Forty
 
Kon watched patiently as the giant bird circled slowly. The clearing in the forest was several hundred meters wide and had a series of monstrous trees that rose up far above the native metallic fauna. They were lightning scarred but a monstrous sized nest sat perched in the middle of the boughs. Made of thick woven limbs that glinted in the sunlight, the half thousand metals reflected the thin light that penetrated the thick cloud cover.
The bird that wheeled slowly back and forth until it dove like a bolt of lightning, talons outstretched. Kon waited nervously for a minute before the bird soared back into the sky, some type of monster clutched in its yellow claws. It screeched in victory as it landed on the nest, the entire burnt tree swaying as the distant cry of pain from the monster as it called out in pain in its last seconds.
Kon stayed in the edge of the woods, watching for more signs of another monster. The rift entrance was visible at the base of the tree, a ten foot wide portal that glimmered with energy. Nothing else moved in the clearing, a death field if he’d ever heard of one. With the monster perched in its nest, it could easily survey the entirety of the field without moving.
“Really wish these rifles had longer range.” Laser rifles like this one didn’t have the strength to fire long distances. Not while remaining lethal anyways. They were good for zero vac or fighting in the interior of atmosphere controlled ships. The thick humidity of the planet would diffuse the energy and shorten the range. Or, at least, that’s what Alice had told him. He’d have to be a lot closer to kill it.
That the goblins had only carried the laser weapons was telling in itself. Alice had theorized they were primarily space based raiders or mercenaries. Fighting and capturing ships as they closed by too close to base of operations. If they had been hired to ambush them, it hadn’t been with the intention of chasing them planetside. They didn’t have the right weaponry for that.
It didn’t change their circumstance, but it was something for them to think about after. Once they were back and off world, it’d have to be something they chased down. Alice had spoken of it softly at night, a hunger in her eyes. Even Diur had seemed interested in those who had possibly financed the attack and been inadvertently the cause of her family's death.
“Alright. Time to get to it.” Kon spoke out loud to try to assuage his nerves. He thought that Alice was watching somewhere, but he couldn’t be sure. If he screwed this up, he was going to die. Based on the monster screaming in the nest, it wouldn’t be fast either.
He set down his pack and left everything on the ground except for his rifle. He tucked a couple spare energy packs into the interior of his leathers, they settled awkwardly around his hip.
“A belt would be nice. Should have taken one from the goblins,” Kon continued to talk to himself as he stared at the single bird. He had never seen a rift with only one monster before. Bones lay scattered about the ground, dozens of them, broken and cracked where the bird had split them for the marrow. There were small hills of the bones.
Kon froze right as he left the treeline, eyes stuck on the bone piles. Then he looked back up into the nest. His finger tapped at the trigger guard as he looked at those bones then the nest again.
“Too focused on what’s in front of me. It’s the damn squid thing all over again,” Kon muttered. He turned his gaze away from the single giant tree that rose up and over the field and to the much smaller trees scattered about the edge of the clearing.
In the shadows of the trees, amongst the roots, were more bones. There were scraps of flesh still attached to these bones, not pecked apart in the clean and mechanical way the ones by the great tree was. It took a minute or two of focusing on his breathing to draw enough energy in to strengthen his sensory rune. It wasn’t much, but it peeled away the cover of the shadows enough that he could see the smaller nests.
“Well, look at that,” Kon said. He turned and started to work his way around the side of the clearing. He kept only a single layer of trees between himself and the clearing as he walked through the perimeter. It took only a minute before he found the first nest in some of the lowest boughs of the tree. A bird squawked quietly as he got closer to it, a head peeping out to look at him.The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.
Kon stopped in his tracks to stare at the abomination looking at him. It had a scaled, triangular lizard head with a red frill down its neck. Feather appeared after its neck, neon bright with half dozen clashing garish colors that made him want to look away. It opened its chitinous beak and shrieked at him, dozens of small nummy teeth in its beak.
Kon shot it.
