“Come on, what are you waiting for? Do your best!” High Commander Ronnu urged us to attack, her deep voice ringing in my ears, for she wasn’t far from bellowing her challenge.

One last look at Stella, her nod back - plus some aura buffs from her - and I lunged at Traiana, hitting her with my presence just a few heartbeats before I tried to sink my teeth into her sword-wielding hand. Pretty much the same tactic I had used against Stella. It was a tried-and-true attack; it worked - and more than once.

Only this time, and with this kind of opponent, it didn’t go as well as I’d hoped.

My presence hit her, that was for sure. The woman flinched and shuddered - but then grinned back. High Commander Ronnu was able to shake it off in a heartbeat, and when I reached her, there was nothing, neither fear nor a moment of surprise, to stop her from moving her sword-wielding hand away from my teeth and into the path of Stella’s sword strokes, which she launched, I’d say in fairly good coordination with me.

The way Ronnu gracefully and effortlessly dodged all our efforts made our labyrinth-practiced attacks look like child’s play. Annoying, for sure.

Nevertheless, despite my experience and therefore my expectations, she did not follow through with counterattacks, even though she could very well do so. We were full of openings, and the moment of surprise was gone - or more precisely, it never came, but she didn’t strike back, sticking to what she said, that she would only defend more or less.

Without a moment’s hesitation, for it would be a mistake to dwell on such shit in the middle of a fight, I swung my claws at her exposed flank, hitting nothing but air, just as Stella did, regardless of how much she pelted her with sword strikes. And she was damn good at it. While I was the brute on the dance floor, she was the dancer, her movements refined and deliberate, none wasted. Yet we both danced to the tune of High Commander Ronnu.

There was no question who was in control here - this Traiana made no attempt to hide her skill, her mastery, her dominance over us - and who was making a fool of themselves.

“I have to applaud you; nice try with the presence,” she said casually as she dodged our attacks or deflected them with her sword. “It might work on someone with your strength, maybe even a three-star knight.”

It was nice to hear some praise. But that didn’t mean I was going to slack off in my so far unsuccessful efforts to draw blood.

“Nice swordsmanship too, girlie,” Ronnu said to Stella as she effortlessly blocked the strikes of her two swords with one hand behind her back. “But the lack of any real experience could not be more glaring. Have you never faced a beast?” she taunted Stella, not hiding her disdain for warriors untouched by real battle.

If the trash talk pissed her off, Stella didn’t show it; if anything, her auras just glowed stronger and her efforts intensified. Honestly, seeing her like that, I had to admit that if I had faced her full force back then, the fight would have ended much faster.

“Your swords are weak. They lack the determination, the intent to harm,” Ronnu continued her taunt as she moved gracefully barefoot through the mud of the tent square. “I’d say it’s a waste for you to wield such fine weapons.”

Her mockery didn’t stop at Stella’s swordsmanship. Even though I was doing my best, pushing my body as hard as I could, my performance didn’t impress her either.

“And you shifter - is this presence all you’ve got? Perhaps I got my hopes up too high after that, because now you seem to be nothing but a little kitten - with wings.”

»Bitch!« My human side might have given a shit about what she said, but my beast side didn’t. I felt anger, an insult to my pride, and so I growled back accordingly, letting her know my displeasure.

“You may have fangs and claws, but you don’t seem to know how to use them. Why are you a shifter if you are afraid to use your beast form?”

The bitch knew damn well why I wasn’t so familiar with the use of fangs and claws. Grand Commander Maignes had mentioned it in that note to her; I hadn’t grown into them. Not what pissed me off, though. It was her claim that I was afraid of my beast form. I fucking accepted what I was, a beast, a hybrid, and it wasn’t easy. It was a harrowing journey for me, where I gave up clinging to my humanity, and the human bitch made fun of it.

I growled a few beastly curses and threw myself at her with a flap of my wings.

It wasn’t just blind rage that made me do it, but also frustration. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t seem to get close to her, always hitting the spot where she was a moment ago, hence the headfirst charge, trying to overwhelm her with my size and mass. 

Well, from the way she grinned, I knew it was a failed attempt even before my hind legs left the ground.

The human bitch was so fast that even the thought of my heart doing its weird time shit crossed my mind, no matter how stupid it sounded. My heart wasn’t sucking up my mana like crazy; plus, I was the slow one, Stella and the world around us, but not the bitch, not Ronnu. So, no, time wasn’t the issue; the human was just too damn fast. I got to where she was standing - mid-jump - in a heartbeat, but Ronnu was already two steps away, watching me miss with amusement in her eyes.

This time, the bitch didn’t just let me land. Before I knew it, I had her fist in my face. The blow knocked me down hard; the impact spraying mud in all directions.

