Chapter 5 v3
Burden part 2
Still suspended in mid-air, his right side facing the hallway wall, the man registered how the situation closed in on him from all sides.
The ripped-out frame groaned to his right. The monster advanced head-on from his left, two of its limbs extended like blades, sealing any route of escape.
And he… he had nowhere to land.
His body was in the middle of a failed leap, gravity pulling him down, with another weight throwing every muscle off-balance: the young man, slung over his shoulder.
His mind screamed at him to do something, anything.
But for one second, he hesitated.
An eternal second where doubt seeped in like poison.
What if he kept holding him?
What if he tried to withstand the blow, even knowing that with that dead weight he couldn't possibly keep his balance?
He doubted…
He seriously doubted.
The monster was coming for him, closer with every instant, and yet he forced himself to believe there was another way out. A lie, perhaps, a self-deception that held him on that razor's edge of indecision.
The conclusion didn't arrive as reasoning, but as a claw tearing at his chest. There was no choice.
His lips pressed into a hard line, the veins in his neck bulged taut.
The man convinced himself in silence, as if pronouncing a sentence no one else should hear.
And he let go of the young man.
The young man fell from his shoulder like discarded cargo, the man's arm releasing him with the same coldness one uses to throw a piece of meat to a starving beast. The fabric of his clothes slid from the man's fingers, and immediately the body began to fall toward the hallway floor.
For an instant…
A single instant…
The young man's body, thrown forward, interposed itself in the trajectory.
The boy's silhouette covered the monster's vision, blocking it at the worst possible second.
That minimal respite was enough.
Shhk!
Something sharp stabbed deep into the creature's left eye, sinking into the socket with a wet, brutal sound.
The monster let out a rending shriek, a roar that seemed to shatter the entire hallway. Its head shook violently, its whole body twisting in agony.
In a savage movement, it threw itself to the floor, spinning on its axis.
The limbs still holding the torn-off frame moved with it, swinging the heavy piece of wall like a club. Splintered wood and twisted metal swept through the air.
The blow struck the unconscious young man.
The impact hit him in the head, a dry crack that sent him spinning through the air like a doll caught in a whirlwind. His body was flung away, out of control, bouncing into the void of the hallway.
Meanwhile, the beast kept spinning.
Something clattered against the floor: the blade embedded in its eye. The impact reignited the pain, an explosion that shot through its entire skull and forced another ragged scream, a mix of fury and suffering. Dark blood gushed out, staining the planks and spattering the air.
But it didn't stop.
The monster completed three-quarters of a spin, and in that instant its one remaining good pupil found the scene again.
There, in the air, caught in the intermittent light, was the red-haired man.
His weapon was no longer in his hand.
The monster, with its single good eye, didn't waste the momentum.
Using the spin, it extended one of its limbs and launched it straight at the man's abdomen, aiming for his right side.
The redhead saw it coming.
His hands moved by reflex, almost seeking to block. But they stopped halfway, as if a spark of instinct convinced him not to waste his defense.
The blow hit him squarely.
The contact was dry, brutal. A choked grunt escaped his throat, short, as if the air had been punched from his lungs.
The impact hurled him backward like a bullet.
His back slammed violently against the floor, bouncing once. Then again. And once more. Three consecutive jolts that dragged him like a ragdoll thrown by a giant.
And a fourth impact was coming.
But then, a red glow enveloped his legs.
The air itself seemed to tint around them, and his muscles tensed in an unnatural movement. His legs bent, forcing the rest of his body to spin in mid-air. In a fraction of a second, an uncontrolled fall became a precise rotation.
The man recovered his posture.
He landed on the soles of his feet, though the landing skidded him a full meter backward, leaving a trail of splinters under his boots.
—"Shit…"— he thought, fleetingly, as fast as the flash of pain expanding in his right side.
The stab was intense, as if the blow had lit a fire beneath his ribs.
The man placed a hand on his right side.
He expected to feel the pressure of his clothing or the heat of blood… but what he touched was skin.
Puzzled, he looked down quickly.
The blow had torn away a piece of fabric: in its place was a hole in his clothes and, beneath it, a horrifying bruise covering his entire flank. The skin was sunken, a throbbing purple hue as if breathing on its own.
There was no time to examine it further.
A roar interrupted him: a brutal impact against the wood, a bellow that filled the hallway.
He looked up.
The monster was already lunging at him again.
The redhead didn't retreat; on the contrary, he took a stance.
He bent his knees, leaned his torso forward, and the red aura erupted around his hands and feet. A dense vibration, like heat turned to light, expanded around him.
When the distance between them shrank to little more than a meter, he acted.
He leaped.
His body shot toward the ceiling with a violence that made the floor beneath his boots crack. The air whistled as it was cut by his ascent, and in an instant he was up, defying gravity as if he'd challenged it.
The monster lifted its head, tracking him with its single eye, not losing sight of him for a second.
