Linnie rolled, pushing off the ground and lodging his feet into the red moose's throat. His feet sank into the soft, rotten flesh without much difficulty. He was then hanging by his legs from the creature's neck.
'Dammit.'
From the side, Liora came sprinting in. She karate chopped the moose, severing the head from its body. Laughing maniacally, she grabbed the decaying head from the ground by the spine and swung it around like a mace, turning the beast to mush.
"That's three dead!"
Two more hooves came crashing down from above her head, but as it was rearing on its hind legs, Linnie saw the decayed, cavernous underbelly. There was a massive opening where its stomach used to be, revealing twisting, knotted roots.
"FIREBALL!"
The red moose turned even redder, engulfed in flames. It fell back, a pile of burning flesh. It stunk.
"That's... four," Linnie laughed softly.
He was panting, feeling tired despite the very... exhilarating events surrounding him. He yawned, moving to lend his hand to Liora, who was still on the ground. With a straight face, maybe even a little amused, she pointed behind him.
He turned his head back and saw a pair of massive jaws seconds from chowing down on his skull. Strings of spit and blood wiggled inches from his eyes, and its hot, pungent breath hit Linnie's face, causing him to jolt back in disgust.
The jaws snapped shut with a loud clack, crunching down only on air. Linnie punched the moose in the face—it didn't do much damage, but it bought time for Liora to slam a large rock across the monster's head.
And again, she hit it. And again.
"You said to use rocks—am I doing it right?"
"No, no, give it to me. This is how you do it!"
Linnie grabbed the rock with both hands and angled it so the narrowest point faced down on the moose. He thrust it downwards, slicing a large gash through the flesh.
"Oh, I see! So rocks isn't always for bludgeoning, but they can cut, too—"
The moose kicked her to the ground and went wild, nearly crushing Linnie. He dodged the raging beast—which was now blind from the children beating it—and gently shoved his hand into the gaping wound.
"HA! die from the inside! FIREBALL!" he shouted, wide-eyed and grinning.
The head burst into flames from within, causing the red moose to collapse to the ground. Linnie, for the first time, noticed a quiet, shrill, almost screaming sound. He listened closer and realized the sound came from the wriggling roots.
'Eugh, that's disgusting!'
"That's five! Only six left, ha! These guys are way easier to kill than I thought—the blue one's way stronger! But... why aren't any attacking us anymore?" Liora said, rubbing her face.
The two of them looked around and spotted the remaining six. They'd surrounded the original spectral moose and were now taking turns prodding at and hitting it. The circle was wary, though, since each one of them had no chance in a direct fight with the blue one.
But they had numbers.
"Hm... should we just run while we can?" Linnie suggested.
"No! We've can't let them kill the blue one, or this would all be for nothing, right?"
Linnie yawned, then sighed. Then started to growl, breaking into a sprint for the circle.
'Hehe, why's he growling like some animal? That's so funny,' Liora thought, chasing after him.
The girl quickly overtook him, much to his displeasure, and reached the gathering first. She bent down as she ran, grabbing a sharp rock from the ground, and jumped into the air, flying way higher than any normal person would, landing atop one of the red moose.
'She really likes getting on top of them, huh?' Linnie thought. 'I wish I could ride one, too... damn.'
The red moose the girl had landed on didn't even notice her. It seemed that, maybe, Linnie's hypothesis was correct—they were connected. A hivemind, of sorts. Controlling six at once was bound to make each individual moose a little less... intelligent? All there?
Liora wedged the rock into the moose's side, dragging it across and making a large incision. By then, the moose had become aware of its passenger. But it was too late.
She had already made a large enough wound to expose the inner cavity of squirming roots. Linnie understood immediately and aimed his hands.
"FIREBALL!" he barked.
The inside burst into flames, causing the roots inside to produce the shrill scream. Liora jumped off of the back, spinning through the air like a cat. The five other red beasts shivered, turning their gazes from the spectral moose to the girl.
This was a mistake, since as soon as they lost their focus on the majestic beast, it wrapped its powerful maw around one of them, crushing its skull between its thick, rectangular teeth. Still standing, Linnie sent another fireball, killing the seventh moose.
Four remained, but the horde's previous momentum—if they had any—was completely gone. They were almost evenly numbered, now. Certainly, the spectral moose could at least take two, while Linnie and Liora took the rest.