I didn’t need to have [Inner Perception] among my skills to know that some of the bones in my jaw had taken quite a beating. I could actually hear them cracking from the impact of her fist. Thankfully, that was all that her punch did to me, except for the bruises. Nothing was broken, no blood.

“You’re a tougher kitten than I thought,” she remarked as I backed away from her, growling. Stella, seeing that her efforts were even more helpless without me in the fight, did the same and took a few steps back.

“What is it? Are you giving up already?” Ronnu asked. “I thought you wanted to prove your honor. Was that a lie?”

“Is it necessary to goad us like this?” Stella asked back, fed up with it too. “Ma’am.”

“This one question only confirms my suspicion that you’ve never faced a tainted beast in battle.”

“If you’re asking if we fought in the Battle of Atazar, no, we didn’t. We wouldn’t be here if we had.”

“That much is obvious,” Ronnu said, unfazed. “In fact, I doubt that you were even members of Dia Eichenralke - but quite frankly, I don’t give a shit about that. What I care about is what you are made of. I want to know if you have the guts to stand up to a horde of tainted beasts while being subjected to the constant whispers in the back of your mind - because that’s what you’re going to get. So if you can’t take a little goading from me, you have no place on the battlefield.

I wasn’t sure if she was serious, if her teasing was truly some sort of test, because it seemed to me that she was enjoying herself far too much. There was no denying, though, that there was something to it.

“That said, I have to say that you haven’t convinced me yet. If that’s all you have, you won’t see the battlefield until it comes to you. So either get your shit together or just give up. I don’t need any more walking meat to feed the beasts.

“Guys, a little help,” she called to the onlooking knights, and they sprang into action. Both men and women began shouting all sorts of insults, taunts, and enticements at us.

“Fuck off, Eichenralkes!”

“Nobody needs your honor here!”

“You’d be handy in my bed, you hussies. It gets cold in there alone!”

“Maybe you could do your honor in the laundry by washing my panties!”

“Do me a favor and maybe I can have a word with the High Commander.”

...

..

.

The beast inside me was howling. I wanted to prove them wrong, prove HER wrong, but I didn’t know how. The bitch was just too strong, and I was too damn weak - at least compared to her. It was like trying to fight a mountain.

But did that ever stop me? No, it didn’t. The question was: What else could I use besides my claws and fangs? The speed rune from Idleaf was out of the question - it would be like screaming to everyone who I was and a straight ticket back to the cage and more interrogation.

As for magic, even though I was able to create a mantle of mana around my body, it wouldn’t help me much when I hadn’t grasped any aspect of it yet. The [Roundhouse Kick] then? It was one of the few offensive skills I had, and with it, I could throw out decent kicks when I was in my Tier III beast form. There was just one tiny problem. And that was actually being able to land those kicks.

In short, I was left with Sage, my tail, and the [Tail of Poison Empress] skill. Yet, the likelihood of me poisoning her seemed even more ridiculous than the likelihood of me striking her with my kick.

Quite simply, the shortcomings in my skills - mostly the low level of my skills - that I had known for some time were now more apparent than ever, and they were holding me back. It turned out that when I wasn’t facing slavers, a beast, someone hell-bent on getting rid of me, or making dinner out of me, there wasn’t much I could do when brute force proved useless.

It was fucking annoying!

Anyway, my mind raced as I tried to figure out what else I had in my arsenal, how I could prove Traiana wrong. It was then that my mane crossed my mind. It was a wild thought, but one that might work. I fooled around with mana control of it and even made some progress, if only a wee bit progressed. I was able to make my mane float.

Simply, given where we were and what was at stake, I figured it was worth a shot.

“You both seem to have found your resolve,” the bitch remarked, a note of delight in her voice. “Took you long enough.”

A glance at Stella told me that she had indeed made up her mind, too, and was ready to face the human despite the seeming impossibility of the task once again. That was all I cared to know. No more words were needed.

With a mighty roar, I broke into a sprint, not attacking but circling around the human. I had to surprise her - at least a bit. Not an easy thing to do. The human was good, too good. And she was expecting me to attack.

Luckily, Stella came to the same conclusion and took the initiative, launching a series of attacks with the best swordsmanship I’d ever seen her use.

With no time to waste, I pumped mana into my mane, the hairs of which grew in length, reaching the tip of my tail in a matter of seconds.

‘Bloody hell!’

Exposing long hair to such a downpour was generally a terrible idea. Doing so with my ridiculously long and bushy mane was madness. I knew that. Just getting my fur and Sage wet was highly irritating. Yet the shortcomings I feared and reckoned with did not come. As the raindrops neared the manna-soaked hair billowing behind me, they turned to ice. Fucking ice - and snow. The trail of icy drops, mixed with a few snowflakes, might be beautiful to look at, but all too telling. I lunged at the human, disregarding Stella locked in battle with her, doing my best to use mana control to spread my mane in all directions, hoping she wouldn’t be fast enough to avoid me completely, that some hair would touch her.

