SWNOVELXO Chapter 13: Crawling Assway
There was a time when I thought that walking through this dense, dangerous jungle was hard. Climbing the small hills, sliding down the slippery inclines, pushing through the thick vegetation…
Back then, I looked forward to leaving this damned jungle more than anything else.
Yet, when we actually reached a part of it where the vegetation started to grow sparse, much thinner than even in the few clearings we stumbled on before, I learned two things.
First, just how mistaken I was.
And secondly, just what Saintess meant when she mentioned there always being a bigger fish.
It was almost as if the world itself heard me whining in my soul about how hard it was to keep on walking and decided to throw me a curveball by making me crawl instead.
Because that's exactly what I'd been doing and by the instruction of no one else but the Saintess herself.
Bit by bit, like recruits in a military boot camp, we made our way forward by reaching out with our arms, locking our elbows on the ground and then pulling and kicking against the ground with our feet while trying to ignore the pain of dragging our bodies over not-so-soft ground.
It was only now that I realized that what I took for the soft undergrowth turned out to be riddled with small stones, prickly bushes and even some ground-crawling insects that didn't take kindly to two humans trying to invade their realm.
And yet, we continued, conquering inch after inch while keeping our bodies as low as possible, almost as if rising above the level of the short grass would mean certain death.
'For all I know, rising up could very well mean just that, death,' I thought, pursing my lips while trying to ignore the pain of tearing my skin against a thousand sharp edges of nature hidden within the undergrowth.
Honestly, though, there was only one saving grace for this moment.
That is, besides the fact that with every pull of my arms, I was getting closer and closer to leaving this god-forsaken jungle.
And it was the fact that Saintess kept herself in the lead, currently crawling just a few feet in front of me.
Earlier, this position allowed her to tread the ground that I later on followed as closely as I could. But now? With both of us squeezed against the ground?
'Shit, man, don't stare too much!' I tried to chastise myself. Heck, I'd tried hard enough to put forward my own candidacy for a medal of valor!
But…
While not exactly designed with sexual appeal in mind but more of pristine grace and elegance, at the angle from which I was viewing it, Saintess's outfit was doing her a heck of a lot of favors!
'Am I really such a creep to be staring at the ass of the girl who's risking her skin to keep my skin intact?' I thought, gritting my teeth in frustration over my own shortcomings. 'Well, relatively intact,' I quickly added in my thoughts, just to give all the tiny cuts on my chest and stomach proper justice.
Then again, why care about the pain when I could see the real-world physics of one hell of a shapely ass during a motion that now appeared to be designed for enticement?
'The way it bounces from side to side whenever she pulls herself up and switches her leading leg…' Despite all my attempts, those vile thoughts continued to oppress my mind.
But was I really to blame? I wasn't really in a position to just stand up, take a swing and then slap myself across the face to get my mind out of the gutter and force some sense back into my rotten brain, was I?
Given my lack of ability to alter my mind through the usual physical means, I decided to focus on something else. And in the boring sensory deprivation of the two days filled with nothing but hard travel, the only thing I could turn my attention to was Saintess's explanation about this part of the journey.
"The part of the jungle ahead…" her voice trailed off as she looked out to where the vegetation visibly thinned out, the slight elevation of our current position giving us quite the nice look ahead. "In a sense, it's a trail. A test for adventurers to see whether or not they are strong enough to enter this place. Which is how I could tell you didn't get into the jungle through your own efforts."
My body relaxed, muting both my attraction to the wiggle physics ahead and my perception of the thousands of stings from the small cuts that went through my clothes and dug into my skin.
"I'm strong enough that I normally skip this trail. Even though the guardian of the jungle's emperor changes for every encounter, they are never fast enough to catch up with me. But with you in tow…"
The message was obvious.
If it was Saintess alone, she could just move past this beast with hardly any effort. And while said beast wouldn't pursue adventurers that it defeated and gatekept out of the jungle, now that she ignored it on her way out…
Apparently, the jungle's guardian would be rather determined to keep her from leaving unless she passed its test properly.
Or, in a way that I understood it, while said guardian only cared to keep intruders away from the jungle, giving up the pursuit as long as the challengers gave up and retreated themselves…
We weren't quite in the position to retreat out of the jungle if our goal was to leave it in the first place, were we?
In theory, we could try to do it. It was something that Saintess admitted herself, even instructing me to just run for it if things were to go south…
But from the very moment we crawled close enough to see what the jungle's guardian would turn out to be this time, I realized there was no way I could even outrun it.
The monster ahead was massive, much bigger than even the panther that tried to get a piece of my butt before. Yet, while massive, it lacked the same coherent sense of familiarity of that big cat from before.
Instead of being just an oversized version of an animal I was aware of, the guardian appeared to be a mix of at least three different beasts, two of which belonged to the realm of legends rather than real animals.
Its bottom half was that of a minotaur, with two massive legs, each twice the size of yours truly, covered with dark, thick fur. And if I knew anything about fantasy worlds, this fur would make for a much better armor than what any human craftsman could ever create!
Yet, while those thick, muscular legs made it clear just how fast this monster would be, it was its upper half that was the problem. Because while it sported a minotaur's bottom, its upper half was that of an ape, with its equally furry upper body constantly spinning around in search for potential prey.
Then, as if all of that wasn't enough, this monster sported a pair of sleek, black, raven-like wings on its back. Even though they were currently folded, just judging by their length I could only assume they were a real, integral part of its design rather than just a decorative part.
My body froze on the ground, my eyes locked on the monster ahead while my heart rate quickly reached healthy limits only to then push straight past. The mere sight of this monster was enough for my hormonal glands to start pumping adrenaline into my bloodstream, prepping my body for one hell of a herculean effort in an attempt to escape this monster's massive arms.
"You stay here," running the risk of being discovered prematurely, Saintess whispered…
Only to then stand up with her sword already unsheathed and sitting firmly in her hand.
"If things go wrong, get ready to run as if your life depends on it," she instructed before straightening her back and taking a step forth. "Because it just might," she added, the corner of her mouth twitching into a small smirk right as she jumped forth, charging the chimera-like monster without a hint of fear or hesitation.