The Ascension of Zandralla's vessel.

7. WAY OF LIFE.

Pain seared through my head, my eyes blurred by blood, my nose engulfed in the scent of blood and my legs quickly traversing the rough terrain of the great Umzingili forest. A myriad of incoherent thoughts had clogged my mind. My heart beat furiously against my chest. I was quickly losing my breath. Stopping was not an option. My legs felt like caving in on themselves. Stopping meant death.

I could hear it. It was getting closer. The ground shook just from its running. In all my life, I had never seen something as terrifying as it! It was nothing like the monster champions that fell from the sky onto my village two years ago and when he...

Suddenly, I tripped on a Resmiria tree root. I fell to the ground with a loud thud. I panicked, staggered to get up and I continued to run but something was wrong. 

How am I still alive?

I noticed something. It had gone silent. I stopped in my tracks. I quickly surveyed my surroundings. My eyes wide open. An unseen predator was a victorious one. That was the rule this forest had so vividly taught me. I saw nothing. Only the wind could be heard and felt. A cold and foreboding wind. The vegetation swayed gracefully as if all was well. My body was now unwillingly shaking. Shaking violently. I opened my first limiter, my eyes shone a brilliant bright cyan. Immediately, my ears perked up. They had picked up something. It sounded like the earth was cracking.

Suddenly, the ground beneath me crumbled. It was right beneath me, its jaws ,adorned with two rows of large dagger-like teeth, opened wide ready to devour me. Quickly, I pushed my left leg against the crumbling earth and did an aerial backflip, just as it snapped its jaws to devour me. The earth around it continued to crumble, violently so, as it surfaced. It trained its four sunken crimson eyes on me. They emitted an ominous red glow. It's dark blue scaly skin shimmered against the light of the two twin moons. It stood imposing before me on its two massive three- toed legs, each with seemingly sharpened claws. It's two tails rose up with their sharpened ends displaying their silver lustre. It raised its head. With an earth shaking force, it roared! An almighty roar! A roar so loud it must've been heard by all villages in the Mount Baraka region. It produced a massive vortex of wind and earth material that  nearly blew me away, the trees bent to its force, some even collapsing. It dashed forward with such terrifying speed my mind didn't even manage to process it had moved. It was now over me and opened its jaws yet again as it dashed.

My body, froze. 

*** 

I sat in the shade of a Bresmine tree, its branches spreading out in every direction, its large leaves and cyan flowers expressing their beauty to the world whilst producing an entincing fragrance in the air. Its vines dropped down from way up high to where I sat, laden with beautiful large succulent fruits which emitted an appealing purple glow. They looked delicious but were poisonous enough to knock out even the biggest of beasts in this land, even the Panthericus.

I looked on at the savannah. It was surprisingly empty and desolate. Only some beasts were present, only few of which were interesting. Like the Googaloo; a small amber bird whose large wings had a brown edge. They had small 3 toed feet covered in a brown scales. They had a long neck and a small head on top of it with tiny black eyes at its side. Its beak was long and broad but all this was not what made her special.

I spotted a herd of Herbacia; long antlers whose ends glowed a faint green, its face, snout and body adorned with beautiful dark green swirl patterns contrasting with its pale green skin. Its tail looked like strands of green light as they flowed gracefully against the gentle wind. They were eating the tall grass unknowingly approaching a Googaloo's nest. The Googaloo present quickly took action. She pulled back her head, inhaled and out came out deafening GOOGALOO! The Herbacia, alarmed lifted their heads and saw a bird that wasn't even half their googaloo'ing at them. Then it happened. The Googaloo exhaled, her hot breath bellowing out of the two tiny nostrils on its nose. She put one of her legsback and suddenly, she dashed forward and she went from a bird to a flying projectile! She passed through the centre of the herd, missing them but a shockwave of wind quickly followed the small projectile, blowing the large Herbacia high up in the sky. They all came crushing down onto the ground making painful grunts as they did so. The Googaloo stood on one of them, and let out a triumphant  Googaloo.