The King of Beasts (Private Mission)

Zhu caught Kihia’s answer to his question and he suddenly became very happy with the idea. He was perfectly happy now, and these pesky lionesses wouldn’t get in his way. He waited and simply continued to bide his time The first opening he saw was the lionesses that were cut by the shield they had so foolishly jumped upon without thinking. Zhu threw Wild Rang as hard as he possibly could. It soared through the air and slashed and struck one of the lionesses three times before the gigantic boomerang returned to its wielder. Zhu smirked as he caught his weapon and leapt at the wounded creature slicing the weapon through it again sending it to the other side.

He noticed that all of the lioness were now injured and he was going to take full advantage of this. He threw Wild Rang once again and the three pronged weapon soared through the air in a great arc cutting through all but one of the already injured lionesses. As Zhu caught it the lioness he missed jumped at him with mouth open and fangs bared. Clearly it was ready to bite Zhu’s head off, but he wasn’t having any of that. He held up the blade and let the Lioness impale herself upon the sharp prongs. Zhu then simply removed the blade by kicking her off of it and slashed it across her entire length causing her to sink dead to the ground. Zhu was breathing a bit heavier now however due to his earlier wounds. This battle needed to be concluded quickly or he would be in even worse shape.

HP: 70/100%
MP:55/100%
1/4 Wild Rang
2/5 Duel Flames Cool Down
2/5 Flame Slash Cool Down
4/4 Cool Down H&E

Kihia exhaled a sigh of relieve when he saw Zhu had managed to counter the lioness who had almost had bit his head off. We need to finish this up fast… Zhu’s injuries are creating chances for circumstances that would give me a heart attack… Kihia then looked at the four remaining lionesses, which had started to have trouble standing. Kihia nodded, and took off towards the lionesses, he then bashed his ice shield into one of the lionesses sending it flying into the grass. Kihia then spun around detaching his ice shield from Icarus sending it flying into one of the lionesses, with the spear blade impaling the animal.

Kihia nodded, he watched as the one of the remaining lionesses made a break for Zhu, Kihia threw Icarus towards the lioness’s path to Zhu. He watched as Icarus impacted into the lioness’s neck knocking it over and prevented it from ever reaching Zhu. Kihia nodded and then pull the Geruks out of his trench coat, as he watched the lioness that had yet to attack charge right at him. He then started to channel his magical power into both of the Geruks, “Ice Make Pole!” Two short poles formed on the ends of the Geruks, Kihia parried Geruko against the lioness that had just lunged at him. Kihia grunted, these lionesses are strong… no doubt from having such a strong Alpha male protecting them…

Kihia then swung Geruka and slammed it against the lioness’s head knocking it out. Kihia stood there for a moment and dispelled both poles and sheathed the Geruks and walked over to the other lioness he had hit Icarus with. She seems to be unconscious… that’s good… this fight is finally over… He reached down and picked up Icarus that was lying next to the lioness, however he had failed to notice that her eye was staring right at him.

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Zhu was not ready for the attack that he could feel coming from his left. He whipped around only to see Kihia smash his staff into the beast. This certainly impressed the warrior, and he turned his attention to the rest of the lionesses, but sadly for him the battle was already decided. He looked back at Kihia as he spoke and scoffed “More like he killed the weakest ones every time he found a newest one, so the ones who are in his presence are simply the best he could find.” He watched Kihia make a grave mistake however and Zhu threw Wild Rang harder than he ever had before in his life.

As Kihia’s arm came into reach the lioness surged up and sank her fangs upon his arm, but she had no chance to try and do more damage as Wild Rang’s blades stabbed her in the throat, and in the chest. The handle was inches from Kihia’s face and the frozen Knight had no choice but to realize that if Zhu had been less talented or less accurate then it would be him, not the lioness who would be dead. Still the damage had been done, and Zhu cursed his weakness at letting his teammate be injured. He rushed forward and pried the jaws of the female off of Kihia’s arm cutting his own fingers in the process.

As the jaws and fangs lifted out of Kihia’s skin Zhu moved the head dropping it to the ground as he fell down coughing up blood from his internal injuries “Seems…we were both a bit too careless…I am sorry I didn’t act sooner my friend…” He sat there and just coughed his wounds finally taking his toll on him. He motioned to the dead lion trying to signal that he wanted Kihia to retrieve the things that he wanted for trophies from it while he took a minute to try and regain his composure.

Kihia frowned, and looked at his right arm after his embarrassing blunder, the only damage done to the prosthetic are were the teeth marks from the lionesses bite. He shook his head and looked at Zhu, “Thanks for saving me… from further harm…” Kihia then adjusted his trench coat to make the holes from the teeth get out of alignment to prevent his prosthetic arm from being shown, I hope Zhu has not heard the news yet… or else this may lead to an unpleasant conversation… Kihia then nodded at Zhu, “I guess we were… Weren’t you going to get a tooth from the Lion before the lionesses showed up?” He said this in an attempt to quickly to change the subject… which had a high probability of failing especially if Zhu has caught wind about Kihia’s right arm, or notice that it is not bleeding at all.

Kihia sheathed Icarus and walked over to the corpse of the gigantic Lion, examining it once again after a brief moment he walked over to the Oasis and took a seat by it, he pulled out his weapons and started to clean them using a rag from one of his pockets and the water from the Oasis. He then looked over his shoulder to see what Zhu was doing, he then quickly cupped his left hand and poured the water on his right arm. Kihia then held his left arm over the damaged area and channeled a bit of his magical power into the arm, he felt the damage from the bite quickly reform and get repaired. He had managed to do this with very little movement, so the chances of him being caught doing this was rather low. Kihia then resumed cleaning his weapons acting like nothing happened. Kihia then remembered he had an extra roll of bandages on hand, he pulled them out and walked over to Zhu, “Would you like to treat your own injuries… or would you like some help…?” he had said this while extending out the hand that held the roll of bandages.

