The entire swamp surrounded us in a deathly silence, the very environment stood still. The bloody raven gazing down with a look of interest, seemingly mocking me for putting myself in this situation.

  The vitreous eyes of the creature scanned the surroundings, seeing the butchered corpses of its kin, I could hear its veins popping, and the anger boiling inside of it. Despite these creatures looking dumb and cadaverous even, the thing they always displayed with uttermost fervour was their kinship. Whenever I killed one of them, the rest would fly into an enraged state.

  And now...

  Now I was about to experience the epitome of that feeling. I wasn't the only one with the rights to anger fits around here after all...

  A roar—even more vicious than the screaches I made—bellowed out of the enraged creature. The surroundings shook, the air darkened slightly and my future looked all the more bleak.

  I keep making these fucking mistakes, I keep fucking thinking I'm the best of the best, when I ain't shit. I had to literally rot down to my bones to stand against the little ones. And yet I'm just standing here in front of this hulking bastard after I killed his possible lovers/children/friends? What am I? Dumb?

  Yeah... I'm probably the dumbest of them all...

  Sigh...

  I made my bed, now I gotta lie in it.

  Thing is, I have these insticts on how to move, how to behave in a fight. Well at least that's what it seems, because had it been a few days prior I would just be lying there on the ground torn to pieces by the little guys. There's also that 'pride?' I felt lying there, beneath the surface, just waiting to come out, and right after I had said that I would keep it in check, I get pissy and it pops right back out. This is getting ridiculous. Though I see I need to keep the momentum, can't afford to get thrashed around. But I absolutely expect I'll get my ass handed to me, on a silver—nay, on a fucking golden platter. Looking more closely to the creature, the veins I was hearing before are getting visible, making those massive muscles look more terrifying. To think in a few seconds those will be aimed at me... a bleak future indeed. Its face is all scrunched up aswell, looks funny as shit, like its an ugly fish about to sneeze.

  That little thought made me crack a shit-eating grin, though not at my behest.

  Once the creature saw my expression it got even more pissed off—yeah you guessed it... it misunderstood me. Even if what I was truly thinking might have made him more pissed off, but he'll never know! So shush! Let me have this moment of self-pity.

  An explosion of mud and every foul thing that lies in this godsforsaken swamp announced the nearing of the creature. It approached me in the blink of an eye, the back of its hand hitting my side with a brutal amount of strength, one far surpassing the previous blow it directed at me. Meaning the prick was playing with me before... figures... That should teach my cocky ass not to go strutting about like I'm made of gold. The only thing I'm made of is rotten flesh and kind of pearly white bones.

  Yeah my bones are kind of good looking aren't they? All whitey and stuff... even when they contort strangely after a brutal blow from whatever is this animal—if it's an animal at all.

  I flew far away. And when I say far, I mean FAR—like in 'far, far away' kind of thing. I bounced, I tumbled, and all other comical ways of describing me being tossed on the surface of the swamp like an ordinary pebble.

  "Fucking hell big guy!" I said coughing out a lot of really nasty stuff that found their way down my gullet, once again blessing my inability to taste anything, I mean tasting ash was preferable to taste whatever was in my mouth at the moment. "I get you're pissed off and all of that but bloody hell! How much force did you put in that blow of yours? And why aren't I minced meat and bone powder?"

  The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

  Sunken into what I guess was my own 'special' mind and what may be a concussion, I stumbled and fumbled a bit, not really processing the next strike that came crashing down. Or in this case—came crashing UP. A real genius uppercut if I have ever seen one! Brilliant really. Had it not been for the fact that I was the one receiving it...

  My skull shook, and I swear I can feel my brain smashing against my cranium, turning into what I can imagine is an awkward looking grey-pinkish soup. Guess I don't even need my brain to think anymore, why not? Should I rip my eyeballs out? See if I can still have a sense of sight after that? No. Bad idea. Really bad idea...

