A Dangerous Battle of Wits

"Hah... huff... hah..." After running for who knew how long, Wien finally collapsed behind a massive rock, utterly exhausted and gasping for breath. He couldn't run another step.

"Huff... huff... I didn't expect this. I've only been here a short time, and I'm already this badly hurt. Good thing that big guy was stupid, or I might really have died there."

Wien worked to steady his breathing, hoping his strength would return quickly. After running so far, he had long since lost his bearings and no longer knew where he was.

I need to find somewhere to recover from my injuries, and fast, Wien thought.

Though badly injured, Wien didn't immediately begin to recover in earnest. First, he had to drag his exhausted, battered body somewhere he could hide.

He had come to a new region without any help, and without shelter, given his current condition, even a Hollow only slightly stronger than him might easily kill him.

Once his breathing had steadied, Wien forced himself to push past his injuries and set off again, looking for shelter. Though he was searching for a place to settle down, he had to tread carefully along the way. After all, no one knew what might be hiding behind the next hill.

After walking for nearly an hour, Wien finally found a hollow sheltered from the wind. He surveyed the surroundings.

Only after confirming that there were no other Hollows around did Wien use his relatively uninjured left hand to dig into a patch of sand sheltered from the wind, little by little. He looked around once more, and after making sure there was no danger, he gently lay down in the pit and buried himself in sand.

Fortunately, the sand in Hueco Mundo was also made of Reishi, so he didn't have to worry about breathing. He had heard that the sands of Hueco Mundo were formed from dead Hollows, though he didn't know whether that was true.

"My body is far too badly injured. I wonder how much it'll recover once I enter dormancy." As Wien lay in the sand, the weariness he had been holding back finally overwhelmed him.

Although every Hollow had the ability to regenerate, that was all it was: regeneration. There was no guarantee of its speed. After all, only a small portion of high-level Hollows could master rapid regeneration or High-Speed Regeneration.

A weak creature of Wien's current level could only rely on his meager spiritual power to slowly heal his body. Frowning slightly, Wien stopped thinking about it and immediately fell asleep. Once asleep, he had no idea how much time passed.

"...Roar!!"

It seemed he had slept for a long time, yet it also seemed he had only just fallen asleep. In any case, while Wien was still sleeping, a thunderous roar blasted him awake.

His eyes snapped open, and Wien leaped out of the sand, immediately pinpointing the source of the roar. Ahead and to his left, a water buffalo-shaped Beast Hollow nearly two meters tall faced him, pawing at the ground.

Wien didn't panic in the slightest at the enemy before him. He simply assessed the situation calmly. It was a beast-shaped Hollow with the appearance of a water buffalo. Two long, sharp bone horns pointed fiercely at him, and its muscular body stood considerably taller than his.

Judging by how angry it looked, it had probably smelled him or sensed the spiritual pressure he had released while dormant. From the strength of its spiritual pressure, it was probably a high-rank ordinary Hollow.

Given the situation, the water buffalo Hollow had probably noticed that Wien's spiritual pressure was weaker than its own and had come to devour him. Or perhaps Wien had simply occupied its territory while it was out foraging.

Wien quickly jumped to the right, landing on relatively stable ground. As he put distance between himself and the water buffalo Hollow, he also quickly checked his injuries.

The bones throughout his right arm had mostly recovered. The five bone blades, however, had yet to grow back completely. Only short stubs had grown from his ring and little fingers, while the shattered thumb blade had recovered. The blades on his index and middle fingers were still intact. All in all, Wien's right arm had regained most of its fighting strength.

He believed he must have been dormant for a long time. Though he hadn't recovered to his peak, he should have enough strength to deal with the stupid buffalo in front of him.

"Want to eat me? Heh, I'm afraid you don't have what it takes!" Lowering his center of gravity, Wien began to focus.

Judging by its spiritual pressure, the water buffalo Hollow was considerably stronger than him in that regard. Its speed and strength probably wouldn't be lacking either.

But Wien believed that this mindless beast, which acted only on instinct and desire, wouldn't pose much of a threat to him. Without an overwhelming difference in power, a gap in intelligence could often bridge the limits of speed and strength and bring down enemies several times stronger than you.

"Moo!!!"

With a roar full of rage, the water buffalo-shaped Beast Hollow charged straight at Wien. It was extremely fast, far faster than the maddened bulls in a bullring.

Of course, that speed couldn't escape Wien's eyes. After all, Wien wasn't an ordinary bullfighter, but a humanoid Hollow with intelligence.

Wien sidestepped to the right, dodging the water buffalo Hollow's charge. He turned and dropped to one knee at its side, carefully watching its every move.

Its first attack having failed, the water buffalo Hollow turned and charged straight at Wien again. The result was the same: Wien deftly dodged its attack once more, and the water buffalo Hollow roared in fury and humiliation.

It charged at him a third time, but this time it was running noticeably slower than on its first two attempts.

