Chapter 16: Lizard Playground

Trint played around like a kid learning gymnastics after drinking an energy drink. He loved the new form. Quickly gaining control, he asked for less mass in the tail, feeling like Pneuma might mess up his balance if he whipped it around to help. He felt like some amalgamation of Hulk and Wolverine.

With giant bounding steps, Trint barreled towards the following lizards. They were lazily waiting in a position to ambush prey but had no time as Trint bisected one on his left and crushed the other one’s head to paste. Exp flooded him from the two as he moved on. Trint also noticed that he could sense further away and with greater clarity in this form. It came up to his ankles as he walked through the water at 7.5 feet tall. This was when he noticed his feet had claws as he stepped on and cut through some of the leeches. Another group swarmed, ate their brethren, and bounced off Trint’s legs, finding no purchase.

Trint picked up speed and found a pack of six lizards. They were slightly different as they had broad heads and stockier shoulders. Undeterred, Trint ran straight at the biggest one. As he got closer, its throat swelled, and it opened its mouth. Out blew a ball of flame. Trint sidestepped and swung his left-bladed arm right through the lizard, killing it as the blade passed through and towards the next lizard. Not slowing, Trint killed another one with his follow-through swing. A lizard jumped towards his right, and he lifted his right arm, putting it in between its jaw. But as it was about to snap shut and latch on to Trint’s arm, he quick-stepped towards the beast, further pushing his forearm into the back of its jaw, and then quick as a whip, he pulled his arm to the side and out of the mouth.

The powerful movement pushed the lizard back, tumbling to the ground with its lower jaw missing. Three of the six lizards were out of the fight, with two dead. Trint was aware of the three still in fighting shape approaching from behind him. Suddenly one was dead. It was pierced through the top of its skull and into the brain. Pneuma had entered the fight by controlling the narrow tail that ended in a sharp talon. An effective weapon with a 6-foot reach.

Two unharmed left and another jawless. Trint spun and saw that one fireball approached him and was too close to dodge. He didn’t know what an elemental magic attack at i10 would do, and he didn’t like the idea of burning. The fireball hit Trint’s raised forearm and dissipated as it washed over his misty appendage. Trint felt his Mana pool drop by a small chunk but no pain or damage.

Not overthinking it, he closed the distance between them with a jump. Landing with both feet on the back of the rightmost lizard, Trint’s weight and clawed feet did massive damage, cutting and crushing the lizard. Broken back and crushed vitals, the lizard, gave Trint more wonderful Exp and started to dissipate into a mist. The last lizard didn’t have time to get an attack in as the bladed left arm went through it and swept from chest to tail. He was leaving a dead lizard and more exp. The final lizard without a jaw had slowly started to retreat with a trail of blood; Trint took two leaps and crushed the lizard.

‘Pneuma, how was that?’ Trint asked, ‘How long can we stay in this form.’

‘That was a good second fight,’ Pneuma encouraged. ‘We have probably 15 minutes left. Hurry, the next fight is with the boss.’

Trint knew he was close but didn’t perceive the boss. He did sense the exit was closed. Starting in a run towards the exit, Trint came to some more water, and after a couple of steps, it grew deeper. He finally saw the boss. It was a giant lizard lying in the sand on a big island surrounded by leech-infested water. There were also more of both types of lizards he had fought already.

Trint decided to go for broke and kill the big guy first. Or was it the mother of these beasts? Either way, Trint took a giant jump out of the water, and landing on the island, he jumped again over the smaller lizards and attempted to land on the sleeping form of the boss. As Trint first hit the island, the boss’s eyes shot open and stood up before Trint landed. It left Trint’s jump short of his goal. Instead, he crashed into the boss’s side with feet claws biting in and left bladed arm burying 3 feet deep into the beast’s ribs. The boss whipped its head around to remove the pain in its side. Unable to twist quickly enough, gravity had already begun to pull Trint down and away from the beast. The quick twist of the boss’s body and gravity sent Trint into a tumble as he collided with a smaller lizard.