Zhu got closer and did indeed notice that his guildmate’s arm was not bleeding. He didn’t know why, but he assumed that so long as Kihia was okay then that was all that truly mattered. He nodded his head and turned back to the lion walking over to it. Using his fists and his feet he kicked out most of the teeth that the lion had these teeth were huge and Zhu knew that he would need something to tie them together with. He then looked to the lion’s mane, and the bandage’s that Kihia had brought him.

Zhu scoffed slightly at the offer, but took the bandages “A true warrior doesn’t bandage his wounds he lets them scar to show the worth of the battle he fought. A battle where one obtains no scars is a battle to quickly be forgotten. I thank you for your concern however.” He summoned up Iron Fang and began to cut into the lion’s mane doing his best to keep as much of it bundled together as he possibly could. Using this cushion of the lion’s mane he wrapped the teeth in it and tightly wrapped the entire bundle in the bandages in order to keep the teeth from leaving it. This would help him carry them back to the village. He carried the bundle under his arm and picked up the great lion’s tail turning to look back at his partner “Let’s…go before I pass out.” He said weakly as he carried the trophies of their greatest triumph back towards the hunting village.

He wasn’t sure how long he could last, but he was sure that he would make it back to the village or he would pass out before then, but he was confident that Kihia would be able to carry him back, or at the very least he would be able to keep him from dying if they were forced to stop.

Kihia nodded in respect to Zhu’s statement, as he took the bandages. Kihia then watched as Zhu walked over to the Lion and had started to shave off the giant lion’s mane. I can understand the fangs… but what does he intend to do with the mane…? He watched as Zhu eventually finished and then turned to Kihia, and said they needed to go before he passed out. Kihia nodded in agreement and started to walk down the same trail they had arrived to the Oasis with, “By the way Zhu… may I inquire what do you intend to forge with your trophies?” Kihia paused for a long moment listening for Zhu’s response.

After a long moment they eventually made it back to the hunting village, the gate guards stood there in amazement, their mouths hanging open in shock at the sight of Zhu and Kihia. “We have accomplished the task given to us… We have defeated the Giant lion and brought back proof… We need to speak to your Village elder once again…” They waited there for a long moment waiting for the guards response, I suppose they guessed we wouldn’t be able to pull it off… When will we not be underestimated by our employers for a change… After a long moment the gate guards finally snapped out of their daze and said, “You may enter the village once again, Great Hunters! We will inform the Village Elder of your return at once!” Kihia sighed, It took them that long to come to say that… I don’t want to picture how the rest of the village is going to react to this… Kihia stepped aside and let Zhu take the lead, “Have the honor of presenting our proof Zhu, you deserve to be able to do that for finishing off the lion.”

Zhu held the bundle of fangs under his arm as he switched his weapon back to Dragon Cleaver and began to use it as a walking stick. As he and Kihia made their way back to the village he heard the Ice Knight’s question and thought to himself “Well…these fangs are strong…long…and truly powerful. I shall have to make a weapon to match that…I think the greatest way to honor this great beast would be to make a halberd. They are some of the strongest Pole arm weapons that I’ve ever seen. This beast has earned such a thing. I shall call it ‘King of Beasts’ what do you think about that?”

As they arrived at the village he continued to walk into it not even trying to bother with waiting for their approval. He was going to go in and get this mission done so he could return to the Lamia Scale guild hall and rest. As he walked into the center of the village he held up the lion’s tail as high as he could. The entire village turned up and began to stare in awe at the feat of amazing hunting that they were witnessing. The village elder showed up and looked at the great tail with the same awe stricken face as the entire village. Zhu then just dropped it and looked to Kihia “I’m going back to the guild hall. I’ll leave the collecting of out reward to you my friend…” with that he turned and began to limp away still using his great sword as a walking stick.

Kihia nodded at Zhu and caught the giant Lions tail as it fell, he waved at Zhu as he left. Kihia then turned to the village elder and handed the tail to him with both hands. The Elder took the tail with his hands shaking, “You two… you two actually managed to kill the beast?” Kihia gently smiled and nodded, “That we did… it was a long fight… but Zhu Feng was the one who managed to finish off the beast.” The people of the village started to cheer and talk amoungst themselves, the Elder then stepped forward and said, “Let us throw a party for you, the Lion has ruined more hunts than I care to count!” The elder laughed for a moment but stopped when Kihia held up his right hand, “Thank you for your offer of Hospitality, but I must go and make sure Zhu makes it back to our Guild Safe and sound…”

The villagers went quiet for a long moment and then the elder nodded and reached into one of his pockets and pulled out a bag of jewels “Here is your reward of fifteen thousand jewels, and You and Zhu Feng are always welcome back to this village has Great Hunters” Kihia nodded in thanks and quickly divided the money into two halves 7,500 for himself and 7,500 for Zhu. I will make sure to give him his share once I catch up to him… Kihia then put his share into one of his trench coat pockets and said, “Thank you, I will surely pass the word onto Zhu once I catch up to him… If you are ever in need of help again… don’t hesitate to contact Lamia Scale… we will send someone to help you…” Kihia did a slight bow and then turned to walk out of the village at a brisk pace, he wanted to try and catch up to Zhu to make sure he was ok.