The beast had the head of a mountain lion and on the middle of his head a horn and three red crystals surrounding it but was as big as a mammoth, it had wings and scales and its tail was that of a scorpion. To Ezra, it looked like an animal sewn together out of different parts.
Deimos and Phobos gasped at the same time.
"It"s a Chimeraan, but normally creatures here are affected by night beast rage, this one does not seem to be else it would have attacked us already, "Phobos whispered.
"Chimeraan? What"s that?" Ezra asked, he did not know the word used.
"A chimeraan is a felbeast that has different animal parts, It looks like it is a Precantae too. Everyone stay alert we can"t outrun this one," Deimos said and lowered his voice.
"What is a Precantae?" whispered a bewildered Ezra.
"Precantaes are beasts that have magic crystals, they can use magic,"
Ezra thought, "hmm, well that is possible, if living humans here can use magic why shouldn"t beasts? But what is the mechanism for them casting a spell? I partially understand visualization but beasts can"t do that. Also, that thing just looks weird, like a duckbilled platypus of sorts, interesting. What does its insides look like?"
Everyone was cautious and let their horse back away slightly. They seem to have entered the Chimeraans territory, thankfully it did not attack yet. It was observing them carefully.
Ezra was now unbound and he shifted his seat. "What should we do? It"s blocking our path, we can"t advance."
"I don"t know how powerful that creature is, it"s dangerous, let"s probe and test it, I still have some dried bear meat maybe it"ll back away if we bait it."
Deimos then proceeded to get the bear meat out of the satchel on his horse, he tossed the meat 7 yards away from the creature. It did not even cast a glimpse at it and was just staring at them.
"It doesn"t look aggressive, maybe if we slowly pa.s.s by we won"t be attacked?" Deimos said.
But as soon as he showed his back the beast began to charge.
"Watch out," Phobos was the one who reacted first.
Due to the warning, Phobos quickly dodged the charge. "Ezra was shocked, this thing can go 0 to 25 km/h in just a second, that"s crazy! How fast is this thing? It doesn"t even move according to its body ma.s.s, magic must have a hand here."
The beast was calm again and stared at the knights.
"Ready your weapons," Deimos commanded.
"Evan, lead lord Ezra back we"ll handle the beast," Rycharde declared.
"No, I can help you with this thing, besides it"s safer if we travel together,"
Rycharde did not reply, he just looked at the Chimeraan in antic.i.p.ation of what it was going to do next.
"Oswyn, I need you to do something," Ezra asked the knight furthest away from the creature.
"What is it, Lord Ezra?"
"Try to turn around and move in that direction,"
"Huh? Okay then sire," Oswyn obeyed the order, as he did the Chimera charged toward him.
"Face the beast again. Quickly!" Ezra shouted.
As soon as Oswyn faced the lion-like creature it stopped its charge.
"This creature seems to attack if we are not facing it, Let"s try to go around it while facing it," Ezra suggested.
The Knights pulled their horses and kept facing the creature.
"Okay slowly now, back away, back away," Deimos whispered, he tried not to blink lest he miss the creature"s movements and fall into a dangerous situation.
"Slowly slowly," Deimos continued.
They were now out of the path to Anticourt but as they back slowly the beast became violent and roared as it charged toward the knights.
"This is bad, we have to fight it," Deimos was shouting now, the thing was stirred it was of no use whispering.
"Who"s the fastest among the knights?" Ezra asked Evan. He was trying to make a plan on how to deal with the monster.
Deimos overheard the question.
"Demon Hunters are the swiftest knights in the land, what do you propose we do Lord Ezra?" asked Deimos as they fled.
"It is going to be risky, you have to be bait."
Deimos opened his eyes wide with shock, but now he was willing to follow Ezra"s command as he was impressed with how he dealt with the encirclement of the felbeasts. He nodded.
Deimos now dismounted and shot a javelin at the Chimeraan. It was not hit it was too swift. However, now it was enraged, it followed Deimos roaring and growling.
"Wow, impressive, 80km/h," Ezra was impressed at Deimos" foot speed. Then he tried to fully observe the behaviour, speed and strength of the animal.
"The, Chimeraan is a bit faster though, 82-83km/h?"
"Just keep making it busy, "Ezra shouted.
"Wow, that is some power,"
The chimeraan struck a tree with its claw, although it did not bring it down it struck a fourth of the width of its trunk.
The chimeraan became more agitated as it could not seem to catch Deimos.
The other knights stood by and awaited the orders of their lord.
"Evan, javelin! 20 degrees and aim in that direction, Evered, hack that tree but only three fourths like this. But after that wait for my signal and hack it with all your strength so it would be chopped thoroughly" Ezra gestured to the knights, as his plan slowly formed.
"Why isn"t it using its magic though, hmm," Ezra was warry as he was told that the creature could use magic.
Evan threw the javelin it slightly pierced its hide but its scales prevented the javelin going deeper, the wound that it created was only 2 inches deep and the javelin even dislodged from the flesh of the Chimearaan, this surprised Ezra as Evan"s throw was six times more powerful than of normal javelin throwers.
Of course for Ezra, this was just a test. "hmm looks like we can"t even use melee combat here, except maybe if we aim at Its face it looks, so far it seems that the creature"s face contains soft tissue."
The chimeraan was furious now and it howled in pain when the spear connected. It charged toward Evan.
"Now hack it!" Ezra yelled.
Evered chopped the remaining part of the tree with his might it slowly fell and as it was about to hit it. The chimeraan roared and looked at the tree and opened its mouth to seemingly bite it, but it didn"t chomp down.
A fire flowed out of its mouth so intense that the tree was incinerated into cinders.