Quickly Trint hopped to his feet and faced the boss. Tail lashing out, Pneuma was methodically killing lizard after lizard with precision strikes, as Trint felt the flow of exp after each enemy’s death. Trint took off with two quick jumps trying to circle behind the beast. It was quickly turning, and Trint couldn’t get behind it.

The boss opened its mouth, and Trint saw a ball of fire forming. Trint started moving left. The lizard must have been unable to track him while the ball of fire built and then unleashed, hitting where Trint had been a moment before.

Trint felt the flames where the fireball splashed against the ground but didn’t take any damage himself. Trint could move almost behind the beast while it collected itself after the discharge of magic. Trint decided between cutting off a tail or a leg. He decided immobilizing the beast a bit would be better than avoiding a tail swipe. With all the strength Trint could summon, he swung his left arm blade at the backside of the big hind leg. The edge stopped at bone but severed some tendons as the beast slumped down towards the damaged leg. Trint, unable to process why felt a rush of adrenaline as he unconsciously stiffened his body in anticipation of an attack. At that moment, the lizard pivoted away from Trint, and the tail whipped into Trint’s left side. The larger frame and strength of Trint and Pneuma’s combined form was a massive increase to Trint’s human form, but it was not a match for many tons of meat hitting him as fast as a speeding car.

Trint was sent flying and hit the ground, then skipped like a rock across the water at the island’s edge. The water slowed him down after a couple of skips. He landed in the shallow water. Pain racked his body. He was running out of time. He needed to finish this quickly. Trint felt the damage and knew he cracked his human ribs inside the spiritually enforced armor.

’Trint, may I finish this?’ Pneuma request.

‘Sure, thing, buddy.’ Trint grunted back in his mind. He was feeling the pain of the last hit.

Pneuma took control of their combined form. He thickened the tail, grew slightly taller, lengthened the blade on his left arm, and mirrored that on his right. Now two scythe-like crescent blades extended from their arms by 5 feet. The new form was much lither and felt nimble, and the tail was changed at the end to a mace-like ball with blades around it. Anything it hit would be shredded if it had any momentum behind it.

Pneuma took quick steps transitioning to the island and into the air in a giant leap toward the lizard. Thinking it had plenty of time and distance, it had begun building up a ball of fire. Pneuma went straight through the building flame, chest-deep in the mouth but with armed blades extended down its throat. With great effort, their arms spread and cut through the neck and jaws of the beast as Pneuma’s tail extended out the mouth and proceeded, quick as a snake strike, to rapidly batter the face of the lizard boss.

After about six hits from the tail in one second, the face was unrecognizable as the eyes were pulped, the bones of the face were shattered, and skin hung in flaps. The disorientation of being battered in the face gave Trint and Pneuma time to slice the rest of the way through the neck, severing muscle and arteries and nearly decapitating the boss.

At the end of the sixth tail bash, the lizard had begun to collapse, and Trint ended up in the boss’s closed jaws, but they were lifeless and unable to do any damage, despite the rows of teeth. With another swipe of the arm scythes, the white mist-covered Pneuma extricated themselves from the dead beast’s throat. While the few remaining lizards were being killed by the whiplike tail, even as the rest of the body got free of the boss.

Exp had been rushing Trint, but when the boss died, it was like a river crashed into Trint—bringing energy and warmth.

Pneuma knew, and Trint realized that all the enemies died shortly after. The only things alive other than Trint were the leeches in the water around the island, and they could not get out of the water.

Pneuma released the combined form, and Trint sank to the ground. He was now holding his left ribcage with his right arm gently wrapped around himself. Most of the damage had healed while in the spiritual form, but there was still pain and what felt like a broken rib.

Trint was also really drained and wanted to sleep.

‘Rest; you should sleep for a little while,’ Pneuma suggested. ‘I will keep watch with my perception, but you should be fine to rest as long as you want.’