This might only work if you're familiar with the tale of Jason, the Ancient Greek hero, but who gives a crap? Haha, anyways, I was going to enter a Penulisan competition because I figured that it would be a good way to, well, I don't know. BUt Greece was my inspiration coz that's where I'ma going and I was looking at this Greek website that my friend Hanniekins sent me the link to and I was Membaca about the Heroes and stuff and I wrote, well, this.... So yeah... xD
JASON

Jason sprinted faster, pushing his muscles to the as he pumped his arms and legs. Behind him, the sounds of his pursuer were getting louder – they were gaining on him. His sword was at his side, but if he stopped to pull it from his scabbard, the manticore – a monstrous creature with the body of a lion, but the face of a man – would be on him in an instant and there would be nothing he could do to stop it.

He was racing across the rugged plains, steadily climbing higher as the landscape steepened. The moonlight rained down before him and behind him, giving him light to see by, but also giving light to the manticore hunting him. He knew, even if he found somewhere to hide, he still wouldn’t be safe. The monster had a sense of smell stronger than all of Jason’s Anjing put together. It could find him anywhere.

There was only one thing to blame for deadly chase through the night – the golden topi keledar clutched tightly in his left hand. That was the fuel of the manticore’s rage, that and the fact that Jason had plucked it so easily from his lair. The topi keledar had been the pride of the manticore’s possessions, a trinket stolen from Jason’s mentor and that Jason was stealing in turn. But Jason preferred to call it ‘retrieving what was already owned.’

Up ahead there was a river, the moon reflected off the water’s surface. Jason didn’t slow, he kicked off the ground and propelled himself across. He landed, rolled once, and was on his feet the seterusnya instant. Behind him, the manticore had skidded to a stop. It was howling its rage and Jason turned to look at it, breathing hard, wondering why it hadn’t leapt after him.

The frightening image of a human-faced lion stared back at him, the sharp clawed paws placed carefully just before the river’s bank, the yellow, cat-like eyes – glinting in the darkness – were set above the short, jagged toothed mouth, and the huge, curved tail spiked with deadly needles that could poison – atau kill – a man stronger than Jason.

The tail twitched, and Jason with it. While he appreciated this small respite, he knew he should always be prepared for anything. The manticore may look tired and completely warn out, but lions were cunning creatures.

It began to pace back and forth along the edge of the river, appraising Jason carefully. He was getting his breath back, his eyes following every movement the manticore made. He still had the topi keledar held tightly in his hands. Such a small and worthless item for all this trouble it had caused. But it was his mentor’s…

The manticore tentatively put one paw in the water, and then hurriedly pulled it out again with a very animal-like snarl that came from a very human-like mouth. And Jason knew why it had stopped. The monstrous cat feared the water!

Realisation dawned in his eyes and he took a step away from the manticore, watching it snarl and hiss at him. Casually, he raised one hand in farewell, turned and began sprinting again.

Something thudded into the ground close to his feet – a poisoned needle thrown from the manticore’s tail. Jason almost tripped as he ran and another needle embedded itself in a pokok to his right. He ducked automatically and felt one whizz over his head. Diving to the side, he ended up rolling through a patch of thorns and down a small slope. He landed in a muddy puddle with a shock that sent the topi keledar bouncing out of his hands.

He sat up quickly and shook his muddy hair from his eyes, frantically looking around in the shadows cast sejak the moon’s light for the golden helmet.

There! It was still rolling down the slope, bumping over the rock covered ground. Behind him, Jason heard the manticore let out a terrible roar. Soon, it would pick up the courage to make the leap across the river and, sejak then, he needed to be far away.

He scrambled to his feet, his hands clawing at the wet ground in his haste to reach the golden helmet. He slid and slipped down the slope after it, his years of training paying off as they kept him from tripping over the hidden stones and holes in the long, tangling grass. He used the trees around him to help keep him upright, but the golden topi keledar continued to pick up speed as it rolled down the hill.

Jason watched as it crashed against a boulder jutting out of the ground and finally come to a stop. He let go of the pokok he was clinging onto for support and slid the rest of the way down to the boulder and the helmet. He picked it up carefully, brushing the mud and dirt off it. His mentor wanted it back in one piece and he knew better, now, than to disobey a direct order from his mentor. So, using the cloth of his shirt, he scrubbed it until it was clean once again – atau as much as he could tell in the light from the moon.

He had just decided to make sure he was in one piece, too, when another loud roar came from the manticore, still up the slope.

Jason raised his eyes to look in the direction the roar had come. He couldn’t tell whether the manticore had made it across the river yet – whether it had faced its fear atau not – and he really didn’t want to stay and find out. So, holding the topi keledar even tighter than before so there was no chance of it coming out of his grip, he carefully made his way down the slope, using the soft moon’s radiance to avoid boulders and other obstacles that covered the ground.

