The first roar shattered the forest's calm, like a tree splitting under a bolt of lightning.
Exildra barely had time to turn before the ground exploded in front of her. Roots burst upward, dirt and splinters spraying as something massive surged from the undergrowth. A bear rose to its full height, towering and grotesque, its body thick with knotted muscle and barklike growths fused into its fur. Veins pulsed beneath plates of living wood. Moss clung to its shoulders. Its eyes glowed a deep, resinous green.
A Treant Bear.
Circle of Initiation.
The air around it felt heavy, charged, like the forest itself had leaned closer to watch.
Exildra's breath caught. Her body reacted before her mind did. She twisted aside just as a claw came down where her head had been, the impact splitting the ground open and sending jagged roots snaking outward. One of those roots wrapped around her ankle instantly.
She slashed down with the hyena claw she still carried, severing it, then rolled hard across the dirt as the bear lunged again. The shockwave of its movement knocked the air from her lungs. Bark plates shifted along its chest as it roared, and the wounds she had just opened on its forearm began to close, wood fibers knitting together with sickening speed.
"So it heals," she gasped, forcing herself upright.
Her stomach still burned where the claw had been pulled out earlier, but the potion had done its work. Not perfectly. Not cleanly. But enough. She could move. She could fight.
The Treant Bear slammed both forelimbs to the ground. Roots erupted in a wide arc, snapping like whips. Exildra ducked under one, leapt over another, and felt bark scrape her shoulder as a third clipped her. Blood sprayed. She hit the ground hard and rolled, coughing dirt and pain.
The bear did not slow.
It charged at her.
Exildra braced herself, claws digging into soil, heart pounding so hard it felt like it might tear out of her chest. She raised the hyena claw, muscles screaming, preparing to gamble everything on one desperate strike.
Then something else moved.
A blur cut through the trees.
The Treant Bear roared again, this time in surprise, as a body slammed into its side with brutal force. Wood cracked. Flesh tore. Blood and sap sprayed together as the massive beast staggered sideways.
Bahamut hit the ground in a low slide, feet carving trenches through dirt. He did not hesitate, nor did he ask who she was or why she was there.
He just attacked.
Ren flew off his shoulder and landed on a nearby rock, eyes wide. "You really have a problem with thinking first!"
Bahamut grabbed a fallen branch as he ran. It was thick, splintered at one end, still wet with sap. He did not slow to test it. He drove it forward like a spear, slamming it into the Treant Bear's ribcage.
The branch pierced bark and flesh, punching deep. The bear screamed, a thunderous sound that shook leaves from branches. It twisted violently, snapping the branch in half and tearing it free, but blood poured from the wound, dark and steaming.
Exildra stared for half a heartbeat, stunned.
Then the bear vanished.
The forest warped. Leaves bent inward. Roots pulled tight.
Exildra's instincts screamed.
She spun just as the Treant Bear flashed into existence behind her, its massive jaws opening wide. The air rushed past her ears as it snapped shut inches from her head.
Bahamut moved without thinking.
He crashed into her from the side, tackling her clear as the bear's claws ripped through the space she had occupied. Wood and earth exploded upward. Bahamut hit the ground hard, rolling with her, his shoulder slamming into a tree trunk with a sickening thud.
Exildra coughed, pain flaring, but she was alive.
The Treant Bear turned slowly, sap dripping from its wounds as they began to close again, bark creeping back over torn muscle.
Bahamut pushed himself up, grabbed the broken half of the branch still lodged in the bear's chest, and ripped it free. He reversed his grip, holding it like a short spear, blood running down his arm.
"No traits," he muttered under his breath. "Fine."
The bear charged again.
Bahamut met it head-on.
He drove the broken branch into its throat. The point sank in, tearing through wood and flesh, but the bear bit down hard, snapping the branch and crunching through it with its jaws. Blood sprayed across Bahamut's face as he wrenched himself free just in time to avoid being crushed.
He grabbed another branch from the ground, longer this time, and jammed it into the bear's eye. The Treant Bear howled, rearing back, clawing at its face as sap and blood poured down its snout.
Roots surged from the ground, wrapping around Bahamut's legs, yanking him off balance. He slammed down, hard, the breath knocked from his lungs.
The bear loomed over him.
Exildra moved.
She ran, pain forgotten, and drove the hyena claw into the bear's knee joint with everything she had. Wood split. The leg buckled. The Treant Bear roared and lashed out, its claws tearing across her side and sending her flying into a tree.
Bahamut tore himself free of the roots, ripping them apart with raw strength. He seized the longest broken branch he could find, braced it against the ground, and waited.
The Treant Bear charged again, half blind, furious, healing even as it bled.
At the last second, Bahamut pivoted and rammed the branch upward, using the ground as leverage. The makeshift spear punched up through the bear's jaw and into its skull.
The impact stopped it dead.
For a heartbeat, everything froze.
Then the Treant Bear convulsed violently, thrashing, roots tearing free, bark splitting as blood and sap erupted in a horrific flood. Bahamut held on, teeth clenched, muscles screaming as the beast fought death with everything it had.
The healing slowed.
Stopped.
The bear collapsed forward, its massive body crashing to the ground and shaking the forest floor. Bahamut stumbled back, covered in blood and sap, chest heaving.
Silence fell, broken only by ragged breathing.
Ren hopped over, staring at the corpse. "That was… excessive."
Exildra pushed herself upright against the tree, shaking, bloodied, alive. Her eyes locked onto Bahamut, recognition flickering, though she said nothing.
Neither of them realized how close they had come to dying.
The forest watched, quiet once more.
…
A/N: I have nothing to say… I just want some castles ^__^