Chapter 5 v2 - Burden part 2
Still suspended in the air, with his right side aimed toward the hallway wall, the man realized how the situation was closing in on him from every direction.
The torn-out frame creaked on his right. The monster advanced straight ahead, charging from his left, two of its limbs extended like blades, sealing off every route of escape.
And he… he had nowhere to step.
His body was caught mid-failed jump, gravity pulling him downward, and another weight throwing every muscle off balance: the young man slung over his shoulder.
The man's mind screamed at him to do something, anything.
But for a second, he hesitated.
An eternal second, where doubt seeped in like poison.
What if he kept holding on?What if he tried to withstand the blow, even knowing that with that burden he could never regain balance?
He wavered…Truly, he wavered.
The monster was coming for him, closer with every heartbeat, and still he forced himself to believe there was another way out. A lie, perhaps, a self-deception that trapped him on the edge of indecision.
The conclusion didn't come as reasoning, but as a claw slashing across his chest. There was no choice.
His lips pressed tight, the veins on his neck stood out to their limits.He convinced himself in silence, as if pronouncing a sentence no one else should hear.
And he let go of the young man.
The boy slipped from his shoulder like discarded baggage, the man's arm releasing him with the same coldness as tossing a hunk of meat to a starving beast. The fabric of his clothes slid through his fingers, and immediately the body began to drop toward the floor of the hallway.
For an instant…A single instant…
The boy's body, thrown forward, cut across the monster's line of attack.His silhouette blocked the creature's vision at the worst possible second.
That brief breath of respite was enough.
Chash!Something sharp stabbed straight into the monster's left eye, sinking into the socket with a wet, brutal sound.
The creature let out a shriek of agony, a roar that seemed to split the entire hallway apart. Its head jerked violently, its whole body writhing under the pain.
In a savage movement, it hurled itself to the ground with a spin.The limbs still gripping the torn frame moved with it, swinging the heavy piece of wall like a club. Splintered wood and twisted metal carved through the air.
The blow struck the unconscious boy.The impact hit him square on the head, a dry crack that made him spin in the air like a rag doll dragged by a whirlwind. His body was hurled away, helpless, bouncing into the void of the hallway.
Meanwhile, the beast kept turning.Something clattered against the floor—the blade embedded in its eye. The impact reignited the agony, an explosion that rippled through its skull and forced another guttural scream, a mixture of fury and torment. Dark blood poured in streams, soaking the boards and spraying through the air.
But it didn't stop.The monster completed three-quarters of its turn, and in that instant, its one good pupil found the scene again.
In midair, caught by the flickering light, was the red-haired man.The weapon was no longer in his hand.
The monster, with its single good eye, didn't waste the spin.Using the momentum, it extended one limb and thrust it straight toward the man's abdomen, aiming at his right side.
The redhead saw it coming.His hands moved by reflex, almost trying to shield himself. But they froze halfway, as if a spark of instinct convinced him not to waste his defense in vain.
The strike landed full-on.The contact was dry, brutal. A strangled grunt tore from his throat, short, as if the air itself had been punched out of him.
The impact hurled him backward like a bullet.His back slammed against the ground violently, bouncing once. Then again. And once more. Three jolting impacts, dragging him like a rag doll thrown by a giant.
And the fourth crash was about to come.
But then, a red glow covered his legs.The very air seemed to tint around them, and his muscles tensed in an unnatural motion. His legs bent, forcing the rest of his body to twist midair. In a fraction of a second, what had been a wild fall turned into a precise rotation.
The man regained his composure.He landed with his soles firm on the ground, though the impact dragged him a full meter back, leaving a trail of splinters beneath his boots.
"Damn…" he thought, fleeting, as fast as the flash of pain spreading across his right side.
The stab of agony was sharp, as if the strike had left fire burning beneath his ribs.
The man pressed a hand against his right side.He expected to feel the pressure of fabric or the heat of blood… but what his fingers brushed was skin.
Confused, he looked down quickly.The blow had ripped a piece of his clothing away: in its place was a hole, and beneath, a hideous bruise spreading across his flank. The skin had sunk inward, purplish and throbbing as if it breathed on its own.
There was no time to examine it further.A crash interrupted him: a brutal slam against the wood, a roar that filled the hallway.
He raised his eyes.The monster was already charging him again.
The redhead didn't back away; instead, he braced.He bent his knees, leaned his torso forward, and the red aura burst around his hands and feet. A dense vibration, like heat turned into light, spread outward.
When the distance shrank to little more than a meter, he acted.He jumped.
