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READ THE NOVEL- Chapters 1-31 - ERBzine

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Tarzan on Mars<br />

that brought the towering brute to the floor, and in the next<br />

instant the Lord of the Jungle pounced upon him and smashed<br />

home his fist straight into Thum's Cyclopean face.<br />

Several of the prisoners gasped when they saw that<br />

almost featureless face crack under the terrible impact. The<br />

blow that could instantly kill a giant thoat split open Thum's<br />

face and drew forth a dark, slow river of ghastly blood. By<br />

ordinary human standards, he should have died, yet it was<br />

only then that it came to the monster's stunned senses that<br />

he would have to defend his life against this unsuspected<br />

demon of a white man who but a moment before had been his<br />

intended victim.<br />

Instead of lying there in bloody, broken dissolution,<br />

Thum rumbled an incoherent warning and rose slowly to his<br />

feet with the apeman clinging to him.<br />

"Tarzan!" cried Kar Komak. "He is synthetic, not human!<br />

No part of him can die except by complete dismemberment<br />

and starvation or by fire! Don not try to destroy him! Break<br />

away!"<br />

Too late did this warning come to the apeman, however,<br />

for he now found himself pinned against Thum's giant chest<br />

in a cold, dead grip of granite, so ponderous and immovable<br />

did it seem. Yet he struggled mightily to get his own arms<br />

inside that grip before the life should be crushed from him.<br />

Slowly, inch by inch, as though he were bending iron bars, he<br />

thrust his arms up under him agains Thum's body, to where<br />

he could start bracing back, and when finally he was ready, he<br />

pushed outward against his adversary with a savage burst of<br />

energy, almost blacking out with the effort. As he did so,<br />

Thum's great arms yielded, and Tarzan broke free, hurtling<br />

to the opposite end of the dungeon.<br />

Thum stood there breathing heavily, his broken, bleeding<br />

face impossible to decipher, but his huge, single eye held<br />

fast upon the figure of his antagonist. As the apeman rose<br />

again to his feet, Kar Komak suddenly stepped into Thum's<br />

<strong>31</strong>2

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