Chapter 40 - 40 Fenris vs. Rodan

I'm standing in the middle of the valley, ready to pounce on whatever prey is unfortunate enough to come looking for a fight.

I look to the sky where I see only clouds. But my senses are telling me something else.

A shadow appears in the clouds in the shape of a very large bird.

In a gust of wind, the clouds part. Revealing a brown Pteranodon-like bird. All over its body, between its scales are bright orange veins filled with magma clearly visible. Its wingspan well over 200 meters (650 ft.).

We lock eyes and I immediately lower my stance, ready to pounce on the big chicken the moment it comes close.

Rodan points his beak downward and folds his wings behind him, entering a dive flight.

'Damn, he is deceptively fast for his size.'

Rodan continues to dive, gaining speed. About 100 meters before he reaches the ground he spreads his wings, allowing him to reposition his body and come straight towards me with his talons ready to grab me and never let go.

This is it. The crucial moment that decides which one of us has lunch and which is lunch.

When we almost collide, I jump towards his left wing, avoiding his talons.

I bite down hard and I don't let go. Due to his speed, Rodan is too late to correct his position.

*KRAAA!!*

He cries out in pain while he wildly flaps his other wing to try and slow down before we crash to the ground.

Meanwhile I keep biting his wing, after a few attempts I manage to snap his bone. Rodan's blood which consists mostly of boiling lava is burning my mouth, which hurts like hell. But I can't let go. With a few more strong snaps of my jaw, I manage to sever most of his left wing. So the moment we crash to the ground, he won't be able to fly again. And while Rodan has the upper hand in aerial combat, on the ground he shouldn't be a threat to me.

Right before we crash I feel a strong pain in my side, where apparently Rodan managed to peck me.

As we crash to the ground, Rodan rolls over and the few tendons and muscles that were holding his left wing together snap off, sending half his wing along with me flying into the side of a cliff.

I hit the cliff with my entire right side and hit my head on a very sharp rock that pierces my temple, making me lose consciousness.

Heat. It's the first thing I notice while I slowly regain consciousness.

I slowly get to my feet and by the time I'm standing, my wounds have all healed.

Meanwhile the heat began to rise higher. I look next to me and see Rodan's severed wing, but it's not the source of the heat. I look around and see Rodan slowly rise to his feet as well but something has changed.

The veins filled with magma are no longer orange, but a bright, fiery red.

Rodan lifts his head and his eyes are shining the same shade of red.

He looks at his left side, where his wing is missing. He then looks around and sees his severed wing on the ground next to me.

*KRAAA!!*

He cries out in anger as the veins on his body start glowing brighter, starting from his legs, up his body. His throat shining the brightest. He pulls back his head and opens his beak. The next moment he launches his head forward and a large, concentrated beam of extremely hot lava is fired straight at me.

Luckily I figured out what was about to happen, so I was able to avoid direct impact by lunging to my right.

Unfortunately the beam was so hot that all the fur on my left side was scorched off, along with a large patch of skin and flesh, revealing my shoulder blade, ribs and part of my spine.

But Rodan's lava-beam doesn't stop. He keeps a steady stream and he adjusts his aim, following my movements.

As I keep running towards him, the beam gets dangerously close. Knowing I won't reach him before I get hit, I jump over the beam and with one last leap I launch myself towards his c.h.e.s.t.

The force of the impact puts Rodan on his back and ends his lava beam.

Lying on his back with me standing on his c.h.e.s.t, Rodan lunges his beak towards me. Easily avoiding his final attack, I go for his throat and bite down as I savagely rip and tear through his flesh until he stops struggling.

Slowly the overwhelming heat that was radiating off of Rodan, starts to fade as his corpse is slowly cooling down.

'This battle was tougher than I hoped it would be. Rodan put up a good fight. And that lava-beam, wow. I did not know he could do that.

Now, it's time to devour my first titan from the Monsterverse.'

I bite down into Rodan's mangled neck one more time and devour every aspect of his being.

My internal organs immediately begin to heat up. My blood boils, my fur sheds and my skin slowly burns until it turns charkoal black. All in all it's probably the most painful experience of my life.

I slowly feel myself losing consciousness. But this time it's not from a head injury that'll heal in a few seconds, so I don't know how long it's going to last.

Knowing that Rodan rests for long periods of time inside volcanoes, I force myself to stay awake long enough to get to a volcano I remember passing a few times about 240 kilometers (150 miles) from the valley.

I get there pretty fast and dip my toe in the lava. Unsurprisingly the temperature felt comfortable rather than painfully hot.

Knowing it's safe, I dive in and let my consciousness fade.