Liora cheered, running a circle around the two remaining moose. Then, she was, once again, kicked in the face. Linnie winced. It was easy to forget that, a blow like that, which would almost definitely end his life, wasn't all that dangerous to the Siaryn.
'Doesn't she learn from her mistakes? Is she seriously stupid or something!?'
Now that only four were left, the strange hivemind only needed to control four bodies at once. The more moose that died, the stronger the individual beasts would be.
Before the two red moose could trample Liora into paste, Linnie jumped into the air. Foolishly, he tried replicating Liora. Instead of landing on the back of one of the beasts, though, he fell headfirst through the ribs of the moose.
The boy didn't even realize what was happening when his vision went dark. That is, until the repulsive smell flooded his nostrils, and the sound of squirming roots filled his ears.
He ripped his head out from the cavity, too disgusted to even scream, and reflexively shot a fireball into the wound.
Stumbling back, he shivered—squirming and cringing with primal disgust. He had completely lose focus on what was happening, and could only go stiff trying not to vomit.
'I'll never be clean. Never again...! And I wasn't even clean to begin with! Oh, gaud, I think I'll just die now!'
The remaining moose charged at him. Linnie snapped out of his trance a moment too late, barely managing to dodge a fatal blow to his chest. Instead, the broken, rotting, black spear of an antler pierced his side, barely missing any vital organs.
'Oh. That's not good. It won't get infected, will it? No, it definitely will!'
Linnie didn't scream out in pain or panic. It's not like it hurt. Situations like these might lead you to think this ability was... incredible! But, despite what Alwyn thought, it was only useful. In that moment, Linnie would've been much better off being able to feel the pain of that antler.
Because, without the basic human sense, his response was slow. Wrong, even. He only understood the peril he was in when his feet left the ground. The beast lifted him into the air, causing the antler to slide further into his body.
Simply put, his fear response was way too delayed!
"Hey, any help? Liora... what're you doing!?"
He squinted, looking at the girl who was still laying on the ground. A stream of golden yellow blood was running down her face, but that wasn't the most worrying part. Her jaw was contorted, having been forced out of place by the beast's hooves and broken.
It didn't look like she'd be getting up any time soon.
'No!'
Linnie desperately thought of what to do, but everything was out of reach.
"FIREBALL! FIREBALL! FIREBALL!"
From this angle, there were no exposed root dens. The fire burned away at the thick hide, but it made no meaningful damage.
'Dammit! Uh, I'll just do what I did against that monk guy, right! But this time, instead of blood, I'll make it so... um, so that moose are flammable! Yes!'
Predictively, something as outlandish as that didn't work. Perhaps it would've, if the boy was more experienced. Though, in that case, he wouldn't have needed to rely on such a strange method.
'Shit! Liora, wake up, you useless girl!'
Linnie heard a bellow from the side, then the sound of fast, heavy footsteps. His eyes widened as he watched the spectral moose, who had left behind the two, now dead, red moose to save him. It tore through the red moose, slamming it with so much force that it flew into the air.
Unfortunately, Linnie was still skewered on the jagged antler. He, too, crashed into the ground with a crunch.
He stood up from the ground, shaking the gunk and flesh off from his body. The boy looked down at his stomach, which had a large severed antler protruding from it. He didn't know yet that it was protruding from the other side, too...
"Aliza's gonna get super mad at me for this," he said. "It's like I'm a unicorn, but my horn is in my stomach."
He poked at the piece of bone sticking from his flesh. He was hesitant to remove it himself.
"Then you're not a unicorn at all!" Liora laughed.
"Oh, so you're finally awake? Thanks for nothing!"
"What!? 'Nothing'? Didn't I kill like, at least half of them?"
"Hell no you didn't!" Linnie paused, then looked around. "Huh. All the moose are really dead."
"Yup! Well, not all of them."
The two turned to the spectral moose, now standing still. It was really beat up, with large gashes and flesh wounds peppering its body. The majestic beast shook its head, cleaning itself of the black, rotten blood.
They both understood what the other was thinking.
"He's all hurt," Linnie smiled. "That'll make things easier. Thanks, you awesome moose. That is, for saving us. Sorry about this!"
Liora burst into action once again. It was quick work, since the beast was already tired.