The cold disappeared almost as quickly as it came. Max opened his eyes and found himself standing inside a wide stone chamber.
For a moment, he simply looked around.
The Gate entrance remained behind him as a pale-blue opening in the rock, but everything beyond it was completely different from the industrial yard he’d just left.
There was no sky...
A rough ceiling hung several meters overhead, supported by thick natural pillars of stone. Three passages led deeper into the Gate from the chamber, while patches of pale moss growing along the walls gave off enough light for Max to see without much trouble.
Bones were scattered across the floor. Most of them looked old, but some didn’t.
"So this is what the inside looks like..."
Max slowly turned around.
He’d studied hundreds of Gate reports before, although usually for information about monsters rather than the Gates themselves.
Their interiors varied wildly.
Some were enormous open spaces that seemed to possess their own skies and ecosystems.
Others took the form of towers with several floors, while Gates like this one consisted of interconnected chambers and passages that Players gradually cleared as they moved deeper inside.
The Razorhound Den was apparently the latter.
Max crouched beside the nearest tracks and observed a mark.
It was four toes from a paw and deep claw impressions.
The spacing told him the creature had been moving slowly rather than running, while the faint scratches around the edges suggested the tracks were fairly recent.
He smiled.
’Razorhound.’
Seeing tracks in person was strangely more exciting than reading them from a report.
Max straightened and began moving toward the passage on his right.
He had only taken six steps when every hair on the back of his neck suddenly stood upright.
Something was wrong even though Max didn’t hear anything.
He couldn’t see anything either.
Yet his body reacted before his mind could understand why.
He dropped.
WHOOSH!
Something tore through the space where his head had been less than a second earlier.
Max rolled across the stone and quickly turned.
A dark shape landed several meters away.
The creature stood roughly waist-high on all fours, though its body was long enough to make it appear much larger. Short grey fur covered most of its hide, while the muscles around its rear legs were so thick that they visibly bulged whenever it shifted its weight.
Its narrow jaws parted.
Rows of sharp teeth appeared.
Max’s eyes widened slightly.
’Fuck, it’s fast.’
The Razorhound didn’t give him another second.
Its hind legs compressed, then it vanished.
Max barely managed to raise the gauntlet.
CLANG!
The Razorhound’s teeth snapped against the black metal covering his forearm, and the force still sent Max stumbling backwards.
Before he could regain his balance, the creature twisted its body and raked one claw across his shoulder.
Rip!
"Argh!"
Max jumped away.
Three shallow cuts had already appeared through his shirt, and a thin stream of blood ran down his upper arm.
He looked at the wound, then back at the Razorhound.
"...Okay."
That had happened much faster than he’d expected.
Knowing a monster’s anatomy and fighting one were two very different things.
Max had studied preserved Razorhound bodies. He knew the average length of their tendons, how much force their rear limbs could generate, the structure of their jaws and even the angle their spinal joints could flex during a turn.
None of that prepared him for actually having one launch itself at his face.
Grrr!
The Razorhound growled, causing Max to lower his body slightly.
’Again.’
The beast rushed.
This time, Max was ready.
...Or at least he thought he was.
He shifted sideways and swung his clawed hand toward the creature’s neck, but the Razorhound changed direction with an abrupt twist of its spine.
His claws cut nothing but air.
The creature landed beside him and immediately attacked again.
Max threw himself backwards.
Its jaws snapped shut inches from his stomach.
Max could see what the creature wanted to do. [Feral Instinct] was even feeding him strange little warnings before several of its movements.
The problem was keeping up.
The Razorhound rushed him again.
Max moved to block.
At the final moment, the creature veered to his left.
’No!’
Its claws slammed into his side.
Max grunted as he was thrown across the chamber.
His back hit the ground hard, but he rolled before the Razorhound could follow up and scrambled to his feet.
The beast circled him now. It wasn’t rushing blindly anymore.
Apparently it had learned something too.
Max wiped a little blood from the corner of his mouth and grinned.
"You’re smarter than the ones on the operating table."
Growl!
"Yeah, yeah."
His right hand tightened.
Rushing at the Razorhound hadn’t worked. Trying to match its speed hadn’t worked either.
So there wasn’t much point continuing to do either.
Max watched its rear legs instead.
The Razorhound’s greatest advantage was also painfully obvious when one knew where to look.
Its hind limbs were responsible for almost all of its explosive acceleration. Before every full-speed attack, those muscles had to contract.
It was only for a fraction of a second, but it was still something.
Max stopped watching the creature’s head and watched its legs instead.
The muscles tightened.
’Now.’
Max moved before the Razorhound did.
The beast launched forward, only to find that its target was already half a step to the side.
For the first time since the fight began, Max saw an opening.
He lunged.
His left hand caught the monster by the side of its neck while his right claws drove into its shoulder.
The Razorhound shrieked and twisted violently.
Max nearly lost his grip.
"Stay still!"
The creature slammed him against the wall, clawed at his leg and snapped its jaws desperately toward his face.
Max pulled his head away just in time, letting its teeth close on empty air.
Then he drove the claws deeper.
The Razorhound kicked wildly until eventually, Max’s grip slipped.
The beast tore itself free, leaving several bloody lines across its shoulder as it stumbled away.
Both of them stopped.
Max was breathing harder now.
So was the Razorhound.
The entire exchange probably hadn’t lasted more than a few minutes, yet his shirt was already torn in several places and blood ran from his shoulder and side.
Still...
Max’s grin widened.
He understood it now. He knew exactly how to take down the beast.
The Razorhound launched itself forward, and Max did the same.
Only this time, there was no hesitation in his movements and no fear in his eyes.
For the first time since entering the Gate, the Razorhound wasn’t the only predator in the room.