TJ was the first to react to the wendigo’s decration. He had plenty of fiden killing the pukwudgies, and the possibility of them w together with the obviously much more powerful wendigo was terrifying. He densed a scythe of wind, feeling the bes of his slightly improved Intelligend Fixation as he did so. When he was fident the bde would cut through flesh and boJ sent his attack forward. With a hissing roar, the nearly ten foot-long bde appeared and flew forward. One pukwudgie on the end dodged out of the way, another fell prostrate, losing only hair from the initial attack. The st three seemed as if they’d die, and TJ felt his adrenaline spike. Victory would soon arrive!
That was when a wall of ice appeared in front of the st three. The wind, with more preparation and power sunk into it than the ice, sliced through, but on the far side, was only able to wound the pukwudgies shallowly. TJ’s stomach sank as he saw that he would be fighting alone against six enemies, and he made his decision without hesitation. He spun and began fleeing back towards town.
The st of blood followed him, the bleeding pukwudgies pursuing without hesitation. There would be two more uninjured ones following as well, and TJ’s mind raced to decide what to do about them. More importantly, though, were the surprisingly quid heavy steps of the wendigo as it too followed his trail. TJ sulted his MP: 222/300. He could do that same bde of wind nearly three more times, though it would empty his MP. Unfortunately, the pukwudgies no loood together and had spread to attempt to surround him. He was sure there would be ons in each hand, though they’d all activated their camoufging ability.
His flight led him ever further, and TJ sidered calling his hunt a bust. Even with the impending dahough, TJ couldn’t bring himself to. This was at least one more level id out in front of him, and he wasn’t about to run away from it even before they’d nded a blow on him.
Deade, TJ slowed himself just enough to allow the quiet sounds and subtle smell of pukwudgie to close in on him. The tromping steps of the wendigo remai the forefront of his mind, but TJ se was too far away to immediately reach him. There was an immensely risky idea that occurred to him, but if it worked, TJ was sure he could quickly dispatch the closest assaint. With that surety and his fiden his own ability to survive, TJ deactivated Diviransformation just as a pair of spears tried to pierce through him to pin his body to the ground. As a human, his body was no lohere, and the pukwudgies were far from prepared for his response.
Though TJ suspected that the level seven goblins had a higher Strength than him, he knew from experiehat their weight was exactly what one would expect from a potbellied creature that was more legs and arms than body. He dove towards one of the two uninjured creatures. His right hand found its pukwudgie’s ankle, and his left its other. Then, just as its spear began to desd towards him, TJ whipped it around and headfirst into the ree. Its skull cracked against the wood with a siing thunk. There was no kill notification, so TJ spun a full 360 degrees before smashing its bato the same tree. Its spine snapped with a final crack, and TJ didn’t pay any attention to the kill notification.
The rest of the pukwudgies rushed towards him and TJ spu time and hurled the limp body at its panions. Two of the injured creatures were uo avoid its spindly limbs and torso while the other one and the single remained healthy one flickered around and outside of the body’s raheir spears glinted dangerously, but TJ’s goal as a human had been pleted. He shifted back to his coatl form, his timer for Diviransformation with over half an hour remaining. The two furious but weak thrusts skittered off his scales uselessly.
TJ lunged forward, catg one’s head while sending magic to the tip of his tail. Anything that followed him would quickly regret it. With the pukwudgie’s head stu his mouth, it wouldn’t survive for long and TJ shook it like a terrier shook a rat while he fled. The sed death notificatio him drop it without w, and TJ wondered if the rest would simply let him escape. The wendigo’s words disabused him of that thought.
“Catch. My. Dinner.”
Wordless birdlike screeches filled the air behind him. The wendigo, with the short dey that fight had offered him, had closed in enough for TJ to see the bushes it was stomping through. He resumed his flight, but the sole healthy pukwudgie had caught up. It stayed in front of him, stabbing at his eyes without engaging fully. It k only o slow him enough for the four remaining eo surround him, and that was all it seemed to io do. TJ cursed to himself, noting the retive position of the other two pukwudgies as he sprinted as quickly as he could mahe wendigo was, once again, bei behind, and TJ evaluated the three pukwudgies that remained.
The healthy nuisan his face could momentarily be ignored, and he focused owo behind him. Though they both were wounded and bleeding heavily, TJ saw they were ready to stab him wherever and however they could. He sent the vast majority of his MP to his already prepared tail, banking on the proximity of his Neophyte level. TJ slowed his head’s dodging slightly, allowing an errant strike to scrape just into the flesh under his scales along his mane. He fred the mahe feathers tightening around the spear and keeping the pukwudgie from easily wreng it free. Meanwhile, the two fnking goblins saw the opportunity he’d deliberately presented.
