The Liger chewed, its movements slow and deliberate. It was relaxed, but its presence was a coiled wire—every breath Rhian took felt like pulling on it.
“Alex,” Rhian whispered, her voice thin. “We should leave.”
He looked at the two wounded boars stumbling away into the trees. The Liger didn’t follow them. It didn’t even look.
It was eating. It had claimed its prize.
Alex ran the calculation. The Arosaurer’s leg was compromised. Power reserves were good, but not optimal. The Liger was a predator, not a territorial brute like the Bull. It would fight with speed and intelligence. He had no data on its capabilities.
He couldn’t be sure he could beat it.
And Rhian was sitting right behind him.
He had dragged her into a boar hunt. That was a risk. This was a death sentence.
“Alright,” Alex said, his voice flat. “We’re leaving.”
He didn’t turn the Arosaurer toward the Liger. He turned it away, slowly, keeping the machine’s profile low. He nudged the throttle, moving at a cautious walk, not a run.
The Liger’s head lifted. Its eyes tracked them for a second. Then it lowered again, tearing another strip of flesh from the boar.
The tension didn’t break until they were twenty meters into the forest, the trees blocking the clearing from view. Alex increased the speed to a steady trot, the damaged leg protesting with a slight hitch in its stride.
Rhian’s breath finally steadied. “That was… smart.”
“It was the only move.”
“You wanted to fight it.”
“I wanted data. But not with you here.”
He guided the Arosaurer back toward the path they’d taken, the same direction the fleeing boars had gone. It was also the way back to his workshop. The irony was sharp—he lived in the same direction as the prey, down the same trail of fear.
The forest felt different now. Quiet, but not empty. It felt watched.
He kept the Arosaurer moving, his eyes on the radar, his hands steady on the controls. The only sound was the hum of the engines and the soft, uneven thump of the damaged leg hitting the ground.
Rhian didn’t speak. She just sat there, a small, warm presence in the cold metal cockpit, reminding him why he had to walk away.
The Arosaurer’s uneven gait settled into a steady rhythm. The silence stretched.
“You okay?” Alex asked, his voice low.
Rhian shifted behind him. “I’m fine. Just… I didn’t think my first time past the wall would be… like that.”
It hit him then. Of course. For people like Rhian, like most people, the city walls were a horizon. They lived and died within them. Travel was a luxury, a risk only Wardens or the rich could afford. She’d never seen a Titan outside of a distant silhouette or a processed component. Today, she’d felt its breath through the cockpit glass.
He’d brought her out here.
“You don’t… you don’t have to come out again,” he said, the words stiff. “If it was too much. That’s on me.”
“It wasn’t your fault, Alex. And no, I’m not traumatized. You were here.” Her tone was firm, a little exasperated. “I felt safe.”
A knot in his chest loosened. He nodded, a gesture she couldn’t see.
The cockpit radar chimed softly. A new contact flickered on the edge of the screen, ahead on their path back. Two heat signatures, moving fast and erratically. Human-sized ones scrambling.
He zoomed the external feed.
There, in a rocky gully, was Kaelen’s team. One of the Wardens was down, clutching a leg. The other two were trying to pull him back, firing sidearms wildly at the two Thorn-Tusk Boars that had broken from the tree line. The boars were wounded, bleeding from his earlier encounter, but that just made them angrier. Kaelen was shouting, his face a mask of panic as he tried to form a line, but his team was already broken.
It was almost funny. The Rank 7, all that bluster in the tavern, running from a pair of crippled prey.
“Are you going to help them?” Rhian asked, her voice quiet.
He watched for a moment longer. Letting Kaelen sweat it out held a certain appeal.
But Borin’s request was clear. Cull the boars. All of them.
“I’m finishing the job,” Alex said, his voice flat. “Not for them. For the request.”
He pushed the throttle forward. The Arosaurer surged ahead, its damaged leg be damned. It wasn’t a rescue. It was a cleanup.
The Arosaurer crashed into the gully, metal feet tearing up clods of earth. The two wounded boars, already crazed with pain, spun to face the new, larger threat.
Kaelen’s face went pale. He stumbled back, his eyes wide.
“What in the hells—!”
One of his Wardens screamed, pointing. “It’s the monster! The one Celestia talked about!”
“Run!”
They scrambled, abandoning their injured comrade in their panic. Alex watched them flee into the brush. Idiots.
He didn’t have time for them.
The first boar charged, its tusks lowered. Alex sidestepped, the Arosaurer’s movement a fraction slower than usual thanks to the leg damage. The tusk scraped along the cobalt-blue plating with a shriek of metal. Close.
He didn’t bother with the autocannons. At this range, in this terrain, they were overkill and a waste of ammo.
He pivoted, bringing the Arosaurer’s good leg around in a heavy, piston-driven kick. It connected with the boar’s ribs. Bone cracked. The creature squealed, collapsing sideways.
The second boar was smarter. It tried to flank, coming at him from the blind spot of his damaged leg. Alex saw it on the rear sensor feed. He twisted the upper torso, ignoring the strain warnings. The Zoid’s head snapped around, jaws opening.
\[ELECTRON BITE FANG\]
A concentrated arc of blue-white energy lanced out, striking the boar square in the shoulder. The smell of ozone and burnt hide filled the air. The creature spasmed and dropped, twitching.
Silence descended, broken only by the hum of the Arosaurer and the pained groans of the downed Warden.
Alex let out a slow breath. Two targets eliminated. Job complete.
Alex watched the Wardens vanish into the trees. Their panic was their problem. The downed one could limp back or not. It didn’t change his job.
“Stay in the cockpit,” he said to Rhian, his voice flat. “Don’t come out.”
He didn’t wait for her reply. The cockpit canopy hissed open, and the damp forest air rushed in, thick with the smell of blood and ozone. He dropped to the ground, the impact jarring up his legs.
His salvage knife was a heavy, single-edged tool of dark, pitted metal. It wasn’t pretty, but it cut. He went to the first boar, the one he’d kicked.
The work was methodical. He didn’t see the creature, just the components. Thick hide for armor plating. Reinforced bone struts for joint housings. The tusks, chipped but still usable, would make decent impact blades or drill bits. He worked fast, his hands steady, slicing and prying. The materials were good. Heavy-duty. Enough to finish the Lanstag’s chassis, maybe reinforce the Arosaurer’s leg.
He glanced toward the distant clearing where the Liger fed. The risk wasn’t worth the extra haul. Three more boars meant three more trips out of the cockpit, three more stretches of time exposed.
He hauled the bundled materials up into the Arosaurer’s storage rig, securing them with heavy straps. The leg joint complained as he climbed back into the pilot’s seat.
Rhian was silent, watching him.
He sealed the cockpit, his hands finding the controls. “We’re done here.”
The Arosaurer turned, its steps heavier now with the extra weight, and began the long walk home.
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