Beast Soul

"You think they'll be alright?" Alphonso, who was sitting next to the injured Clarice and was tending to her wounds, asked Harold, who was keeping a lookout for any vehicles that were passing by and could offer them some help. 

"What? Gerald and Max?" Harold asked without even turning around. "I don't know."

"Aren't you supposed to say that they'll be fine?" Alphonso asked with a frown on his face.

"I don't know that now, do I?" Harold's face was still turned away from him. "And besides, we don't even know that the plan would even work properly.."

Right then!

A bright light could be seen coming from the corner of the hillside, and Harold's face brightened as he waved his hands at the vehicle that was arriving.

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Grab!

With no resistance from the monster, which had now started to twitch uncontrollably, Noah grabbed hold of the monster's head from behind and tightly gripped it, before pulling it using all his strength.

"AHHHH!" He screamed loudly as he pulled the creature's head, and the flesh on its neck began to be torn apart, which caused dandelion flowers to fall out from within its esophagus along with the massive amount of blood, flesh and bones. As the creature's head was completely ripped out by Noah, the headless body of the monster began to twitch uncontrollably for a few more seconds before falling down with a loud noise, and Noah dropped the head onto the ground, while letting out a heavy sigh.

"I can't believe that worked," Gerald said with an astonished expression on his face, and Max nodded his head, replying, "Me neither.."

"F*ck!" Noah screamed loudly as he leaned back and fell down onto the ground, and the other two boys turned to look at him and asked, "Are you alright? Do you need any help?"

Noah tilted his head up to look at the two boys, and then shook his head as he gave a thumbs up. "No, it's alright. I'm totally fine." He replied with an exhausted smile on his face. "I'm jus- I'm just a bit tired…"

The two boys nodded their heads in understanding. Gerald then turned to look at Max, who was panting like crazy and asked, "What about you?" He said with his eyebrows raised. "Are you alright after what you just did?"

Max shook his head as he let out a short chuckle. "Ha ha.. Yeah, no." He said with a smile. "No, I'm not alright. I feel like all my energy has been completely sucked dry. I feel like I'm going to puke any second now."

Gerald's concerns grew, but the beaming smile on Max's face was making him confused. "But you know what?" Max said as he raised his hands and looked at it with pride and joy in his eyes. "I'm also kinda happy." He turned around to look at Gerald, whose face was implying that he was puzzled by Max's words. "I'm happy that I was able to do something about the situation with the creature." He decided to clarify his words in order to make Gerald understand what he was saying.

"Ah, I see.." Gerald's eyes widened with surprise before he nodded his head in agreement. He responded, "You felt like you had control of your situation.."

"You're damn right I had control!" Max said loudly, which made Gerald let out a nervous laugh. He didn't remember Max ever being this excited about something. This was strange. 

"But still," Gerald said as he stared at the monster's head that had been ripped off from its torso, and let out a long and heavy sigh. "To think that your idea actually worked…" He paused for a second and took a glance at Max, who was breathing in and out, and continued. "Since when did you figure out what your powers were?" Gerald was curious, as he has yet to have any sort of awakening processes. 

"It just, it just happened.." Max said, while still having trouble breathing properly. He stopped and pressed his hand on his chest, in an attempt to keep his composure. But he was already too excited. 

He had absolutely no idea whether his plan would work, and was terrified of his situation right up until he made his first move. And now, after what he just went through, Max felt as though this was a much more exhilarating experience than what he had imagined. The adrenaline fueled Max was addicted to what he was feeling right now. He felt as though he was on top of the world!

"Hah.." Noah, who let out another round of long and heavy sighs, then turned to look at the headless body of the batlike monster with intrigue in his completely blackened eyes. 

Tap! Tap!

He then got up from the ground and walked towards the body of the monster, kneeling down right in front of it, as he placed his hand on the creature's cold chest, his eyebrows raised as he did so.

"And I can't believe I still haven't even figured out what your powers really are…" Gerald shook his head as he said with a chuckle. Max chuckled along with him and responded, "What, you still haven't understood after you literally watched me implement it? How is that even possible?" His chuckle soon evolved into a loud laughter as time went on, and Gerald decided to join in as well, and the two boys laughed loudly.

"Is your superpower something related to flowers?" The voice of Noah interrupted their laughter, and the two turned their heads in unison and saw Noah walking towards them, his hands covered in something sticky. He then raised his palm upwards and pointed it towards the two boys, opening it for them to see a dandelion flower in his hand.

But the boys were more interested in figuring out how Noah even appeared behind them without making any noise. They were both pretty certain that they wouldn't have known of his presence had he not said a single word, which was simply terrifying. 

"Uh, not exactly?" Max decided to respond to Noah's question. "My power is related to manipulating the lifetime of anything that's plant related." He clarified. Max then pointed his finger at the dandelion flower in Noah's hand, and all of a sudden, the flower flew up from his palm and began floating up into the air.

"It's floating…" Gerald whispered under his breath. Noah shook his head and replied, "Not exactly." He then pointed at the dandelion flower and continued, "The flower seems to be maturing.." He then turned his gaze towards Max, who was sweating once again, for confirmation, and he nodded his head in agreement.

"That's right!" Max said as he let out a loud breath of air, and the dandelion fell down onto the ground. He then wiped the sweat that had accumulated on top of his forehead and continued, "I don't have any more energy left to demonstrate my move, so I'll just explain." He said with a weak smile. "The dandelion flower on your hand was already destined to fly in the air, because that's how the seeds of the dandelion plant are transported. Through air." He pointed at the sky.

"So you manipulated time itself?" Noah asked with confusion evident in his eyes, and Max shook his head. "Not really, no. I merely manipulated the path and the speed it takes for the flower to get to its eventual position in the air. If I had used my powers even more, then perhaps you could've seen the seed begin to germinate, although I don't think I would've had the energy to pull it off a second time."

"Is that what you did to the monster?" Noah asked as he pointed in the direction where the body of the headless monster lay, and Gerald turned his gaze towards Max, his eyes widened. "That's right," Max nodded his head. "I manipulated the path of the dandelion flowers, and some of them had entered into the monster's open mouth. From there, I tried to control and manipulate the seeds that were inside of the creature's body and tried to germinate and grow them from within its organs."

"So you killed the creature from the inside.." Gerald mumbled under his breath as he rubbed his chin. "Incredible…"

"Incredible indeed…" Noah nodded his head, and Max let out a nervous laughter and waved his hands dismissively. "Well, it's really not that incredible. It's incredibly time consuming, and it drains my energy with just one try, so I'd only have one shot to try this. And plus, I can only utilize such a technique if there are plants which have seeds that use air as transport and are small enough to enter into the openings of monsters."

"Don't be humble, Max.." Gerald patted him on the shoulder as he spoke. He had a proud expression on his face. "The fact of the matter is that you've saved us. And that's something that you have to be proud about. You can never undersell something like that."

All of a sudden, Noah's eyes widened, and his gaze shifted to the side of the road, where a group of cars could be seen coming straight towards them.