A Sharp Blade
From hearing such threatening words, the bear began raising its legs and stomping them into the ground whilst infusing its Ki into the air within its lunges to produce an attack that would shake up many creatures' souls.
Bellowing out an ear-deafening "RAWR" that shook the ground and echoed throughout the forest, causing the trees to lose their snow, however, as the bear gazed with its prideful eyes at the human did, the bear noticed he didn't even look like he had flinched.
Standing up because my little hiding hole had not only been uprooted by the roar, but it also cleared the area of snow. Standing, I raised the hilt besides my right ear and spoke "Do I really need to kill you"
Glancing over, I could see its thick coat that couldn't hide its bulky musculus as it moved closer to me, as well as the protruding claws that curved into the ground.
Gripped the hilt tightly with both my hands, I was fully prepared to wait for the bear to make the first move when I sensed something approaching me fast from the side and instinctively brock me stance to do a large half turn out the way.
Feeling the tip of the sword cut through the snow as I steadied myself, looking at the creature that tried to flank me. Resembling that of a wolf, but with an extra pair of ears and its six legs.
Lifting the sword to the front of my body, I put on more of a flexible posture to not have to break stance again, but it has now reduced the power behind some strikes however speed has been increased.
Focusing on the wolf's four hind legs, but I noticed that it slowly looked like it was getting ready to strike as its front legs began to aim at me. So gripping my hilt harder in anticipation of its inevitable attack.
Subsequently, It became a blur as it dashed towards me, but knowing at those speeds it would be hard for it to change its angle of attack, so I just needed to strafe slightly to the left and wait for the wolf to collide into the blade.
Shooting through the blade, I could feel as it bounced across the ribs, you could see the wolf had no idea what just happened by the way it stopped to turn around to then collapse, with a pool of blood quickly spreading around it.
Flicking the blood from the blade, I could feel an old sensation being emitted from the bear, which brought a smile to my face as I thought. "How long has it been since I felt someone forcing bloodlust on me?"
At the start, the bear had thought it was going to be easy killing a wandering human, but after he killed one of its subordinates and on top of that, he showed them how it was easy for him to kill his aids.
The bear signalled for the other wolves to come out of hiding with a low grunt.
Seeing this, I unconsciously painted a smile on my face, as I placed my hilt again to the side of my ear and loosely placed my feet on the frozen dirt as I watched intently for any signs of movement that would indicate an attack.
I didn't have to wait too long until one of the wolves began sprinting at me, but I was let down as the wolf movements were quite primitive and easy to see through. To show it the error of its ways, I swung a quarter circle aiming right at the neck, expecting a clean cut.
Forgetting my power, I felt it jam against the wolf's spine, trying to shack the blade out, I gave up pretty quickly and placed my boot against the head to push it off.
The few animals left got furious at the sight in front of them, so the bear proceeded to give a signal which told the last two wolves to attack.
Watching as the wolves ran at me, gripping the hilt I stepped forward to strike down, giving the blade extra momentum, on the first wolf, which made a beautiful arc as the edge passed through the middle of the wolf's head and cut cleanly through the bottom of the jaw.
Looking forward, spotting another one running at me, waited till it was close enough for me to quickly glide to the left and thrust the sword at the chest, feeling the blade glide in-between the ribs and watching the life leave the animal.
Retracting the blade, standing straight with four dead wolves scattered around me, I looked over at the bear and raised the sword up in front of my body and swivelled the blade to look at the flat face, to my disappointment I saw cracks that were snaking across the blade.
"What a shitty blade" as I mumble, gazing at it, I thought I would be lucky if it even managed to last two strikes.
The bear perceived an overwhelming pressure radiating from the human that was busy smiling at a sword, but the pressure quickly vanished almost as soon as it showed up.
The bear didn't want to feel like it was being crushed again, so it quickly wanted to quickly exterminate the man that had caused it to feel fear.
Noticing the bear rush at me with its large strides, that shook the lightly settled snow off back into the air.
Readying my sword and this time planting my feet firmly into the hard dirt as I raised the sword above my head, watching as the bear tried to swing its right paw at my face and quickly sidestepped and in a swift, powerful arc I tried to cut off the leg that struck at me.
