Deacon launched off the body of the Bark Ape and toward the vertically inclined centipede.
Its many mouths screamed in a chorus of agony as it reared, fangs snapping. Deacon slid beneath its first set of legs, grime and damp earth scraping at his leather leggings. Dodging a head strike from one of the centipede's heads, he jammed his left short sword into the slick joint, unprotected by its exoskeleton, beneath one of its two writhing necks.
Snapping backwards, Deacon dodged as the centipede twisted itself toward him, dozens of its legs lashing out at him.
…Weird, he thought as he weaved between its leg strikes, his eyes glancing at the other beasts that seemed to give the both of them space to fight undisturbed.
Now! he mentally called out as he launched himself upward, using the dagger's hilt as a foothold. His body twisted midair into a front flip, bringing him face-to-back with the creature just in time to drive his right short sword deep into the base of its neck.
Dragging the blade down its skull like a zipper as gravity yanked both him and his blade toward the ground, black blood sprayed across his face and leather chest piece. The centipede shrieked as it was being bisected.
The body slammed into the forest floor behind him with a quake, arriving moments before the ding that echoed in his head announcing its death.
Deacon rolled out of the landing and whipped around just as two Shrieking Crows dove from above, banshee calls piercing the mist. Their wings were like broken glass, limbs protruding from joints that should not bend.
He ducked the first and impaled it through the gut, twisting his blade as it burst into feathers. The second came in with talons wide, but Deacon was already turning, catching it midair and slamming it down with a hand to the head and crushing it between his fingers.
Snapping his head forward, he saw the Iron Moose, twice the size of a horse, thundering from the tree line and beelining it straight at him. Its iron antlers slicing through the trees. Deacon pulled himself from his crouch and ran straight at it.
Just as the beast lowered its head to gore him, Deacon ducked and twisted to its side and jammed both a short sword and dagger into its spine.
Deacon twisted his blades deeper into the Iron Moose's spine and kicked the creature's haunch aside. It stumbled, bellowed, and collapsed with a bellowing groan, steam curling from the open wound. He hit the ground in a roll, then shot to his feet.
"I wish I had a recall function on them," he muttered, sprinting back toward the centipede's corpse.
Its large form was twitching ever so often as a final nerve impulse rippling through the remains, before going still. Deacon leapt onto its back, boots slapping wet carapace as he sprinted across the spine toward the neck. The embedded short sword still jutted out of the right of its bisected cranium, buried to the hilt.
He wrenched it free with a grunt, black blood splashing over his wrist. "I definitely need a shower."
A Root-Lion, its bark-coated mane writhing with parasitic vines, pounced the moment it touched the ground. Deacon spun, flames wreathing his recovered sword, and met the beast mid-leap.
Steel crashed through bark and tendon, his blade carving a fiery gash from throat to hindleg. The lion howled as the vines ignited, turning its mane of wood into one of flame before it even hit the earth.
But already another figure loomed behind it.
The Stitch Terror rose at nearly two meters in height, its flesh looked like a grotesque quilt of mismatched limbs and features, stitched with glowing red thread. Its appearance reminded him of an old bedtime story his father told him long ago involving some sort of doctor, but for the life of him, he couldn't put his finger on it.
It let out a guttural roar and lunged, a swollen arm wide as a tree trunk swinging for his chest.
Deacon dropped to a knee, sliding beneath the blow. Sparks flew from his boots as he passed between the abomination's legs. In one smooth move, he jabbed his left short sword up into the seam of its inner thigh, igniting the flames across the blade to boil its blood
The explosion rocked the beast from the inside out. A pulse of flame erupted from the wound as it toppled sideways, collapsing with a choking shriek.
"I know there's one more of you," Deacon hissed, eyes darting through the smoky mist.
To his left, the viper slithered forth, glowing runes etched into its pale flesh like sacred scars.
It struck.
Deacon threw one short sword, nailing it through the mouth and pinning it to a nearby elongated root with a loud thunk. The viper writhed, screaming in hisses
He rushed in before it could tear free, grabbed the protruding hilt, and drove his second blade into the center of its neck with a stomp.
"Yeah, yeah," he muttered, pulling both blades free and stepping back, chest rising and falling fast. "Wave two. That all you got?"
