Stygian Beast Form II

The ravenous beast that had just acquired a taste for the blood of adventurers only had three targets left.

Determined to devour all three of them, it elected to chase the single enemy that had escaped in a different direction then the other two.

It had sensed him to be the weakest and thus easy to devour and turn to chase the others before they could escape.

Dix and Gran's scents and auras were already memorized by the beast and now, there was ittle they could do to hide from it as very few things could ensure their safety now.

The pair however, had access to one. Knossos, the artificial Dungeon. Designed by Daedalus and impeached to his descendant through a blood curse that forced them to continued its construction and development.

Only descendants of Daedalus, like Dix was, could open the massive orichalcum gates that lead to the labyrinth and not even the beast would be able to breach them.

There was an access point on the 24th floor in which they were in, the only question was if they could safely enter the labyrinth before the beast caught up to them . . .

Quickly disposing of the lone Level 4 adventurer, the beast quickly turned around and blurred into motion, rapidly following the scent and aura of the two snack that were trying to escape its grasp.

Its movement speed in the forested region that was the 24th floor was incomparable to that of an adventurer's, even that of one who should be faster than it in other circumstances.

Soon, it reached a seemingly normal stretch of dungeon wall, the traces of the prey's scent ended here but it could feel their auras behind the wall in front of it.

Following its instincts, blood coalesced into a red coating of the beast's right claw and, when it swiped at the wall, the blood turned into a destructive wave of energy that tore it to shreds, revealing a wide passage behind it.

Once again finding the trace of its prey, the beast set out in pursuit but meanwhile, the pair of escaping adventurers had already reached the orichalcum door into Knossos.

"What was that!?" Gran asked with alarm, hearing a sound from the end of the passage they just came from.

"Shit! It's definitely that thing!" Dix exclaimed as he banged the door with his fist.

"Can't you open fucking faster!?" He shouted with fear starting to seep into his voice, even if just slightly. After all, despite the horrifying power and visage of the beast, the notorious Hazer, Dix Perdix was not so easy to scare off.

Immediately after that, the pair saw the shape of the beast barreling towards then with bloodlust in its madenned eyes but by that point the door had opened just enough for someone to squeeze in.

Dix didn't waste any time and immediately did so.

'Just in time. Not today filthy freak monster!' He internally shouted but the next thing he saw, chilled him to the bone.

Seeing its prey about to get away into a place where it instinctively felt it could not chase, the beast activate and ability it had never used before, out of sheer desire to catch its fleeing prey.

Bursting into a mass of shadows, it flashed forward until it was right next to Gran and Dix as they were crossing the gateway.

The former had his back turned to it so he didn't see but Dix could and he did the only thing he could to save himself.

*bam*

He kicked his second in command Gran into the chasing beast as the doors closed shut.

The beast tore Gran appart and roared in rage at losing its most valued prey. It drew on the blood arts in an attempt to breach the door but was unsuccessful. Properly refined orichalcum was almost impervious to any physical damage or magic.

It even tried to use its shadowy innate abilities to phase through the door, much like Nox did by the means of Dark Magic but the properties to the orichalcum prevented this from happening.

Eventually, after about an hour of frenzied attacks on the gate, the beast was finally exhausted but, thanks to this, Nox regained some semblance of control.

It was not perfect and the transformation was not over yet, nor could he undo it at the moment but at least, he now could direct the beast's actions.

'Fuck!' Was all he could think when he finally got control back.

'At least I remember everything I did and nothing was too bad except eating a couple of people.' Nox thought.

'What the hell!?' He suddenly questioned himself.

'I never had any problems killing but I would have never taken cannibalism as an acceptable act before.' Nox pondered as his beast like body stood frozen in place.

'Come to think of it, after I created the curse of vampirism, I never really felt any resistance towards drinking blood which is definitely not normal . . .'

'Shit! I'll think about this later. For now, I should clean up the remnants of my little rampage, can't let anyone figure out that can actually happen to me so I better be thorough even though the chance of me being discovered is really small.' He decided.

And so, he not only cleaned up the battlefield, collecting a few spoils while destroying everything he didn't find useful and, most importantly, he went back to the place of his transformation and disposed of the remains of his destroyed gear.

During this time, he was actually in beast form and, quite curiously, felt no rejection at all as he deftly controlled this new body as if it was his form since he was born.

'This is freaking me out . . .' He thought to himself.

Bolting towards his nearest hideout, Nox tried to calm down and reverse the transformation and thankfully, after about half an hour of failed attempts, finally managed to recover his human form.

"This was far to freaky . . . I always carelessly created skills and spells I considered powerful and cool but this is too much. Sanguinare Vampiris is clearly influencing my mind in various ways. Bestowing the instincts of a vampiric creature and eliminating my aversion to following said instincts"

He talked out loud in an attempt to calm down. Facing the dangers of this world never unsettled him that much but finding out his gung ho attitude with his magic led to him messing with his own mind, permanently in all likelihood? It profoundly disturbed him.

"I got to update my status, just the skills so Loki doesn't figure out I can do it, since she can only update the whole thing at once." Nox decided.

*

Name: Nox Lyros

Race: High Human

Gender: Male

Level: 3

Abilities:

. . .

Magic:

. . .

Skills:

. . .

Sanguinare Vampiris - The Bloodcurse of Vampirism: Permanently boosts the user through the consumption of blood no matter the source. More powerful sources of blood show greater effects.

Consumed blood is stored in a blood pool and can be used to perform "Blood Arts" a special type of magic that does not require slots or Mind.

Mental energy can be used to access Night Powers that involve the manipulation of darkness, shadows and mental effects of various kinds.

As a cost, the user must regularly satisfy their thirst for blood and if this is not done, they will slowly fall into a feeding frenzy and attack anything on sight, letting the beast within out and transforming into a monstrous form.

Changes the users physiology to grant several vampiric traits like charm, glowing blood red eyes, pale skin and fangs. These can be disguised however it limits the power of the curse when done.

Gives use access to the Stygian Beast Form that draws on the user's vampiric traits and monster like qualities to gain a monstrous form of untold power. In this form, all vampiric and physical abilities are drastically enhanced and one's Level is boosted by one.

The beast within has awakened, lending the user its power but threatening to extinguish his humanity first and eventually his sanity. Continuous use of the curses abilities will speed up the process, particularly, the Stygian Beast Form.

Keeping yourself well fed and restraining the use of the curses abilities will restore you to a certain point. You will always be a monster but so long as you maintain your hold on the beast, your humanity and reason will never completely fade.

*

"Well fuck . . ." Was all Nox could get out of his mouth seeing how deep the shit he got himself into was.

'Not like I can do much about it now. It is far too late for me to change anything at least for the time being but I should dedicate some of my time to finding a solution for this . . .' He decided

Nox then used a nifty spell he developed just in case called Fake Status to change his skill's description back into what it was before so that Loki would not be able to see it.

'Okay . . . Even though this is highly diconforting, standing around doing nothing is not going to help me. I'll just keep me reliance on the curse to a minimum and keep living my life, no better alternative at this point.' Nox declared to himself and swore to keep on going in spite of adversity.

'Still, the scum from the Ikelos familia is really unlucky . . . Or was it my Luck development ability that let me find crappy adventures to kill rather than innocent ones? Food for thought.'

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