  As I was flying towards the sky above, on the cusp of taking my rightful place amongst the dull clouds, my ankle was grasped by the big guy, who quite ruthfully slamed me on the ground, no sense of decorum for fucks sake...

  Not that I'm any better, as I had used his friends as an improvised club earlier.

  Slam after slam, more of my own flesh detached of my body, creating a Kael-sized print on the ground. It looked morbid and foul, the flesh and skin looked like an ugly snake had just shed in there.

  "You're quite spiteful aren't you?" I said in between the bastard slamming me on the ground. Noticing I was still speaking and seemingly not in that bad a shape, the creature stopped pounding me on the ground, as if I was a fucking dough of bread, and looked at me curiously. "Yeah that's quite enough don't you think? You should be feeling all nice and fluffy you prick."

  As I finished my words, I lunged for the forearm that was holding me, I used my hands, that almost had no flesh on them at this point, to claw at his flesh. The iron-like muscles tore under the sharp tips of my phalanges.

  The result?

  A harrowing blood-curling scream, and me falling like a ragdoll on the ground. Not feeling really safe under the creatures feet, i rolled away shamefully on the ground.

  I tried to get up, but as my eyes gazed to my 'hands', I saw a shadow tower over me. i put every ounce of strength I had in my arms and pushed the ground with all my might, I flew backwards a bit, falling on my butt. The ground I was in previously, was graced with the not-so-soft fists of the big guy. His arm sunk into the soil up to his elbow.

  If I still could sweat, I would be sweating buckets right now.

  I got up as quickly as I could, never letting my gaze stray from the hulking bastard. It struggled for a while, after which he took his arm of the ground and charged at me like a raging bull. His clawed hand making a sweeping motion, my answer to that was me hunching downwards and throwing a punch to its ribs, which to my surprise had little to no effect.

  "Well damn..." Musing at my own failures I stepped back, avoiding yet another furious blow. "And how am I supposed to take you down big guy?"

  It ignored my heartfelt request and just swinged at me violently, causing a little moistness to hit my face now and again. Taking a bit of distance I wiped my face to at least know what was spiling in my face.

  'Please let it not be feces, please let it not be feces!'

  I wiped my face and looked at the slimy though not fecal liquid that graced my humble face, then it dawned on me, and I looked at the bastards forearm, then I looked at my bony hands. A wicked grin flew on my face. The creature saw it and got pissed off again, though this time it misunderstood nothing.

  "Where there is a will, there is a way! Is that not how it goes big guy?"

  The thing didn't even wait for me to finish my ingenious wordplay and snarky humour before it lunged at me. Tough crowd I must say. I dodged the strike, as I clawed at its torso, leaving a nasty gash. It wasn't that deep of a cut by any means, but a couple more of these and the bleeding will be a serious problem—at least I hope so...

  Seeing the cut on his flesh, it dropped onto all fours, muscles contorting beneath the skin with raw power. And what are you going to do now? I'm really not too fond of surprises you know?

  The ground rumbled and it shot out of the ground like an arrow out of a crossbow, its shadow making the sky go pitch-black.

  The view of a moving mountain of muscles falling down on you is not too pretty of a scene, that I can assure you, stuff of nightmares really. As the shadow grew closer, all my instincts screamed of danger, and I just jumped desperately out of the way. Escaping by a hair's breadth, I quickly got to my feet and started to turn around, opening my arms wide to create momentum. If anyone looked at me they would probably say I was dancing or spasming, probably the latter though. I got another opportunity to leave a cut on the thing, and I'll be damned if I don't take it. Once out of my strange movements what graced my view was the monsters back. To which I happily leaved a few proofs of my admiration. In the form of new fresh cuts of course. Those just look nice on him, they suit him if I do say so myself. i swear by my innocent heart that I'm just trying to improve his (my) day.

  The creature turned back, with fury in its eyes, after all no one likes an annoying bug pestering them ceaselessly.