"Yaaah!" Leor let out a valiant cry as he swiped his new polearm from left to right across the air, to defend himself from the ugly defiled monster before him. He was facing a strange Beast indeed. With the slime and mud covered body of a fish, it crawled across the soggy bank of the swamp using its front fins as makeshift legs. The defiled Beast's massive fishy mouth opened wide enough to swallow up Leor's entire chest, its body stretching at least 5 feet across from head to tail. Two bulbous green eyes bulged out of the very top of the creature's head like bubbles, sinking down and popping back out every time it opened its massive jaws to attack him.
Leor and Alina had gone out to test their new equipment. Taking the advice of Drelk, they headed north east from the mountain fortress, until they arrived in a swampy area where low tier defiled Beasts were numerous. Almost the moment they reached the muddy shore of the swamp, they began to come under attack by three of these strange mud covered fish.
They appeared to be simple Feral Tier defiled Beast. Alina had made quick work of the two that had attacked her. She stabbed through their eyes and into their brains with a few swift piercing blows of her new rapier, ending the fight as soon as it began.
Leor on the other hand, was having a bit more difficulty. The slippery skin and rapid movements of the Beast made it hard to land an accurate strike, and he was not nearly as strong as Alina. So he couldn't just break through the Beast's defense in a single blow.
He continued to retreat as he cautiously placed each footstep to avoid slipping on the muddy ground, the angry fish creature continued to pressure him relentlessly. As he slowly became more self assured in defending himself from the steady attacks, Leor let his curiosity about the creature rise to the front of his thoughts for a moment, triggering a rush of knowledge into his mind.
The information entered Leor's mind at just the right time. Gripping his polearm with both hands, Leor sent his Willpower coursing into the weapon. At the same time, he activated the low quality spirit crystal embedded in its shaft for an extra boost of power. There was no use trying to use his Willpower to stun such a weak defiled, so he focused all his energy on empowering his spear for a lethal strike.
The ignorant fish continued to launch itself at him in the same predictable manner, allowing Leor to perfectly time his attack. The polearm in his hands began to hum with power as the extra Will from the crystal was released. He chose that moment to strike.
Just as the Mudskipper launched it's slippery body off the wet floor, Leor sprung forward with all his might. The defiled beast opened it's wide fishy jaws up once against, aiming to fill it's teeth with human flesh, but instead it got a mouthful of something else.
Leor pressed the lethal tip of his weapon into the creature's mouth, bypassing the hard fishy scales on the monster's exterior. The forked blades sticking out to each side of the spearhead began to slice through flesh and tongue as Leor continued pushing the weapon deeper.
The metal spearhead passed through the fish's mouth and into its throat, sinking deep into its guts as Leor let out a grunt of exertion. The bulbous eyes of the Mudskipper went wide with pain and shock, attempting to wriggle itself away from the deadly attack, but it was too late. The Elven Watchmen's Polearm was a viciously sharp weapon, and the extra Willpower amplification allowed Leor to do more damage than his current strength should normally allow.
The creature wriggled on the end of his polearm like a hooked fish. It's struggles to free itself only serving to tear apart its inside even more, as the head of the polearm was yanked back and forth inside its vulnerable belly.
"Tsk. A dim-witted creature indeed" Leor mumbled as he watched the light fade away from the creature's eyes. A familiar warmth filled his chest as the Beast's defiled Will was snuffed out, adding a bit of power to his own growing strength. By now, when he condensed his Willpower inside his chest, it formed a ball nearly as large as two fists held together. About the size of a large grapefruit.
As he wrenched his weapon free from the defeated Beast's guts, Alina stepped beside him, gently laying her hand against the back of his red plate armor.
"Well done, Leor! What do you say, shall we continue? There is no shortage of these strange defiled fish, and I could use the practice with this Rapier." She asked.
Leor answered her with a simple nod, and like that the two of them continued to trace the shores of the large swampland. The defiled mudskippers were quite numerous, and although they tended to attack in groups of two or three, Leor and Alina were able to handle such small groups with relative ease.
Only once during their hunt did a larger group of six come splashing out of the water toward them, a humongous Dire tier mudskipper leading the pack. Alina was forced to use her Beastly transformation to keep from getting overwhelmed, while Leor acted as bait, luring away as many as he could to allow her time to thin the enemies ranks.
The strategy worked well, and the duo was able to slowly pick off all five of the weaker Beasts before teaming up against the larger one. Even two against one, however, the skin of a Dire tier defiled Beast is not an easy thing to break. Alina could send her rapier piercing into the Beast with her full strength attacks, but even then the blade didn't sink nearly deep enough to slay the creature.
For defiled Beast's above the Feral tier, the combination of Willpower and Beastly body created an incredible potent defense. So, the best way to defeat such a creature was to use Leor's talent to momentarily disable the defiled Will that was empowering it.
Alina drew the Beast's attention while Leor sent what was left of his Willpower in his weapon. He had drained his reserves many times over during their hunting trip, but they always stopped to recharge between each battle. The same was true now, and Leor had just enough Will inside him to fill the head of his polearm.
As Alina sidestepped a furious attack, Leor jumped in from the rear and slapped the tip of his weapon down hard on the oversized Mudskipper's head. A bright flash of light natured Willpower momentarily blinded the two young humans as Leor's attack landed right between the ugly Beast's bulbous eyes.
The young man's miraculous talent did its work, and for a few precious seconds the defiled Willpower of the monster was forced to retreat, completely lowering the creature's defenses. Alina sprang into action with cat-like reflexes, jumping up into the air above the Beast as she took absolute advantage of the situation.
The young woman's furry white skin shone in the red Beastly sun as she seemed to linger in midair for a moment, then gravity took hold of her body, and sent her crashing down toward the dazed monster with her needle like rapier held out below her in both hands.
Alina came down on the Beast with all her might, using the weight of her body, the strength of her arms, and the inertia of her fall to perfectly execute the most powerful strike she could muster.
The tip of her blade touched down directly atop the bulbous eye of the powerful Mudskipper, sinking through the Beast's fleshy defenses without so much as a shudder of hesitation. The weapon sank down inch after inch, finally slamming to a halt as the thorny metal guard made contact with flesh.
Leor knew right away that the attack had done its job, because the Willpower inside of him flared to life once again, burning brighter as it accepted the defiled sacrifice.
Alina held tightly to the handle of her weapon as the large body of the Mudskipper crashed to the ground, then she gently stepped off the monster's corpse and collected her sword. She took a moment to catch her breath and wiped the slimy mud from her arms and legs with a distasteful frown.
"Ick. Disgusting slimy fish!" She scolded as she returned her sword to its ornate sheath. "I suppose we should drag some of these corpses back to the fortress. We will need food for the journey ahead of us.
Leor smiled as he pulled a few lengths of rope from his pack. Alina had developed quite a taste for Beast flesh ever since she had undergone her transformation. She wouldn't admit it, but he knew that she was quite excited to deliver this Dire tier corpse to the Beast jerky dealer back at the fortress.
It took a few minutes to figure out how to properly tie up the fish, its slippery skin kept allowing the knots to slip loose. Eventually Alina stabbed a hole through its rear fin, allowing Leor to tie off the rope to that hole.
They were tired from the day's hunt already, and it was getting dangerously close to night, so the two human companions slowly made their way back across the plain toward Drelk's fortress. They walked side by side, each holding a length of rope as they shouldered the burden together.