I looked ridiculous, like a peacock flaunting its tail feathers. A consequence of my lack of mana control in this regard, coming with incredible drag that almost stopped my pounce. But I did it.

Even though the bitch effortlessly dodged my pounce, while Stella hit the ground to avoid my ridiculous attack, some of my hair touched the human. The moment that happened, I lunged at her again, lest my mane lose contact with her - those few strands serving as a guide for the rest of the mane.

In no time, I had my mane wrapped around her waist.

Of course, I wasn’t stupid enough to think that I had her, that I had outsmarted her. She let me do it, that much was clear to me, as well as the fact that I had to see this through to the end. And so I pumped as much mana into my mane as it, my brain, and the moss on my head could handle while I wrapped Sage around her legs and finally bit into her, unfortunately, non-sword-wielding hand.

“Oh my, that does some damage...” Traiana marveled not at my fangs chewing on her hand, for they did not even pierce her skin, but at the coldness of my mane. “But do you think it’s wise to get so close to the enemy, kitten? Let me show you...”

The bitch actually staggered as Stella struck her from behind with her aura blast, the heat of it warming my cheeks. The human reacted swiftly, whirling around, her movement all too telling of her intent. 

Not keen on becoming her shield against the aura blast, I let go of her hand, uncoiled Sage from her legs and bounced off her.

“Not so fast, kitten,” she purred, obviously enjoying this too much, and while exposing her chest to the full force of Stella’s aura, she grabbed my mane in her bare hand, seemingly not caring about the cold, and yanked. With a whimper, as the pain shot through my entire scalp, I ended up hitting the ground at her feet with a force that took my breath away. In fact, my whole body creaked, bones grinding against each other, tendons straining, not to mention the PAIN.

Before I knew it - before I could even gather my thoughts - Ronnu yanked on my mane again and I found myself in the air.

Unwilling to be slammed to the ground again, I let go of my mane. It was a good shot, giving Stella a chance to use her aura blast, but there was no point in clinging on to it. Actually, there was no point in sticking with my full beast form either, not when I ran out of things to try in this form. And so, as my mane disintegrated into dust that was almost immediately battered to the ground by the rain and I rose above the human, I shifted back a tier. There, hanging upside down in the air, I twisted my body and executed my original move - a somersault ending in an axe kick, given extra power by the swing of my tail and the flapping of my wings - my aim being her head.

Well - my heel never touched her. While treating Stella’s aura blast like a pleasant ray of morning sunshine, she caught my foot in a flash, just inches from her face. What followed was what I had hoped to avoid earlier; she slammed me to the ground.

»Fucking bitch!« I growled as pain shot through my body and clouded my mind. I tried to wash it out with [Indomitable Will], but the miracle didn’t happen. I still couldn’t figure out how to do it.

Probably seeing that her most powerful attack was as useless as mine, or simply running out of steam, Stella dropped her aura blast and switched back to her swords. She moved quickly, each step squelching in the mud I lay in, aiming for the hand the human was holding my leg in.

I was pretty sure that the bitch, Ronnu, could easily break it if she wanted to. One twist and that would be it. Of course, it wouldn’t take me out of the fight, not completely, but it would have made it much harder for me to move around and deliver a proper blow. Ronnu didn’t do it though. She didn’t ruin my leg. Instead, as Stella rained down her sword attacks on her, she let go of it.

Honestly, I wished I could have stayed lying there in the cold mud, battered by the rain. Unfortunately, my instincts told me otherwise. I just couldn’t leave Stella alone in this shit, so I jumped to my feet and joined the fray in a heartbeat. Alas, there wasn’t much I could do - well, except use Sage, whose poison I wasn’t sure would even come out the way he was covered in mud - except show what Deckard had taught me. So I unleashed a flurry of kicks on the human, taking full advantage of [Roundhouse Kick] and Stella’s buffs.

The two of us were in sync, complementing each other’s attacks quite well, if I may say so. Yet Ronnu, annoyingly, made our efforts look pathetic. It was so frustrating, so humiliating, and so hurtful to my pride that I wanted to scream. I wanted to retaliate in kind, to knock the bitch down a peg!

But I didn’t know how.

“All right, that’s enough,” Ronnu bellowed. “I’ve seen all I needed to see.”

What? It took my brain a moment to process what I had just heard, and I took one last kick. A mistake I regretted the second she stopped it with her hand.

“I said enough, kitten!” she grunted, throwing me face first to the ground.

This time I got to taste the mud for real.