Chapter 28 – Tiger (1/2)

Gravis slowly walked closer, but the tiger didn't react. The tiger seemed to feel completely safe in its surroundings, like a king on his throne. Gravis slowly climbed up the hill, getting closer to the tiger. The tiger still didn't react. When Gravis was only ten meters away, it slowly opened its eyes, looked at Gravis, and just grumbled a little.

The whole nearby village could see the hill. Some kids had noticed that Gravis was walking to the tiger and called their parents. The parents called other adults, and soon, the whole village was watching Gravis getting closer to the tiger. The parents quickly protected the eyes of their children. They didn't want the kids to see a suicidal fool getting mauled.

The tiger had just eaten, so it was too lazy to stand up right now. A low grumble would surely scare that puny human away. The tiger closed its eyes again to sleep. Suddenly, the tiger heard that the footsteps became faster and heavier, and it quickly opened its eyes again. Sadly, it was too late. A saber stabbed into the tiger's left eye, completely destroying it.

The tiger roared, jumped up, and tried to hit Gravis with a swipe of one of its claws, but suddenly, the atmosphere changed. The tiger felt like it was fighting an incredibly powerful enemy, while before, the man felt like an average human. The sudden change in feeling made the tiger hesitate.

When Gravis had seen that the tiger would not care about him, even when he was so close to it already, he took the chance to attack. Gravis had not activated his Will-Aura until the tiger was injured. If he activated his Will-Aura earlier, the tiger would never allow such an easy attack to land.

The tiger continued roaring in pain, rage, confusion, and fear. It had never been in this situation before, and it didn't know how to handle it. Was it supposed to attack Gravis? The tiger wasn't sure. The feeling that Gravis gave it was an enormous cold pressure. Should it flee? Then it would have to go back to the wild, where there were stronger beasts than the tiger.

While the tiger continued thinking, Gravis had thought of a battle plan. The next attack would decide the whole direction of the fight. If Gravis attacked its front, the tiger would have two choices. It could bite or swipe with a claw. The tiger was faster than Gravis, so he had to decide his course of action before the tiger started reacting. In some sense, one could say that Gravis could only act based on prediction and not on his opponent's action.

If Gravis deiced to slide beneath the tiger and it swiped him, everything would be fine. The fight would take a similar direction to his previous battle with the lion. Yet, if the tiger decided to bite him, it would nearly kill him with a swipe if he slid beneath it. It was a 50/50 in that case. Gravis didn't like those chances and decided against sliding beneath his opponent.

Instead, he started running to the tiger's front. The tiger's instincts kicked in, and it bit towards Gravis. Luckily, Gravis hadn't decided to slide under the tiger. Instead, Gravis started jumping before he was in the tiger's bite range. The bite missed, and Gravis used all his strength to hit the upper side of its snout.

The saber hit the bone of the tiger's snout and broke it. The snout-bones of tigers were very fragile and thin, and a good hit could make them collapse easily. As the tiger jumped back in pain, the bone fragments cut its nose's insides, and a thick stream of blood started flowing out. It could not breathe through its nose anymore and took heavy breaths through its mouth instead.

The fear in the tiger's eyes increased, and slowly, panic began to build. Its rage diminished, and fear gradually replaced it.

Gravis took note of the subtle changes of the tiger and immediately attacked again. If the tiger decided to flee, it would be a hassle to hunt. This was not the cave of the practical test. Escaping was a real possibility that could happen. Everyone knew that winning was always easier than killing because of this.

Gravis saw the fear in the tiger's eyes and took a gamble. When he reached the tiger's front, he started sliding forwards on the floor. Just like he thought, the tiger was too scared of getting its head anywhere near Gravis, so it swiped with its claws. Gravis easily slid beneath the claws and arrived under the tiger. This time, he had an even better plan than when he fought the lion back then.