But the man didn't stop there.
He used the ceiling itself like an invisible springboard: he leaped again. This time not just vertically, but with a precise spin. He curved in the air, bending his back and shoulders, compressing his silhouette until he became a smaller target.
The monster's limbs snapped shut around him like a trap, but the reduction in size was enough: the blades closed on empty air.
The man shot through that narrow space, escaping between the limbs trying to catch him.
The man dropped with all his body's weight.
His hands, feet, curved back: every muscle landed on a single point. The landing wasn't on the floor, but on the sword still embedded in the monster's left eye.
The steel vibrated under the pressure, sinking even deeper into the ruined socket.
---
[Before]
The man had released the young man, throwing him toward the monster like bait, a temporary sacrifice.
The inertia of that throw pushed his own body downward, accelerating his fall.
When his feet touched the floor, something different received him. Water.
Not just any puddle, but a vibrating sheet that reacted to the contact, trembling under his boots as if it had been waiting for that impact.
The water churned violently, dragging his own body along with the current he had summoned.
The redhead continued his motion, curling further and stretching his left arm upward.
His fingers closed around one of the monster's limbs.
The creature barely budged, rigid as an iron bar. For anyone else, it would have been an impossible handhold… but for him, it was a perfect pivot point.
The combination was brutal:
A fixed limb.
The speed gained from his escape.
And the water propelling him like a liquid spring.
All of it turned his body into a human pendulum.
He swung around the monster's arm, rising with impossible precision, until he was above the creature.
From there, the view was clear:
The monster had its gaze fixed on the young man, its eyes focused on the prey thrown before it… unaware of the threat falling from above.
Without overthinking it, he used the momentum of his spinning body.
He released the slick limb at the exact instant, letting inertia launch him upward. At the same time, he threw the sword with his right arm, aiming for the monster's left eye.
The steel found its mark.
It sank with a thick sound, piercing flesh and nerve. The creature thrashed in a violent spasm.
The man cursed silently.
Seeing the monster's reaction, he knew it would notice him. And he was in the air, with no way to maneuver.
The counterattack came immediately.
A limb slammed into him like a hammer. He could have raised his arm to block… but he remembered. He remembered the image of another similar monster crushing someone else against the floor, bending them like a ragdoll.
The decision was instantaneous:
"Better a hard blow than losing a hand. That way I'll have a better chance of surviving."
The impact caught him.
The pain was immediate, searing. It was unlike anything he'd felt before. It was as if the air itself had exploded within the strike.
His body folded in the air, flung in the opposite direction.
And in the midst of that unbearable pain, a vague memory pierced through him.
That sensation… that kind of burning pain… wasn't entirely unfamiliar.
"I've felt this before… where…?"
---
[Present]
The man landed with all his weight on the sword.
The force of the impact drove it deeper, slicing downward through the left side of the monster. The creature let out a roar that shook the entire hallway.
But the triumph lasted only a second.
The pain in the redhead's abdomen erupted like an internal stabbing, sharp, unbearable. The forced posture he was in betrayed him: his muscles failed, he lost his balance, and the sword's trajectory veered off.
The cut tore outward, ripping part of the monster's skin… and then the blade came loose.
Both fell at the same time: the man and the weapon.
Upon hitting the floor, he reacted by pure instinct. He curled up, spinning like a wheel, and in the middle of the spin, he firmly caught the sword.
He forced himself to stop, panting.
He tried to recover, rising sharply and twisting his torso to face the creature.
But he had no time.
A limb shot toward him like lightning.
The movement was too fast; he barely managed to cross the sword in front of his body. His left side blazed with the red aura, enveloping his shoulder and ribs like an improvised carapace.
The impact was brutal.
The sound resonated like a double cannon shot:
First, the physical blow, the clash of flesh, bone, and aura against steel.
Second, the consequence: the man's body being shot backward like a projectile.
He was hurled down the entire hallway, bouncing off splintered walls and loose planks, until he ended up back at the point where the unconscious young man lay.
His back hit the floor next to the boy with a dry crash.
The air was forced from his lungs in a ragged gasp.
The man got up as best he could.
His breathing was irregular, and yet he found the strength to stand. His body, however, couldn't hide it: he leaned to the right, yielding to the pain burning through him like white-hot iron.
Before him, the monster gave no quarter.
It launched itself like a bullet of flesh and claws, a projectile with six limbs tearing through the air.
The redhead planted his left foot firmly, stepping forward. His stance was firm despite the wound.
But then he noticed it: the cut he had opened earlier on the monster's flank… was disappearing. The wound was closing.
—"You gotta be kidding me…"— he snarled through clenched teeth.
In response, he spun his weapon.
The edge now pointed downward, ready like a claw. The red aura enveloped his feet, intense, vibrant.
Crack.
The floor fractured under the pressure of his right foot.
Boom.
A dull rumble followed it.