His body launched toward the ceiling with such violence that the floor cracked beneath his boots. The air whistled, cut apart by his ascent, and in an instant, he was above, hanging from gravity as if defying it.
The monster raised its head, tracking him with its lone eye, never losing sight for a second.
But the man didn't stop there.He used the ceiling itself like an invisible springboard: he jumped again. This time not only upward but with a precise spin. He hunched in midair, folding his back and shoulders, compressing his silhouette into a smaller target.
The monster's limbs closed in on him like a trap, but the reduction in size was enough: the blades snapped shut on empty space.
The man slipped through that narrow gap, escaping between the limbs that sought to cage him.
He fell with the full weight of his body.Hands, feet, arched back—every muscle slammed down on the same point. His landing was not 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 shattered socket.
---
[Before]
The man had released the boy, throwing him toward the monster like bait, a temporary sacrifice.
The inertia of that motion dragged his own body downward, accelerating his fall.
When his boots touched the ground, something different greeted him. Water.Not just any puddle, but a vibrant sheet that reacted to the contact, trembling beneath his soles as if it had been waiting for that very impact.
The water surged violently, carrying his body along with the current he had summoned.
The redhead continued the motion, bending even further and stretching his left arm upward.
His fingers clamped onto one of the monster's limbs.The creature barely budged, stiff as an iron bar. For anyone else, it would have been an impossible obstacle… but for him, it was the perfect support point.
The combination was brutal:
A fixed limb.The speed he had 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's gaze was locked on the boy, its eyes fixed on the prey thrown before it… completely unaware of the threat descending from above.
Without thinking twice, he used the momentum of his own swinging body.He released the viscous limb at the exact moment, letting inertia hurl him upward. At the same time, he threw his sword with his right hand, aiming for the monster's left eye.
The steel found its mark.It sank with a thick sound, tearing through flesh and nerve. The creature convulsed in a violent spasm.
The man cursed in silence.Seeing the monster's reaction, he knew it had noticed him. And he was in the air, unable to maneuver.
The counterattack came instantly.A limb came crashing down on him like a hammer. He could have raised his arm to block… but he remembered. He remembered the image of another monster crushing someone else against the ground, folding them like a rag doll.
The decision was instant:"Better to take a heavy hit than lose a hand. That way I'll have more chances to survive."
The strike connected.The pain was immediate, searing. Nothing he had ever felt before compared. It was as if the very air had exploded inside the blow.
His body bent midair, flung in the opposite direction.
And in the midst of that unbearable pain, a hazy memory pierced through him.That sensation… that burning kind of pain… it 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, sliding down through flesh and cutting along the monster's entire left side. The creature roared, shaking the hallway to its foundations.
But the triumph lasted only a second.The pain in the redhead's abdomen erupted like an internal stab—sharp, unbearable. The forced posture betrayed him: his muscles gave way, his balance collapsed, and the blade's trajectory went astray.
The cut veered outward, ripping part of the monster's skin… and then the sword slipped free.Both fell at the same time: the man and the weapon.
As he hit the floor, instinct took over. He curled in, rolling like a wheel, and in the middle of the spin, his hand clamped back onto the sword's hilt.
He forced himself to a stop, panting.
He tried to recover, pushing himself up and twisting his torso to face the creature.
But there was no time.
A limb lashed at him like lightning.The movement was too fast; he barely managed to cross the sword in front of his body. His left side flared with red aura, wrapping his shoulder and ribs like an improvised armor.
The impact was devastating.The sound rang out like a double cannon blast:
First, the raw strike—flesh, bone, and aura smashing against steel.
Second, the consequence—the man's body being fired backward like a projectile.
He was hurled down the hallway, bouncing off splintered walls and loose planks, until he ended up back where the unconscious boy lay.
His back slammed against the ground beside the boy with a dry crash.
Air burst from his lungs in a forced gasp.
The man pushed himself up as best he could.His breathing was uneven, yet he still found the strength to rise. His body, however, betrayed him: leaning to the right, caving to the pain burning through him like molten iron.
In front of him, the monster gave no respite.It lunged like a bullet of flesh and claws, a projectile of six limbs tearing through the air.
The redhead planted his left foot firmly, stepping forward. His stance was solid despite the wound.But then he noticed it: the gash he had opened earlier in the monster's side… was vanishing. The wound was closing.
"Don't fuck with me…" he growled through clenched teeth.
In response, he shifted his weapon.The blade now pointed downward, ready like a claw. The red aura wrapped around his feet, intense, vibrant.
Crack.The floor split beneath the pressure of his right foot.
Boom.A dull rumble followed.