Somewhere in the mess of narrow trees, in the direction of the section of the forest that the boar had come from, the rustling of leaves and almost inaudible whispers flowed…
The boar, although enraged and having exhausted itself with two, near-consecutive charges, attentively listened to these whispers, while simultaneously drawing in long, drawn out breaths, capturing the scents that flowed on the wind in its flaring nostrils...
Around it, a myriad of scent paths stretched out, weaving throughout the forest like a tangle of spiderwebs in its eyes. The scent paths began at a patch of large trees, which protruded from the wall of branches, and ran towards the river, before sharply turning towards a tree that had had several of its branches torn from its trunk, and then returned to the riverbank, whereupon, it stretched out into the forest, forming the intricate patterns that filled the beast’s scent-aided vision...
[Grunt…][Grunt…][Snarrll…!]
[Rustle...Rustle...Rustle…]
Its furious blood-colored eyes sharpened as it scanned the forest floor, as the sounds of shifting leaves continued to plague its ears, taunting it endlessly.
Its foe had eluded it previously, and now dared to mock it in this way, creating a substitute to lure it into attacking and hiding amongst the trees, waiting to strike. Its instincts roared at it to repay its prey for this disrespect, as it licked the substance from the dummy off its fangs...
[Rustle...Rustle...Rustle…]
It soon began to slowly trot into the shadows, passing through the sparsely filled area of narrow trees, and began following the maze of scents towards the taller, thicker trees, as the stirring of leaves and the sound of faint whispers grew stronger…
The river gently flowed to its right side, allowing
[Rustle...Rustle...Rustle!]
The beast continued to lick the blood of the creatures it had gobbled down, as well as the strange substance that had leaked from the dummy’s chest, causing a strange, itchy sensation to fill its throat, which it ignored...
[Snarll…]
The boar, now able to more clearly hear, slowly began to disengage its scent-aided vision, throwing away its amazing olfactory senses, despite how fatal this could prove if the beast was wrong, in favor of its auditory ability, as it absorbed the sounds of the world around it…
It felt the itchy sensation grow to a slight pain, which slowly spread through its body, though this soon faded.
[Rustle...Rustle, Rustle!!]
The noise intensified, and as the boar continued to zig and zag around the thick trunks of the trees, a peculiar shape came into view, some meters away…
However, a sudden burst of pain caused it to stop moving. It’s vision became slightly fuzzy, and a stinging sensation burst from its stomach into its legs…
[G-gru...nt!]
But, just as quickly as it appeared, it soon disappeared, just as the painful sensation in its throat had, moments prior.
The boar soon recovered from these painful sensations, and attempted to ignore them, as its instincts had taken over completely, and were crying out for the flesh of its prey.
With its vision now clear, the boar was able to make out the strange shape that had come into view.
[Rustle, Rustle, Rusle!!]
In the shade of a massive oak tree, was a large pile of leaves that looked like a small ball, which was trembling endlessly. The maddened boar maliciously sneered at the quivering mass of leaves, paying no attention to the gentle burbling of the river, or the falling of the leaves, not even to the spiderweb of scents that surrounded it…
[Rustle, Rustle, Rustle, Rustle!!!]
However, when the boar was about to begin charging up for its ‘charge-attack,’ it noticed something.
[Grunt…?]
The fearsome, intense miasma that had covered it like a cloak of living shadows, was now a faint, black fog that was barely visible and clung around its ankles. It felt its strength wax and wane, pulling inward and outward like a tide, but unable to surge to its height as it naturally should have.
It was confused by this, and, despite its instincts driving it, began to suspect that something was wrong with itself, given the lack of strength and the sudden bursts of pain it had felt. However, it had already had its target in sight, trembling beneath a pile of leaves, how could it back away and reassess itself now?!
Despite its strength not being at its peak, the boar began to ready itself to bore through the flesh of the child beneath the leaves, to pin it to the tree’s trunk with its metallic tusks, and to savor each moment as it tore apart and consumed his flesh!
...