Its head exploded in a mist of red, body going limp and sliding out of the nest to thump into the soft ground. It was the size of a small dog, its purple and pink feathers floated about in the soft breeze, they were small, soft and downy. Kon looked at it for a minute before scaling the tree and looking into the nest. There was nothing of value in the nest, just raw, bloody, bits and pieces.
He looked back down on the dead bird lizard thing and decided he didn’t want to cut it open to harvest the core. Then he thought about what Alice would say if he didn’t harvest every core he earned. He grabbed the body and threw it to the edge of the wood, he could harvest when he was done.
For twenty minutes he walked around the edge of the woods killing the smaller monsters, all the while keeping an eye on the monster in the center of the field. It never stirred as he killed the monster’s offspring. Nearly a dozen of them were neatly piled up by the time he was done.
A fresh energy pack was slotted in and he tossed the nearly drained pack away on top of the dead birds. Now that that was done, he could see how to push forward towards the center of the field and toward the giant bird. It had finished crushing down on the monster, thick blood dripped through the cracks in the nest to dribble across the ground.
He took a few breaths, trying to calm his heart, and then started out into the field. Stepping into the field around the tree, he could feel the press of energy emanating from the rift. The grass here was thick and waxy, fighting him as he walked closer to the tree. Yellow reptilian eyes peeked over the edge of the nest and locked onto him as he cut across the ground. They slowly blinked, once, then twice, before giant wings snapped out.
They were similar to the smaller ones he had killed. A riot of colors that stood out against the murky sky of the world. It tilted its head back and screamed into the night, allowing Kon to see the matted blood around its beak and throat. The yellowish scales were slick with gore as it launched itself up and into the sky.
“This is so damn dumb.” Kon kept his rifle to his shoulder, tracking the F-Grade beast as it circled him. Its stretched out wings were several meters long and Kon though he could tell the difference in quality already. The little birds he had killed were low F-Grade, this monster was upper if not peak.
It sped up as it flew around and it became a struggle for Kon to keep up with its speed. It pinned its wings and dove like a bullet, Kon dove instantly, firing as he did so. The bolt of energy sliced through the air and feathers lit on fire as talons scooped up chunks of earth and grass. A wave of air washed over him as the wings flapped as it rose back in the air, squawking in rage as its tail feathers smoldered.
“Should have eaten some of the cores,” Kon said to himself as he got back to his feet. He fired again as it rose in the air and another burn appeared along one of its four legs. Kon blinked as he looked again at the four thick legs that pumped as it rose back into the sky.
“Thing is creepy.” Kon continued over towards the rift, jogging as he kept his eyes locked on the bird. It rose up high, well above even the highest tree, and circled over and over again. The smoldering feathers were extinguished by the speed of its ascent, smothered by the airflow.
It kept flying faster and faster as he got close to the center of the field and the foreign tree. It screeched and Kon stumbled as he grabbed at his ears. The piercing screech was powerful, rippling through the energy around the world and assaulted him in multiple ways. The energy in his body roiled for a second before it settled.
He missed a step, his stride suddenly off. Vision went blurry as his node was cut off from power and his enhanced sight diminished to its regular, mortal, limits. His instincts screamed and he threw himself to the ground and rolled fast as talons scraped at the ground again. Heat baked him, the bird so close he could reach up to touch it.
Firing without looking, the bird screeched in anger as it flapped its wings. It stuttered, wings failing as it slammed into the trees close by. Wood snapped with the screech of bending metal.
Feathers floated in the air as it thrashed across the trees, snapping and breaking them as its claws dug into the metallic bark. Kon charged it, firing with every step. Bolt after bolt hit, burning and cooking flesh as feathers ignited. It hopped and leapt, wings frantically beating at the air, but failing to rise.
Kon got within feet of it as his heart beat with thunderous rhythm. He took careful aim and fired again and the creature’s head exploded just like the others had. It went limp and collapsed, laying in the wreckage of the trees.
“That was exciting,” Kon said as he ejected the spent energy cartridge and replaced it. He was going to have to harvest the birds. He didn’t want to enter the rift underpowered and he needed the convenient energy of the cores.