Tired? The thought crossed Wien's mind, but he quickly dismissed it. Even if its larger body consumed more stamina and spiritual power when it ran, this was only the third round. It definitely couldn't be running low on spiritual pressure. It was clearly a trick!

Calming himself and concentrating, Wien watched the water buffalo Hollow's movements closely. The instant it was about to crash into him, he slipped aside and dodged its attack again. Then he quickly steadied himself and, without even thinking, pushed off with both legs and darted away once more.

Wien's sense of danger had been right. This time, the water buffalo Hollow didn't charge stupidly onward. After missing Wien, it steadied its footing, raised its front hooves, and stomped down where Wien had thrown himself. But Wien's second, preemptive dodge had successfully carried him clear, and it raised its head and roared at the sky in anger.

An opening! Seizing the moment of its anger, Wien pushed hard off the ground and rushed forward, clenching his left hand and punching it viciously in the head.

Bang!

A dull thud of colliding bone rang out, mixed with the sound of cracking.

After the strike, Wien swiftly retreated. By the time he regained his footing, he had put a considerable distance between himself and the water buffalo-shaped Hollow.

Pain traveled along Wien's nerves to his brain. His left hand was numb from that punch. He raised it for a look and saw that the keratin layer over his knuckles was badly shattered. By contrast, the keratin layer on the water buffalo Hollow's head had suffered only a shallow crack.

"I was careless!" Wien couldn't help frowning as he spoke. "I forgot it's a Hollow, not a water buffalo. Its skull is much harder than an ordinary water buffalo's."

"Roar!!!!" The injury to its mask had a tremendous effect on the water buffalo Beast Hollow. Of course, so far, the greatest effect was on its mood.

Rage filled its mind, making it charge at Wien with no regard for anything else. The fight returned to the way it had begun.

"Moo..." With an angry bellow, the water buffalo Beast Hollow stopped and pawed at the ground with its front hooves. Its heavy breaths sent the sand beneath it flying.

"Finally angry." A cold smile appeared at the corner of Wien's mouth. He stood up, extended his left hand, and curled his fingers at it in provocation.

"Moo!!!!" Feeling Wien's provocation, the Beast Hollow finally lost the last of its reason and charged like a mad thing, faster than it had in any of its previous rushes.

Seeing that the water buffalo Beast Hollow had lost its reason, Wien immediately readied himself for battle. The moment the water buffalo Hollow reached him, Wien flashed to the left, poured all his spiritual power into his right claw, and slashed at the water buffalo Beast Hollow's side. Aided by the speed of its own charge and the sharpness of his claw, the blades easily cut through its skin and pierced straight into its body.

Two enormous wounds opened up, spraying scarlet blood in an instant. The outcome was decided at once!

Victorious in a single strike, Wien turned and slowly walked toward the water buffalo Beast Hollow, which lay on the ground at death's door. The buffalo let out a few whimpers, as though begging for mercy.

But there was no such thing as mercy in the world of Hollows. There were only the rights granted to those above: as long as you possessed enough power, you could decide whether those beneath you lived or died. And now, Wien's decision was to grant it death.

Raising his right claw, Wien slit its throat. Blood spurted out, and the water buffalo Beast Hollow lost its right to breathe. Before its Reishi scattered, Wien quickly tore off its mask, bit it to pieces, and devoured it. Then he set off and left the area. He found a somewhat weathered rock face, tore an opening in it with his claws, and dug a hole large enough to slip his body inside. Only then did he slowly breathe out and begin digesting the spoils of his victory.

A few days? Or a few hours? No one knew. In any case, when Wien woke, everything around him was still quiet.

Crawling out of the cave, Wien first released his spiritual pressure to probe the surrounding presences. He felt no fluctuations of spiritual pressure whatsoever, which meant the area nearby was relatively safe.

Having digested the water buffalo Beast Hollow's mask, Wien's body had returned to its former condition and was even stronger than before. That made sense, since the spiritual power in Wien's body had increased by nearly double.

Aside from what had been consumed restoring him, the rest of the power had replenished his body. With his spiritual power greatly increased, Wien believed he had leaped from a mid-rank ordinary Hollow into the ranks of high-rank ordinary Hollows.

First of all, he was much larger than before. Then there was his right claw: a layer of bone spurs had grown over its joints. The bone blades had also become sharper, and the bony layer had extended from his forearm to his upper arm. He believed it wouldn't be long before it continued spreading over his whole body.

After examining himself, Wien prepared to continue his hunting journey.

He roughly got his bearings. Aside from the path he had just taken, he could go whichever way he liked within the roughly 180 degrees in the opposite direction. After all, that was unexplored territory.

Wien climbed a relatively high rock face and looked into the distance. At the edge of his vision, he spotted a patch of white that looked like a thicket. He believed that if he went closer, he would find a forest of whitened trees.

"Low-level rations can hardly meet my needs anymore. It's time to go deeper into the forest. There must be plenty of bigger prey and enemies waiting for me to challenge them." Having made up his mind, Wien leaped down from the rock face and ran toward the distant forest.