"Humph!", both the little girl and the filly softly snorted at the previous, still there was some caution in their pretty eyes as they saw the new form attained by the black horse, with that shape he should be able to fight with them both at the same time.

Still, with a soft tap from her ankle, Kana gave Ember the signal and the filly charged towards the enemy who welcomed her with his clawed frontal right hoof.

"Clack!", Ember blocked with her own hoof producing a loud sound, unlike before the filly couldn’t outright crush the king’s claws but had a stalemate ongoing for a second before she ultimate broke the claws.

"Crack!", though her hooves still won in terms of toughness, she couldn’t force the black horse backwards like before, what’s more, he used his "arms" to try and slash Ember’s eyes with his claws.

"Clang!", this time Kana blocked with the spear and used the momentum to redirect a part of the attack to the side, before she aimed to slash the horse’s neck with the dagger only for the king of fangs to block with his free arm, ultimately resulting in both parties distancing from each other.

"Tsk, you are lucky that I’m not used to this new extremities yet", said the black horse as he regenerated his broken and dented claws, clearly he wasn’t used to have arms so his movements were still clumsy and basically relied in his strength to block Kana’s spear, the previous was much more noticeable with Ember since he couldn’t directly overwhelm the filly so his claws were crushed contrary to what happened with Kana who could only dent them while changing their trajectory to make an opening for an attack.

Without saying anything else, the black horse galloped towards those two but then under Kana’s confused gaze, he passed next to them instead of attacking them, it didn’t take long for the little girl to realize what the enemy was trying to do, though.

’Since you two forced me to rush my transformation I’m going to make you wish you were dead, let’s see what face you’ll put when I devour your herd members alive!’, venomously thought the king of fangs as he charged towards a "creature" with copper colored hair, which earlier passed a new stinger to the small creature that was fighting against him.

Kana who could see through the inner thoughts of the black horse immediately gave Ember the signal and the filly rushed towards the king, who in response tried to accelerate more, only to realize that he couldn’t outrun the filly and now there was a spear being thrusted at the base of his hind legs where he received wounds earlier.

"Damn it!", cursing due to the fact that Ember was still faster than him in long-time movement, the black horse interrupted his plan to vent his anger on Camila and turned around to block Kana’s spear.

"Do we look weak enough for you to divert your attention from us and more importantly how dare you try and attack big brother and sisters", fiercely said the little girl as she thrusted her spear.

"Ding!", continuous clinking sounds echoed through the vicinity as Kana continuously thrusted the spear at the black horse who blocked them with both of his clawed hooves, he was taken by surprise due to the sudden fierceness that the small creature was showing.

What’s more, Ember was also stomping her hooves trying to crush his own hooves and legs, both had suddenly become quite savage with their attacks which reminded him of how the mare had seemingly gained strength out of nowhere after being surrounded to break a path so that the children and Ember could escape.

As a result of the previous Kana actually managed to bypass the claws of the king and slashed a small wound on his right cheek with the spear to which the black horse snorted as he proposed to claw at the little girl only for his eyes to contract like needles.

"Neeeigh!", the horse felt a burning pain coming from the really shallow and small cut on his cheek which was about to close due to his healing speed and couldn’t help but let oud a loud pained sound as he retreated on the spot, unfortunately he didn’t have the leisure to wait until the pain disappeared.

"Clang!", forcing himself to react, the king of fangs used his claws to block Kana’s spear while enduring the pain coming from his face, but then the little girl skillfully twisted the spear bypassing the defense of the claws so that the tip of the spear reached the leg of the black horse.

"Neeeigh!", compared to the very few centimeters of the spear that pierced through his flesh, the king of fangs let out a loud shriek and then immediately retreated abandoning any idea of diverging his attention from Kana and Ember.

What’s more, he who had retreated in a certain specific direction, directly chewed on a part of the errand black horse’s corpse from earlier, since he had only eaten the head before, eating half of the corpse in a few seconds.

"What!", but after his body trembled the king of fangs couldn’t help but let out a surprised and angered voice as he realized that the pain he was feeling didn’t disappear, even after the wounds he suffered closed.

’How is it possible, I was actually poisoned!’, inwardly screamed the king of fangs, he could produce his own venom therefore he had a high toxic resistance which was temporarily increased when consuming flesh as well and yet after eating half of the errand black horse’s corpse, he was still suffering that horrifying pain.

Seeing the grave expression on the black horse’s face, Kana softly snorted as she rolled the spear in her hand.

"Don’t worry, this poison is not the type to kill nor weaken you, it will only make you feel the pain a normal animal would feel when inflicted the kind of wounds you get, in other words this poison simply returns you to be on equal standing with us, nothing more nothing less", said the little girl.

"Mm, after all the suffering you have caused it is only fair that you die in horrible agony, without being able to do anything about it", added the filly with a cold light in her eyes.

Ember was told by her aunt that she with her last burst of power had smacked the king of fangs against a sharp rock that pierced his shoulder, leaving a palm sized deep hole on his flesh, but then unlike when she had inflicted him with small scratches and bites during their skirmish before, the black horse completely ignored such a major wound to continue pursue her.

