Spirit Taming

Clark held himself back a little while watching the other begin to battle. He wanted to see how Jerold and Brad would handle themselves. He also felt bad that he had let his tongue slip when he spoke just a few moments ago. Normally he was a lot more calm and more concise about what he was saying or doing. He couldn’t think of a time he had ever slipped like that.

Too many thoughts were rushing through Clark’s mind but he had to stay focused. With a shackle of his head, he charged towards the nearest pair of beasts fighting. Not every single steel clawed mole was cowardly.

The steel clawed mole that was fighting and somehow dodging the attacks of the hammer tail lizard was certainly older. Clark could guess that this was the cause of the steel clawed mole benign able to survive this encounter. It was even more dramatic when the hammer tail lizard would strike the ground where the steel clawed mole had just dug under but the result was no damage to the mole at all.

This meant that the mole had a much greater understanding of the earth energies that it used to see. It was able to judge where the attack would land and how to avoid it all while digging frantically. The only failure in this was that the steel clawed mole was unable to do proper damage when it was close enough to the hammer tail lizard. Instead, it was slowly chipping its claws on the tough scales of the lizard.

That was until Clark took advantage of the distractions that the mole created. With his spear, he approached with his ghostly steps at a much faster speed than one would expect. The mole barely felt Clark’s presence before he had leaped in to the air.

The space between scales around the lizard’s neck was an easy, and one of the largest, targets to strike. The falling moon pierce had all of Clark’s weight behind it letting him easily pierce through to the spine of the lizard. It only helped that it was not the largest lizard with the toughest scales here.

The mole reacted to the crashing body of the hammer tail lizard by attacking it quickly. It had no idea that it was sensing the last few breaths of the lizard. But the blind charge proved why only using one sense out of all senses was wrong. The mole charged right in to Clark’s withdrawn and readied spear.

The sound of the mole piercing its own skill on the spear was sickening. However, Clark didn’t even flinch. He had faced the death of beasts before. Knowing that the mole was an invasive beast that caused many problems only made it easier to defeat in this way. The more used to vicious deaths like this, the stronger Clark’s mentality would be when he faced his enemies.

Nearby, Clark watched as Brad charged forward and completely bashed a steel clawed mole in to one of the stalactite pillars. The force behind his attack was much greater than Clark expected Brad to be capable of. It appeared that Brad was able to use his momentum without causing himself damage. This skill would be very valuable in a fight against an opponent that used momentum against him. 𝒇𝒓𝒆𝒆𝙬𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝓸𝒎

The hammer tail lizard that was fighting the mole that Brad had just bashed viciously was silently taken down by Maria. The roaring and slamming sounds that Brad made while fighting drew attention. This was enough to allow Maria to move in the open without being seen.

She had been focusing on her movements and using poison on her daggers. The new understanding of her body made her steps much lighter. She could feel that her body obeyed what she desired it to do much more so than before she had trained in strength. It was finally time for her to have these realizations.

Every step, jump, and slash of Maria’s dagger showed her the changes that had come with the brutal muscle tearing training she had done with Ella’s older brother. The large differences that she found in her bodily awareness proved to be the reason she could effortlessly leap around and strike the weak points of the hammer tail lizards. She easily left three with mortal wounds without them knowing because of Lit’s numbing poison.

More interestingly though, was that the midnight eel was not just following Maria’s shadow to protect her. It was actively biting in to the legs and sides of the steel clawed moles that were anywhere near Maria. This caused the moles to shrink in fear because they were attacked by something they could not sense at all. It also weakened the moles so that Brad, who was still nearby had an easier time fighting them.

But this was all a short moment for Clark to witness. His eyes became drawn to the blue flame skeleton that was walking toward the hammer tail lizards. The lizards were in a confused daze and they tried to make sense of the living mist that made strange forms in front of their eyes. The spirit infant just added more energy and buffed the living mist further to make the illusion stronger.

Just as the lizards would try to step toward the living mist’s illusions, the earth prince would take on the soil of the cave as its body. The strength it took from the earth energy allowed it to use the soil to create weak shackles. Just strong enough to hold the lizards still while the blue flames skeleton pierced the lizard in a weak point with its burning hands.

It would have been odd if Ella was nowhere to be found, yet, when Clark heard the cracking of a whip, he knew she was there. The other distracted hammer tail lizards became the moving targets for Ella’s whip training. She was sharpening her skills against the tough opponents that were slowly weakened by her attacks. She was the one preparing these lizards for her beasts to defeat together. Her actions perfectly embodied a third year student, calm and precise in battle.

The weak link proved to be Jerold. He was clearly out of his mind because he was facing two steel clawed moles at once. One had been poisoned by his rainbow chameleon about the poison was not working fast enough. This left Jerold to fight two opponents with the spear he had already been told not to use. It appeared that he was being stubborn and trying to show off. It made Clark angrier seeing that Jerold was also glancing at Maria the entire time.

The fire that welled up in Calrk’s stomach made him question what he was doing. He wanted to just leave Jerold there to flail against two opponents he would lose against because he had not become strong enough. However, that would make him much worse. Forgetting the illogical feelings, Clark charged toward the two steel clawed moles.

"Idiot, use the daggers or anything else but a spear. You need more training to wield it properly. If you can’t listen, then leave and tell professor Wright you need new training." Clark effortlessly used a crescent moon slash to slice the mole’s heads off. He gave his order then walked away again. Jerold could only stay there panting while he wondered just how he would ever be able to beat Clark at his own game. But he would not throw away that goal.

The next target that Clark’s eyes fell on was one he could easily use to blow off illogical steam. The dual tailed lizard was starting to stir with all the commotion. Its tails rose from the nest and various ores, rocks, and soil fell off of its body. Instead of remaining hidden in the nest, it had decided to stand up and eliminate the pests that were there to steal its eggs food for when they hatched.

Besides the dual hammer tails of the dual tailed lizard, there were other differences compared to the hammer tail lizards. It had many more spiky gray scales sticking out along its back while it also had much tougher teeth. The large size did make it slow in standing, but that was still much faster than the hammer tail lizards. It was much older as well so the dual tailed lizard had a better handle of its strength.

The stomping sounds that vibrated the cave even more made all the hammer tail lizards shiver along with the steel clawed moles. This was the master of the cave. All the territory had been claimed by the dual tailed lizard. Now it was angry that others had invaded its space.

Some moles attempted to flee while the hammer tail lizards began to fight harder. Now that their reason for defending the nest was awake and ready to fight, they had to show off. Only the strongest could have the potential for being the next father to a clutch of eggs. But even more importantly, they didn’t want to become the target of the dual tailed lizard if she was unhappy with their performance.