46 – Badger Badger… Badger?

The beast that was scavenging around the dead wolves was a… Well, Jonny didn’t actually know what it was. It looked kind of similar to the dire badger he had fought a few weeks back, but the colors were completely different, and there was something about the way it was shaped that made him know they were different types of animals. Whatever it was, though, it was clearly related to badgers somehow, so he mentally dubbed it ‘badger thing.’

The badger thing had a mixture of dark and light brown fur, walked on all fours, and its shoulder was the same height as Jonny’s. It probably outweighed him by at least double, but compared to many of the magic beasts that Jonny had encountered in the mountains, that wasn’t much.

It’s punchable, he thought happily.

It didn’t notice him immediately. It was too busy digging into one of the wolf corpses, and Jonny was able to get within 50 feet before he decided it was better to stop and observe. Igrette had spent quite a while lecturing him on how to size up opponents, and right now, her life depended on him not screwing this up.

The badger thing didn’t have any obvious magical properties. For something weaker than fourth layer, that usually meant it didn’t have any magical properties at all. Beasts with magical abilities were usually more like the glass deer, where their magical traits were obvious at a glance, and this badger thing did not have anything like that.

It’s mouth was not overly large, but as he watched, its jaws could open wide enough to easily wrap around his limbs, and when it bit down on the wolf’s flank, Jonny winced at the crunch of ribs breaking. As the wolverine tossed the ribs aside and dug its nose deeper into the body, Jonny made a mental note to avoid its jaws at all costs.

Its claws were long, but not especially worrying. Not any more worrying than anything else’s claws, at least. He couldn’t see them well through the snow, but it occasionally put a paw on the dead wolf to help pry the ribs open further, or give it leverage as it pulled out an organ or two.

Jonny observed for a minute more, but with the badger thing just chowing down and not doing anything else, that was about all he could get. Still, Igrette said it was second layer, and he didn’t see anything obviously magical, except maybe its jaw strength, so he was reasonably confident that this was just a typical physically-focused magic beast. The fact that it was a carnivore was concerning, since that means it would be much more able to kill him than something like a deer, but it also looked like a scavenger, rather than a hunter, so it might not have been as dangerous as something like a wolf.

Either way, it was relatively small, didn’t seem to have any magical abilities, and while it was physically stronger than Jonny, he was confident he could make up that gap with his skill. And since he couldn’t get any more information of it until it stopped eating, there was nothing left to do but make it stop eating.

He was getting excited for the fight, but he didn’t let that excitement cause tunnel vision. Winning safely was more important than a good fight. He slowly circled around until he was behind the badger thing, trying his best to sneak up on it. He doubted it would work, since the snow crunched under his feet, no matter how softly he stepped, but if he failed at this, he didn’t want it to be for lack of trying.

I bet Igrette could do it with that weird stealth thing, he thought. How does she even do that? I should ask her.

He shook the distracting thought from his head and continued forward. Just as he predicted, once he got too close—about thirty feet away—the badger thing suddenly lifted its head out of its meal and perked its ears up. Jonny held still for a second, but then it turned its head, and saw him. As soon as it did, Jonny charged.

The badger thing gave a low, guttural growl and reared up on its hind legs as it turned to face him. Jonny came to a stop, and stepped sideways as it fell forward, lunging to catch him with its claws. It landed heavily on all fours, and still low to the ground, lunged again, trying to slash at his legs.

Jonny danced back from slash after slash, careful to avoid the fallen corpses all around until finally he saw an opening. Since its normal attacks were failing, the badger thing had decided to gather itself and do a much longer lunge, trying to catch up to him before he could finish retreating. Jonny had enough experience with magic beasts at this point to see what it was doing, and when it lunged, he leapt to the side.

It reacted quickly, stopping just past where Jonny had been and twisting its body around, but momentum was not in its favor and Jonny was prepared. He stepped in, exhaling and sending mana coursing through his body as he delivered a hook directly to its snout.

Because of what Igrette had taught him about how his mass was a disadvantage, and because of that, he had been leaning more toward powerful, single blows with his entire body weight behind them, instead of prodding jabs like he usually would. His hook on the badger thing was one of the strongest he had ever thrown, and although it was a full-fledged second layer beast, and Jonny was only first, it didn’t seem to matter.

Its head snapped to the side, and blood and saliva flew from its mouth, sprinkling the snow. It staggered a step back, and Jonny responded by stepping forward and switching his stance to land an identical shot with his right hand. He was ready to do it a third time, but after this punch, instead of stepping back, the badger stepped forward and dove at him, screaming in rage.

Stolen story; please report.

Jonny was not expecting that, but he was not entirely unprepared either. He didn’t have time to dodge to either side, and he didn’t want the things claws or teeth anywhere near his body, so he tensed his legs and pushed upward, watching as the badger thing flew by beneath him. He smiled as he reached the apex of his jump, then his smile vanished as he realized he had overdone it slightly.

Jumping in a fight was not something he normally did. On Earth, it was generally a bad idea to jump in a fight, unless you were attempting a flying knee, and even that was usually not a good idea. He hadn’t done it much since coming to this world either, except when he needed to do something like jumping onto the glass deer.