Reincarnated as an Energy with a System

1694  Mountain Lions n/ô/vel/b//jn dot c//om

Ning moved to the side, dodging the mountain lion's lunge. But then another one came for him. He dodged that too, kicking it in the chest as hard as he could.

The lion whimpered and fell to the ground, Ning's strength being strong enough to make it stop for a moment. It would get back up soon. Ning quickly spun his spear and swung down the back of it onto the head of the first lion. He could feel the wooden spear tremble from the shock. He needed to be careful about its durability.

His momentarily divided mind caused him to miss one of the incoming lions until it was close enough. It jumped for him, mouth gaping to bite him completely.

Ning put his stump toward it, turning the entire arm iron as he did so. The lion chomped on it and Ning felt the lion's jaw crunch his stump. Even though he had turned it into a lion, the sheer force a lion's jaw had was enough to nearly break through it.

Ning turned the spear around and stabbed through the lion's chest. He went for its heart, but he could feel the spear miss and hit the rib instead.

Still, the lion whimpered in pain and fell to the ground.

A notification appeared before him, covering most of his vision in a bright blue panel that made it even harder to see the lions. Thankfully his Life Sense was there, so he knew where exactly to focus.

A new quest had been provided, and Ning managed to only see the reward for it, which was 10 points. It was a difficult enough task, it seemed.

It wasn't exactly life or death but had the chance of causing a lot of pain if he wasn't careful. He would have to focus.

The black mountain lions had black fur, like that of a black jaguar, and hunted in a pride, entirely at night times. They were excellent hunters thanks to that.

Their bodies were smaller than other feline beasts, and more similar to leopards than actual lions. They had no mane or anything, just thick black fur that covered their entire body.

'But this doesn't make sense,' Ning thought. As far as he was aware, these lions were known to live in the mountains but never attacked people who went along these paths.

It didn't make sense that they had come out of the way to attack them. What's more, they all came straight for Ning, almost as though they knew his scent.

Or rather, the scent of a human's flesh.

'Have these lions found a taste for human flesh?' Ning thought. That was the only thing that made sense for him given the situation since not a single one of them went for the horses.

Every single one went for the humans.

The other fighters had all come out with weapons to fight. Arrows flew in the night, whistling underneath the pale moonlight as they struck a few of the lions.

The braver of the men rushed forward, swinging down on their swords and axes to cut down on the lions. Due to the size of the lions, they were small enough that these fighters could fight with more certainty that they wouldn't die so easily.

Ning could hear a few cries of pain, but he couldn't do anything. He could only fight the ones that were coming for him. Since he was the first out of the cart, his was the scent they had noticed and he was the one they came for.

Ning fought, kicking and stabbing, and getting beaten in return. His stump was what he used to block most of the attacks and stabbed the lions with his spear in return.

Since it was nighttime, and most of the area was dark, no one could see him using his powers at all.

Ning's new powers, his ability to turn part of his body into iron was quite strong. Turning into iron not only improved the defensive capabilities of his body but also made it so that his attacks were stronger in general.

He had a lot more to learn in this regard, especially in relation to turning more and more of his body into iron. At some point, he was certain that he could turn his entire body into iron. He simply needed a bit of power for that.

After a bit of attack and a whole lot of noise, the lions were scared away, running down the cliff. Within minutes, they were all gone, leaving the caravan in a state of fear.

The anxiety was at an all-time high and people ran around to make sure the mountain lions wouldn't return.

"Someone help him!"

"Bring out a healing kit."

"Towel! Someone hand me a towel. Quickly."

Chaos filled the caravan in the aftermath. Even though the mountain lions had only been there for a few minutes, their departure left with a lot of physical wounds and fear.

Ning went to check on people that had been terribly hurt. He too had been hurt, his arms chomped through, although not as severely. It would heal in a few days.

He saw a man who had lost two of the fingers in his arms and continued to grunt in pain. People grabbed cloths and wrapped it around his finger, stopping it from bleeding.

Thankfully, they had a doctor brought along and the old man had enough ointments for the wounded to heal.

The man arrived next to Ning to look at him. "Are you alright young man?" he asked.

"More or less," Ning said, showing his stump. "I wouldn't mind a bit of medicine though."

The old man sat with him on the side of the carriage and undid the bandages that were wrapped around his stump. When the last bandage finally fell, the man gasped in surprise.

"You… when did you lose your arm?" he asked, looking very much anxious about something.

"It's been about a bit more than a week," Ning said truthfully. "Why do you ask?"