Chrysalis

When Tiny notices I'm running forward, about to overtake him, he speeds up!

Stop it you stupid ape! I'm trying to save your damn life!

Oblivious to my good intentions, Tiny is sprinting with all of his ape might, grinning from ear to ear and screeching out his simple minded lust for battle.

Bless you, you idiot.

Gritting my mandibles tight I exert every ounce of my strength into my legs, moving them so quickly they flicker in my eyesight. Is this the legendary shadow step technique?!

It's enough. Triumph surging in my heart I pass my ape companion at the last possible moment and break out of the tunnel and into the open pit.

Ha ha! Take that Tiny you slug!

Oh right, the bear.

Before I have a chance to throw the breaks on I smash into the bear, effectively head butting it rather close to the eye, quite hard due to my impressive momentum. The bear of course is extremely impressed by this action and attempts to repay me by levering its face out of the dirt and biting my head off.

Duck!

The massive jaws snap shut directly over my head. Thankfully I've learned from past experience and remembered to pull my antennae down when I ducked, I'm not losing my antennae this time!

Ok. Now I'm face to face with a truly terrifying and enormous bear monster. Now that I'm closer to it the scale of the monster is even more impressive. This thing is probably the same size as Tiny or the Titan-Croc, but is most likely even more massive. I suspect this thing weighs even more that Titan-Croc, it's carrying some serious heft.

Watch out! Paw!

Leaping back I manage to avoid a fearsome swipe of the beasts paw, the claws whistling past my face.

Thankfully the monster is considerably restrained in this pit, it's massive upper body and head occupy almost all of the available space, making it rather crowded in here now that Tiny and I have joined the fray.

It would be nice if I try and build up a mana ball to blast this thing but since Tiny has decided to engage in melee with it

In these narrow confines I can only make use of my finest ant-like qualities to make the best of this situation.

Scrabbling up the wall I make my way out of the reach of those fearsome teeth and begin to charge up my infused mandibles. Waves of mana flow from my core, streaming through my body and charging my mandibles with vibrant energy.

Hope you're ready for this, bear!

Crushing bite!

THUNK!

bristling eyebrows of Gandalf, that

hide, right on his flank, it feels like I'm digging into a tree trunk with a knife!

bear roars indignantly in response to my attempted wounding and struggles even more violently to free itself from the trap, finally pushing managing to push its paws under

dangerous. In order to keep the monster distracting I keep biting, hoping to eventually carve

the piercing chomp this time I bite again

THUNK!

the heck is this

hide feels as tough as nails. My mandibles, aided by the bonus penetrating power of the piercing bite are able to dig deeper than before, but I still don't feel

This guy is tank!

free itself, I can hear the chirping crackle of electricity. Clearly Tiny

noise and the entire body of the bear flashes with electrical light. The

I'll give him another

THUNK!

Dammit!

bite a little deeper that time but this bear is a tough nut to crack! I try to pull more mana from my core, drawing it out faster and faster before it packs into my mandibles, causing the light they give

to jump off the wall and clamber onto its back. Pushing off I latch onto the beasts fur with all six of my claws, holding fast even as I'm rocked back and forth. I can see from here that the hind legs of the bear are getting a decent hold of the ground

to deal some damage

more of my mana into my mandibles, causing them to be crackling with intense power, I swear my face feels like it's on fire. I don't think this

Tiny who continues to fling lightning punches into the

POW! POW! POW!

do you

…

its job, hardening and sticking to everything that it hit. I

and his hide is too thick for the acid

this bit doesn't work then I hope I can grab Tiny in my mandibles and drag him into the tunnel where the bear can't follow because me might be

forceful mana shout but I'm not sure I can

and

Piercing chomp!

CRUNCH!

mandibles gouge into the bear meeting the incredible resistance that had frustrated me so far, and then they keep going,

Finally!

Chomp has reached level