As it was biting down on my arms I flailed, and fell into the water. The stream was about a third of a meter deep but with me on my back and a wolf-like creature I was just now realising was nearly the size of a full grown bear on top of me, I began to panic for air.
While this wolf-like creature was almost the size of a bear, it wasn't quite as bulky. This should have meant it was significantly lighter. It wasn't
This place had significantly increased gravity, any creature here would be innately heavier just simply because of gravity.
That was bad news to me.
I had a weapon on me of course, my pistol was strapped securely to the hip of my clothes. There were two glaring problems with this though;
First is that the damn thing was ten or so meters away, getting to it with this thing on me would be a problem.
Second and more importantly, I wouldn't be able to use the damn thing anyway.
It required mana to power, as did everything humanity had made in the past decade or so. Even though I called it a pistol it was more of a railgun than anything. None of that really mattered though, point is I can't rely on a gun, luckily I also had a combat knife. The problem of getting to it still remained.
The creature loosened its bite on my arm and stood on top of me, keeping me from moving from my spot underwater. I spun my body, their claws dug into me as I did so but I managed to take their foot. Their Paw? Whatever I managed to get it off of me and tried to stand up.
It refused to give me the chance, it bit down on me and kept pushing me over and down into the water, trying to drown me to death clearly but I resisted fiercely. The lack of oxygen was creeping up on me though. It wasn't all that bad yet but if I wasn't able to get a breath soon it would start spelling trouble.
Once again the creature was trying to bite down onto my neck, and once again I was shocked by the sheer speed it was able to move.
Unlike in many of the stories I heard in the past, time never slowed down when my life was in danger. My mind simply went clear, I didn't take any time to deliberate what I should do or what the consequences of my actions were. It was as if I was simply able to do more, act quicker, more decisively.
I had never quite felt this quick though.
'Youth is truly amazing'
I was past my prime before, my reaction speed and decision making had been degrading over the past few years. The others didn't notice it but I could feel it every time I fought.
Each bite the beast attempted was dodged or occasionally counter attacked. Each swipe was parried or otherwise avoided. Each time it tried to stomp on me or push me over it was met with perfectly timed resistance.
Despite my inability to use mana or even see currently, my mind for the first time in a long time felt completely and entirely focused. Each moment I inched closer to my clothes which held my combat knife, once I got that the fight would flip to my advantage.
I was close to my goal now, just a few more steps until I was close enough to try dash for it.
'Now!'
In the exact moment I had parried an attack I lifted my leg and kicked off the wolf-like creature. Both as a method to send me forwards and push them back.
I was definitely sent forwards but the creature had barely even flinched. Then not even half a second later it was chasing after me, ludicrously quickly too.
I had bought myself enough time though. I aimed for my trousers, preparing to unsheathe and brandish my knife. In that moment I felt a wave of mana rush towards me.
Instantly I understood what it was trying to do and it was quite simple, It was trying to push me.
Unluckily for it however, I no longer had a mana core nor a weave. Either one of those would act like a wall to the incoming mana, which as Newton's third law dictates, would push me forwards like it intended.
'It probably has never gone up against something lacking a core'
Of course it hadn't, even the bugs here would have some form of a core and weave. Having mana within your body has countless uses so evolution would always make sure they had both a way to store mana and a way to control it throughout their bodies.
In short, I wasn't pushed. Not to any noticeable degree at least.
At last I had gotten my hands on the knife. At the exact same time I turned around and tried to stab the creature with it. It swiftly dodged however, making sure no part of the knife would even come close to touching it.
It had obviously come across knives before, judging by how cautious it was of them.
'A shame I can't see where any scars are, I would have loved to stick it where it hurts the bastard.'
It seemed cautious now, it was circling me slowly. My mind raced for ideas on what to do but from my experience in a situation like this the best option was to run. Sadly I didn't exactly have anywhere safe to run to.
I considered climbing up a tree, after all humans were a kind of ape. While we had long since diverged from climbing trees, we still had many of the traits to make us effective at doing so. I was confident in my ability to climb trees so the only question was how good this guy was at doing the same.
I tried to put a proper shape to the creature, I had been able to dodge their attacks based on how much mana in an area was being moved. Seeing its shape in any way other than a foggy outline was much harder. It was akin to holding an object up to the night sky and trying to see its shape by the stars it obscures.
The thought of trying to do more or less that exact thing came to my mind, the floating islands still had those crystals pulsing with light beneath them and I could potentially use them to see its shape. The problem with that was that the crystals were too far away, making them too small at this distance and there were not enough of them to give me a clear picture of their form.
I once again went back to trying to do so with mana, I didn't need to know much. I just needed to know what it looked like between their arms. If it had powerful muscles akin to a chest it was likely able to climb.
All animals which climbed required this muscle for the strong pulling action needed to climb trees; Humans, monkeys, koalas, hell even bears had them. Yes, seeing a massive bear being able to climb a tree quicker than you can is indeed horrifying, I've had first hand experience.
Seeing the hand or paw thing would have been better but there was no way I would ever be able to see something so precisely.
'No I didn't have to actually see their chest, I just need to understand how they move. If I can do that I can estimate what kind of muscles it has'
I looked at how it walked, the points at which it touched the ground. I tried to remember what things meant what.
In the end I simplified it down to 'does it walk more like a wolf' or 'does it walk more like a bear'.
A wolf when circling around pray completely turns its body to the direction it's walking in while turning its head to face the prey itself.
A bear still mostly does the same but thanks to the increased width between the arms from the chest allows it to also have their body face towards their prey a bit more. The space between the arms allows their stride to go slightly left or right when moving which is the reason this kind of motion happens.
I carefully analysed how this animal moved as it circled, where it stepped and how its body was generally positioned.
It almost certainly had a chest, its body was slightly pointed towards me. Suggesting it could indeed climb trees.
'Shit, well all that thought I put into it has gone to waste.'
I knew it hadn't, knowing what it could or couldn't do would allow me to make better decisions but I was still disappointed at the result.
At that exact moment the creature stopped circling and carefully began to make its way towards me and at the same time it began to hide its mana, cutting off my only real way of knowing where it was.
'This is going to hurt isn't it'