>>6080943"If this ends up being another Stranger, I swear to God," Marie mutters before sidestepping you and engaging the fiend in melee.
In the following moments, you notice that the thing can deflect and parry her blows with its claws, most likely a combination of biology and reinforcement magic. Though it acts in a manner where its wrists and arms are prioritized in its defense, a weak point? You'll have to exploit that. You find your chance when Marie takes a blow to the arm then torso from the fiend's claws and is sent reeling back into the bridge's pillar, rather close to Ota's corpse. Instead of committing to ending her, however, it changes its form once again to that of a hawk, and its avian head turns towards you.
But it's too late for it, far too late, you’ve been given time to plan. You pull the trigger on Ota's gun and a bullet finds purchase in the bird's shoulder. The changeling shifts and falls from the pain. You take the initiative to advance with your eternal companion, impacting her with the changeling's wrist from what you figured is its dominant wrist, severing the entire hand from its body. Again, it shouts in pain as its claws fall into the water below, and its other clawed hand cradles its new stump. Words full of vitriol in both the common tongue and many you cannot claim to know are thrown towards you, Marie, everything, as it backs up towards the ledge and its body again begins to transform.
Yet, in a split second, it starts to grow scales, and you
>Go in for the kill. The enemy has an experienced changeling; it's too dangerous to let live>Allow the wounded beast to flee with its tail between it's legs>Knock the changeling out, but you're unsure if it'd even survive unconscious with three major wounds>[Write-in] 