Chapter 19: Enhanced Instincts

Arthur had quickly made his cowardly-looking escape to the trees with the hope of gaining the advantage under the cover of the thick forest.

His reasoning was quite simple:

Demon Bears were large four-legged animals so he figured turning was going to be hard for them inside the thick compacted trees.

Visibility was also bound to be harder under the dense canopies and that would eventually give him the upper hand in manoeuvrability, speed and agility.

It was only after the prince was under the cover of the trees that he realised just how wrong he was about the whole situation.

The tusked red-eyed demonic beasts didn't slow down for even a second.

On the contrary, under the cover of the trees, they got faster and faster… tasking the prince to sprint as fast as his legs could carry him.

Arthur found himself leaping high into the air to avoid the open jaws and massive tusks of the demon bears and even sliding with his back low to the ground to avoid their deadly sideways lunges and numerous attempts to sandwich him, tasking him to utilize his muscles and gymnastic superiority in the most daunting and daring ways.

The two demon bears weren't fazed and even continued making well-synchronized efforts to put him down, each time getting closer than the last.

Arthur even felt the metallic claws graze the fabric of his clothes every once in a while, trumping his inflated sense of pride and superiority from earlier…

'THESE ARE NOT… NORMAL DARK CREATURES!!!' he mentally screamed as he continued this dangerous dash and dance with death.

If it hadn't been his life on the line, Arthur would have been impressed.

Better yet, it made him applaud the struggling humans he'd left behind. They had done a marvellous job of defending themselves against not two, but four of these things.

Arthur increased his speed against his burning lungs and searing muscles and broke through the treeline and leading up to another high cliff similar to the one he'd left the boy and girl at.

The subtle curve of the edge of the cliff made it feel like they were currently trapped in a bowl… the height of its sides remaining unknown.

It was a dead end.

Arthur quickly made his way to the cliff, wondering how long it had been since he'd started running.

His mind was filled with fear for his life, as well as fear of losing during this part of the Sorting. Could he lose in the Sorting? Or would he actually die? Would 'dying' mean he's not fit to be a Hunter?

Based on his recent experience with Sullivan's gang of bullies, he figured death wasn't possible during the Sorting… rather, something else that signified that someone was indeed dead.

But to what extent was the realism in this simulation and how much pain was he going to feel if he got injured?

He'd slapped Sullivan in the flat of his blade and the boy had got instantly knocked out after colliding hard with a tree. He'd even sent his friend, Donnie flying with a hit to the chin but neither of them had died.

Arthur couldn't find it within him to accept gut-wrenching pain just to test when he'd be granted death at the tusks of a demon bear… not that he had a poor pain tolerance.

It just didn't make sense for him to try something suicidal.

Then again, his current situation was bordering suicidal from an observer's perspective.

He knew for sure breaking a limb wouldn't equal death… which probably meant that people here had to die the right way.

These thoughts, while necessary, weren't getting Arthur any closer to solving his current problem.

The prince reached the cliff and turned, his spear glowing a furious orange from the mana he'd injected into his.

His hands weren't burning from the enchantment but he wasn't in a position to start asking himself such questions now.

The demon bears chasing him were now stalking him slowly, keeping a reasonable distance, baring and gnashing their teeth.

Tendrils of uncontrolled saliva dripped from the savage beasts' maws. More from the deranged one-eyed bear than its healthier partner.

They both regarded him with so much hate that he could probably cut through it with a knife.

Arthur spun his spear dangerously around him, the rapid motion blurring it into an incandescent orange disk of fire. Tendrils of flame blew off the edge of the disk as he continued feeding the weapon with his mana, shifting the hot lance from one side to the other in a dance similar but more refined to the dome of slashes he'd envisioned earlier.

The prince was hoping to find an opening during a slight show of acrobatic superiority.

Of course, this wasn't going to work on these bloodthirsty savages… He'd already witnessed their fearlessness firsthand.

Unlike the goblins he'd grown used to in the first minutes of the Sorting, these bears were actually a threat.

He'd already witnessed them blocking his attacks and felt the resilience of their bone skulls, which he now noticed were always at the forefront…

'Protection…'

The thought would have excited him but he quickly remembered how quickly they were on their feet during his mad dash through the forest.

It felt almost impossible for him to get past their defences as he was now. Let alone fool them into thinking he had any more tricks up his sleeve.

