each approaching step. The earth underfoot seemed to come to life: small pebbles, particles of sand, small twigs and dried leaves with light gusts, trembling, for a moment broke away from the surface of the rock. The herbivore lizard was already very close.
The shaman scooped up a small handful of dust from the surface of a nearby boulder. Slowly rubbing it in his palms and not making the slightest noise, the leader jumped up from the ledge above the reptile. For a moment, Vall hung in the air and, like a Pterosaur, swiftly, under the weight of bone armor and Her attraction, fell on the neck of the victim. The humility of the spirit and the strength of the shaman merged into one. The element of the creator’s prana filled the engraving on the edge of the knife to the limit, and the symbol of the cutting blade in the embodied gaze of the leader lit up with a green flame! Going beyond the limits of his body, the shaman plunged the weapon into the hard skin of the reptile with a force inaccessible in everyday life.
The lizard roared in pain and began to shudder, trying to throw off the offender. The leader dug his claws into the neck of the victim with all his might and delivered a few more blows. The flames of Pangea blazed in the cavities of the engraving and gave the shaman’s onslaught incredible power! Through the eyes of his ancestors, Wall saw how with each subsequent blow the tip came closer and closer to the vital organ, how the vessels enveloping the flesh of the reptile expanded either from an overabundance of fear, or from hatred for the one who caused the pain. Being agile many times, it always seemed to Val that the blood threads of the next prey were about to be torn apart!
Longneck quickened his pace and, without abandoning his attempt to throw off the rider, rushed into the infinity of the Bennettite field. The rest of the hunters ran behind, readying their bows and spears.
The distance between the detachment and the herbivore increased, and the lizard did not allow the shaman to hit himself with a knife. It was then that I had to jump off the giant, otherwise he would have gone too far from the hunters and eventually dropped and trampled the leader. So Wall loosened his grip and deftly rolled over the reptile’s neck onto its back; immediately pushed off his back and landed somersault on the grass.
Arrows immediately rained down on Longneck! The volleys of young rangers did not inflict significant injuries – they only distracted the lizard. But the powerful shots of persistent hunters, the arrowheads of which were made of the Edge stone and concealed the mysticism of the flame in the engraving, dug deep into the body of the cold-blooded. It was they who angered the giant even more and forced him to stop in order to fight back. Waving his tail and rearing up, Long-necked began to furiously rush at the offenders. But the first people deftly dodged: they jumped and rolled under the lizard, hitting it with sharp spears, and hitting the limbs with clubs, trying to damage the joints.
– Tarot, lasso! roared the shaman to the beater who came to the rescue.
With a deft movement, Taro removed the skein from his shoulder and threw it to the leader. Wall picked up the liana rope in mid-air and jumped on the lizard again. In an instant, the shaman ran along the sinewy back of the reptile and tried to throw a lasso around the giant’s neck. But the loop did not reach the goal and tightened on the muzzle, and the lizard bent and trembled with muscles. Vall lost his balance and, grabbing onto the taut lasso, flew over the ground, crashing into the bushes right in front of the enraged herbivore. A blow to the ground stunned the leader of the Great Hunt, and the shaman lost the incarnation of the eyes.
The huge paws of the giant flew a stone’s throw from Val – Arwen, the Tyrant and a dozen other hunters managed to pull the lasso in time – and the ground shook so that the leader was thrown aside!
Salas, help us! – Arwen yelled at the teenager who arrived at the place of persecution.
But seeing what was happening, Salas was stunned. The roar of a bloody lizard trying to escape from the lasso, and the shouting of the hunters filled the youth’s ears. Everything blurred before my eyes. Salas felt his eyeballs heat up, as if a flame of fire touched his eyes. A shiver ran through my entire body. The young beater’s legs became weak, and, unable to stand any longer, he fell to his knees. Meanwhile, the reptile rushed once again. The hunters could not hold her, and, releasing a lasso, fell to the ground, and the giant turned and rushed towards Salas.
– Watch out! shouted one of the tribesmen.
The young beater raised his head with difficulty and stared at the reptile.
But what is it? Instead of a reptile, he saw bloody flesh hurtling straight at him. Bloodied flesh without skin! A living carcass of meat and bones with eyes filled with madness rushed at the youngster! Salas tried to get up, but found that his hands and feet were entangled in the roots of unseen plants.
– Aaa! yelled a stunned Salas.
He tried to free himself, but the plants, suddenly rapidly making their way out of the ground, began to envelop his limbs. Seeing this, Salas was completely shocked. Everything went dark in his eyes and, losing consciousness, he fell to the ground.
– I-i-ha! I-i-hu-hu! Taro’s battle cry rang out loudly.
The reptile slowed down and paid attention to the human scream, and Taro rolled under its belly with lightning speed and, jumping to the side, aimed the spear at the bleeding wound on the neck. The bright green light of the Tarot engraving flared on the edge of the Edge in a blinding flame. The spear pierced the flesh and half came out the other side. A deafening roar swept over the Bennettite field. The lizard’s body bowed to the ground. Letting out a heavy sigh, the reptile finally fell off its feet, raising a huge column of dust around it.
***
Val walked towards Longneck. Approaching the body of the lizard, the shaman took off his helmet. His tangled black hair, freed from bone armor, casually lay on his broad shoulders. The scaly nose of the leader was sweaty from the fight with the giant and gleamed under the rays of the Great Fire. His beard, through which prickly growths were visible, was fastened with a hairpin in a small ponytail. In the right ear of the shaman hung an earring of several Rasaur fangs, and above the ear there was a huge scar that diagonally reached the left side of the chin. The scar also fell on the upper and lower lip, and he got the leader during the rescue from the claws of a heavenly predator. The scar, painted green as usual, did not disfigure Vall’s face, but only gave it a defiant look.
The shaman looked at the body of the mortally wounded lizard. Then, coming closer to the head of the reptile, he stared into its still not cooled eye. The cheekbones of the leader of the Great Hunt tightened, and the human eyes again embodied in reptilian ones, and Long Neck immediately caught the hunter’s gaze and froze. Val opened his eyelids wide. The yellowed whites of his eyes shone as if a tear had poured into them, and his gaze was frozen in the gaze of a lizard. The leader reunited with the fading mind of the herbivore and transferred his vision to his peaceful past. As heaven and earth are reflected from the surface of an undisturbed water surface, so the vision of shamans in unity with reptiles in shining eyes reflected fragments of the past, and a liana forest appeared in the eyes of the leader…
Arrived in time relatives began to closely examine their leader, watching his harmony with the Long-necked. Zavrini’s eyes in Vall’s gaze have always fascinated his fellow tribesmen. His pupils were similar to the color of the flame that was hidden in the engraving of tenacious hunters. No one had such bright green eyes! And watching Vall traverse the giant’s recent path, trying to find similar herbivores, was always mesmerizing.
In front of the shaman, a small pond appeared, surrounded by vegetation and mighty liana trees. Thin rays of the Great Fire, with difficulty passing through the crowns of trees, playfully rotated particles of moss and wood dust in the air, scattering light over a muddy lake in the middle of a dense forest. Flocks of multi-colored dragonflies were circling near the shores of the reservoir, above the thickets of horsetail and fern, and behind it, among the young shoots of ginkgo, the shaman inadvertently spotted fallen dead wood – a dilapidated snag seemed to the leader to have met before.