Chapter 41

  Time for Caution

  Its trail of destruction was easy to find.

  The bear was mostly black with streaks of red in its rough fur.

  On all fours its head was six feet high.

  Oh fuck it.

  Cycling up his core, he blitzed it.

  “Take this you big bastard!”

  The bear lazily turned.

  Ken, fueled by pure arrogance and force, delivered a brutal, full-power strike to its temple.

  The impact cracked the air.

  The bear shook its thick skull.

  And huffed.

  The forest went silent.

  His fist throbbed.

  That… wasn't the plan.

  A downward dismissive swipe meant to crush him.

  Ken immediately abandoned brute force, channeling his reflexes to dance sideways, slipping past the devastating claws by a hair.

  His focus sharpened.

  Scanned for weakness.

  It didn't have any.

  Fucked up. Again.

  Strike now.

  Or die.

  Right punch to the foreleg- joint shifted.

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  The bear's swing went wide.

  The left elbow flowed upward-exploding its right eye.

  It refused to fall.

  The backpaw caught him.

  The strike sent Ken flying, thankfully a helpful boulder cushioned his fall.

  Everything…

  Hurts…

  That one strike almost just ended him.

  Things were cracked.

  Things were bruised.

  He carefully climbed back to his feet.

  I'm going to kill this fucker.

  A vicious, guttural roar ripped from the bear's lungs.

  Vision blurred.

  Sound cut out.

  The air shimmered with a feral red glow, and the beast moved with impossible speed.

  Ken, recognizing approaching death, forced himself to move.

  The stumble turned into an explosive, evasive, painful dance, weaving between tree and rock.

  The monster broke through it all.

  Scattered debris battered Ken's body, but his momentum didn't falter.

  The beast's crimson glow flickered and dimmed.

  He snapped back to action when the glow finally faded.

  The bear, exhausted and angry, charged straight in.

  Ken, exhausted and angry, stared it down.

  He slipped under the high-swinging paw.

  Delivered a sharp kick to the knee joint, breaking the leg.

  The beast fell.

  Double hammer fist to the spine helped.

  Again.

  His right hand had an audible crack.

  And again.

  Something in his left wrist gave.

  The beast hit the earth—silent and unmoving.

  Battered but victorious, he focused his will and absorbed the dense cloud.

  The chi was angry that day my friends.

  With his body buzzing, he noticed another sensation of power from the beast.

  He sensed.. something, somehow, around its stomach.

  This is going to be gross..

  He punched his way in.

  The smell of hot iron hit him in the face.

  Inside, he found a gore covered black orb.

  Glowing with a sinister red light.

  It pulsed once, like it hated him.

  “It should be fine.”

  With a shrug, he wiped the orb and put it in his pocket.