That’s why she ultimately had to flee and hide, apparently while the black horse couldn’t heal his wounds by consuming flesh like as of current, back then he was capable of blocking pain to maintain himself in the condition to "hunt" for preys.

So, with Kana’s help, Ember asked Mylene to make a poison that would make it sure wounds will inflict pain to the enemy, of course since there is no access to spirit energy and Mylene hasn’t completed a unique mission to obtain a special ability from her profession manual like Aster, though Mylene alchemic creations do have results that surpass the normal mortal effects one would expect, partly due to her refining skills and partly due to the materials that exist in this place, they don’t reach the level of spirit medicines and the like.

Fortunately, they have two "cheat codes" in the form of Vivian and Aster whose blood is worth more than gold even at base mortal rank for refining purposes, so while the products created directly by Mylene can normally achieve around 5% of the effect that the lowest ranked barely spiritual alchemic products have, adding in their refined blood can triple that result, what’s more if it comes to poisons, venoms and anything related to that, the enhancement directly doubles, that is a 30% of a spirit poison.

"By completely disregarding every other possible effect besides causing pain, Mylene actually amplified the resulting effect by another 5%, multiple effect results are better in general but for specific situations, having specialized potions is better", said Aster as he dodged the charge of a black horse to then punch the other on the face with his free hand.

"That little girl sure is quite something", added a girl with red hair a soft smile and eyes that seemed to be closed at all times giving her a gentle pretty appearance, it was the oldest of the three sisters, Mina.

As to why she was praising Kana despite she simply using poison on her weapon, that’s because it wasn’t just that, the always smiling Mina overheard when Kana commissioned that special poison to Mylene and offered the little girl an "advanced course" that she had yet to teach the other girls from the sect.

As previously shown, Mina is an expert in targeting weaknesses and she has developed a fighting style that combines every possible way to achieve that, be it psychological shock, deceive, anatomy, brute force etc.

So, of course the very first thing she did was observe and learn about Mule’s physique compare it to the one of the other horses and learn their weak spots, with that knowledge she taught Kana how to target the black horse’s nerves since applying the poison developed by Mylene on them further increased the effect by another 5%, and that’s how the current scene in which the horse couldn’t help but scream due to pain when Kana’s spear did as little as slash open the upper layer of his skin, came to be.

"Clang!", the black horse saw the little girl’s spear approach him and directly blocked with his right clawed hoof and then smack the spear with his left one, now he required both of his "arms" to block Kana’s attack.

"Crack!", unfortunately, that slowed down the focus he could put on his lower body and the strong filly’s hoof directly stomped on his left frontal hoof, destroying his claws and wounding his leg on the spot.

Still in the mind of the king of fangs, he would rather take on Ember’s hooves than the spear, so a flash of relief flashed through the black horse’s eyes, only for his eyes to contract like needles the next second.

"Neeeeigh!", a bigger wave of pain even when compared to when his cheek was grazed earlier assaulted the king of fangs, before he slashed both of his upper clawed hooves at Ember’s neck after realizing that the filly had that horrible poison applied on them as well, of course to prevent accidents both Kana and the filly had taken the antivenom prior to this.

"Clang!", both clawed hooves were blocked by Kana using the spear and the dagger, producing sparks before he continued with his assault while using his bigger frame to force the filly backwards.

But then after a few rounds of clinking sounds, the horse nearly cursed to the sky when his claws dented due to the continuous impacts, after all his claws might be really strong and are actually damaging the edge of the spear, but they aren’t stronger than the decent quality steel processed by the girls of the sect.

And in case you wonder why his claws being damaged caused any reaction when he could simply repair them, you ought to know that claws... have nerves in them.

This time the black horse gritted his teeth and toughened up the pain coming from his claws though, instead of retreating he extended his right frontal leg to try and disarm Kana with his arms and that leg, creating a 3v2 situation as Kana only has two weapons.

"Boooom!", however, Kana and Ember skillfully synchronized their attacks blocking the enemy’s, the impact of weapons and hooves created a loud sound, which resulted in Ember ultimately being forced to retreat a couple of meters, but the black horse wasn’t happy in the slightest, his claws were dented and destroyed and three waves of pain travelled through his body.

"Agh, why, why is this damn poison able to affect me, I’m turning into the perfect predator with a body that is able to hunt at all times!", screamed the king of fangs to which Kana softly snorted.

"Humph, while this version was indeed created for this fight, the concept of this poison was originally devised to deal with someone stronger than you, in fact just the materials used for it come from people who are way stronger than you", said the little girl, which both shocked and angered the black horse.

As far as he knows, the only animals who can be considered "way stronger" than him, are just two, Guardian and the crazed bear which he was originally targeting to kill alongside the anaconda before his plans went to hell.

’These creatures are targeting one of those two monsters as well, that means they are like me!!!’, inwardly screamed the black horse before he decisively rushed towards the remains of the errand horse, his mouth salivated as his jaw... dislocated giving him an ampler bite which he used to devour the corpse in a couple of bites.

"Sister Ember", with a disgusted expression on her pretty face, Kana gave Ember the signal and she charged towards the black horse who surprisingly ran away.

