Chapter 3

Michael whispered towards the masked couple, "Don't move if you want to stay alive. I don't want to hurt either of you, but I need you to stay back."

Once their eyes adjusted to the bright light of the flashlight the husband began to panic.

"Where is your mask? How dare you bare your face in my house, you're going to get us all killed!"

"I said stay quiet, shut the hell up right now."

The man ignored the orders, turning to his wife. "We need to get rid of him, what are we going to do when the inquisitors discover him? They'll think we smuggled it in! Gods were going to be killed for this! "

The more panicked the man became, the more his mask began to shift and stretch. At some point the woman had slumped down to the floor, tears flowing down her mask.

Michael's attention was fully on the man in front of him. Things were escalating, he needed to either calm him down or leave, but leaving wasn't really an option, he still needed information.

"Listen, I'm going to need you bot-"

Before Michael could finish the sentence, the man lunged at him.

Reflexively, Michael pulled the trigger of the shotgun, firing off the shell loaded with small rubber projectiles that impacted the man's chest hard. A loud crack echoes throughout the building despite the suppressor, no doubt alerting anyone that happened to be nearby.

The man collapsed to the floor unmoving, his chest bloody and bruised. Moments passed before his mask began to shift and contort, attempting to rip itself away from his face.

Michael moved forwards firing two well placed shots into the man's face, the mask stopped moving.

He needed to get out of here. Somebody definitely heard those shots, and this guy seemed more scared than anything else.

Michael ignored the crying woman and rushed through the door and out into the quiet dirt path. It was dark, but a huge moon provided enough light to see. Looking around farmland stretched out endlessly, with similar cottages speckled almost randomly throughout. The fields housed every crop imaginable, and several that he was almost positive didn't exist back on earth. This place would be beautiful if it didn't have such unsettling caretakers.

He reached into his bag, pulling out the gas mask and putting it on.

He wasn't sure if it'd make a difference, but he'd feel better having something covering his face near those things.

With that, he began to jog down the dirt path.

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After roughly twenty minutes of jogging Michael began to feel the strain of his new body. He was gasping for air and a cramp in his side made its presence known with every step. He'd been putting exotic looking fruits in his bag while he ran, probably not helping the whole running situation, but like hell was he going to give up the chance to discover new plants.

When he came upon a field growing something similar to wheat Michael decided to stop and catch his breath. He moved and crouched down within the plant to better stay hidden, but his rest only lasted ten minutes before he was spotted.

Michael could make out a figure illuminated by the moonlight rushing towards him. It moved with an alarming amount of speed, getting near Michael within mere moments.

The figure was within fifteen meters of Michael when it stopped.

Shining the flashlight towards the man revealed a disturbing figure. He stood tall, roughly seven feet, his left hand holding the decapitated head of the woman from the cottage.

His mask seemed to be more comparable to muscle than the rotting flesh of the couple. It covered his entire head and completely blocked out his eyes, only his nose was revealed. Flesh coiled and veins stretched from the mask into his nostrils, pulsing rhythmically.

He sniffed the air deeply and turned towards Michael.

"Now how did an unblessed get so deep within my fields, hmm?"

Michael decided to stall for time, any second waisted is one closer to leaving this dimension.

Still with his shotgun raised Michael responded, "I'm just a man passing through, I don't want any trouble but I'll give you plenty if we can't settle this peacefully."

He scoffed, "I simply wish to know how these fools managed to smuggle in an unblessed." He says, gesturing to the head.

"I pride myself on keeping my quadrant clear of pests, you're going to sully my record, and I can't have that."

Michael sighed, "Well you see-"

Without warning Michael unloaded three shots towards the creature, impacting its chest with all three. It stumbled and let loose an unearthly shriek while dodging the fourth shot. It ran through the field faster than anything he could ever hope to shoot.

Michael reached into his bag and lit two flairs, tossing them to either side of him, trying to get better visibility.

The second the flairs touched the wheat an inferno quickly started to overtake the field. It was like someone had soaked the wheat in gasoline beforehand.

Michael turned and began to run to the edge of the clearing, away from the rapidly spreading flames. WIth each step, he felt the heat of the fire growing closer to his back.

When he finally reached the edge of the field he dove for cover, quickly reloading his shotgun and pointing it towards the field.

The creature was desperately trying to put out the fire, using it's enhanced strength to throw large amounts of dirt into the flames. Many of the cottage residents were also running towards the fire, attempting to stop the spread.

A waste of time in his opinion, the fire was probably going to consume the wheat field and burn out after that. Dirt paths surrounded the field, making it unlikely to spread.

With that, Michael ran away through the various fields of fauna.

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Michael moved frantically, trying to think of a plan to kill that creature.

It's blind and would likely track him through scent. It was also substantially faster and stronger than him. While running though an apple orchard Michael came across a small stream and an idea struck him.

Weighing his chances he shrugged, "This probably won't work, but fuck it."

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The creature had long since given up on putting out the fire, content to let the larvae do the work. He could smell his quarry, the one that dared enter his territory, to tamper with what he'd worked so hard to obtain. That damned interloper even burned a field of splik, nobody can know of this. This is not weakness, that damned creature is just lucky.

Suddenly his head shot up, the scent trail he'd been following was coming to an end right behind that tree. Was he waiting for him, how idiotic. He'd feast upon his flesh and bury this embarrassment.

The creature's mask contoured into something resembling a smile, before punching a hole straight through the tree.

However, he didn't feel the sweet tearing of flesh he expected, nor the screams he craved so much to hear. He moved to pull his arm out of the tree, when pain erupted in the side of his head.

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Michael could see the monster moving towards him. It moved confidently, foolishly. It's so certain of its sense of smell that it's ignoring the prospect of this being a trap, even after it's crops got burned it still thinks he wasn't worth taking seriously.

Michael sat in a tree shirtless, with his body smeared in mud. His shirt was stabbed into the neighboring tree the monster was currently stalking towards.

It crept up, pulled its arm back and punched straight through the tree.

Once it's arm was fully in the tree, he chuckled. Try running away now.

He unloaded the magazine into the creature, going for shots to the mask only.

All eight shots hit the monster as it ripped its arm out of the tree and collapsed to the ground.

Michael jumped down from the tree and ran over to the creature. It's mask was squirming, trying to rip away from the most likely dead man.

Michael gripped his shotgun like a bat and swung down at the mask. With each hit it screeched.

At five swings it's squirming slowed.

At nine swings it's screaming stopped.

At fifteen swings a feeling of weightlessness overtook his body as space itself shifted around him.

When the feeling passed, Michael looked around and he could see he was in a meadow, a highway not too far away from him. He still had his foot atop the creature, its head a bloody pulp of what it once was.

He breathed heavily in relief before walking a ways away from the corpse and collapsing in the soft grass of the meadow, panting hard from exertion.

He started up into the sky, "Huh, I guess I just killed a monster."

Michael smiled, probably the happiest he'd ever been.