Claw

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Dzenan Belegic

Nerastus

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By the way, what do you think of the new synopsis and book cover?

The book cover is the same thing Freya sees every time she looks at Chaos inside Lyze's soul.

(Image)

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(Lyze POV)

The giant monkey screeched at me as it suddenly swung down from the branch with one hand while arcing its tail right towards me. It did so with alarming speed, even more than I expected from it.

The barb on its tail glistened in the small bits of light that were allowed through the canopy as the sharp end sailed straight towards my face. I ducked out of the way again as it nicked off a few hairs of mine. Rolling away, my hand caught onto a rock. As soon as I came out of my roll, I whipped around and hurled it at the giant monkey who'd turned in mid-air as well to swing back.

The rock whistled as it bulleted right towards the monkey's face, but quick as a flash it caught the rock in its giant palm. Let me tell you, in the real world monkeys have some killer aim. You'd think they had some sort of preinstalled aimbot, that's how accurate they are sometimes even from a great distance.

Now instead of that, picture a giant one with both an enhanced body and mind while also evil to the core. Not a good combination I learnt as it hurled it right back at me. The Pallum armour I was wearing gained a massive dent in it as the rock collided with the chestpiece and I was sent careening through the undergrowth, digging a large rut with my small body.

I shook my groggy head as the monkey's screeches resounded in my ears and I caught a glimpse of it's tail disappearing into the trees above. I heard the rustle of leaves die down a little as I felt the monster's presence disappear momentarily. Noticing that it seemed to be aiming for my head quite a bit, I took the Pallum Viking helmet out of my hammer-space and equipped it. Out of all the armour I had, it was the one I least used so it was the most durable.

As I got to my feet, the tree whose branches I was standing under suddenly shook as the giant monkey swung down and then proceeded to swing around the trunk with it's arm held out. Lifting Grigor, I slashed forward hoping to lob it off. But the monster anticipated it and grabbed onto the blade. It also appeared to be smarter than I gave it credit for as it grabbed the blade with its sharp claws.

Sparks flew off at the connection but the ape held on in order to still the blade for a singular moment. Once it was stilled, it grabbed Grigor by it's blunt end and pulled on it, lifting me with it. The monster brought both me and Grigor around and I soon found myself smashing through trees, tumbling though the air as leaves and branches got stuck in the chinks of my armour as I got a taste of leaves in my mouth.

My body embedded itself into a large tree trunk so hard, splinters and sawdust exploded outwards in every direction as the branches nearby the spot I'd landed just flew off the tree. Gritting my teeth, I looked up as I saw the monkey once again swinging through the trees from branch to branch. It had thrown me about a surprising sixty feet away which was indicative of its bizarre strength.

It let go of the last branch it was holding onto as it swung upwards and it came sailing through the air as it gained height. The momentum caused it body to fly higher than my position, which meant the monkey intended to land on my in its descent. I found Grigor stuck in an odd lace which would not let me pull it out in time. So I took a different approach.

"Rising Tornado!"

A spiral of wind magic different to Ais's green glowing winds erupted from beneath the monkey at a perfectly timed moment as it could not doge mid-air. The twister hit the monkey's torso which was protected by the twinkling golden chainmail, and launched the primate in the opposite direction, away from me. I saw it's body land about 200 feet away, and even from here I could hear the branches breaking and even saw a few smaller trees fall down as they took the brunt force of a giant monkey landing on it.

This gave me some time to think. I knew for a FACT that this monster did not belong in the dungeon. And I knew it only because of the chainmail it was wearing. Had it not been wearing that thing, I would have assumed that it was another new kind of monster the dungeon had created for the 18th floor safe zone. With the abundance of fruit and trees the paradise of the 18th floor offered, it was the perfect place for giant monkeys to live.

But I knew who this 'Beast' was. And I was really confused because even upon recognising it, there was no way it should have been strong or fast enough to catch me off-guard.

Claw, the giant monkey.

The evil guardian of one of the six pieces of the Golden Armour, the golden chainmail which increased the wearer's strength of heart. Contracted by an evil wizard, the beast agreed to aid in keeping the priceless treasure away from the hands of the franchise's protagonist.

Now the only thing was, IT WAS FROM A FLIPPING BOOK SERIES! One that I hadn't read since I was seven years old! More than that, the protagonist was an ordinary human that managed to defeat this primate. So what the HELL was an obviously buffed up version of the hairy bastard doing in an anime world?

...Did I really have to ask that question? Three guesses as to who it was that was responsible for this.

The good thing was that due to being an avid fan of the 'Beast Quest' series, I knew this particular monster's weakness. The bad thing was that from this altitude, I couldn't see anywhere nearby here I could properly employ my capitalization on its weakness.

