Luke sprinted through the winding, debris-strewn streets of the capital, his boots splashing through puddles as he fought to put every possible inch between himself and the Beast Lord. His breath came sharp and ragged, heart pounding like a war drum in his chest. When he risked a glance over his shoulder, he caught sight of the massive serpent coiled on the elevated street above. Its chest rose ominously before it exhaled with a thunderous hiss, unleashing yet another vicious barrage of acid into the sky. The first drops of rain had begun to fall, hissing like dying embers as they struck the rubble-filled streets below.

Luke crashed through the door of a half-demolished building.

"All or nothing!" he growled under his breath, yanking out his bow.

He bolted for the windows, firing arrows mid-run. Each time he passed a window, another shot flew. Every one of them struck the serpent, but the Beast Lord didn't flinch. Not yet.

A deafening crash shattered the air as the serpent's massive body came slamming down through the building. Luke dove headfirst through a window, hitting the ground and rolling. Chunks of serpent flesh smashed into the surrounding structures, and as he scrambled to his feet in the middle of a crossroad, the Beast Lord's long neck rose above the rooftops like a tower of death.

Its mouth opened wide, fangs gleaming.

"I haven't forgotten," it growled. "You tore a piece of them off. I grew them back… but I swore you'd beg before the end. Swore you'd regret ever crossing me."

Luke dismissed his bow back into his inventory and raised both kukris overhead.

"Well, I'm not begging," he called up, voice steady. "And regret? Haven't even started."

The creature snarled, lips peeling back. Then the jet came, another blast of hissing acid roaring from its throat.

Seriously? Is that thing unlimited?

Luke dodged, not retreating but charging forward. The acid tracked his movement, but his refined perception was dialed to its peak. He pushed everything at once: the dance, the stamina flooding his body, Force Infusion charging his blades, and a dark dash that blurred his figure as he moved.

A cloud of mist exploded outward. Luke burst from it like a wildcat, kukris flashing in both hands. They collided mid-air.

One of his blades locked into a crushing grip, and with the other hand, he drove a brutal punch. Then he twisted, slashing across the creature's scaled hide. The serpent snapped, its jaws lashing down, but Luke slipped beneath the strike with split-second timing.

The head smashed through a rooftop, splintering it. Luke darted up the monster's coiled body, dragging his kukri through its hide in a line of blood. The Beast Lord coiled violently, snapping again. As Luke's boots hit solid ground, he launched himself up and drove both blades into the soft under-jaw, tearing downward in one vicious sweep.

The serpent lunged. Luke twisted mid-air, backflipping away, then pushed off a nearby wall, spinning as he raked his blades along its face.

Another acid blast. Luke leapt above it, fluid and sharp. The kukris vanished. He pulled the bow. In the air, he fired. Arrows struck scale. He charged them mid-flight with stamina and redirected the next shot, not at the serpent, but at the load-bearing column of a building.

He landed hard, rolled, swapped weapons again. Kukris reappeared, instantly flung. Both blades shimmered with stamina as they spun through the air and struck the side of the serpent's head, slamming it into the same building he had hit earlier with the stamina-charged arrow while pretending to aim at the Beast Lord. During the fight, he had led the creature through the city's maze of buildings to that exact spot and now he was ready to finish his plan.

Right where I wanted you.

With stamina roaring through his arms, Luke launched himself forward. He mimicked the precise, rapid strikes of the mantis he'd once fought in the cave, stabbing again and again into the monster's eye. Each blow dug deeper. The hole widened.

The Beast Lord shrieked, thrashing to retaliate, but Luke vaulted away at the last second, vanishing into the collapsing debris.

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"YOU'LL PAY FOR THAT!" the monster howled, one eye now gouged out, black ichor dripping down its face.

