Rian slowly watched the claw ascend straight towards his face, for an instant, all sounds vanished. Time slowed.
'Is this what they call your life flashing before your eyes?'
He could see the individual serrations on the Lycan's blackened nails and the way the air shimmered around the limb from the sheer force of the swing. The monster's eyes were wide with a predatory glee, as if it was boasting that it knew it had him.
'So this is it?' a cold, detached part of his mind whispered.
The thought triggered a spark of white-hot loathing that burned hotter than the pain in his knees. He refused to give up his freedom and his life so easily. Not after everything he had endured.
Suddenly, the frozen world of grey and violet was pierced by a light so pure it felt like a needle in his brain. Floating just inches from his retinas, a symbol manifested. It was a simple, elegant circle with three diagonal slashes through its center, glowing with a blinding, incandescent white light. It was twisting and moving as if it was waiting to be freed.
As the Lycan's claw moved another fraction of an inch toward his throat, Rian quickly reached out and his fingertips brushed against the symbol.
The white glow erupted. The light flooded into Rian's body, imprinting him with a white-hot pain like a brand.
The lock in his knees broke moments before he was impaled, and Rian jumped. Actually, it would be more apt to say he soared. His body flew nearly seven feet into the air, allowing him to land with a jarring thud on the Lycan's massive shoulder. Before the beast could process the weight, Rian scrambled onto its head, his boots digging into the coarse fur.
The Lycan let out a confused snarl and straightened up, reaching upward with its trunk-like arms to crush him. Using the monster's own momentum, Rian kicked off the Lycan's skull with a desperate, powered-up shove and lunged for the chains above.
His fingers burned as they locked around the cold, rusted iron.
The Lycan wasn't about to let its prey escape. With a howl of pure fury, it leaped after him, its powerful legs launching its massive bulk into the air. It caught a parallel set of chains, the heavy links groaning and snapping under its weight as it began to climb with terrifying speed.
Rian felt the white light in his veins pulsing in time with the swinging iron. His movements were no longer sluggish, they were much more precise, filling his body with strength unknown to him. He began to swing, his body carving a wide arc through the air.
The Lycan wasn't about to let its prey escape. With a howl of pure fury, it leaped after him, its powerful legs launching its massive bulk into the air. It caught a parallel set of chains, the heavy links groaning and snapping under its weight as it began to climb with terrifying speed.
What followed was a frantic, vertical dance of death.
Rian swung himself toward a thick support pillar, the white-hot brand on his skin flaring with every jolt of momentum. Behind him, the Lycan lunged, its claws raking across the iron links with a sound like grinding stones. The beast was faster than Rian expected, it didn't just climb, it lunged from chain to chain jumping like a demonic ape. One massive paw swiped out, catching Rian's boot and nearly ripping him from his perch.
Rian gritted his teeth, using the pain from the brand acting as a focal point for his concentration. He didn't climb further up, he circled.
Like a spider weaving a web of steel, Rian swung past the Lycan, pulling a heavy slack of chain with him and looping it around a support pillar. The Lycan hissed, snapping at his heels, its yellow eyes wide with confusion as it struggled to keep up with Rian's bizarre movements. Rian dived through the forest of iron, his new strength allowing him to propel himself with crazy agility, crisscrossing the beast's path again and again.
The conflict reached a fever pitch as the Lycan finally managed to corner Rian against a cluster of four heavy chains. It let out a triumphant roar, lunging forward with its weight fully committed.
Rian didn't move until the claws were inches from his face. He dropped, letting the chain slide through his hands.
As the Lycan's massive bulk sailed into the space Rian had just occupied, the trap snapped shut. The tangled mess of chains Rian had been weaving, the loops around the pillars and the slack he had carefully positioned, tightened all at once. The Lycan's own momentum acted as the catalyst.
With a sickening clank-clank-clank of tensioned iron, the chains constricted. The beast's arms were jerked backward, its torso slammed against a central pillar, and its legs were pulled into a jagged, metallic knot.
The Lycan thrashed, the rusted iron biting deep into its muscle and fur, but the more it struggled, the tighter the "web" became. It was left dangling 15 feet off the ground, a Blight-ranked predator reduced to a trapped animal, let out choked, gurgling roars that shook the stadium floor.
Rian dropped lightly to the ash-sand, his boots skidding through the grit as the white light behind his eyes began to flicker and fade. His body was a map of agony, but the whatever power was currently searing his veins kept him upright.
Fifteen feet above, the Lycan thrashed, a mess of silver fur and snapping jaws caught in a spiderweb of iron. The sound of the chains grinding against the pillar was like the screams of the damned. Every time the beast lunged to free itself, the knot Rian had woven tightened, the rusted links biting deeper into its throat and chest.
Rian didn't hesitate. He knew the creature's regeneration would eventually find a way to slip the trap if he gave it enough time.
He gripped the hilt of his sword with both hands. The white brand on his body flared one last time, sending a final, violent surge of kinetic energy into his arms. His arms started to vibrate with a high-pitched hum that harmonized with the ringing in Rian's ears.
He took a sharp breath, planted his lead foot, and put every ounce of his borrowed strength into a single, explosive throw.
"Die," he rasped.
The blade flew with deadly accuracy cutting through the air and scent of blood.
*Thwack*
The Gladius buried itself to the hilt directly between the Lycan's eyes. The impact was so great that the beast's head snapped back against the stone pillar with a sickening crunch. The thrashing stopped instantly.
The Lycan's massive body went limp, dangling in the chains like a puppet with its strings cut.
[Blight ranked doorborn killed]
Rian's knees finally buckled. He collapsed into the sand, his breath coming in ragged, broken gasps. The white glow receded, taking him back to his cold crushing pain, but as he looked up at the dead Lycan, a quiet sense of satisfaction crept in chest.