The Paradox Games

Overreactions

Iroh

As I walked through the what seemed like an endless forest, I couldn't shake the feeling that I wasn't alone in these past few minutes. I had been alert but nothing had come at me. I remembered hearing a dragon a while back and it being silenced a bit later. But now I was worried something else was in this forest too, not one of the competitors.

And that's when I heard it. I heard a slash and a falling tree. Then the earth was rumbling too, I was extremely confused too. If it was chopping down trees, then it was making the ground tremble with every step it took after the fall of each tree. I looked in the direction that it was coming from, but it felt like the rumbling was coming from a different direction.

Not two...

I looked in that direction to see a familiar face coming towards me. I sighed breath of relief as Toph landed in my arms. She didn't seem completely right anymore, the terrible fight we were in was destroying her fragile mind.

"Toph, what's happened?" I asked her, holding her back at arms reach. I could see remnants of rock armor on her, she had been in an intense fight no doubt.

"I... I k-k-killed someone. And it was satisfying." Toph told me, they were corrupting her. That's when the tree fells we're getting closer, we had to do something.

"Toph, we've got to stop whatever this is." I told her, she nodded. I didn't want to bring her into harm but I couldn't do this alone. She wasn't exactly weak either, the exact opposite really. Both of us ran in the direction that the trees were coming from, when we finally got to what was felling trees we were horrified at what we saw.

A giant metal creature was rampaging through the forest. It looked like two fighters were already trying to subdue it. I recognized them as Link and Frozone, there was just one problem. The metal creature was about to kill Link, Toph pointed her arm at Link and a rock shield formed around him. He then escaped and Frozone attempted to freeze its feet to the ground, but the creature was far too strong.

"Hey! The things wild, you guys better do something!" Frozone yelled at us dashing out of the way just before he got stomped. I looked at Toph and nodded, I briefly made contact with Frozone and Link. We all went on separate corners of the metal creature, this would do it for sure. At the same time we all hit it with a powerful attack, flames scorched out of my hands, icicles flew at it from Frozone, pointed stones cascaded on it from Toph, and light arrows pierced it from Link. The creature screeched in pain from our team attack, was it really going to be this easy to take down this foe. That's when it's mouth opened and a ray of light came out and it came down on Link, he had put up his shield just in time to block it. But the shield seemed to be melting from the intense attack.

"Alright, you wanna play dirty? Let's see how you handle a little electricity." I said smugly as I made a motion and electricity courses through my body. The creature realized what was happening and was about to turn towards me with its death ray. I then let it have the lightning, it fell over on its side from it. I felt slightly weak after using lightning, it wasn't easy for me to do it. Toph and Frozone rushed over to my aide. Link's shield had melted completely now, his hand also was burnt from the heat of his shield melting.

"That was a pretty intense attack, are you alright?" Frozone asked me, extending a hand. I took it and he heaved me up, I saw Toph looking at Link. She cocked her head slightly, I looked at her with worried eyes.

"Toph are you alright?" I asked her, she nodded and looked back at me. Link walked over to us, his hand pretty red from the burning.

"What even is that thing? He asked us, none of us seemed to really know what it was.

That's when it started to get back up, Frozone and Toph each went to attach one of its arms to the ground to prevent it from getting up. It's strength outmatched then both as it stood up to its full height. All of us grimaced at it, it wouldn't give up.

"How are we supposed to kill this thing, it won't give up!" Toph shouted getting impatient, I patted her shoulder to console her.

"We have to keep fighting or else we won't survive." I said to them holding my hands out to conjure more flames. Frozone and Toph both held out their hands as well, Link couldn't really do that but he seemed determined. All three of us used our attacks together and fired it at the metal creature's head. It then fired its death ray back at us, the attacks canceling out in the middle. We all had sweat dripping down our faces from the effort we were exerting. That's when Link then ran in front of us and jumped up with his sword in hand. He slashed the creature on the neck, but it only created sparks. The creature then looked down and redirected the ray towards Link, it hit him and he evaporated on the spot. We lost Link, we had to do something and quick. A cannon noise sounded in the distance.

Fortunately enough for us, our attack hit its head and it screeched in pain again. We were making slow progress but it was going to take time and we didn't have that much before it either outsmarted or overpowered us.

"Looks like you need a refresher on our last lesson." I said firing lightning at it again. It screeched yet again. Toph created rock spikes that came out of the ground and hit its skin but couldn't pierce through it. Our attacks weren't doing much because of its skin. But if we focused our attacks on one spot.

"Let try this one more time but on the skin, if we can destroy a piece of its skin we can get some damage on this thing." I told them, they nodded and we focused our efforts on a spot of skin right on its stomach. The creature then retracted its arm backwards and flung it at us, Toph and I were able to avoid its attack, but Frozone got hit hard with its arm. Frozone was flung away far into the woods, we looked back at the creature. We had finally broken though it's skin, it was now time for me to finish this creature off. I focused and went to fire my lightning at it, but as I did I heard rumbling coming from the side. As the lightning left my fingertips and went at the creature, another creature burst out from the woods and chomped down on the metal creatures neck. It was Dynal in his dinosaur form, we had to leave now.

"Toph, run!" I shouted at her grabbing her arm and dashing away from Dynal. He was bad news and we had to escape before he killed us too.

"An overreacting Dinomaton, how curious? A strange place to see one of my people. But all must fall, I will win." Dynal said still in his dinosaur form, he then walked off into the woods away from us. He had killed the Dinomaton in a single hit.