He had barely gone eleven paces when something hard slammed against a boulder beside him, followed a saat later sejak another landing in the ground between his feet. It was covered in a shiny liquid that glowed sejak the moon’s light. The needle had passed so close sejak his leg that it had torn the cloth of his pants.

Jason turned slowly to look back the way he had come.

Standing with some deadly majesty on a boulder above him, was the manticore. Its kala jengking tail was arched over its back, the points of the needles glistening almost as dangerously as its eyes. And the eyes themselves bore down into Jason’s, like they could see into his very soul. He realised he would’ve been rooted to the spot if he had been ignorant of the manticore’s ability to destroy him completely. But knowing this fact kept him alert, it unlocked his muscles and allowed him to back a few paces further down the slope.

The manticore’s tail twitched and slowly, it lowered the tail back until the tip of it was almost touching the ground. Then it flicked it to the front again, unleashing a sword-sharp needle. Twice lebih the manticore did this, in little lebih than a few seconds, so that three poisoned needles were headed directly for Jason.

With speed that surprised even him, Jason had drawn his sword and, deflecting the first needle, sending it spinning away from him. At the same time, his sword went pulled out of his hands from the force of the needle’s flight. He dodged the saat needle and felt the wind from the third ruffle his hair before it embedded itself in the ground. He looked around for his sword, but it was laying a fair jump away.

The manticore snarled in anger, making Jason glance back up at him. It was leaping down the slope towards him with agility that he suddenly envied, turning to face the treacherous decent. But he had no choice but to keep going, so he pushed himself over another boulder and started slipping down the bukit again, with lebih haste.

He hadn’t gone very far when, sejak the dim light of the moon, he saw something ahead of him that made his hati, tengah-tengah freeze – the slope ended in a sudden and deadly drop.

Jason struggled to slow himself, cutting his palms on rumput strands as he pulled at anything to stop his slipping decent. He managed to come to a stop before he fell off the edge of the sudden cliff, and he knocked quite a few small stones down into the dark abyss as he scrambled away from the deadly edge.

The manticore saw the danger, too, and came to a lebih graceful stop than Jason. It snarled as it skidded on its four paws, small rocks skittering away from it. Jason was trying to get away from it, back up the slope. The manticore pounced, landing between Jason and his escape. He scrambled backwards, tripping back towards the edge of the cliff. He felt his heel slip off and his arms waved as he tried to regain balance, his mentor’s heavy topi keledar in his left hand upsetting his steadiness. If he dropped that over the edge… he may as well just jump after it.

The manticore took a step forward, its eyes watching Jason closely. Its human face smiled wickedly. There was nowhere to run. The manticore didn’t need to use its poisoned needles, Jason was trapped between the edge of the cliff and the monster’s sharp claws.

Jason realised this, too. He stared into the eyes of the manticore, holding the topi keledar against his chest, ready to throw it. If this was the end, the manticore wasn’t going to get its paws on his mentor’s helmet, even if it meant losing it.

He glanced over his shoulder for an instant, and then back at the manticore. Its grin was growing wider, it took another step forward.

“Nowhere left to go,” it growled. Its voice resounded in Jason’s ears, deep and menacing. “Nowhere left to go but down.”

Jason glanced below him again.

“I know,” he berkata to the manticore, and then he back flipped over the edge.

The manticore let out a surprised and angry snarl and leapt ke hadapan to peer down into the valley far below… just as the pegasus gave a mighty flap of its wings and launched itself up past the monster’s head. With Jason clinging tightly to its mane one-handed – his other hand clutching the topi keledar – the winged horse galloped through the sky and up towards the shining full moon, its great feathered wings pure silver in the light.

Below them, the manticore let out a series of livid roars and growls. It launched poisoned needle after needle, but they fell short. The pegasus was already too far across the valley, its galloping flight taking Jason to safety.

He looked back over his shoulder to watch the manticore getting smaller and smaller. Only when it was invisible in the night, did he turn back to the front and stroke the winged horse’s slender, white neck, allowing himself a small grin of triumph.

“Thank you,” he whispered to the pegasus, knowing it could hear him above the sound of the wind. He looked up at the star-filled sky. “Now, can anda take me to Mount Pelion? I think Chiron will be wanting his topi keledar back.”

THE END

So, anyway. CHIRON is the centaur that trained Jason when Jason was sent to his care because his dad's brother killed his dad to become king and was going to kill him because he was the heir atau something... Anyway, Chiron is his mentor, tutour and trainer and he lived at Mount Pelion, which is in Greece of course, and it looks really pretty from the photographs... xD Anyway, the competition is 2000 words... I can't write short-stories, but this about 1888 words, so I'm good xD