Fear resistance

Mr. Meyer could see the thicket ahead. Crimson snow sat on the
boughs. Finding a narrow break, Mr. Meyer forced his way through.
His legs froze.

Before he knew it, his whole being was being hammered by an aura
lurid to the extreme, awakening a primeval fear in each and every one of his
cells. Though his mind demanded he move forward, his body rebelled. Man
was not an animal of unified spirit and flesh. Roughly ten feet ahead of him stood D.
And another six feet beyond the Hunter lay a corpse, face down and
clad in red fur. He couldn’t see the face, but from the long, ponytailed hair
he knew it was a woman. There was nothing else, and no one else, to be
seen.

Despite that, the teacher got the distinct impression that the body itself
emanated the unnerving sense of evil that was crushing him like a vise. He
wondered if D, too, had fallen victim to it. But no . . . D had already unsheathed his longsword.
The pose he took, with the tip of his blade low enough to prick the end of his right foot,
was so unnatural it could hardly be called a fighting stance. But by extension, it suggested
that whatever tact he took next was going to be positively unearthly.

And then the teacher noticed something that made joy buoy up in his
withered heart. While the malicious aura was eddying all about D, it hadn’t
so much as touched the Hunter. He wasn’t the least bit afraid of it!

The evil aura over the girl moved. It pounced!
D flew through the air, too. He was the veritable image of a graceful
hawk, chiseled in all its majesty in the chill air.

The teacher saw only a silver flash.
Space and time twisted—at least that was the way it felt.
Something slipped by the teacher’s side, burst through part of the
thicket, and vanished. Mr. Meyer ran toward D, who had landed by the
girl’s side. The spell was now broken, and only an air of cold tranquility
spread through the area. They could even hear the chirping of birds again.

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