The Rise Of A Tribal Deadbeat - Chapter 65

Zok slowly opened his eyes, but rather than finding himself in the frosty cave, he was back in the wilderness.

“No… this isn’t wilderness,” He mumbled as he got up and looked around him, “This is my bed. Am I back in the tribe… how the heck am I here? Was that all a dream?”

“Oh look! The prince of wilderness is finally awake! Prepare for a festival!” Ahuli gave his brother a mischievous smile, “Good morning, sleeptard. Get up, we have to train.”

“Train?”

“This kid… You are now the chief hunter of the tribe. We have to train newbies, don’t you remember? The Shamanka chose you as her disciple as well. Father was so happy he ended up having a special spear made for you!” Ahuli Crossed his arms in front of his tattooed chest, “You had a ceremony last night, remember? You got your chieftain’s tattoo too. Well, future chieftain tattoo to be precise.”

The more Zok chatted with his brother, the more confused he got. What the heck was Ahuli spouting out of his mouth? Even if his life in the wilderness was a dream for Okun’s sake, there was no way in hell Skah would ever make him the next chieftain of the tribe. Not after hating him since forever.

“What’s up with that look, Zok? Did you hit your head or something last night?” Ahuli teased a very confused Zok, “The bed looks okay… I thought you had a wild night. Guess it was my ears ringing after all…”

“What happened last night?” Zok asked after getting out of bed.

“Are you for real right now? You really don’t remember- Wait for a second, I know exactly what will make you remember last night.”

Saying so, Ahuli rushed out of Zok’s room leaving him alone and confused. Zok slowly got back to his feet and saw something weird… his body… it was covered with black and red tattoos. Moreover, these red tattoos weren’t given to someone for ordinary achievements.

Even Skah only had one red tattoo and that was given to him as a remembrance for his aid to the tribe in the crisis. And yet, the tattoos on Zok’s body were predominantly red.

Just what did he do to deserve these many red tattoos? Why the heck was he even in the tribe and why did the Shamanka choose him? She was supposed to be the one to try and kill him back in the Arachnid cave… nothing was making any sense to him.

A moment later Zok heard someone coming towards him. He turned around and saw a sight that he would never ever forget… Sera was standing at the doorway to his room. But more importantly, she had a metal necklace around her neck which was the symbol that the woman was already taken by a man.

However, the necklace wasn’t the only thing that left Zok surprised. it was how she looked as well. She had grown at least 5-6 years from the last time he had seen her and she had only gotten prettier.

Just looking at her made Zok’s heart skip a beat. She slowly walked towards him, but suddenly everything around Zok changed. Sera, Ahuli, his room, everything turned black.

“No… NO!”

Zok rushed ahead with his arms extended forward, only to be greeted by a horrifying sight instead. He found himself standing in the wilderness, however, everything around him was on fire, with numerous corpses of beasts and Occunians spread as far as he could see.

In the middle of it all, a lone person was standing. His hands were wrapped around a spear. A spear which Zok immediately recognised. After all, it was the same spear he had been using ever since he left the tribe. Just at that moment the man standing in front of him turned around and threw his spear at Zok.

Zok’s reflexes kicked in and he immediately caught the spear and as he did, the man turned around to face him.

“About time you showed up here…” The man smiled and pulled the cloth that was covering his face to reveal that it too was Zok, but an old and broken one, “I can peacefully move on now… as much as would have wanted to see what happens next.”

The Old Zok disappeared into thin air and as he did, everything around Zok that had been dead came back to life. All of the dead creatures and Occunians were back on their feet and had a variety of weapons in their hands. They slowly started surrounding him and rushed in to kill him.

“Get back! I said GET BACK!!!”

In a desperate attempt to save himself, Zok started killing everyone around him… one after another… friends, family… everyone.

***

While in the real world…

Any and all idea about not wanting to fight back and to only dodge went straight out of Zok’s head. His eyes turned completely white as if he was unconscious, yet his body was moving at a frightening speed.

The giant too was taken aback by this sudden change in the demeanour of its prey. Zok was behaving as if he was possessed, blindly swinging his spear at the ain’t like a mad man. However, unlike him, the giant was still under the control of his body and easily dodged all of the incoming attacks.

However, after reducing his size by 40%, the giant had lost the advantage of reach that he had before. Thus it could no longer attack Zok while keeping him at bay. On top of that, due to the significant loss of weight, the Giant’s punches no longer had the strength behind them that they did before. As a result, all of his area of effect skills were now useless.

The only weapon the giant could use now was his claws that had put Cero in the state that he was in. But the giant would have thought about using his claws only once Zok stopped attacking him. For now, the Giant was busy defending against his ‘prey’.

This gave Zok the opportunity to finally start doing some damage to the beast. Still, the giant’s agility was helping him with dodging the attacks. But Zok’s relentless attacks did not give the giant enough time to strike back. With each attack, Zok was rapidly pushing his opponent back into the pile of bones that had been scattered there.

It was only a moment of time before the giant took a misstep and fell flat on its back. The second that happened, it would be the end of the giant. Zok was subconsciously working for that to happen, but as someone who has been alive for centuries, the giant would not have fallen for such a trick.

The moment it appeared that Zok had the giant cornered up, the giant pulled a manoeuvre its previous bulky body could never have and jumped over Zok. This simple move instantly turned the tables as the giant had caught Zok off-guard.

The giant threw his claws at Zok hoping to get rid of him as well. But Zok simply ducked down and stabbed his spear right into the giant’s chest. However, nothing happened… no blood, no screams, nothing.

Zok finally snapped back to reality, unaware of anything that had happened in the last couple of minutes. By the time he realised what was going on, his weapon was snatched away from him.. Leaving him at the mercy of the Giant.