The flame attribute of the spear he held was a significant advantage. So good that he was willing to bet that an average spear wouldn't have pierced through the first bear he killed so easily…

This thought… a single memory, brought with it the answer the prince had been looking for.

A Weakness!

A weakness the demon bears shared. Right behind their ears, after the bony protection of their grotesque white skulls was a weak spot meant to allow the demon bear's head some degree of movement.

Arthur launched into a flurry of jabs, sending a rain of thrusts towards the bear with two good eyes. The bear stepped away to avoid the onslaught, but only to the side to get a better angle of attack.

The other one circled as well, getting away from its partner and giving the prince fewer options.

He couldn't turn his back on either of them and yet it seemed to be their plan to divide his focus.

Ending his pointless jabs that had yielded nothing, he tried dashing back to the forest, only to get blocked by the one-eyed bear. Its speed of recovery was astonishing… and so was the deranged look in its eye.

Arthur held his spear in both hands and made a forward thrust, one that was meant to be a member of a constant barrage of them.

However, the bear had other ideas. It quickly swatted the spear away and lunged forward. Arthur quickly dove to the side, narrowly dodging the bear's maw.

The two bears quickly closed his exit to the forest once again, not allowing him any time to recover.

Losing an eye had taught the bear something, further reducing Arthur's options.

Arthur resumed his dome of slashes, keeping his attention on the other bear as well.

Animals weren't irrational… and even though these demon bears were fearless, they had some sense of caution. Fortunately for him, the bears weren't mindless… And that very aspect kept it from making any rash decisions…

'Running away created a weakness which they could utilise… but now that I'm focused on fighting, they are cautious… Since when are dark creatures known for thinking things through? It's part of what makes them easier to kill,' the prince wanted to scream.

This simulation was definitely set on hard mode.

Amidst this stalemate, one of the bears made an attempt to attack and was met by a furious wave of flaming attacks that left the bone-white skull scorched and dented before it stepped back.

Cornered just like the boy and girl. The only difference was that Arthur's mind was constantly working for an exit… and eventually, he found one.

The angrier demon bear kept its good eye trained on him, openly revealing that it had a reduced field of vision.

'You have a second weakness, One-eye…'

A smirk graced the prince's face as he turned to the two-eyed demon bear and unleashed another rain of strikes.

The prince's muscles screamed with pain from exhaustion… but he wasn't done yet.

No, he was far from it.

The bear he'd turned his back to, as expected, saw the wide opening and went in for the kill. A smirk graced the prince's face.

Putting more mana into his spear, he let out a jetstream of fire at the healthier bear. The deranged one-eyed bear seemed slower now that the prince was exerting himself, even more, to pull off a tasking technique.

At the last possible moment, as the demon bear's paw came down on the prince's frame, Arthur crouched low and dashed its arm with a short burst of speed, appearing on the eye with a bad eye… its blind spot.

The healthy bear still recovering from the flurry of blows and spray of fire as Arthur's lance sang through the air and into the right grip intended for his next attack.

Without wasting another second, Arthur plunged the hot lance deep into the one-eyed demon bear's neck, cutting deeper into the hide than he'd done with the first one.

The bear shuddered in place and crumpled to the ground before exploding in a shower of ash and amber runes.

'Two down, one to…' the thought remained unfinished as a black furry swipe armed with razor-sharp metallic claws came through the ash aimed at the prince's face.

The prince abruptly leapt back, his reflexes kicking in to just barely survive the bone-crushing attack that could have claimed his head.

In the next moment, however, another swipe came, its reach extending to his torso this time. The prince took three nimble choreographed steps backwards and in the next fraction of a second, the demon bear covered the distance.

Arthur hastily brought his spear to the new path of the demon bear's claws. Metal rang through the air.

The sheer force of the demon bear's attack threw Arthur a few metres before he regained his balance.

There was no time to think of how close he'd gotten. The crimson-eyed tusked menace was on top of him in the next second again, delivering a downward slam on his smaller human frame.

Arthur sidestepped the attack and tried once more to put distance between himself and the demon bear.

No matter how many steps or leaps he took back, however, the demon bear covered in nearly the same time attacking with frightening unrelenting ferocity.

Things were not looking too good and for a while, Arthur was surviving as a result of nothing more than his instincts and enhanced reflexes.

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