"Oh really? ... Tell me more."
The voice slithered across the clearing, smooth and mocking, but cold enough to chill the marrow.
Avin’s eyes snapped open, vision blurred with blood and dust. The bandit’s heavy foot, pinning him down, faltered. His head turned sharply toward the sound.
At the edge of the hill stood Leo.
He looked utterly unharmed, his white coat immaculate despite the crash, his hair neat, his lips curled into that snake’s grin Avin knew too well. His green eyes glowed faintly in the shade, narrowed, burning with venomous hate—but the smile never wavered.
Relief crashed over Avin like a wave. For a split second, he could breathe again. Leo was alive. Leo had come. The nightmare wasn’t his alone anymore.
The giant lifted his foot from Avin’s back, and air surged painfully back into Avin’s lungs. He rolled over, gasping, clutching his throat as precious oxygen seared into him. Each breath was jagged, desperate.
"Stay there, noble," the giant spat, his voice a low growl. "Don’t move."
He strode toward Leo, cracking his neck first to the left—crrk!—then to the right. His knuckles popped as he clenched his fists, joints snapping like firecrackers.
Leo only watched, one hand tucked casually behind his back, as if welcoming a guest instead of facing a brute who had just nearly killed Avin.
"You interrupted our trip," Leo said softly, each word laced with venom. "Damaged our carriage..."
He extended one hand, palm open, a polite gesture, almost playful.
"Please pay us back for your disturbance."
The giant froze. His brows twitched. For a heartbeat, disbelief overtook his savage mask. Then his head tilted back and he bellowed, clutching his face as laughter burst from him.
"HAHAHAHAHA!" ᴛʜɪs ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ ɪs ᴜᴘᴅᴀᴛᴇ ʙʏ N0veI.Fiɾe.net
The sound echoed across the broken trees. He leaned forward suddenly, his grin manic, teeth bared.
"You nobles always say the stupidest things!"
Leo lowered his hand again, tucking it neatly behind his back.
"Oh?" His smile sharpened. "Didn’t you just say something similar?"
He took one step forward.
The ground dented beneath his foot, leaving behind a deep print. The air thickened instantly, turning dense and strange, a green tint seeping into the world. The leaves overhead rattled without wind. Avin felt the weight pressing into his chest, squeezing his lungs as if the forest itself bowed to Leo.
The giant clapped his hands together twice—CLP! CLP!—and crouched low. His knees bent, his calves swelled, thighs coiling like steel springs. Every fiber of his quadriceps bulged as he lowered himself into a launch stance, veins writhing across his skin like angry worms.
His grin stretched wider. "Ooohhh, you’re strong." His voice trembled with manic delight. "Good. GOOD!"
Each stride cracked the ground. Dirt sprayed with every step. He hurtled forward, raising one arm high, fist clenched tight.
The punch he released roared through the air with a deafening WHOOOOOSH!, faster than a boulder dropped from the sky, aimed to split Leo in two.
The giant blinked. His fist passed clean through Leo’s body.
"I missed?" he muttered, stunned. His knuckles brushed air, his arm buried where Leo’s chest should have been.
But Leo was no longer solid. His body dissolved into swirling green smoke before the bandit’s eyes.
The brute’s jaw tightened. He stumbled back a step.
Avin’s heart pounded as he watched from the dirt, too weak to move. He can do that?
A voice, calm and mocking, slid into the brute’s ear.
"Hey. Behind you, brute."
The man whipped around.
There stood Leo again, intact, smiling, eyes bright with amusement.
The brute thundered forward once more. This time he lowered his stance deeper, his heels tearing into the ground. His calves trembled with pent-up force, glutes and thighs flexing as he stored energy in every tendon.
The earth gave way beneath him as he launched upward. He rocketed into the sky, his body rising like a launched cannonball, his roar splitting the air.
Avin’s crimson eyes followed in disbelief as the giant twisted in midair, hands clasped together into a two-fisted hammer.
He descended at meteoric speed, his joined fists arcing toward Leo’s head.
But again, Leo dissolved. Smoke. Green mist, curling and vanishing into the breeze. The brute’s hammer-fist plowed straight through the illusion and slammed into the dirt, cracking the earth.
"Where are you?!" the brute bellowed, veins bulging, saliva spraying from his lips.
Leo’s voice drifted again, light and amused.
"Come on. Don’t give up. I’m right here."
The brute spun, eyes wild, locking on Leo a few paces away. His rage twisted into a monstrous grin.
"Stay there, coward!"
He charged once more.
Leo tilted his head, smile unfaltering. "Okay. If that’s what you want."
The brute’s fist rocketed forward, faster than before, his roar shaking the trees.
This time, there was impact.
Leo didn’t dodge. The brute’s knuckles smashed into his face—
But Leo didn’t move. Didn’t flinch. Didn’t even blink.
The brute’s eyes widened. He had landed his strongest blow, but it was as if he’d struck a wall of marble.
Leo’s grin lingered. And then, once more, his form unraveled into smoke.
The brute stumbled forward, fist burying itself into the trunk of a massive tree.
The wood cracked, groaned, then split.
Avin’s eyes shot upward just in time to see the top half of the tree give way.
The enormous trunk collapsed, smashing down on the brute’s head with earth-shaking force. Bark shattered, splinters rained. The giant roared, clutching his skull as blood trickled down his temple.
His eyes snapped to Leo.
And for the first time, fear crept beneath the rage.
Leo inhaled slowly, as if bored, then sighed. "Let us end this."
He lifted one arm, hand open.
The brute tried to move. He planted his feet, roared, strained—
But nothing. His body froze mid-step. His limbs refused him.
His muscles bulged, veins exploding across his skin as he fought against invisible chains. Sweat poured from him, his teeth grinding.
"What—what is this?!" he snarled, spittle flying.
Leo’s smile grew sharper. He clenched his hand into a fist.
The air tightened, compressing.
The brute’s muscles caved inward, flesh crumpling like paper. Bones cracked, snapping audibly one by one.
CRRKKK. CRRKKK. CRRSHHH.
His eyes bulged, veins bursting in his face. His scream caught in his throat, choked off by the crushing force wrapping every inch of him.
His body burst into pulp.
A spray of gore painted the ground, the trees, the rocks. Blood spattered across Avin’s cheek, warm and wet, dripping down his jaw.
Chunks of bone, flesh, muscle rained down, the remains unrecognizable as human.
Leo lowered his fist slowly, as though nothing extraordinary had happened. The green tint in the air began to fade, dissolving back into ordinary daylight.
Avin lay frozen, his body trembling. Relief still surged through him—Leo had saved him, killed the monster that would have ended his life.
But mingled with that relief was something colder.
The way Leo smiled while crushing a man alive. The casual cruelty of it, the efficiency, the elegance of slaughter.
Avin’s chest rose and fell rapidly, eyes locked on Leo’s back. Gratitude, awe, horror—all tangled into one unbearable knot.
Leo turned slightly, his green eyes glinting, that same snake’s grin plastered across his lips.