Henry’s blade slashed across the beast's flank, as he rushed past. Roars in the distance combining with the snarls from his opponent. Fortunately for him, the support from Michael allowed him to dart in and out of combat with relative ease, enabling him to keep an eye out for any additional threats from those sounds.

  The initial wound from the sabercat throbbed, filling his left eye with blood every second or so, forcing him to constantly wipe his face or risk losing sight of his foe.

  A torn face was a huge problem for a human as it bled so much more than other parts of the body, but Henry was incredibly lucky that he hadn’t lost the eye. While the face injury was detrimental to the swordsman, Michaels injured snout was of no consequence. Though short, the battle had been intense so far with Michael tanking most of the damage.

  Maybe he’s not a normal wolf? Henry thought. The feline creature swiped its vicious claws across the professor's shoulder, hardly breaking the surface upon contact. His white fur was tinged pink in multiple places, where the brown scaled beast had attacked previously. Despite the bestial nature of the fight, Michael didn’t seem to noticed the pain. Previously, he had taken some serious damage against the wendigo in his canine form but Henry had noticed that the damage had almost entirely healed when Michael had shifted into this form again.

  An enhanced healing factor would make sense if these transformations were similar to lycanthropy, he thought. I wonder if I could transform into something else if he bit me. Wait… what the hell would I be if Adam bit me? An opening presented itself as Henry pondered what exactly the others had become, allowing him to dash in and make a critical strike along the beast's neck.

  Michael had managed to latch his jaws into the side of the creatures skull while his claws were embedded into its shoulder and haunch, effectively halting its movement. The beast hissed its frustration and failed to shake itself free before Henry’s chinese straight sword pierced into the far side of its throat, just behind the jawbone, piercing its brain.

  The strain of the creature's dead weight slumping to the ground pulled the blade from Henry's hand as he leapt back from the corpse. With the conflict ended, the only sound in the area was the sound of system notifications and heavy footfalls as Adams' large frame bound around the corner towards them.

  Henry's eyes widened as he took his friend in. His shaggy underfur was matted and glistening with blood and viscera dripped from his snout. The long tusks that jutted up out of his lower jaw were like crimson soaked towers of ivory, rising from the dark black lips of his wide face.

  Before he could say anything to his friend, a low and menacing growl filled the space, causing the swordsman to break out in a cold sweat. He slowly turned to face the new aggressor and was confused when he laid eyes on Michael, standing over the fallen beast with his hackles raised and his fangs bared at Adam. In horror, he realized that even with his teeth bared, Michaels jaw was moving, as he had ripped a portion of the throat out of the felled feline.

  Adam had stopped moving right as he finished coming around the corner and Henry was, once again, surprised to see his friend slowly lower himself to the ground and begin to shrink.

  Over the next couple seconds, Henry watched as Adam’s fur receded back into his skin, his grey hide lightened, and his tusks shortened, as his bestial transformation skill was deactivated, leaving Adam crouched naked on the ground roughly 25 feet away from the professor and his meal. Throughout the transformation, Henry noticed that Adam’s eyes never left Michael even when his face briefly contorted with pain as his bones reshaped themselves.

  Adam slowly and calmly stood up from his crouched position.

  “Professor Johnson, it's me, Adam.” he said softly as he stepped towards the growling man. A snarl ripped out of him as Adam moved closer, stopping the naked man in place before he could move any closer.

  “I just experienced this myself, reign it in Michael. You are not an animal.” he raised his hands out wide in an effort to seem less threatening, ironically treating him as an animal through his actions.

  The viciousness that filled Michaels features held, a long pregnant pause filling the space more than the rumbling growls had, before he shook his large head and stepped off the carcass.

  Two heavy sighs echoed as Henry and Adam both relaxed and looked at one another with relief.

  With the tension released and Michael beginning to transform back to his human form, Henry gave Adam a more discerning inspection. Something about him looked different then before he had transformed. It was hard to tell what it was exactly though, as the transformation had not cleaned the blood and guts from his form.

  Adam seemed to notice his inspection as Otto, Emi and Sylvia joined them, and quickly covered himself with the collar that he had been wearing in his beast form.

  The ladies made an effort not to look at anyone but Henry as there were now two naked men, since Michael had also completed his transformation back to human form as well.

  Otto quickly moved to Adam and the professor, handing over their clothes while Sylvia and Emi moved towards Henry.

  The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  “What happened up here?” Sylvia asked as she walked up to him. Emi moved right past him and went straight to the creature's body where she started feeling around at its scales and muttering to herself.

  “Michael and I had found some tracks and wanted to check them out before bringing you guys forward.” Henry explained, “He had gone a bit ahead of me and I got ambushed by this thing. Luckily, he was able to get back to me in time and we were able to kill it after a minute or two.”

  While he spoke, Sylvia worked on his facial wounds, taking one of the strips of cloth that they had saved from making the collars earlier and wrapping it around his head to help stop the bleeding. “We heard the professors bark and tried to come help but we were attacked by another one.” She paused and glanced over the creatures body to where Adam and Michael were standing, staring at the creature. Henry thought he heard Adam call the creature an Armored Sabercat or something. Somehow he knew what they were and was talking about them with Michael, Otto and Emi.