Before their spears could wound him terribly, TJ flicked his tail and released the ripping winds into the pukwudgies’ gaping maws. There was a wet sound of tearing flesh and screaming pukwudgie as TJ’s bde of wind ripped the upper half of their heads free. Two more death notificatio him with one wholly uninjured pukwudgie and wendigo ready to rip him to pieces. The wendigo was again gaining on him, the time taken to sy the penultimate monsters providing it enough time to draw closer still, closer than it had ever been.
TJ rolled his whole body over, the pukwudgie’s spear lodged between his feathers wreng free of its owner’s hands. He could hear the crag of frost behind him as the wendigo approached. Cheg his MP, he saw he had only 54/300 remaining. He couldn’t use it in fear of weakening himself with a killer migraine if this st pukwudgie didn’t give him suffit experieo reach level 8 of Neophyte. His deade, TJ leapt at the pukwudgie, disregarding the sound, smell, and chill that apahe wendigo as it reached him.
His coils ed around the pukwudgie, and its sharp teeth dug into him with a desperate ferocity. With a Toughness of 78 and his scales, it only broke its owh. TJ stricted as strongly as he could, bones crag and its breath wheezing. Before he could kill it, though, the wendigo reached him and, with chilled cws easily pierg his scales and flesh, began pulling him from his prey. The fear that had so easily settled over him by its presence was washed away by fury. It would steal his prey from him? TJ bit down on the pukwudgie again and again, tearing its flesh free.
A sharp icicle of pain shot up TJ’s whole body iurn. The pukwudgie was dying in his coils aopped his desperately snapping jaws to look at the source of agony.
The wendigo was doing to him what he’d doo the pukwudgie. Its mouth, though skeletal and shaped like a cow’s or ram’s, was filled with the sharp teeth belonging to a predator. It ped easily through his body and tore a four inch se from his tail free. With its cws still holding his body, it swallowed the mouthful of his flesh with its coldly glowing eyes fring in apparent pleasure.
“You. Tasty.” It’s tone rasped up his spine and made TJ’s mane fre up in an involuntary attempt at intimidation. The wendigo paid him no mind as it lowered its mouth to take another bite. TJ wriggled in a maddetempt to escape, but its cws, buried inches into his flesh and literally freezing his muscles, held him tight. The frost crawled up his skin, nearly a full foot of his body frozen to a snake-shaped ice cube. His mind swam with the agony of the frigid magic stealing from him his ability to move. With a wide grin, the wendigo’s mouth desded once more and ped nearly pletely through his body where it had bitten before. The st foot of his tail went limp as much of his spine was severed.
Hiss screaming in fear and desperation, TJ bit towards the wendigo’s arms and face again and again but it didn’t seem to care. His fangs scraped off the wendigo’s skull and face, and though his fangs found purchase in its arms, the ropy flesh was straough and refused to bleed or fall apart under his assault. To make matters worse, with each strike he made, the wendigo’s frost spread over his fad down his throat.
Then, as TJ lost all hope of escape, praying that he would be able to drop Diviransformation and maybe escape, his wounds stopped bleeding. The agonizing cold that filled his head more sharply and painfully than any brainfreeze disappeared. The wendigo’s cws in his flesh were pushed free by his healing wounds, and though feeling didn’t return to the parts of his tail below where his spine had been bitten through, every other wound he’d suffered in this brief csh was healed.
With a sharp twist of his body, TJ wrenched himself out of the wendigo’s grasp and flopped to the ground. He didn’t hesitate to pull himself bad out of its immediate reach. He looked at his notifications, thanking the System and Kukulkan that the final pukwudgie had provided suffit experience for him to level up.
5 Pukwudgie Cultists, 7 sin.
Css: Neophyte has advao level 8. Attribute points allocated: Endurance +3, Vitality +3, Toughness +2, Wisdom +1, Intelligence +1, Perception +1, Willpower +2, Fixation +2, Free Points +1.
Race: Human has advao level 7.Attribute points allocated: Strength +1, Agility +1, Endurance +1, Vitality +2, Toughness +1, Wisdom +1, Intelligence +1, Perception +1, Willpower +1, Fixation +2. Additional Free Point currently avaible.
TJ threw the Free Point into Intelligence, well aware that if he wao kill the wendigo, he couldn't be anywhere his monster as he did so.
For its part, the wendigo didn’t seem to mind TJ’s escape and survival. Instead, a long bck tongue licked its bloodstained snout as it wheezed out an off-putting cackle.
“You. Bring. More. Meat? Always. Make. More? Perfect. Snack.”
Its piece said, the wendigo resumed attag, rushing forward with cws and jaws ready. TJ slithered away while sending a couple densed spears of wind into its face, though its eye’s fmes didn’t flicker or eveo react to the attack. Its ughter grew louder and more pierg, and TJ’s rage surged and filled him. Disregarding the paralyzed tip of his tail, he was at the top of his game, and this undead cow-skulled bastard was going to attempt to mock a son of Kukulkan? TJ allowed his magic te through his body as he leapt tage the monster.
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