LII. The Boars

He walked to the door and opened it, then quickly closed it behind him.

Myr was there.

"Oh oh oh, well... here you are" he said, looking at Dag.

Dag wielded both weapons, ready to face him.

"Who took my keys? Not you, it's impossible… I would have noticed that" Myr continued.

Dag looked at the shaman intently, defiantly.

"Maybe the young slave? Did she do that?".

Dag's expression became darker.

"Hahaha! I've centered it! So she's the culprit" Myr said.

"Your enemy is me now, stop babbling" Dag replied, with both weapons pointed at the shaman.

Myr put his hands one on each other and began to channel a spell.

Moving each other's palms apart, a small sphere of air appeared in his hands, widening more and more, until it took the form of a bird.

The shaman had just created an elemental crow, made of air! It looked like a little hurricane.

"Find the girl" he said, releasing the elemental into the air, which flew at rapid speed toward the door.

Dag tried to hit him, but the tomahawk crossed the bird, which continued its charge.

Arriving at the door, it flew quickly without stopping and passed through, leaving a thread of dust behind.

"You bastard! That girl has nothing to do with my escape! I'm the one who got out of the cage! Your rune is not as strong as you think" Dag said, challenging Myr.

Before the shaman could respond to the taunt, two guards came from his back.

"You're an insolent little boy. I'm going to silence you! I'm sure the Xis will accept your body even when you're dead!" said Myr, altering himself.

"Did you call us, sir?" the two guards said.

"Yes, my loyal warriors... I need your help to catch the fugitive" Myr said, and as soon as the two men advanced toward Dag, the shaman stabbed them both in the back.

With a dagger lodged in one's back and a dagger in the back of the other, Myr began to quickly recite incomprehensible words.

Dag stood still, trying to figure out what was going on.

Within seconds, a vortex of wind began to rotate around Myr and the two guards.

One by one, both men knelt and Myr violently pulled the daggers out from their backs.

The guards' hands resting on the ground, as well as the feet, became hooves and their bodies began to bend over themselves and to cover with a thick black fur.

One of the two men turned to Dag during the metamorphosis. His gaze expressed inhuman suffering as if he were pleading to end his suffering.

Soon, the man opened his mouth and two huge tusks grew from his lower jaw, two smaller from the upper one.

The transformation lasted about a minute, in which Dag was paralyzed, observing the scene.

The two men turned into two huge black boars.

With their eyes as red as blood, they stared at Dag, exhaling thick air from their nostrils, ready to charge as soon as Myr had given them the order.

"Two wild boars? Can't you do better?" said Dag, trying to boast, to intimidate Myr.

He was actually scared: those beasts didn't look like mere wild boars. They were as big as bears and their tusks looked like elephants' ones.

Myr moved both arms forward, pointing them at Dag.

Immediately the two wild boars charged at him.

One of them ran erratically towards Dag, the other instead followed a straight trajectory and resting one of the long tusks on the floor, during its charge it tore all the tiles one by one along its path, digging a groove into the floor.

It was a powerful being.

Dag got ready for the impact, trying to figure out which of the two wild boars arrived first because of their crossed trajectories.

He walked away from the door to prevent the beasts from breaking through, and when the first wild boar tried to hit him with one of its tusks, Dag dodged the shot with a jump and clung to the pig's fur.

With a decisive blow, he stuck it with his sword, which penetrated deep into its back. The boar uttered a loud groan in pain.

Dag grabbed the short sword again and pulled it out from the animal's body, jumping off his back.

In the meanwhile, the other wild boar tried to charge him frontally.

Dag parried the tusk blow, but the beast continued incessantly to push forward until his back touched the wall.

At the same time, the other wild boar already seemed to have forgotten the wound.

Dag continued to hold his weapons firmly with both hands to repel the boar that pushed him hard, trying to crush him against the wall.

"They have a frightening strength!" thought Dag, who could not get out of that position.

With a powerful knee, he managed to hit the beast under the snout and it finally loosened its grip.

As soon as the animal stepped back, Dag struck it with a sword lunge, piercing it in one eye.

The wild boar continued to retreat, waving its head and the short sword lodged in it when Dag struck it again, but this time with the tomahawk, which sticked in the beast's forehead.

The huge black boar fell with his belly on the ground, still panting with pain.

Dag violently pulled the sword and the tomahawk out of the animal's head at the same time, which despite being on the ground in a pool of blood, continued to flail its hind legs for a short time.

Then it stopped.

Myr uttered a groan as if he had just been stabbed.

Maybe those two wild boars were like extensions of his body: they shared the pain.

Myr, stabbing those two guards, had managed to summon the two beasts, through a tribute of blood.

Dag concentrated, staring at the other remaining wild boar.

It exuded a yellowish aura, similar to that of its creator.

Myr lowered one of his arms.