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“There is nothing more dangerous than the heat of battle.”
This was the first lesson that Lucia was taught in training. It was the first lesson everyone was taught actually, before they got assigned classes and final exam groups. On the stage, the orator spoke plainly and bluntly, “You will die if you are unprepared. And being prepared doesn’t mean you can’t die. Know the limitations of yourself and your compatriots.”
The field they were in was frosted, melting into morning dew and they fought this monster. Lucia stood back, allowing both Everett and Jin to take the more dangerous position on the offensive. This was their first practical practice for their exam. It was a weak monster that was implanted with something to make it slightly more sedated. Their advisor said that the group was ready far sooner than most in the school to take on this challenge, even with the actual Hunter’s Exam happening in multiple weeks time.
The monster was probably 7 feet long with scales running down its chest and matted fur on its back. It was a mix between a snake and a bobcat, but they weren’t given a specific name. Just the goal to kill. The scales were a pale cream in the center of it’s stomach. becoming more brown and yellow as the scales closed in on the fur. It’s fur was also brown, stripes of black and tan breaking up the silhouette.
It moved on all fours, sometimes standing on its hind legs to attack. It growled and hissed as Jin slashed at it. Its roars of pain echoed across the field.
They had already damaged it pretty significantly before, but there was still more work to be done.
Everett’s eyes turned dark and slitted. He “became a monster” once before, demonstrating on a dummy, showing it to Lucia and Jin. His nails would turn to claws, and his demeanor would become more feral, like a raccoon revealed from a closed wooden box.
He said that it was mostly safe, which was good enough for her. Some of her own magic could definitely be unsafe if she did it too often, draining her to severe exhaustion. Even when cautious of that, she has accidentally burned herself too many times to count while using magic.
Lucia saw Everett staring down the beast like he was sizing it up, not as a competitor, but as predator. He stared at its legs, then moved to its chest, then neck. He focused his gaze back to the chest, waiting to pounce.
Lucia, not knowing quite what to do, casted a spell on Everett to make it easier to claw into the creature. She’s a healer at heart.
Jin adeptly stabbed into the hind legs of the beast, hindering it’s ability to move. It was limping away, weakened to a state that someone could easily kill. It always made Lucia’s chest tighten when the monster got so weak. It hurt for reasons she couldn’t readily name.
Everett sprinted up to the monster. He ran faster than Lucia thought was possible, hands at the ready to attack as soon as he reached it. He bared his teeth terrifyingly, like he was prepared to bite if the situation called for it. He let out a low growl, which scared the creature even more. It really seemed like this poor thing was his prey now. There was no way it was coming out of this alive. It could barely even attack any more.
The moment Everett arrived, he tore his claws deep into the soft flesh of the monster. The scales were ripped apart as it soaked his hands in blue blood. He ripped apart the front of the monster’s body, completely rending it from the ribcage. Blood covered the once dewy ground, painting it blue. The creature cried in pain.
With the front of the chest torn to bits, Everett ripped at the furred skin. He tore and shredded it. Each wound was hidden by the fur, but there was nothing hiding the way that it dripped with the same bright, navy blue. The tufts stuck together as the blood congealed, making the process that much easier.
And he wasn’t stopping.
It’s legs couldn’t support itself anymore, and the monster fell, still wailing at incredible volumes. Lucia almost wanted to cover her ears, but she felt far too guilty to allow herself to avoid listening. Jin was just staring with his mouth wide.
When the wailing stopped, Everett just continued to claw into the body. He only stopped ten seconds later when he realized that it wasn’t reacting anymore. He turned to face Lucia and was absolutely covered in blood. It stained his chest and arms. His hair was obviously getting matted with the blood coagulating quickly in the open air. The ends looked brown with how much blood was trapped in it. He growled, not ready to stop fighting.
Everett looked at Lucia. Looked at her legs. Looked at her torso. Looked at her head. His eyes were piercing and made her shiver.
Without hesitation, Everett began sprinting toward Lucia. She covered her face with her arms, too stunned to try and run away. She probably wasn’t fast enough to outpace him at any rate.
Jin screamed, “Everett!” as Lucia now heard two sets of steps coming toward her.
She felt the claws that just dug into the body of the snake-bobcat pierce the arm protecting her face. She screamed in pain, feeling how sharp it was as he dragged deeply through her arm. Her red blood mixed with the blue of the monster’s to form a disgusting, dark, purple tone. She could practically taste the copper smell coming from her new wound with how bloody it was. She didn’t want to even look at it.
His claws pulling out of her skin left it open to the air, raw and burning. Not wasting a second, Everett clawed into her again, turning her arm to shreds.
“Lucia,” Jin shouted. Suddenly, both her and Everett were on the ground, tackled by Jin. He was easily able to pull Everett off of her, which snapped him out of his feral state.
Lucia groaned on the ground, holding her injured arm close to her chest. It was still bleeding profusely, and she knew that she would need to heal it, but she felt so tired. Her arm was stiff with pain.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” Jin snapped at Everett.
Everett stayed quiet for a moment. “There is a price to pay for any power someone can yield.”
Jin sighed, letting Everett go since he was clearly not a danger anymore. He moved to sit beside Lucia. “I was probably using poison, so we will have to deal with that.”
“What?”
“Poison. When I attacked you.”
“Oh. What kind?”
“I’m not too sure. I have never used it against something that lived the attack.”
“Oh,” Lucia darkly realized, “Will it kill me? The poison itself?”
“I’m not sure. It was the wounds, not the poison, that killed the monsters that I have defeated.”
Lucia’s arm pulsed with pain, barely able to move it. She floated her hand above the gashes to heal it. She saw how her skin was shredded into ribbons of flesh,her blood still dripping down her arm. The magic worked, but it was only able to cover the superficial wounds. The pain remained just as strong as it was before.
