Damn that Snake !

Akirai gasped as she lept to the side, the snake pursuing her relentlessly, intend at claiming her as its next meal.

She flinched as the snake collided with a tree, biting through it with its sharp fangs, the left over stum corroding under a layer of green venom, potent enough that it began to smoke.

Akirai paled, in her life she had seen many, many poisonous and venomous animals, living out in the wilderness guaranteed that, add to that Akirais many travels across the lands to explore new regions, but she had yet to see such destructive venom before, not taking into acount the force of its bite, that thing was dangerous to make her want to turn around and run.

Akirai wasn´t sure if she should be happy or terrified that this being was a No-grade, a King Beast, sure, but a No-rank nontheless, she didn´t want to imagine this thing if it could spit fire at her, Akirai was a skilled fighter, but she was only human, to face off against such a Beast was the best she could do, but anything above this?

The only reason Akirai had managed to slay so many beetles before lay in the fact that their joints were weak and that the Beasts were one of the weakest Bronze-ranked beasts recorded.

The thing reared its ugly head again and hissed at her, Akirai entertained the thought of hiss back at it, but decided to keep on dodging instead.

To some, it might even look like a dance, the prize to win would be to live, the loser would perish, nether had the intentions of losing, one retreating, the other advancing.

Akirai looked around in a calm panic, her hands weren´t shacking, she was only sweating midly and her breaths were only slightly laboured due to her running and dodging continuesly, internally she was silintly panicking, trying to figure a solution out, sadly, due to her Beast, running was out of the question.

Should she climb a tree and wait it out? No- Snakes could climb trees, and even if this one couldn´t, her Beast could be the next target.

The area around them was destroyed, a few trees upturned with most of them being at the very least dented, only the giants were still standing, and Akirai feared what would happen if they fell, they would crush the both of them.

Akirai stilled.

Crush them!

Yes! That´s it! She had to crush the snake, even if it didn´t die upon impact, it would be restrained and could pose no more threat to them! Akirais eyes lit up as her thoughts raced in her head, coming up with strategies upon strategies, discarding them, and replacing them with new ones in the blink of an eye, she smirked, she had a plan.

Now? She needed to inact it, its own venom would, if all went to plan, be its downfall.

She circeled the snake, prompting it to attack her, the snake lunged again, and she once again lept out of the way, letting the Beast crash into the tree with full force, the tree barely even budged, but thats what she already expected.

She kept circling the tree, making the snake attack it again and again until holes and dents were beginning to show on its surface, to a bystander it might look like Akirai was just dodging without any other reason, but she was carefull and let the snake attack the tree trunk in one area more than others, this would hopefully be the place the tree fell, and fell onto the snake.

They began to wittle away at each other, and Akirai was only waiting until the tree finally gave out, the snake didn´t seem to notice that the trunck it kept crashing against was slowly becomming thinner and thinner.

Akirai didn´t know how long she´d been doing this, but she knew that she needed a break, she held on stubbornly and when she finally heard a large crack coming from the tree she nearly danced in joy.

A grin crept onto her face, but it wasn´t a cocky grin, an amused one, or even a condescending one, no- the grin was full of sharp teeth and radiating blood thirst as she watched in anticipation as the the giant, hundred meter tall tree came crashing down.

It turned out even better than she expected as the snake got stuck in the trunk of the tree, Akirai ran away and to the side to avoid the falling tree, the snake managed to free itself as it tried to slither away from the tree, but it was too late, the snake barely managed to get halfway out of range before the tree crushed its lower half under its weight, it screamed in anguish, and Akirai laughed.

She laughed and laughed as she saw that the snake was trapped, completly imobile from the it´s neck down, she was roaring in laughter, feeling the adrenaline rush trough her veins, she fell backwards and sprawled out on the mossy forest floor, watching the crown of trees above her and the small hole in the ceiling in the forest her two fight had caused, the warm daylight gently spilling onto her face as she laughed like a mad woman.

She stretched out her hand towards the sky, seemingly holding the sky in her handy, she grinned widely as she closed her hand into a fist, seemingly catching the sky in it.

Akirai was breathless but far from tired, although her muscles were screaming at her, her mind was racing, recounting the fight and the many close calls she´d had, her chest was rising and falling rapidly and she felt her heart thrumming in her ribcage.

She let her hand fall, letting both of them lie in the grass beneath her and just stayed on the ground, she listened to the wind and closed her eyes.

Sylvie, as usual stayed silent unless spoken to and let her have this moment.

-----------------------

The girl lying in the destroyed, now clearing, was bathed in a halo of light, it stood out like a star in the pitch black night sky, as if the light chose to focus on her alone, the rest of the forest still shrouded in shadows, blood dripping from her form, eyes closed and a smile on her face, clothes in tatters and a few wounds on her form, she seemed etheral, untouchable.

In that moment, in that clearing, she seemed to be otherworldly.

It was at this moment that the girl lying on the loor, covered in blood and clothes in tatters, a content smile on her face, choose her own fate.

To live and breathe what she loved, to be free of all that shackled her down.

It was the real beginning of : The Shade and -The Shop of the night.