Hungry Rabbit
Chewed trees, shattered bones. A severed rabbit leg is standing in a trap made of sharpened trees, with blood trails flowing out of the trap. The forest’s gloomy silence and the strange mixture of burnt rubber and rotten egg smell coming from the rabbit’s blood.
"This smell is serious enough to kill a vampire's appetite for blood." Luna was covering her mouth and nose with her arm, trying not to smell it as much as possible.
"Actually, I think we can suppress this smell with a few wild shepherd's herbs." I took the petrol-black, shining leg, which was as big as my own leg, from the trap and started smelling it a bit more. When I smelled it up close, the putrid scent of the blood became even more intense; I threw the leg far away to avoid vomiting. "I changed my mind; even a ton of shepherd's herbs couldn't suppress this smell."
"You realize, don't you, that you haven't eaten anything proper for almost a week? Come on, I am okay; I manage somehow with blood—there is still blood left from the bush-deer—but we finished its meat long ago."
"I know. I am just managing with berries I find here and there, but still, this smell is too heavy."
"There is no doubt about that. Maybe if we boil it long enough, it will become edible."
"How about finding the owner of the leg? Maybe there is an edible part of these rabbits that we don't know about."
"True, maybe. Larkan used to say the snake's tongue tastes good, even though it is poisonous itself."
"The snake's tongue?"
"Yes, they cut the snake tongue, pickle it, and eat it in Ranlia. It tasted very salty to me, but it wasn't bad."
"I would prefer even the snake's poison over this rabbit."
"Your shield is with you, isn't it?"
"Yes, this useless arm is at least ready for duty as a shield," I said, showing a small shield tightly strapped to my bitten arm. We started following the bloodstains.
While blood continued to flow from where its foot was missing, the rabbit looked at us with all its anger, holding its breath. After a few seconds of staring, the rabbit started eating its own severed leg.
The part of its unusable leg that was adding weight was gone now, and blood continued to flow. A black liquid flowed from the rabbit's mouth as it licked its wound, and the wound began to bubble and emit smoke.
As it burned, the bad smell of the blood started to spread an even worse, nausea-inducing odor into the environment.
While its own blood flowed from its chin, it shot a glance at us. It lunged at me with the remaining strength in its single remaining leg. I pulled my shield in front of me. I managed to stop the rabbit without too much difficulty.
"Luna, the rabbit started biting the shield; do something."
"Let the chaos of Areferi rule; let Vedana fuel the compassionate fire of pain."
After saying this, fire appeared in her hand, but the fire continued to burn in the shape of a larger sphere in her hand with every second. Finally, she threw the fire in her hand at the rabbit.
The rabbit's fur started to burn brightly. The rabbit began to scream in pain and crashed into the surrounding trees. It started attacking more aggressively. The forest began to burn, and black smoke began to rise.
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The shield had become shattered from being bitten and burned; it was now just adding weight to my arm. The majority of its fur was burnt, but it came towards me aggressively, opening its jaws wide. Before it closed its jaws and bit me, I prevented it from eating the remaining part of my arm by blocking its jaw with the remaining piece of the shield.
Luna had started preparing the same spell again.
"Nox, get rid of that thing; I will cast the second round."
"Luna, are you crazy? We will die from the smoke before the rabbit dies anyway; don't cast the spell."
The rabbit had started to bend and break the shield now. I removed the parts holding the shield on my arm. I forcibly closed the rabbit's jaw by kicking it upward with my knee.
Blood started flowing out of its jaw. The other piece of the shield was visible under its mouth. The rabbit was trying to scream in a dazed manner, but there was no trace of its previous majestic voice.
I used Flash Step and opened some distance, yelling at Luna, who was still holding fire in her hand.
"I said no fire."
"It looks like it took damage from the fire; what if I cast it one more time?"
"We would become charcoal along with it."
The sound of the fire burning the wood. My hair is sticky all over due to the blood.
"Luna, how about seriously boiling the rabbit?"
"Boiling? You handle the water; I will handle the heat."
Luna extinguished the fire in her hand. "Droshi, let the liquid of life flow."
The rabbit relaxed after the liquid landed on it and stood where it was. It removed the broken pieces of the shield from its mouth and spit them out.
It was visible that the wood on the ground started melting and emitting smoke in a way different from burning. The smell of burnt rubber was dispersing in the smoke.
"Avaritia, take this heat and give it to the one who truly deserves it." I started holding one hand towards the burning trees and the other towards the water on the rabbit.
The rabbit started screaming. After a while, the smell of burnt rubber started spreading around even more, and the blood flowing from under the rabbit's chin turned a black color and started flowing more slowly.
Smoke continued to rise from the rabbit. Following a bit of relief on Luna's part, the rabbit could be seen struggling momentarily one more time.
The rabbit, which could not even stand, closed its jaw somehow, and after standing as if chewing something, it spat a black liquid three times towards me. Although I escaped two of them with Flash Step, the last one hit the right side of my face.
Smoke started rising from my face, and a sharp pain followed it. It was like hot oil had been poured on me. The pain increased exponentially every second. A few seconds later, the pain started to subside, or rather, my face started to go numb.
I washed my face with water magic. I saw the rabbit looking at me again; it had closed its jaw and was preparing for the second round.
"Collect this Droshi water and turn it into a drop. Tsesi give shape of the full moon"
She started collecting the water on the rabbit at its head, covering its head completely to turn it into a large drop of water; meanwhile, I continued to transfer the heat.
Before the rabbit could even decide what was happening, it struggled and tried to get rid of the water from its face with its hands, but it was of no use. When it opened its mouth to take a breath, the black liquid dispersed from its mouth into the entire sphere of liquid, and a few seconds later, the rabbit had stopped moving.
I collapsed to the ground, my legs giving way in exhaustion, and started grinning; I couldn't move the numb other half of my face even a gram, but I still managed to grin, even if it was forced.
"Nox, are you okay? Your face..."
"Luna, I am better than good." A grin that I still couldn't wipe off my face, and a calmness when my heart should have been exploding due to adrenaline.
"At least let me wash your face properly." While Luna poured cold water on my face with trembling hands, only calmness covered me.
The burning of the forest had stopped, and the smoke had dispersed. The charred trees were barely standing. The trees made of charcoal had started swaying, cracking, and crumbling.
The massive trees behind where the corpse of the rabbit we killed with a thousand difficulties lay fell, splitting in two as if they were dry toothpicks. From within the darkness, a shadow large enough to cover the sky fell upon us.
The thing that came was a rabbit. But the monster from a moment ago would remain merely like a cub, perhaps an appetizer, beside this. Its pitch-black fur stood hard like armor; every time it breathed, the steam coming out of its nose fogged the surroundings.
The massive creature ignored us. Slowly, with a comfort as if strolling in its own garden, it leaned down next to the rabbit we had just killed. It opened that massive jaw; its teeth were lined up like rusty spearheads.
CRUNCH.
A single movement.
That creature, which was about to kill us seconds ago, whose skin was acidic and bones hard as steel... it swallowed it in a single bite, without even deigning to chew. The sound of bones breaking remained simple and faint, like stepping on dry branches.
The sound coming from its throat as the creature swallowed brought my stomach to my mouth.
And then...
It slowly turned its head towards us.