“Can we call our instructor over?” Lucia asked weakly
“Right,” Jin said. He blew into the horn that was given to them for this trial just to make sure that they would be safe if something bad were to happen. The sound bellowed from the large opening of the horn.
Lucia grit her teeth as sound pierced her head and the venom made its way through her arm. Her arm tingled with pain, migrating away from the wounds themselves and more to her shoulder and the rest of her body. She tried rubbing around the wound, but that only made it hurt more.
Everett looked at her, his face completely stoic. “Let’s try to make sure this doesn’t happen again.”
“What caused it?” It felt like he needed to force the words from her mouth. Tears filled her eyes involuntarily with how the pain grew and traveled through her. Her hands began turning numb.
“I don’t know,” Everett answered, “But I do know that I need to practice self-restraint as a prevention method.”
Lucia made a sound of acknowledgement, as she curled into a ball on the ground. The tears began to fall, but it didn’t feel like she was crying. It was like it was happening to her with no input of her own. Like the tears would have fallen if she was there or wasn’t. Like she was floating down a river with no way of knowing when she started nor when she would finish.
The pain once again ramped up, turning to lava in her veins. She sniffled.
“The instructor will be here soon enough,” Everett tried to soothe.
She stiffly nodded. Jin pulled her from the ball that she had rolled into and helped her sit upright, leaning her against his chest. She was shaking. She could barely move her arm and fingers, and was terrified of what might happen as it traveled further. She buried her head into Jin. She couldn’t handle seeing Everett, even if he didn’t mean to do this. The pain was too excruciating right now. Later, she knew that she would be able to act as she did before he attacked, but it hurt so much right now.
Tears continued leaking from her eyes. After waiting for a few more minutes, Ignis, their instructor arrived at the scene with her giant eagle. She saw the desecrated corpse of the monster, with Lucia holding Jin close and Everett sitting on his own.
“Good work,” Ignis said, “any major injuries?”
“Lucia was poisoned, but aside from that, no,” Everett explained.
“How? This monster didn’t have any venom.”
“Yeah, Everett–” Jin glared, before being cut off by Lucia softly moaning in pain.
“It doesn’t matter,” Everett “She needs antivenom.”
Ignis nodded and gestured for the new team to follow her to her eagle.
Jin looked at Everett before picking up Lucia to bring her over. Lucia whined and once again curled into herself as much as she could. Jin pet her hair to try and help her calm down, but it really couldn’t help the flames inside of her.
The pain was flooding her chest at this point, and she couldn’t move her injured arm at all. It was a massive blaze that overtook her entire arm and upper chest. She could barely focus on anything but the pain, and her body rathered not focus on anything at all.
She vaguely floated as she was placed on the eagle and held in place by Jin. The eagle was probably soft, but she couldn’t feel it. She could barely see anything, her mind completely blank. Anything to stop feeling the molten burns within her.
She was shaken what felt like a few short moments later, but were at the apothecary building. That was almost 30 minutes of time that went by without her noticing. She would have been concerned if it didn’t happen as often as it did.
She was practically dragged inside by Jin, Everett, and Ignis. She couldn’t feel her legs, but could still move them, so at least they didn’t feel the need to carry her. What did frighten her was that she couldn’t move her arm opposite to the injury anymore. She glanced to everyone helping her inside before focusing on trying to move her legs in a way that got her to where they needed to go with a bit more ease.
They arrived at the room of the apothecary and the only thing Lucia wanted was to lie down and not be in pain. And one was far more achievable than the other.
“Hello Archie, thanks for making sure you had room on such short notice. The venom has paralyzing properties, if you have any antivenom for that.”
“And it hurts,” Lucia whined pathetically.
“And it hurts,” Ignis added, “So if you have any health potions of pain relief tonics, that would be lovely.”
“What kind of person would I be if I didn’t have potions and tonics,” they said, “and I have a few antivenoms, so we should be fine there.” They paused momentarily, “Might require some preparation though.”
Lucia nodded with stuttered movement. She was led to a bed, but wasn’t quite able to get herself in without either of her arms.
Jin noticed immediately, and lifted her in. Ignis pulled the thin blanket up as Everett watched with a distant frown on his face.
“Thanks,” Lucia whispered.
“It’s no problem.”
The apothecary returned with a pain relief tonic and lifted it to Lucia’s mouth. It was pale and bubbly in the glass, and about as much liquid as a small health potion. As it hit her tongue, she was flooded with bitterness. It was such a stark contrast to the overly sweet nature of health potions that made you want to suck on straight salt to compensate.
The tonic was so harsh, she thought that she was just going to spit it out on accident. But she managed to swallowed it, but not without gagging some. But she was so glad she was able to stomach it, as the pain began to ebb as soon as it entered her stomach. She sighed quietly. Even if the pain was still near excruciating, she could feel it dissolving away with the work of the tonic.
Lucia could see Archie quickly mixing something in a small vial, but was unable to focus on it for very long. She preferred to relish in the comfort of this bed.
Archie returned with the antivenom and quickly prepared to inject it into her upper arm. They barely even told her that it was going to happen. They just swiped the spot with alcohol and with one prick, they were done. Lucia couldn’t even feel it with the numbing pain still permeating her arm.
“Alright, it’s all in there now,” the apothecary whispered. Lucia felt herself sink into the bed even more from the sheer relief that there was an end in sight. “I’m gonna leave, but let me know if she needs anything.”
“Understood,” Everett and Jin said simultaneously. Jin looked over to Everett for a brief moment before returning his gaze to Archie.
Lucia still couldn’t move her arms, and pain still flowed within her, but she was so exhausted. She closed her eyes and let sleep take her gently in its arms.