Force Infusion was a powerful skill. One of his best. But by default, it only worked on weapons or projectiles. But what was a weapon, really? What counted as a projectile? Who made those rules? Luke didn't ask for permission. He just slammed the stamina into his gloves. It hit differently. Stamina flooded his gloves in a surge of power, and at the same time, he channeled it directly into the bones of his hands. His arms ignited with strength, the kukris pulsing in sync. It was all connected, every muscle, every edge. Ready to strike.

The Beast Lord lunged. There was no time to dodge. No time to run. Luke slammed both kukris into the creature's gaping jaws, locking them in place with a scream of effort. The serpent halted mid-snap, stunned by the resistance. But it pushed harder, and Luke felt his arms buckle under the pressure.

He shifted fast, flipping himself upward and bracing his back against the top half of the serpent's mouth, both legs locked, holding it open like a living trap. Pain exploded in his limbs, but he didn't stop. With his hands now free, he channeled a focused pulse of stamina into one kukri and then drove the blade straight into the serpent's fang, right at the tip. The impact echoed like a gunshot. The tip of the fang snapped clean off.

The pain hit the Beast Lord like a spike. It hissed, recoiling in a panic, and Luke dropped free before it could snap shut again. He hit the ground hard and rolled, but didn't waste a second. In one blink, he was airborne again, this time landing square on the serpent's snout and slamming a full-powered punch straight into the bone with a stamina-boosted glove. The Beast Lord's head whipped to the side from the force, crashing into the street.

Luke didn't let up. Before it could recover, he followed up with a barrage of stabs, kukris flickering like mantis claws. Over and over, precise and merciless, targeting the same wounded eye again and again, deepening the damage, widening the gap.

The monster screamed.

"ENOUGH!" it bellowed, voice shaking the air.

Luke didn't answer. He simply appeared again, kukri glowing with every drop of stamina he could squeeze into it. Then he drove it deep. The serpent reared back and instinctively flung its massive body into the nearest building. Exactly what Luke had planned.

The building was already weak, the one he'd softened up earlier with a stamina-charged arrow. The impact shattered its structural core. Debris exploded in every direction, raining down across the street in a thunderous collapse that buried part of the serpent beneath concrete and stone.

Luke hit the ground, breathing hard. He'd barely rolled clear of the fall in time. He glanced at his system screen.

[Stamina: 333 / 1970]

When he caught sight of the Beast Lord again, the creature was getting crushed beneath the full weight of a collapsing building, slammed into the ground by stone and steel.

Luke grabbed his bow.

He nocked an arrow, eyes locked on the serpent's massive form. Still, dazed, half-buried in rubble. It had been knocked out cold from the impact. He didn't need a full-power shot this time. He was close. The monster wasn't moving. And more importantly, he had a clear line to the damaged eye, the one he'd been carving open with his kukris just moments ago.

Perfect target.

He activated Force Infusion. Stamina surged into the arrowhead like a crashing tide, flooding it with power. His hands stayed steady. All around, the wreckage shifted. The serpent stirred. Its eye twitched.

Too late.

The monster sensed danger and tried to move. It struggled, but the debris kept it pinned. That moment of panic in its gaze was all Luke needed to see.

"No acid left?" the Beast Lord hissed, voice laced with desperation.

"I timed it," Luke snapped back. "I know how long it takes you to generate more. If it was unlimited, you'd never stop using it."

The arrow began to glow white-hot.

"Even the weakest rat," he added, "can turn deadly when cornered."

He let the arrow fly. The Beast Lord lunged. Time broke. The serpent's jaws opened wide. The arrow blurred through the air, then vanished, swallowed whole in one desperate snap. Agony hit the creature like a bomb. But Luke didn't dodge in time.

The serpent's second fang pierced through him. Pain carved through his body like a blade. He staggered back, eyes wide. Blood poured from his shoulder. He screamed. His arm was gone. Gone. Ripped clean off.

The Beast Lord had taken it, like payment for its shattered fang.

Luke collapsed, blood soaking into the earth, vision going dark around the edges. One arm left. No bow. Stamina nearly gone. The monster was free now, blazing with hate and fury.

And in that moment, he knew. This was it.

He was going to die.

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