My arm continued the motion, but the blade didn't follow with, I now only had a hilt and about 2 inches (5.08 cm) of metal protruding from it and now having no reason to be holding a broken sword, I throw it to the side.
It happened so quickly, that the bear only knew something was wrong when it could see a shiny metallic object glinting.
Seeing it limp away from me with blood coursing out rapidly, I quickly decided to take this opportunity to execute a flurry of blows to the ribs of the bear.
Feeling that the bear was sturdier than I initially thought, I decided to go for a killing blow by sending Ki to my fist in order to hurt it internally.
Twisting the punch upon impact as the Ki exploded, reverberating throughout the body, shattering the bones and along the way bursting the lungs, blowing out the other side of the body.
In the wake of blood painting the floor, I looked around just to be sure there wouldn't be any unwanted surprises.
For a while only the noise of the wind blowing in between the trees could be heard, judging that it was safe, to proceed I crouched down and pierced the bear, trying to search for its beast core and beast crystal.
Slowly rummaging around what felt like a thick soup, I first searched in the general area of the heart as that's where, beast cores usually manifest themselves, feeling around for a little while I felt a round smooth ball and pulling it out I wiped off the blood onto the fur.
Looking at the core, which happened to look red with a tint of darkness discolouring everything, I put it away and went back to search through the bear gain hoping to find the crystal as they are sometimes worth more as they have more uses.
Being unable to find one I stood up I looked around at the carnage from the fight and I went to look through the other bodies, finding 4 almost pitch black beast cores.
Placing them into a makeshift pouch, I let my eyes wander around, trying to figure out which direction I should start to walk in again. Finding my last footprints, I guessed the overall path I should go in.
Tired and exhausted from trekking through the forest for at least what felt like a week, I finally managed to come across an enormous dome that glowed a faint orange through the trees, following the glow I reached a vast flat plain that surrounded the dome.
Gradually travelling closer to the dome, my impression of it started to go up in my mind as its sheer size baffled me as its entire structure curved away from me around the horizon.
Staring at the size, I noticed a thick looking wall encircling the dome, it seems as if the orange glow radiates some heat as there was no snow surrounding the wall or on top of the dome.
Reaching closer to the walls, I found myself being drawn into a line of travellers wanting entrance as well. A beautifully chiselled arcing entrance greeted those who waited.
It took me a moment to realise why the lines were taking so long to filter into the dome it seemed that a large group of people were trying to make their way in through what looked like toll booths, placed on either side and two guards stationed at each.
The line in front of me managed to subside enough, so I could get to one of the booths and finally being able to stand in front of the booth, I heard a nasally voice speak to me"Show me your citizen's pass."
Looking down at the small man wrapped in extremely thick clothes" I have never been here before."
Sighing out of annoyance, he tapped with his pen on some wood just below" read this sign."
Looking just below the booth's window, I started reading the sign.
1- U.Copper Coin for a single day.
1- U.Silver Coin for a year.
1- U.Gold Coin for 20 years.
1- U.Platinum Coin for 50 years plus nominate anyone of your choosing and you get to move into a free house for ten years.
After reading through the writing, I sighed, "I don't have money"
On hearing those words the toll operator laughed "Pfft, then don't waste my time" waving his hand to show him off
"I can get money, just let me sell these" Pulling out the pouch with the beast cores and dropped them on the booth's little table.
The booth operator swallowed dry spit looking at them understood what he meant"You could just say you're a hunter" sighing "Show me your time crystal"
Looking at him blankly, unable to grasp what he meant by a 'Time Crystal'
The operator catching on pretty quickly glanced at the guard called him over to whisper in his ear, shortly after leaving, he came back with what looked like a wristband that had a milky white crystal placed in it.
Throwing it at me in a monotone voice, the guard commanded"Put it on"
Folding it around my wrist, I heard the nasally voice ring out" Have this copper coin and put it against the crystal" as he handed over a little metallic brown coin.
Taking it from him, I did as he asked and upon placing the coin against it the milky white changed to a brown glow and the coin in my fingers had gone, however, a number 1 could visibly be seen inside the crystal.
"If that number disappears, it will send a ping to people who would happily kick you out," said with a smile.
Before I was ready to make my way inside I just needed to know something " Are they accumulative"
Sneezing into a tissue "Yes, now go"