  “Was Adam… different when he came up here?” she asked.

  He had to think about it for a second. When Adam had first changed back to human, he had looked upset somehow. His new tusks and the blood covering his front made it difficult for the swordsman to fully read the man, but something about the way he had been standing and the look he had given Michael, told Henry that something had happened before he showed up.

  “He seemed fine, I think? I didn’t notice anything really. Adam came in and helped right away.”

  A look of fear and possibly regret flashed across Sylvia’s face as she nodded and focused on bandaging Henry’s head. Clearly, their conversation on the topic was over.

  Between the quick glimpse of fear of Sylvia’s face, the darting glances she kept sending towards Adam and the way Otto was standing a step farther away from Adam than seemed necessary, Henry could guess what had happened. Adam had killed the other sabercat in a really violent way, scaring the others. While none of them had experience with the crazy situations they were currently being put in, he, Adam and Michael had all adapted to the more violent parts of this new world better than the other three.

  Otto was trying and obviously wanted to help, but he was too gentle of a soul. Henry had noticed during their first encounter with Jessi– with the Wendigo, that Otto hesitated and started to close his eyes when he would throw his stones to attack. The Computer Science Engineering student was still front and center in the man's mind. Sylvia had adapted in her own way, moving on instinct to help deal with the wounds that they sustained.

  It really feels like I’m the only one that really is getting hurt. Syl has patched me up like five times and we have had two fights so far. It was a foregone conclusion that more fights would come. Monsters existed so monsters needed to be slain.

  Henry shifted his attention from Otto and Sylvia to Emi. Oddly enough, the small woman had changed the least. She had always been a problem solver and her love of machinery and making stuff carried over into this new world perfectly. This big change to her reality was nothing more than another problem that she needed to fix. It was the thing that Henry had always loved about her; her single minded ability to focus on what she could control. If anyone else were to look at her in this moment, they would think she was completely unaware of her surroundings, engrossed in studying the carcass in front of her. Henry knew better though. The way she shuffled her feet and pointedly moved to a new limb to study its claws when Adam came close, gave away her own anxiety about being near him, even if her face betrayed none of it.

  He sighed to himself and thanked Sylvia for bandaging him up as he went to retrieve his sword.

  Adam and Michael were like opposite sides of the coin from the others. Henry believed that their selection of the Path of the Beast was what had allowed them to adapt so quickly but he wasn’t sure. After seeing the way Michael had acted after killing the sabercat, his jealousy over their cool transformation abilities had diminished significantly. At least I know that if I go crazy, it's all me. Not some internal beast that's taking over or whatever the hell that was.

  His background as a fencer and as an all around sword-nut allowed for him to brush aside Henry McCoy, the General Transfer Student, so that Henry the Swordsman could take his place. His inner child was leaping for joy, imagining all of the ways that this new version of himself could grow. While being “isekai’d” had always been high on his list, becoming a “hunter” or something would be cool too.

  Maybe I'll have a chance at becoming a sword saint or something, he thought with a grin as he pulled his sword from the creature's neck and wiped it clean with the remains of his jacket before sheathing it on his hip. His attention shifted back to his companions as Adam had cleared his throat to get everyone's attention.

  “We should get moving again, but… “ He looked at Michael grimly before continuing, “I don’t think we should take our beast forms just yet.”

  Michael nodded, “As beneficial as I think we can be, we simply don’t know enough about what is happening to our bodies and our minds to comfortably be around anyone else.” He looked at Henry apologetically, “I recognized that you had helped me kill the creature but I was ready to fight both of you for it and I can’t stand the idea of losing control and attacking a student of mine.”

  Henry put on a fake smile, “You would have snapped out of it, professor. I have complete faith in you!” he turned to Adam and extended a fist, “ Both of you.”

  His friend gave a soft smile and fist bumped him before accepting one of Emi’s daggers.

  Hopefully, they will get it figured out soon. Henry couldn’t imagine leaving his friends behind but as the only real combatant in the group, if Adam and Michael were to lose it while transformed, he would have to get the others away from them.

  The group of six gathered their things and started moving through the final stretch of the path towards the Arts building.

  As they exited the rocky outcroppings that covered the area between the Arts building and the Student Center, they entered an open space roughly 20 meters across filled with broken pieces of pavement, overgrown with creeping vines, long grasses and four unexpected shapes. Vehicles.

  The main thing of note was that the vehicles, a truck, two small sedans and a twelve passenger van, had been knocked over. The seats had been shredded long ago leaving rotting cloth over metal and plastic framework.

  While the new space seemed to be fairly untouched, Henry noticed that the far side of the open space had what looked to be a couple bodies sprawled out across the ground. At least three of the bodies were human and two others looked to be beasts of some kind.

  Just as they stepped clear of the protection of the stonework, a voice called out from the balcony above the entryway.

  “Quick! Run this way! The cars have monsters!”

  Then all hell broke loose. Again.