's arm before its mouth snapped forward. Three-quarters of the man's body dropped to the floor like a sack of potatoes.
A large earth fist smacked the spirit's long maw to the side. The battle quickly turned too fast for Jasper to perceive. He looked to Arya to see her helping with the spirit. He could tell her group was on high alert now and seemed unwilling to help. But they wanted the spirit core of the powerful beast. It could be sold for a very pretty penny or used to significantly increase the strength of one of their spirits. Soon, the battle reached a point where the spirit was about to be slain.
Just as it was reeling in pain, Weston dashed in. His hand reached out only for it to get immediately rejected. He recoiled in pain as his eyes rolled into the back of his head. Blood poured out of his nose and leaked through the edges of his eyes as Arya ran up to him. Luna leaped on top of the beast and shoved her staff through its eye. She wriggled it around a little before stabbing it deeper. It suddenly shuddered and collapsed to the ground.
Luna pulled a knife from her waist and sliced into its chest. She stuck her arm in and pulled out a dark orb the size of a volleyball. She tucked it under her arm and dashed back to her ally's side. Jasper looked on as the two groups eyed each other with cautious glares.