36 The run home

The dust from the attack faded away and there was only a small crater left. The bird had sat there for few more seconds than flew away.

5 minutes later the ground next to the crater moved for a few seconds than stop. 2 hours later ground moved again and Ryan crawl from the ground looking terrible.

The hole under the root had a decent amount of space in the inside. When Ryan first entered he was surprise to see that but he still felt unsafe. So he tried to dig along the wall to make the dirt fall on top of him, in the attempt to buried himself.

When the beast released the attack Ryan was already laying along the wall, with dirt on top of him in order to blend in better. The attack narrowly miss Ryan but he still took some damage from being so close to the impact area.

More dirt had fell on top of him cutting off the air flow, so Ryan had to move the dirt around to breathe. Than he waited for 2 hours to make sure the beast was not around.

Once Ryan made it out, he looked around cautiously for the beast. Not seeing anything he moved from the area and examined his injuries.

Other than his back being scraped up a bit he was fine. It did feel like he got hit by a car from being near the last attack but all it really did was knock the wind out of him. He received very little external damage from that last attack.

Ryan had to look around for a bit to find the direction to travel to get back home. This the first time he travel this far and the beast chaseing him made him temporarily lose track of where he was at.

On his way back home he had looked up every other minute, feeling paranoid about that flying beast. Ryan had killed another beast to keep in his ring just incase he need to throw it out again.

He had been traveling towards his home for about an hour now, and been making good progress. He was traveling fast, he can't wait to get back to his hideout.

Ryan gotten over confident lately killing rank 1 and rank2 beasts. He been thinking subconsciously to himself, that this forest is not that bad. He had got reminded today, he just been extremely lucky all this time to not had run into anything stronger untill now.

Ryan started to think to himself as he made his way home. (This is about the limit of my strength right now. Even if I stay in my hideout for another year, I won't be able to get strong enough to fight a rank 3 beast.)

(My lightning element is useless, I tried many times to use it in fights. At most I could keep doing my daily training but it won't help me kill a rank 3, the gap is simply to big. The only hope I have in killing a rank 3, is ranking up my core. But I been here for about half a year and im not even a quarter of the way to ranking up.)

( my dad did leave 27 mana stones in the ring but I know he left that for buying things not cultivating. If I ever leave this forest, I will have to find a city and money will be very helpful at that time. Plus I would need more than 27 mana stones anyway to rank up, it wouldn't even get me half way.)

(Daymon had trained with mana stones and he said it took him hundreds of mana stones to rank up. Its probably better for me to start making my way out of this forest. My luck can only last for so long.)

( Should I bring midnight but what will I do if i make it to the city. I would probably be bett.....)

swish, whoosh,

Ryan hear a sound of something traveling through the air at a fast speed, and turned to see that same rank 3 flying beast.

( wh-wh-why, this fucking bird is clearly going out its way to attack me.)

Ryan jumped down to the ground, it will be a death sentence to try to out run it in the trees. He will be easy pickings when he is mid air jumping.

Ryan had already been using his floating steps so his speed barely increases, all he did was run with more determination.

The bird been closing the gab fast and Ryan just kept on running. At this point the bird was 30ft away and Ryan had an idea.

(Hope this works. ) Ryan pulled out one of the fruits he picked the other day in hopes to grab the bird attention.

"Hey, do you want this." Ryan said, as he shaking the fruit from side to side in the air. He threw it back to it.

The bird had casually dodged it, and paid zero attention to the fruit as it traveled past.

(Fuck.)

Now the beast was only 20ft away  and still closing the gab.

(Think, think, or this will be the end. Even if I throw the beast corpse out, that will be a temporary fix. It had clearly came back to me last time. Maybe this will work.)

The bird was only 10ft away at this point as Ryan eyes frantically scan his surroundings.

(Found one.)

Ryan made sure to keep track of the beast as he ran from it. Right when It was bout to claw at him, Ryan made a left turn to cause it to miss. Then he ran around the tree when the bird flew past temporary losing sight of him.

At least that what he had hoped for he didn't actually checked to see if it was looking. As he ran all the way back around the tree coming back the same way he came, he ran towards a beast he saw a few moments ago.

As for the bird, when it had missed it had made a late left turn to catch up back with Ryan. For a moment it actually didn't see where Ryan went until he heard him running the opposite direction. The bird wasted no time to travel in that direction.

It gave Ryan an extra few seconds, the beast was already lest than 60 ft away. But the few seconds is what Ryan had need it and he ran to the beast he saw. 

It was a fat hippo build beast with 2 tusks coming out its mouth. Ryan had killed a few of them and it was pretty easy to kill. But Ryan wasn't running to the beast to kill but to see if he can get them to fight.

Being out of good ideas this the only thing he could think of, he had seen it happen on TV before.

The hippo looking beast notice Ryan was coming at it and was about to charge at him until it stop mid charge. It turned in a different direction when it noticed the beast behind Ryan only 20 feet away.

Ryan seeing this knew his plan was useless if the beast won't fight it. So Ryan chase after it and jumped on its back holding onto it fat rolls.

The bird that was following Ryan didn't even waste any time and opened its mouth.

When Ryan was just about to crawl under the beast in order not to get grab from the top. He looked back to see that air blast skill and he immediately jumped off.

swish, whoosh, BOOM!

The hippo beast hitting the ground hard was the actual cause of the loud boom sound. There was a chunk missing on the back of the beast as a blood mist  was formed around it.

Ryan did not care one bit about what had happened after he jumped and kept running.

(All my daily running really paying off.) Ryan thought to himself, attempting to find something positive out of his current situation.

The bird was still 20ft behind Ryan and killing that other beast didn't really slow it down.

Ryan was able to run for another 10 minutes by dodging at the last second everytime. But the last attempt he made at dodging, didn't work how it was supposed to and he got clawed pretty bad as the price.

The bird seem to be learning and Ryan realize this probably going to be the end.

The bird was less than 10ft away and Ryan pulled out his sword to make his last stand. He swung the sword but miss entirely. The bird casually dodge the swing by slowing down than swoop down onto Ryan.

Ryan pulled out the beast corpse and let it take the claw attack that was ment for him as he rolled out the way. He learned his lesson from the first time to move out the way of the corpse after throwing it out.

Ryan attempt to run again but he here that iconic sound. He jumped in a random direction.

swish, whoosh, BOOM!

Dust was hit up near Ryan covering his line of sight. He assumed the beast can't see him either than he started running for a bit and realized something off.

He looked around as he ran but he didn't see the bird. It didn't cause him to slow down though but after 10 minutes he can't help but feel surprised.

(What happened to it, im not complaining but am curious.)

At this point he was close to home less than a hour away. He been running home the entire time trying to make it to the stream and hide in the water. Knowing it was to far away he didn't really have hopes in that plan.

Once Ryan made it pretty much home he killed a beast for midnight and went inside.

"You won't believe what type of day I had today." Ryan said to midnight, as it walked up to him when he came in.

"Here, I know you probably hungry. I will tell you about it once I clean and patch myself up." Ryan took out the beast corpse  and went to go take a bath.