19

My guts squirmed at the sight of the beasts body writhing without a head, but I didn't have time to worry about that right now. Something bigger, and much more powerful had killed it. I drew my daggers, and looked at those big eyes. The beast lit up as if literal lightning was coursing through its black scales. Lighting up the everything within three feet of its massive body.

The beast ignored us, and inhaled deeply. Filling its large chest to full capacity, and then when it exhaled. The beam of concentrated lightning that came out was as thick as a tree trunk, and scorched through three more beasts hiding in the grass. The ones that weren't killed instantly by the attack writhed in pain as they tried to flee with giant holes in them or parts of their bodies completely cut off. The lightning beast on the other hand just scoffed in annoyance as it darted toward the three severely wounded beasts.

It didn't stop there either. Its tail lashed out. Striking the three wounded as it passed with enough force to kill them all in single blows. All three of its tail strikes were aimed squarely at the beast's heads. Leaving indents in each of their heads.

Its teeth clamped down on a fifth beast. Ripping its arm out of the socket, and tossing it in the air. The beast screamed as it went up in the air. Coming down head first into the black beasts open mouth. It looked almost as if the beasts teeth vanished for a second when the creature's head landed in its mouth.

A sickening crunch rang through the quiet of the night, and then the black beast sucked the smaller beast down its throat like a noodle. Its throat bulging, and flexing as the dead beast writhed going down. Drawing several quiet gags from the women of the group. The beast licked its bloody snout, and a sound that was halfway between a growl, and a chuckle reverberated through the night. This big beast found all of this amusing as it retreated into the dark with disturbingly low amount of sound considering the creature's size.

"Holy fuck," I was the first one to break the silence, "I don't know about you, but there is no way I'm fucking with that thing."

*****

When I woke up the next morning I felt Wyatt's absence. I wondered briefly where he was, but dismissed the thought quickly since he appeared to be having fun. I stood up, and stretched slowly. Wondering if I was going to get in trouble for Wyatt leaving. I showered to wake myself up.

Then I remembered that we'd forgotten to go back to that kid Bryce. We had supplies to give him. Savannah was already awake like usual. I grabbed the bag of scales Wyatt had given us to use. He wanted us to mix it with beast crystals to create a leather like material.

From there we would construct a saddle. The big mana storing gems would be set in the leather so they could continually store up mana while he was wearing the saddle. Wyatt was prepared to infuse large amounts of mana into the project so that the saddle could be stored within him like his mana clothing was whenever he switched forms. I swung the bag of scales up over my shoulder, and walked through the front door. Calen the guild leader looked at me as soon as I crossed through the door.

I sighed at him glancing over to the open doors of the warehouse.

"I'm guessing this has something to do with Nix," I tried to keep my tone level, and calm.

"You neglected to tell me that your beast is intelligent enough to let himself out," Calen rubbed the back of my neck.

"Nix won't cause any trouble," I wanted to shake my head at him, "He knows humans are off limits. He won't harm them without giving them some sort of warning or being attacked first. If you want proof just look at Jax, and Savannah. They've approached him multiple times without getting harmed. We even rode in the back of the shuttle with him, and he didn't put a single scratch on any one of us or the pilot."

My voice started to waver toward the end as my fear slowly got the best of me. Calen just sighed at me with a frown. He seemed to know better than to try threatening Nix again. He shook his head at me, and let me go. He didn't seem to like that I could switch back, and forth from confident to subdued so easily.

I wish I could say it was something I was doing on purpose as I shuffled through the settlement with my eyes mostly downcast. I was glad the settlement wasn't very big. It didn't take me very long to find Bryce's shop. I walked in, and sighed in relief now that I was out of the eyes of the public. I looked up at Bryce.

One person was far easier to deal with then a crowd, and we were still new here so everyone that saw me on the street gave me a glance. Some stared longer. Those were the ones that really set my nerves on edge. I set the bag of scales on the counter.

"These are the materials we mentioned," I tried to swallow back my fear for a few seconds, "We want to mix this material with beast crystals, and create the leather like material we mentioned earlier. I want you to study these scales, and tell me if you can use these to do it, and if you can. What you need to create the material?"

Bryce picked up one of the scales, and started studying it under a scanner. His eyes slowly grew more, and more focused on the screen as the details of the material it was scanning was put up on the screen.

"Where did you get this stuff?" Bryce looked at me with a sparkle in his eye.