Yorick once again sidestepped and narrowly dodged another one of the bear’s quick claw swipes. However, he wasn’t quite quick enough, and the edge of his shirt was lightly tapped and torn - fzzip!

“Dammit… so fast!”

But it wasn’t over - the bear was learning from its mistakes, and was now predicting Yorick’s movements. It quickly adjusted its feet and turned toward Yorick once more, its sharp six inch claws completely extended!

At that moment, Emmet’s roaring voice rang out. “Flamethrower... activate!!!”

Fuaasshhh!!

The new contraption in Emmet’s hands activated, the piece of obsidian inside the device lighting up with a radian yellow. Out of the side of the contraption was a small tube, and at that moment, a thick flow of yellow-orange flame burst out of that tube, directly toward the bear!

“Fire!!!” Yorick was overjoyed, stepping out of the way and letting the stream of fire flow unimpeded toward the bear.

SzzzSZsZZSZZ!!! The fire crackled menacingly, spreading out and lighting up the entire area in an orange glow.

ROAR!

The bear was alarmed and quickly backed up, letting the fire harmlessly pitter out a few feet from him. Clearly, it was afraid of the fire. It could feel the warmth of it from even feet away, and all of its instincts told it to stay away. Pacing around the hot crackling fluid-like mass, it attempted to step past it, but every time, the fire would move, blocking his way.

“Keke…” The producer of the fire, Emmet, held onto his new contraption and guided it to steadily face the bear. Out of it continued to flow a steady stream of wildly crackling fire, seemingly without end. “Taste my flamethrower!!!”

Having successfully kept the bear at bay, Emmet reached down into bag and pulled out a final familiar contraption: the Emmet Defense System! Holding so many contraptions at once, it was very awkward, and he was forced to clamp one down underneath his arm.

“Take this! The Emmet Defense System 5000!”

Pia! Pia! Pia! Pia! Pia!

Numerous medium-sized rocks rapidly shot out of the mechanizing contraption, popping out like bullets.

Pak! Pak! Pak!

Although two rocks lost their way, three of them struck true, hitting the bear on the leg, chest, and face. These rocks were nearly the size of fists, so they packed a punch! The bear growled and hurriedly covered its face from further rocks.

Yorick sucked in a breath. These rocks were more numerous, were traveling much faster, and were much more lethal than those from the Emmet Defense System 4000! Since last time, the contraption had been improved further!

After reverse-mechanizing for a moment, the Emmet Defense System re-mechanized and shot out numerous more rocks! Pia! Pia! Pia!

The bear quickly lost any hope of launching an offensive attack and quickly weaved away, dodging the rocks while still trying to keep away from the stream of hot fire. It had a tough task - Emmet made sure to keep his aim on the bear, and whenever the bear would move, Emmet’s contraptions would tilt as well, keeping up with its movements.

“Here’s my chance!” Yorick’s eyes lit up. Having caught his breath, he cocked his shovel once more and burst forward. Following this sudden movement, Emmet had a bit of trouble keeping the reinforcement beams on him, but managed to just barely keep up.

THUNK! THUNK! THUNK!

Yorick didn’t hold back, taking advantage of the bear’s situation to land full strength hits one after another on the bear. Every other hit, he would shuffle his body around the bear so that the bear couldn’t defend, and once again let out a strike with all his might. Distracted with everything else going on, the bear’s movements were sluggish, and couldn’t adjust itself in time to strike back.

RUFF! RUFF!

Seeing the opening, Wolfie suddenly gained back his courage too, charging forward and attempting to get some bites on the bear’s legs. Even though it failed to bite through the bear’s thick hide, it managed to make the scene more chaotic and disorient the bear further.

ROAAARRRR!!!

Finally, the bear had enough. He had originally been chasing just one human, but now, there were three, holding weird lights and producing fire, and even a yapping wolf. This was much more than it had bargained for! Letting out a final roar, it turned tail and charged away. Within moments, it had disappeared within the thick brush.

Emmet and Yorick tensely waited a few moments, in case the bear was still around.

“Phew…” Yorick finally let out a breath. “That was close!”

Emmet nodded and let out a breath too, exhaustedly powering off all his contraptions and putting them down. It had been tiring trying to coordinate four things at once. The beams of light and fire quickly disappeared.

That had been the most precarious situation they had experienced so far. One misstep, and it would have been over! Luckily, Yorick had gotten much quicker and stronger, and Emmet contraptions had greatly improved. Otherwise, this could have been the end!

So there were such creatures in the surrounding forest! Yorick and Emmet would never doubt the danger of the forest ever again, that was for sure.

ROARRRR!!!

Suddenly, the familiar growl rang out again! Once again, the bear had appeared in their vision, and was charging directly toward them! Its face was fixed in an enraged expression, like an avenger coming to finish its mission.

“Fuck!” Yorick hurriedly lifted up his shovel again. “It’s back!”

“Wha!” Emmet panickedly picked up his contraptions once again, taken completely off-guard. It looked like the bear was much smarter than they had thought! It had pretended to run away, and then quietly sneaked back to launch a surprise attack!

Just as the two were preparing for another intense fight, a calm voice rang out.

“Enclose.”

Nuooong… - a graceful-sounding noise rang out, and the next moment, four clear shimmering walls rose out of the ground, enclosing the bear in its path!

BANG!

The bear rammed straight into the clear wall in front of it and ricocheted backwards like it was a ragdoll. Surprisingly, the clear wall was completely unaffected by the impact, not moving in the slightest!