1 Tough life

In the depths of Marcher forest, a herd of Denser bison were busy grazing in a formation. The younger and weaker beasts of the herd were in the middle, surrounded by the stronger and more powerful ones in the herd. Generally, even a Denser bison calf was able to protect itself from various predators owing to its tough hide and powerful horns but as of late, their herd was targeted by the local tribesmen. So these beasts wisened up and adopted a basic formation to protect themselves.

Suddenly, there was an unusual movement in the bushes. One Denser bison's ears perked up and it stomped its hooves sending a tremor through the soil. The herd became alert and roared as they got ready for a battle but there was no response from the bushes. The leader of the herd, dug its horns in the ground and began drawing upon the essence of Still. The soil started to gather around its horns and get denser to form a heavy rock. With its full force, the Denser bison flung the rock towards the bush at a great speed. A small whimper could be heard and soon blood started to flow like a small stream from the bush. Realizing that they've been discovered, several tribesmen sprung forth from various hiding places and began their attack.

Armed with clubs and spears, several youngsters charged towards their prey. Some drew upon the essence of Flow to increase their speed while some drew upon the essence of Fury to make their attacks more lethal. The bison herd was undeterred by their charge and retaliated with full force. They were confident in their hides which were inherently empowered by the essence of Still and couldn't be easily penetrated even by bullets. However, the young tribesmen seemed to be much more coordinated in their attacks. They used their spears to puncture the defenses of the bison while using their clubs to smash apart the barrage of rocks flung by the bison.

As the weak points started to emerge, several teenagers who stayed hidden away from the battle, started making their play. They drew upon the essence of Will and heightened their focus. They were armed with high caliber rifles. They carefully took aim amidst the intense battle aiming for the weak points. As they fired in succession, the bison fell one after another. The leader of the herd was enraged by this sequence of events and started drawing upon essence of Fury. Its horns started to glow and it was able to seriously injure some of the youngsters. The youngsters, albeit being powerful, were beginning to falter due to the ferocious attacks.

"Shit! Is this Denser bison close to evolving to an Elder beast? Its capacity to draw upon the essence of Fury is much higher than ours!", exclaimed a young tribesman.

"Don't falter now! Drawing upon essence of Fury will cause its essence of Still to weaken! Focus on breaking its defenses. We have to prove our worth to our tribe.", said another young tribesman trying to rally everyone.

As they continued their attacks, all the bison fell, except for the leader of the herd. Like any awakened beast that was capable of using various essences, it was capable of a higher level of thought. Had it been an ordinary animal, it would've escaped realizing that it cannot win anymore but the Denser bison was maddened by the death of its herd. Out of its desire for revenge, it drew upon more and more essence of Fury and lost control. It started to attack the youngsters in a much more lethal fashion. It even hurled rocks at the distant sharpshooters, some of whom couldn't escape in time.

Just as it came close to mauling a young tribesman's head off, one of the senior tribesman who had been watching the entire battle, jumped into the fray and caught the bison by its horns. He didn't take a lot of time to draw upon the essence of Still. In an instant, he was able to use the essence to increase his strength. As he stopped the charge of the bison, he raised his fist and drew upon the essence of Fury in an instant. He smacked the Denser bison on its skull, shattering its defense and killing it immediately.

Victory was finally theirs but the youngsters didn't feel joy. In the end, they had to rely on their elder to finish the fight. The young tribesman, who tried to rally others earlier, hung his head in shame. He was able to escape the jaws of death today but he was not happy at the outcome.

"You don't have to be so glum after a victory, Wil. You did your best today."

"But it wasn't enough father. I'm starting to doubt whether I will awaken my Strain at all."

"One day, you will. One day, when are fighting to your fullest, in the heat of the battle, you will awaken your Strain without even knowing it. You're a Lyons after all."

Wilbert Lyons, a.k.a. Wil nodded and treated his injuries. None of the youngsters were capable of using the essence of Life to heal themselves. They had to get back to their village healer for full recovery. So they performed some first aid and got back to work, preparing the transport to bring their hunt back to the village. They had lost one of their brethren to the first attack by the leader of the herd. He was quite young and inexperienced in using the essences so he was not able to strengthen his defense to tank the first hit in time. The tribe would be saddened by his death but they had much bigger problems at hand.

The city state of Griffin, had imposed an embargo on all resources ever since the truth about the world became public a few months ago. Their chieftain had gone to Griffin city to plead his case but then he went missing. The tribes that usually work together soon started having disputes and now their neighboring tribes were planning to wage a war on them. Facing this tough situation, the interim chieftain ordered Alexis Lyons, to get all the youngsters ready for war. The results were somewhat underwhelming. Without sufficient experience in the usage of the essences, many of them failed to awaken their strains even after life and death battles.

Not all strains were the same. There were variants in the same Therian Strain like the Bull variant or the Wolf variant which were relatively easier to awaken and quite a few youngsters had successfully awakened them. However, his son, Wilbert, had the powerful Lion variant that was passed down in his family . It was much harder to awaken. Without the Strain, he was afraid that his son would lose his life in the upcoming war. He had to do something to prevent that from happening.

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