Test pt. 2

Still looking at his hands behind him tied stiff to his back with little slack to move around. He looks at the tree he detached himself from and takes short fast breaths to some himself up.

'Alright so all I gotta do is break a thumb not to hard not to painful'

Virgil takes a few more breaths and internally counts down. As fast as he could runs backwards slamming his thumb against the tree using the weight of his body to break it. A sickening crunch and stifled scream later he slips his one hand out and fumbles with the second. After a minute of steadying his mind he picks himself up off the ground stretching his arms and resetting his thumb back where it should be.

'Wait why didn't I just cut the ropes?'

reaching behind he feels nothing and grabs air.

'EVERY SINGLE TIME!!'

Touching the floor and realizing it is slightly damp he figures there must be water around here somewhere or it just rained. To test the theory he walks forward his foot leaving an impression in the moist dirt. Then walking backwards there was no impressions after a certain distance the way towards water must've been forward.

'Ok ok ok what does Angel always tell me?'

He nods his head remembering the scolding and constant advice to think before moving.

'First things first sword I find that everything else will be easier.'

He notices a set of footprints to his right leaving a deep impression deeper than his in the least about a quarter inch impression. He stares questioning the next set of moves seeing the dirt still damp, and no other prints he figures Angel to be in that direction an slowly ventures deeper into the woods.

'This is the last thing someone would do. Venture deeper in the woods following a mysterious trail of footprints with no concrete knowledge and no weapon.'

The sun starts beating down on the forest Cicadas are heard through out the area.

'Alright first things first a weapon I doubt they'd let me have mine back. So I gotta improvise.'

Grabbing a stick that's arm length, just about the same size as his sword would be, takes his typical fighting pose

'. . . Yeah not me.'

Sighing he breaks the stick in half tossing it to the side and keeps walking. After another hour or so he enters a clearing and sees his sword right there in the middle atop some rocks. Thinking to himself pinching the bridge of his nose in irritation.

'What kind of video game ass test is this!'

He just about runs forward but comes to an abruptly stop, and notices a giant black Panther laying on the thick branch of a tree only ten feet away from the sword. Cursing himself while he moves forward.'

'Stupid heirloom, stupid pride, stupid forest, stupid test.'

Treading forward barely on the balls of his feet making sure not to step on any twigs, sticks, or leaves that might alert the beast to his presence. Getting closer by the minute Virgil takes in the creatures appearance, it might've looked like a panther upon first inspection but he quickly realized it wasn't that simple. He looked closely at its coat noticing a pattern that mimicked a Rorschach test in a slightly lighter hue of black making it appear as if it was just the shadows of the leaves above it.

The beast had two tails both skinny the tips coming apart into two pointed prongs giving it the appearance of having four tails, and not two. From its mouth a thick froth was forming almost as a reaction to the beasts snoring. Every time the beast took a breath in its lip would curl revealing the pink underside along with it's canines nearly peaking out.

The first thing Virgil noticed however was the smell. It stunk like sulfur and freshly turned dirt which on this creature was not the best of combinations.

Holding his nose fighting the urge to release his insides he continues to slowly trek forward

'How can something stink this much damn ?!'

Virgil stops dead in his tracks and tenses as the sound a twig snapping reaches his ears he backs up trying to take the noise back. In his panic he accidentally kicked a rock into the tree where the beast was perched. The panthers ears perk up it looks around for a second eyes still closed, and yawns puts its head back onto it paws falling back into its slumber.

Virgil let's out a breath of relief internally scolding himself and inches closer to his sword agonizingly slower. He reaches his hand towards the hilt his finger lightly brushing his prized weapon. The panther jerks it's head up as it gets dragged off the branch and yowls in deep pain before slowly going quiet.

There's a flash of purple the growling stops completely, and is replaced by something sounding almost human with the reverb of a beast. Suddenly something jumps over the branch the shadows and light behind it making only a silhouette kicking Virgil away from the stone he rolls hits his head on a tree.

His head lolls he sits there for a second and looks up quickly and sees a woman her skin completely black darker than shadows themselves seemingly absorbing the light. She opens her mouth as fangs grow and her jaw elongates and widens.

It's eyes change from a deep intelligent brown to the yellow of a panther as well as slitting in the same manner becoming sharper that of a hunter. The women's hands become larger fingers growing and length and turning into a mixture of a human hand with retractable claws. Virgil assumed he was looking at something at of a horror movie seeing the rib cage break and reform.

This all happened in the span of seconds but to Virgil it took forever to process as his head was still ringing from being hit against the tree with such force. He was barely regaining his breath and two of everything slowly became one while his eyes stopped rattling in his skull.

'Stupid heirloom, stupid pride, stupid forest, stupid test!!'

The beast gets on all fours and pounces Virgil rolls out the way and dashes towards the stone the beast skids planting its feet on the trunk of the tree and jumps bounding toward Virgil's path. In a low guttural growler speaks

"No shiny for you'

It reaches Virgil before he can make it to the rocks slashing at calves forcing him into his stomach. Not giving a second of rest to Virgil it plants it's paws onto Virgils back and takes a bite out of his shoulder.

Next taking a hold of the nape of his neck as if he was kitten and starts thrashing it's head. Even with his pain tolerance being what it was after years of training the feeling of his skin slowly tearing was unbearable as warm blood and spittle made its way to the front of his neck and down his chest. Slowly losing consciousness from the pain alone his neck tearing apart slowly his eyes start to roll back until only the white were seen.