Keeping up with the creature was a challenge. He wanted to have a big open area before engaging it, but he couldn’t get too close or else it would whirl around and descend upon him in tighter quarters, where he would be unable to dodge its enormous jaws. Fortunately, he was in no danger of losing track of it. It left behind footprints at least four feet across, and there were plenty of places where there were other signs of its passage. Scratches in fallen logs showed where its enormous talons raked the ground, and areas where the trees were close together had a few lost feathers, each one about six inches long. Kaldalis gathered them up and tucked them into his inventory, wondering if they might be of use for research, even if he couldn’t successfully hunt down the beast.

After a little while, he found himself once again surrounded by the jungle’s silence. He stopped and ducked down low, waiting for the feathered monster to move on so that he could stay at the edge of whatever radius it exuded that cowed the other wildlife to silence. But after a minute, nothing changed. It must have stopped moving. Kaldalis crept forward slowly, trying to keep as silent as possible. He remembered how quickly it had been upon him when he’d just muttered something. He didn’t want to get pounced on here, without any obvious cover near at hand.

It felt like he was creeping forward for hours, carefully going inch by inch through the forest. He logically knew it was only a few minutes, but the idea that a beast the size of a tractor trailer could rip its way through the brush at him at any moment made his heart thump in his ears, drawing out the seconds.

Kaldalis was surprised to find himself back at the edge of the clearing where he had defeated the grizzled dragon. It seemed that the creature had taken a relatively circuitous route compared to the direct path Kaldalis had taken to get here from where their paths had crossed earlier. That said, he could see why it had come here, and why it had stopped.

The giant feathered creature was devouring the remains of the giant lizard, ripping it apart with its long, but thin forelimbs, and swallowing the chunks whole, limb by limb. It was a grisly display as blood and entrails were scattered, alongside the thick purple venom that dribbled from its jaws. The noises of rending flesh and snapping bones filled the air, and Kaldalis understood why he was able to approach so close.

He wasn’t that stealthy.

The creature was just lost in its meal.

Kaldalis took a careful step out into the clearing. With the grass softening his footsteps, he hoped to position himself behind the beast, and possibly get the drop on it. Step after careful step, he gratefully put the bulk of the monster between himself and its messy eating habits. He crept forward, spear at the ready, prepared to lunge as soon as he was in range.

There was a crackle under his feet, and he flinched as he felt the bit of branch crackle and crumble noisily under his boot. He thought to hope for just a moment that the creature didn’t hear it, but it stopped eating, and its giant head lifted up. Kaldalis went stone-still as it turned its head, hoping that its vision was based on movement, like they said in that one movie. A yellow eye the size of Kaldalis’s two fists together oriented on him immediately, dispelling that notion.

The beast straightened up and turned towards him, even as it licked the blood from its lips and teeth. It stomped its feet as it faced towards him, and lowered its stance to bring its jaws down to a level with him. It inhaled and let loose a trilling, birdlike call of challenge. It was obviously supposed to be threatening - the sort of thing that would happen in an introduction cinematic while the monster’s name would flash up ominously - but the sound itself was just so… Silly. Sure, the beast was frightening, but its war cry was like that of a puffed-up seagull. He endeavored not to underestimate it, but he found himself feeling much less likely to flee in terror if it charged.

He didn’t want to disappoint whatever audience was watching him on the stream, and so he let loose a war cry of his own, yelling wordlessly back at the beast. It started to stalk forward towards him, teeth bared and thin clawed arms reaching out for him.

Kaldalis didn’t wait for it to reach him. Instead, he charged forward, spear-first, at the monster. He wanted to meet it near the middle of the clearing, giving himself the most room to maneuver for the fight.

He felt himself leaning into and anticipating the first strike. He wanted to jump up and stab it right in the mouth. A single heroic strike that would fell the beast. But that wasn’t how things worked. He could hit it, sure, but he would take a strike in return. If this was truly a beast of the dreaded Infernal Horde, then he needed to avoid taking damage at all costs, or he’d never survive. Especially against whatever venom it could inflict.

His memory tickled and reminded him of something he was told while sparring. As a tank, he would need to accept some damage so that he could deal damage and hold aggro. But alone as he was, there was no need for such risks. He could take all the time he needed to wear it down.

Instead of striking, he waited until they nearly collided - almost running right into its jaws - and threw himself to the left, diving out of the way before it could bite him. He kept running, maintaining his momentum as he ducked low, under the grasping arm.

He didn’t think about striking until he saw an opening appear. He ran on the outside of its right leg, and jammed his spear into it as he darted past, hoping it wouldn’t be fast enough to react and stomp him like a bug.

The attack led him to believe that it was only slightly higher level than the grizzled dragon, which was a surprise. He dealt ten physical damage and four wind damage. It was a significant decrease from the twenty-one total damage he was doing before, but he had expected some difference. That it wasn’t more substantial was a good sign. He was worried he’d be doing like five damage per hit like he was against the elder nautilobster.

The creature snarled and whipped around to face him, its jaws closing in on him again. Kaldalis threw himself to the right this time, letting the enormous jaws slam closed on nothing, even as purple spittle sprayed over him. It didn’t burn through his clothes or anything, so he felt a little better about dodging so narrowly. He slammed his glaive into the side of the creature’s neck, slicing through the feathers there and leaving behind a shallow cut - along with another fourteen damage.

The feathered beast let out another trilling roar and leaned away, taking two steps back from him. It shook itself, fluffing out its feathers a bit and baring its teeth again. It lunged at him and for a moment, he considered trading blows. He’d gotten a few hits in already. Surely he was ahead. But he noted that he wasn’t fully recovered from the fight with the grizzled dragon.

As much as he wanted to do the classic tank thing and just set his feet and fight, he recognized that this wasn’t that kind of game. Damage avoided was death avoided.

The creature lunged, and instead of picking a side, Kaldalis fell back, running backwards away from it. Enormous jaws snapped closed right where he was, and then snapped again and again, the creature chomping at the air as it charged. It was all he could do to keep ahead of it as it chased. He couldn’t set his feet for a proper attack, so the only option that remained was to flail at it, hoping to scare it off-course and away before a misstep put him in danger.

He swept the polearm across his body, trying to put enough force behind it to do damage to the charging beast. Kaldalis missed the first swing, the blow barely missing its snout as its toothy maw opened again. The second one struck at an off-angle, glancing off a bony part of the skull beneath the feathers. He decided to take a gamble, planting his feet and swinging hard, hoping to deflect the beast’s next attack - or, at the worst, to survive it.

The attack landed, inflicting the fourteen points of damage he expected. Unfortunately, it did nothing to stop the rampaging jaws. They smashed closed on him and blinding pain filled his world. Everything went white for a moment, letting him focus on what was really important.

He took thirty-one physical damage, and was poisoned. A little purple debuff added itself to the upper left corner of his vision.

With that number on the damage, he realized that the monster was likely much higher level than he anticipated.

The creature flailed him around in its jaws before hurling him to the ground. He was glad he only took damage the one time, but he was left feeling sore and battered, even if he’d only actually taken a fraction of his total hit points in damage. He wanted to just lay still and rest, but he had to move. Scrambling to his feet he felt the creature’s claws raking at the ground where he was laying. He had a horrible vision of how it had been tearing apart the carcass of the grizzled dragon, and knew that if he didn’t beat it, he was going to share that fate.

He shook the soreness away, hoping the adrenaline pumping through his system would be enough to carry him through this fight.