A bloody mist had formed over the machines, the bodies and the blood crystals. The stench of blood intensified even further and as Orou flickered his tongue, he could taste the blood, though it wasn’t like the blood of beastmen or animals, rather, it burned his tongue. The burning sensation on the tip of his tongue snapped him out of his trance as he rapidly turned his head towards the oncoming noise, but before he could see what was attacking them, he was struck dead on. Orou felt sharp claws rake his back, leaving five deep gashes on his body, as well as a sharp pain on his neck. He felt something bite into his neck and rip out a chunk of flesh before hungrily going for another bite.

Orou reared his head backwards and launched himself into a nearby wall, slightly injuring himself in the process, but successfully throwing the thing attached to his back off. Having no time to cast spells, Orou scanned the area with his eyes, his tail raised, ready to strike at anything that would approach him. He looked everywhere, but there was no sign of the creature anywhere to be found, at least until he looked at Grizz. He was blankly staring off into the distance, his eyes lacking any sort of focus. As soon as he saw Grizz, he also saw the creature, which was rapidly charging towards Grizz with its eyes locked on his neck.

The creature could only be described as hideous. The creature was two meters tall and had four large legs built solely out of rock, its claws being made out of sharpened blood-crystal. Its torso was a strange mix of shadow, rock and crystal, all blending together to create what some would call a hideous abomination. Its head resembled that of a hound, built entirely out of crystal with even the smallest details visible on its face. Of course, the nearly perfect crystal face was ruined by the abnormally large teeth which jutted out of its mouth. Although they were made from the blood-crystal, that made up this whole mountain, they were several shades deeper and inside of them, Orou could still see dark blood that moved with every footstep the massive hound took.

Seeing this thing bounding towards Grizz made Orou’s heart and core practically explode with energy. Using his tail as a propellant, he directed all of his blood waves towards his tail and, cracking the stone beneath him, he launched himself into the air. It was a race to see who could reach Grizz first, but fortunately, Orou had won the race by a small margin. Just as the hound was about to take a bite out of Grizz’s neck, Orou slammed head first into the hound’s body, which likely hurt Orou more than it hurt the hound. Still, it accomplished Orou’s objective of distracting the hound from killing Grizz. Using his tail to knock Grizz prone in one sweep, he bared his fangs at the hound before taking a closer look at it.

From the perspective of the spirit world, the hound was nothing unique, though only after staring at it for several seconds did he realise that the hound’s body didn’t have a single spirit inside of it. Instead, using his black and white vision, he saw that the shadows making up the hound were similar to the black strands and the sickly glow, though distinctively much different than both. It was like a mist that was compressed together but still allowed to freely move on its own. The blood-crystals and the stone weren’t ordinary either, black strands freely wove through the hound’s body, moving to accommodate the hound’s actions.

Although it seemed like the hound was standing still, it was constantly moving in place, using its two hungry eyes to observe Orou for any cracks in his defense. Orou prided himself in being able to stay focused for a long time, but this time, his concentration lapsed as he heard a noise coming from his back. Turning his head to look at the noise, he recognised it as Grizz, who was finally stirring from his trance. This, however, gave the hound an opportunity to pounce on Orou. With a surprising burst of speed, the hound made its way to Orou’s other side and as Orou was turning his head to look at the hound, he pounced on Orou, once more digging his sharp claws into Orou’s flesh.

This time, Orou saw that the claws were coated in several black strands and each time the hound injured Orou, it would inject some of the black strands within Orou’s body. Strangely, Orou didn’t feel the strands do anything and he wasn’t planning on finding out. This time, instead of charging into the nearby wall, Orou lifted the lower half of his body, lifting the hound who was in process of delivering another strike. Guiding the blood-waves to his tail and amassing all of the strength from his lower body, he slammed his tail against the wall with all of his force, slamming the hound into the wall as well. The mountain wall trembled as shattered stone went flying everywhere, raining over both Orou and Grizz.

As Orou withdrew his tail, he saw that while the hound had several cracks running down its body, it was completely fine in other regards. Retaining its original speed, it once more charged towards Oro, but this time, he was ready for the hound. Raising his tail high up, he slammed down onto the hound with all of his strength, creating another hole in the ground in the shape of a hound. This time, Orou was confident that the hound wouldn’t be able to move, but once more, he was proven wrong. The hound leaped out of the hole and onto Grizz’s head, digging his sharp teeth into Orou’s neck.

The hound was sucking Orou’s blood the longer its teeth stayed in Orou’s neck and even though Orou had large quantities of blood, he was beginning to grow faint and powerless. This time, instead of violently jerking his tail, he whipped his neck with all of his strength and even though the hound tried its best to hang on, it was launched far into the distance. Immediately, Orou got to casting spells. He didn’t know how much time he had before the hound was back and if it would go for Grizz, who was still rolling on the ground, struggling to get up for some reason, so he opted out of the beam of light spell and prompted to conjure two separate blood serpents in hopes that they would be able to mess with the hound.

It was going well until the formations were halfway done. The hound was still nowhere to be seen, but his concentration was put to the limit when he felt something in his body stir. Quickly glancing downwards, he saw and felt the strands that the hound injected in him start to mix with his blood, making his blood burn everything around it, including itself and the rest of the blood in his body. This made spellcasting almost impossible, but quickly, waves of soothing blood came to his rescue and he resumed his spellcasting. The unfortunate news was that the hound had once more caught scent of Orou and Grizz and was currently in a mad dash towards them.

It would be a close call, but Orou had confidence in his spells. His confidence wavered when the hound was approaching the hundred meter mark from Orou, but the blood serpents appeared before the hound could take one more bite out of Orou. Sending his two serpents to bite at the hound, he was almost confident in being safe for now, but the hound once more surprised him. The black mist inside of his torso burst outwards, cloaking the hound in shadows and at the same time, giving him a burst of speed. The hound agilely avoided the blood serpents and turning the shadows into several bigger claws, he swiped towards Orou’s body.

Orou had the choice of dodging the swing, but he had worked so hard for the blood serpents that he wasn’t willing to let them dissipate for now. Barely bearing through the pain to preserve his blood serpents, he felt the hound once more land on his back, this time, his claws were wreathed in shadows. Although he couldn’t see the blood serpents, he didn’t need to be able to see in order to give the serpents orders. Picturing the hound in all of its glory, he ordered the serpents to wrap around the hounds, in particular, to wrap around its front left leg.

The blood serpents followed their orders to perfection, while the hound was busy with tearing open several holes in Orou with his claws, two serpents approached from its back and ambushed it. One of them charged head on towards it, knocking it off of Orou’s body and making it land directly in front of Orou. Now that he could see the hound, he had a much easier time of manipulating the other serpent. It was quite a simple matter to make it wrap around the leg and as the hound struggled to get out of the serpent’s hold, the other serpent joined in the fray, further wrapping around the leg and beginning to bite it.

All at once, Orou commanded the serpents to crush the leg and over the course of several seconds, he heard the sound of rock being crushed until there was nothing left. Heaving a sigh of relief, he made the two serpents wrap around the other front leg and repeat the process, all while the hound made several ungodly noises in the process. Orou dismissed the blood serpents and looked at the hound with cold eyes, enjoying the hound’s struggle to get up.

Orou could have chosen to end its life with a beam of light, but instead, he chose the most painful way for it to die. Raising his tail high in the air, he smashed the hound into the ground, into the walls and threw it around like a toy, shaking the ground beneath them and slowly cracking the hound until eventually, the hound’s crystalline face shattered and with it, the rest of the body decayed.