For Claw's convenience, there really had been no better place for him to fight other than this place. A place crawling with trees, he had the home advantage while I was just getting tossed around like a ragdoll.

My musings were broken as 'Thread' picked up Claw moving in on my position. He burst out of the canopy underneath me and landed on the tree I was on. Just like his smaller cousins, he began climbing the tree at a nimble pace, his mad red eyes never leaving my face as he hurled his body upwards towards me with each time he pulled his body up the tree.

I waited until he was a little bit closer before kicking outwards with my legs, taking me off the tree and I flipped my body in an awkward way to escape his grab. If there was any monster I was counting on to eat me, it was this giant screecher. I flipped and turned by body to face his back and tried stabbing him with Grigor as I finally managed to bring the blood red sword around into a proper hacking motion.

I aimed for the back of the monkey's neck but he pulled his body upwards, making me miss the neck and hit the chainmail instead. It was as if I tried to smash a rock with a wooden bat as Grigor bounced off the protective armour, sparks flying everywhere as metallic clangs filled both our ears.

This caught Claw's attention as he turned his body around to see me. His mouth widened into a demonic grin as he saw me mid-air. Flexing his legs, he jumped off the tree in my direction with both his arms out in a motion to swipe me with both out of the air and into his hungry embrace.

I returned a smirk at him as I activated my flight ability and flew just out of his reach. His expression became oddly human-like as he was overcome by dumbfoundedness. He landed in one of the smaller trees but I granted him no reprieve as I threw down a fireball at him. His instincts were sharp though and he leapt out of the way into another tree.

The explosion rocked the trees around as some of their leaves caught fire and the blue flames became orange as they found the trees as a fuel source. Claw caught sight of the fire and momentarily there was an expression of terror on his face as he leapt away into trees not near enough to catch alight.

As he landed on a branch, he looked up at me unsure of what to do. I smiled at him and mockingly beckoned him to join me up there. He growled before dropping and hooking his tail around the branch. Swinging his body around the branch, he became a spinning blur as he released his tail from the tree and came spinning in my direction.

I readied Grigor to slice him in half as he neared me bur Claw surprised me as he unfurled his body and shot his barbed tail at me the same way a scorpion would. The sharp tip smashed into Grigor sending another shower of sparks everywhere.

I wasted no time and pointed my hand at the golden chainmail. Torrents of electricity burst from hand and engulfed the precious metal. Gold was conductive, to it stood to reason that Claw started spasming mid-air as he was consumed in electrocution.

Giving him no chance to recover, I grabbed the tail right above the barb with my free hand and swung as hard as I could. The monkey was flung over the treetops as I pursued his flailing body that was releasing a bit of smoke in its wake. I gave it the same treatment it gave me earlier as it smashed through several treetops before finally descending and splashing into one of the many pools littered in the forest.

The water fizzed for a bit while it churned from having such a large mass of fur and limbs suddenly disrupt its calm waters. I put Grigor away and landed near he pool waiting with my arms up and my hands clenched into fists.

"Combo Star." I said as I felt the skill activate. I'd had not many opportunities to test this out as most monsters just died from a punch. But this guy seemed more durable than the other monsters, and he certainly proved to be so he launched out of the pool and landed awkwardly on his feet.

I grinned as he stumbled a little bit. The books from my childhood had been right. Claw was a beast meant to swing in the trees. So his claws on his hands and his feet were curved a little, which made it difficult for him to stand straight. Thanks to this, his balance was way off, so as long as he was on the ground, he wouldn't be able to fight back properly.

Which brought me back to my earlier problem. Even if he'd just come out of a pool, he was still near trees. If I could find a spacious enough clearing, I could force him to stay on the ground where I would just destroy him with no worry of his escaping. But luck was on the monkey's side as there was no such clearing around for a bit.

Claw screeched at me before beating his chest which was odd since he was a monkey and not a gorilla. More than than that, there were no thumping sounds of his chest because the chainmail got in the way. Instead, there was just the tinkering of golden links. That piece of armour was seriously distracting, but problematic too as it protected his vital organs. It prevented me from carving him up like a Silverback.

Nonetheless, I smiled and closed in. In another life, I would have questioned why I just didn't use my various skills and magic to just end the fight. But I was living the actual adventurer life, and what was an adventurer if he did not walk into risky territory? There would be no room to grow. This was a lesson I'd learnt in the past few weeks as I came to realize exactly how cunning and intelligent monsters could be sometimes.

Besides, a fisticuff with a giant monkey seemed a perfect opportunity to practice my punching motions. And with Combo Star active, I couldn't wait to see how far I could push this primate before he became weak enough to kill. I wanted to see what his core would look like, if he even had one.

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A.N. Any Beast Quest fans here?

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