The mist thickened slightly around the outskirts of the heart of the forest.
*[Bark Ape Lv 3] has been slain – XP has been given.*
***
*[Viper Lv 3] has been slain – XP has been given.*
Then the System Notification chimed in his ear.
Wave 2 has been completed!
Do you wish to begin Wave 3?
[Yes] [No]
Deacon wiped the black blood off his face with the back of his palm and nodded. "Yes."
[SYSTEM NOTICE]
Wave 3: Initiated.
Hostiles Detected: 7
Classification: Mixed Beasts & Monsters – Level 3-5
Threat Level: Low
Objective: Eliminate All Threats
The moment the System's Notice faded, the forest let out a low groan as the mist coiled tighter around the clearing, turning the twisted trunks into silhouettes, until the first beast lunged.
A Boneback Stag with moss growing from its ribcage like armor, charged from the gloom with its skull-like head down and antlers like jagged bone scythes. Deacon sidestepped, flames sparking to life across his blades, and let the creature pass by, then pivoted and drove both swords into its flank.
With a grunt, he twisted and pulled, the flaming edges dragging molten lines across its decayed spine. The beast shrieked and collapsed, burning from the inside out.
"Six more," Deacon muttered.
The earth cracked.
Two more came in tandem: a Howling Hag, hunched and skeletal, shrieking with mouths stitched across its torso, and a Mudborn Brawler, a toad-like brute dragging a stone club bound to its webbed hands.
The hag hissed and cast illusions, causing false Deacons to flicker across the field. The Brawler slammed the ground, sending a shockwave that threw dirt and dust into the air.
"Cute," Deacon snarled. "But if you are the one being copied and you're alone, then… well, it's pretty much useless."
He dashed through the copies and locked eyes with the Hag as he crossed the arced distance between them, and his blade found her heart, or whatever mush that was inside her body passed for it, and ignited a fireball off the tip of his blades with Ignis.
The Hag exploded in a burst of ash and gory light.
The Mudborn roared, rushing in, but Deacon had already turned, sprinting toward it. He ducked under a heavy swing and slid low, slashing behind its knees with both blades. The brute stumbled. Deacon leapt onto its back and jammed his right short sword into the back of its skull.
"Three," Deacon breathed, yanking his blade free from the Mudborn Brawler's skull, only for his ears to twitch at the sound of wings behind him, a sharp gust of air and feathers slicing mist.
He pivoted.
A Dire Vulture swooped low, nearly clipping his head with its talons, each claw the size of a sickle. Its ragged wings beat against the fog as it wheeled upward, shrieking.
He sheathed his right short sword and swapped it with a dagger and tossed it at the flying avian, but the creature twisted, the blade nicking only a wing. Cursing, Deacon dropped to a knee, snagged a rock, and took aim.
It dove again, intent on piercing through Deacon's brain.
This time, he waited until the last second, then threw the rock, but the target wasn't the bird, not exactly.
The rock whizzed just below and past its right wing as it was fully unfurled.
A sudden gust disrupted the air beneath it, throwing off its balance in an instant. To a bird, this was the equivalent of a human getting their chin bashed in.
He sprang himself upwards, catching its leg mid-dive, and was lifted off the ground. Hanging one-handed, he swung himself once to pull himself to its chest and plunged his short sword into its underside, ripping sideways, this time away from his face.
The vulture shrieked, flailed as its blood was spraying out of its body and showering the ground.
Deacon landed hard, the corpse crashing beside him. His breathing had become slightly shaky due to having faced more than twenty beasts in a row, causing him to let out a deep and quick exhale to reset his breathing rhythm at the sight of his next foes.
A bit weird how the System is bringing in most creatures that don't even reside in a forest, Deacon thought to himself.
A Marsh Lynx, twice the size of a wolf, padded from the fog. Its usually matted fur was now slick with moisture from the forest, and its curved fangs clicked in anticipation. Behind it, two more came, one slightly smaller, the other missing a chunk of their left ear.
They circled in a loose triangle, low to the ground, their heads level with his waist.
"Great. A pack of cats," Deacon muttered before suddenly becoming thoughtful. "Frankenstein! That Stitch Lion reminded me of Frankenstein!"
The first lunged, seemingly able to sense his momentary distraction. To which he responded with parrying low, steel clashing with fangs, but the second came from the side.
