The creature—Alpha—was a mountain of contained fury. Every muscle in its body seemed to hum with power, vibrating hard enough to make the air itself buzz. Unlike the swifter monsters, its movements were slow. Deliberate. Like a battleship aligning for a broadside. The ground trembled with every step it took toward Artur.
Artur's mind, honed razor-sharp by constant danger, assessed the threat.
A frontal assault was suicide.
His brute strength was a joke against that mass.
He would have to be smarter.
He would have to be faster.
He would have to dance.
Alpha attacked.
Not a sprint—but a charge. Thirty tons of muscle and armor accelerating into a living battering ram. The sound was that of a freight train tearing off its tracks.
Artur waited until the last possible second. The wind displaced by the creature lashed at his clothes. The scent of ozone and scorched stone radiated from its hide.
The instant those massive tusks dropped to skewer him—
he threw himself sideways, rolling across the asphalt.
The creature thundered past, unable to halt its own momentum. It slammed into the facade of a storefront, and the brick wall exploded inward as if struck by a wrecking ball.
Artur was already on his feet.
His leg was a wildfire of pain.
His mind was ice.
He had an opening.
As Alpha backed out of the rubble, shaking its massive head, Artur ran. He didn't strike at the armored back or the plated skull.
He aimed low.
The rear joint of its left hind leg—where the armor thinned, where movement demanded flexibility.
He swung the axe with everything he had. The blow wasn't meant to cut.
It was meant to break.
Steel met joint with a thunderclap.
CRACK.
The strike would have split a tree in half.
On the creature, it barely scratched the surface of the carapace—though it did force the beast to falter a step.
Alpha released a roar of irritation, not pain.
It was like hitting a tank with a hammer.
He had underestimated its durability.
The creature spun—far faster than something of its size had any right to. Its tail, thick as a steel beam and tipped with a mass of bone, carved through the air.
Artur tried to leap back.
His injured leg betrayed him.
The tail caught him across the ribs.
The world dissolved into pain—and the sound of breaking bone.
He flew.
Slammed into the side of an overturned car, the metal frame crumpling beneath the impact.
He hit the ground.
Air blasted from his lungs.
A sharp, blinding agony tore through his left side.
Ribs.
Definitely broken.
Each breath was a knife.
He tried to rise, but the world tilted and spun. Alpha turned toward him, head low, magma eyes gleaming with what could almost be called satisfaction.
It had played.
Now it would finish.
Artur dragged himself backward, dust and shattered glass shredding his palms. The axe was still clenched in his fist—a dead weight.
Brute force wouldn't work.
He needed a new tactic.
He needed the environment.
He needed to turn the monster against itself.
Alpha advanced, slower now. Savoring.
It lifted one massive foreleg, preparing to crush him like an insect.
Artur stared at the raised limb.
The underside wasn't covered in thick carapace.
It was softer. Wrinkled flesh, laced with veins as thick as fire hoses.
A weakness.
With a shout that was half agony, half defiance, he rolled beneath the descending limb.
It was an insane gamble.
Mistime it—and he would be pulp.
The foot came down, the pavement cracking under the impact.
But Artur was already moving.
He found himself beneath the beast's belly—a claustrophobic space reeking of sulfur and hot flesh.
He didn't hesitate.
He drove the axe upward with both hands, burying it into the creature's softer underbelly.
This time, there was no crack of armor.
There was a tearing sound.
Like thick leather being pierced.
The blade sank deep.
The creature unleashed a roar that shook the entire street—
not irritation.
Pain.
Real. Shocked.
The beast reared, trying to rid itself of the source of agony. Artur was thrown aside, crashing hard against the pavement, ribs igniting with white-hot torment.
Alpha thrashed in panic.
Dark violet blood poured from its abdomen, splattering the asphalt as it trampled cars and shattered storefront windows in blind agony.
Artur forced himself upright, limping heavily.
He had found the answer.
It wasn't about strength.
It was about agility. Precision.
And the suicidal courage to get close.
He couldn't fight the mountain.
He had to climb it.