Well, retreat would be a better way to put it, since he didn’t escape from the area but returned to the tunneled hill where his bloodshot eyes immediately posed on the mares, with his jaw still dislocated and his saliva dropping from it the king of fangs looked quite eerie.

"Thud!", however when he pounced onto the mares with the idea to turn them into nourishment for whatever he was trying to achieve, a towering figure who could almost contend with him in terms of height, but now surpassed him in terms of frame since he had changed the shape of his body, intercepted him.

Both large black bodies collided producing a loud dull sound, the king was ultimately repelled while the other party didn’t move even a centimeter and that is a lot to say considering that even Ember when using her imperfect second technique "Solid Stance", still flinched in a direct clash with the king.

"What do you think you are doing!", exclaimed the king of fangs as he saw Mule stand between him and the mares whose bodies were paralyzed due to fear, earlier the black horse had actually exuded the natural aura that a strong carnivore has, rendering them unable to resist him!

"I won’t apologize king, we both know that you would have aimed to eat me after them, if I truly was wounded", said Mule with a slightly complex voice, the king of fangs he followed was ambitious and he aimed to eat the horses that didn’t obey him, but the premise was that he promised to not lay a hand on his subordinates, however he now has clearly degenerated into a bloodthirsty creature that regarded anyone but himself as prey.

"Good, very good, so you betrayed me and sided with that snake, that eliminates the last traces of doubt I had about eating you", said the king with a cold voice, that contrary to what Mule expected didn’t make him waver, on the other hand it is understandable, he was subjected to Alice’s murderous intent and violent mood swings during the past days, so he was too afraid of not fulfilling the tasks given to him to care about the king’s threats.

’I knew it, these guys are like me, otherwise how could this trash resist a direct clash with my new strength’, thought the king as he gritted his teeth to then rush past Mule who didn’t stop him, he is a meat shield and can block the king but lacks in terms of offense after all, also his orders were simply to not let the king eat those mares, so he only did as he was told.

Under Kana and Ember gazes as they arrived into the tunneled hill, the black horse used his clawed hooves to dig into the ground, throwing out a large quantity of dirt which was different than the rest of the soil within the tunneled hill, in fact it was different than any soil Aster and the others have seen so far in this place, as it was of a deep dark red color.

A trace of unwillingness flashed through the black horse’s eyes but then he saw the cold glint of Kana’s spear as Ember was charging towards him and he ultimately lowered his head and grabbed the object which was buried below that dark red soil with his teeth, it was an arm bone which was completely dark red colored.

"Crack!", with a resolute face the black horse bit down the bone and crushed it with his spiky teeth to then swallow, the next second without Kana having to give her the signal, Ember stopped, what’s more Mule immediately rushed and stood in front of those two.

What a joke, should any harm come to the small creature that rode on the back of the filly when he could prevent it, the creature with golden eyes which seemed to be the only one to whom the terrifying creature with red eyes "feared", would turn him into a pile of grilled horse meat.

"Roooaar!", a loud uncomfortable sound echoed through the vicinity, stopping the ongoing fights, before all the black horses suddenly trembled to then fall to their knees against their wishes, before their eyes became bloodshot.

"Clang!", continuous clashing sounds then came as the horses attacked Aster and the others with twisted fierce expressions on their faces.

"Is it me or that was similar to lineage suppression, I thought that among the animals here only that lynx could use it?", said Alice as she dodged the horse’s bite to then use her elbow to smack one of the horses on the face.

"Boooom!", next Aster and the others saw a large black body being thrown a dozen of meters to then heavily land on the ground, that was Mule who took a moment to react before he stood up, there was blood coming from the corner of his mouth, the previous attack, whatever it was actually wounded him whose manual is focused in defense and endurance.

"Clang!", a spear reached the one from whom the attack that sent Mule flying, only for it to be stopped in cold before... the spear tip was subjected to a huge amount of pressure.

"Crack!", the spear tip created out of steel actually broke down the next second, which prompted the filly to retreat alongside Mule and the mares who were now sticking as close as possible to Mule.

Only then did the appearance of the one that sent Mule flying and also broke the spear tip, was revealed, it was still the king of fangs and the number of limbs he had remained the same.

However, his previously provisional "arms" had turned into real ones, as in he now had proper hands with fingers and claws that extended out of them, besides there were red bulging veins that could be seen on his muscular arms and his body had grown thirty centimeters in height.

With a "swoosh", the king of fangs rushed towards Kana, his black large fists like canons punched towards both the little girl and the filly.

"Booom!", however two tall figures blocked both incoming fists, one was Mule who used his body to take the punch, while the other one was... Alice, the wild dragon princess used her own fist to intercept that hammer-like punch, producing sparks and the sound of metals colliding, the exchange actually resulted in a tie, because this time Mule was prepared, though it’s obvious that the punch caused him pain.

Kana expected someone from the group to lend a hand, but she was actually surprised to see Alice being the one who jumped into the fray, but then any trace of goodwill that appeared in the little girl’s heart disappeared as she heard Alice casually saying.

"Humph, who do you think you are, only I can bully Kana", said the wild dragon princess which made the little girl’s right eyebrow twitch.