He rolled just as claws scraped his leather chest piece, grunting as its claws raked across the back of his left shoulder. He swept his leg out, tripping the smaller one mid-pounce, and drove his dagger into its chest before it hit the ground.
The first Lynx returned, fangs biting into his protected forearm. He gritted his teeth as its sharp fangs pierced through his bracers and tore into the flesh of his forearm. But Deacon kept his cool; instead of acting rashly in this scenario and forgetting his training, he grabbed the creature's throat, twisted, and slammed it into the dirt. Fire erupted from his palm as he punched into its mouth and cast Ignis.
The Lynx thrashed and shrieked for a few seconds as the inside of its head liquified.
Once it had died, Deacon began to turn, just in time to see the last one leap at his head.
He ducked, twisted mid-crouch, and caught it on his back, then slammed it down, just beside the one he'd just killed. His blade followed, piercing through its neck and out.
Deacon's breath came a little harder now, just enough to feel it in his ribs. Sweat trickled past the edge of his jaw, mingling with blood and grime.
Alright… I need to take a short breather before the next one, he thought, rolling his neck and flicking a gob of soot off his glove. He unsheathed his off-hand short sword, giving both blades a quick glance. The edges were chipped, dulled from constant impact, and stained black.
Another two, then I'll sharpen and recharge.
But he never got the chance to finish the thought.
The trees ahead exploded with motion.
A Great Boar burst through the underbrush, snorting a thick stream of steam from its snout as its hooves tore into the forest floor and b-lined to him. Its tusks, honed like twin scythes, glinted in the thin rays of sunlight that pierced the tree line.
At its side, a Ravine Wolf stalked into view. Long-legged, lean, eyes like dying coals. Its fur shimmered with pale veins pulsing beneath its skin, each step soundless, deliberate.
Deacon barely had time to raise a blade.
"…Shit."
The Ravine Wolf lunged first, teeth flashing in the low light, but Deacon was ready this time. He sidestepped with a grunt, bringing one short sword across in a shallow arc, slicing just above its snout, his flame-wreathed blade easily tearing through its flesh. The wolf yelped, reeling back, but only for a second.
It was smart, patient, trained by experience to wait for the Boar, its partner in the hunt. And the Boar didn't keep him waiting.
It came at Deacon again, this time slower, and a lot more cautious, feinting left before charging right. Its thick side caught Deacon mid-dodge and sent him flying into a nearby tree with a crack of splintering bark and bone-deep ache.
"Fuck me," he hissed, dragging himself up just in time to parry another pounce from the wolf. He slashed out instinctively, catching it in the shoulder. Blood sprayed, but the wolf didn't stop its attack on him.
Deacon ducked as it snapped at his head to his unprotected neck, then slammed his forehead into the wolf's face, staggering it by his sudden attack. He used the moment to pivot around and drive one of his blades into its flank, hard and deep.
The wolf howled and kicked wildly, one of its claws catching Deacon across the chest and tearing through his leather chest piece and into his chest. He gritted his teeth and twisted his flame-wreathed short sword harder and deeper, and after a few more seconds, he felt the beast go limp under his weight.
Kicking the wolf off his right short sword, Deacon glanced back at the Boar as it charged straight at him once more, causing the ground to shudder.
He took aim with his left short sword and hurled it at the boar, it easily sank into its front leg due to the heat of the blade, the Boar flinched back as a result and tripped over the Bark Ape's corpse.
Deacon shot forward and jammed his short sword into its neck.
The Boar screamed and thrashed as Decon continued to both push his short sword deeper and supercharge Flame Armament. And only once he heard that oh so beautiful ding from the System signifying its death did he release his hold on his spells and short sword, rolling off its body and hitting the ground hard, body covered in blood and soil, breathing ragged and uneven.
*[Boneback Stag Lv 3] has been slain – XP has been given.*
***
*[Great Boar Lv 5] has been slain – XP has been given.*
Then the familiar sound of the System Notification chimed in his ear.
Wave 3 has been completed!
Do you wish to begin Wave 4?
[Yes] [No]
Deacon lay there a moment, staring up at the dim canopy.
"…Screw Wave 4," he muttered, coughing once, remembering to not say No as to not fail the quest. "I need a fucking potion."