Chapter64

It lay there for a second, then its legs twitched, followed by its head slowly lifting from the cracked ground with blood and dirt caked across its snout. It shook its head then pushed itself back to its feet like nothing had happened, its three Shards still spinning steadily around its tusks.
'No way,' he thought, staring at the monster while it turned to face him again, its eyes locked onto him with the same dead intensity as before. 'I put a lot of force into that hit and it just got back up? This thing is insanely tough.'
'Alright, eyes it is,' he thought, adjusting his grip on the sword while tracking the boar's bloodied face. 'If it can't see, I can actually get some damage in.'
He shifted his weight forward, ready to move, but the boar beat him to it.
Its jaw dropped open, and instead of a roar, a dark, heavy mana started gathering in the back of its throat, glowing faintly while the air around its mouth distorted from the pressure.
Hajin froze, his brain stalling. 'Wait, what the fuck is that? Since when do boars shoot beams?'
The ground started shaking under his boots, the vibration climbing up his legs while the mana in the boar's mouth condensed into a tight, pulsing sphere.
'What kind of evolution is this thing going through?' he thought, his grip tightening on the hilt while his pulse spiked. 'This isn't normal at all.'
He didn't wait to find out, kicking off the ground and sprinting straight at it while the sphere kept growing, figuring if he could close the distance before it fired he might be able to interrupt it.
He was almost within striking range when the boar suddenly shifted its aim downward.
The blast hit the dirt right in front of it, the force kicking up a massive wall of dust and rocks that swallowed the entire clearing in a single second.
'Shit,' he thought, his momentum carrying him straight into the cloud while his vision dropped to zero. 'I can't see anything.'
He tried to stop, planting his feet, but the ground was still vibrating from the blast and the dust was not helping at all.
Something moved in the haze to his left, fast and silent.