The Raven's POV-Chapter 35: It was just the 1st phase

He raised his sword and swung down splitting a chunk of an incoming tentacle whilst redirecting the rest to the side.

Above. Below. And from the front. He was surrounded by them.

One came crashing down from above– an attempt to crush his head perhaps.

Tentacles weren’t that big, 15 centimeters in diameter at best, 7 centimeters at lowest.

Every tentacle ended with a pincer like that of a crab.

If caught it could very well snap his body in half, from the waist.

He drove his sword into the side of another tentacle and instead of cutting it cleanly, he used the hilt as a foot hold to stand onto the tentacle.

He ran atop the tentacle, sword in hand; a different sword– a katana

Rowayne had tried to recreate the phenomenon by which he got the sword and succeeded, and he did so in the middle of the battle.

A total insanity, but perhaps insanity was exactly what was needed to fight a losing battle.

Running on the tentacle which could hold his weight surprisingly well,

The tentacles that went past him turned and followed him, they were faster than him

One came aiming at his shoulders, he bent his knees just enough for it to miss him by inches and chopped it.

It was a blessing that tentacles did not change directions unpredictably, he was sure they could but didn’t – the figure was testing him, it did not aim to kill him, not yet. That much Rowayne could tell.

What did it want?, why test him?, heck why was he fighting in the first place – Rowayne did not have time to ponder on these questions

One thing was clear, the figure wanted a performance, and Rowayne had to perform well, to survive, for survival.

And thing about these kind of performances, they would not be good if he kept staying in comfort zone

Yes, being tired, barely dodging was still inside the comfort zone, at least for the figure it was otherwise why would he still be fighting?

He needed something to impress the figure.

So he narrowed his eyes, focusing on an incoming tentacle. The optimal path he could envision was to side step, cut and duck to dodge the next tentacle

But he did not do that. Instead he cut the tentacle he was standing on, the tentacle dissolved into dark water, leaving him in a state of free fall. 𝘧𝓇ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝘣𝓃ℴ𝓋𝑒𝑙.𝑐𝘰𝑚

His sword traced an arc, in upward direct, cutting the incoming tentacle that was previously aimed at his side

He kept falling, directly towards a tentacle that had erupted just beneath him

He could dodge, so he didn’t instead he pointed his sword down

The tip of the sword touch the pincer of tentacle, he rolled mid air and slashed the tentacle three before crashing to the ground

The dark water acted like a trampoline, sending upward, where he latched onto a tentacle.

He swung his sword recklessly, full of opening he was, but he didn’t care

The tentacles dissolved before they hit him. He always cuts them first.

He was back at the ground, even after all that gymnastics, the distance between him and the figure remained the same.

He pushed and in return was pushed back, the figure still hasn’t moved an inch. Calmly observing Rowayne.

Rowayne cut, cut and kept cutting.

He slashed upward, downwards, vertically, horizontally even diagonally.

Amidst relentless slashes, he felt something, an epiphany, there was a rhythm to it, to the movements of him, of the tentacles.

Like notes of music, he was a musician. The sword was the tool, the slashes were the keys.

He could press on them hazardlessly and create sharp unpleasant noise or he could press deliberately giving weight to each key, just right and he could create a symphony

He could see it now, an underlying rhythm, guided by invisible hands he followed the tune he was seeing,

He cut, but this time, there was a subtle shift in demeanour, something the figure noticed but made no comments on, he focused not on cutting his opponent but on the act of cutting itself.

His sword flowed from one tentacle to another, no longer focused on cleanly cutting them in half, only in connecting one strike to another.

Result showed themselves as his breathing stabilized, he was no long thinking about his next move only following the trail he could envision in his mind,

That gave him time, precious time to analyse his situation.

He noticed while he was tired, there was no fatigue building up, even his tiredness was lessening with each passing moment

Second thing he noticed the wounds, or more precisely the lack of them, the severed tentacles dissolved into dark water, some of which fell onto his skin.

That healed his wounds.

The dark waters; that was what Rowayne was calling the ground he was standing on.

It looked like water dyed black, but behaved erratically, devoid of any logic as far as Rowayne could discern – he couldn’t see any.

It sometimes felt like cold fog, other times like oil, or like a solid ground.

Like it itself could not decide on what form it should take and what properties it should retain.

But it was an ally that much, Rowayne was sure of. It healed him, gave him a weapon

He could try to see what else it could do but he did not have time to leisurely experiment.

But he could see the light at the end of the dark tunnel, he thought he could win.

A delusion that was broken as soon as it was formed

The figure clapped his hands

"Are you finally taking this seriously?, I get the appeal of slowly taking your time testing your strength against an easy opponent just to finish them off later, make no mistake I am nothing like the weaklings you have faced thus far"

"So fight with your full strength before my patience run out"

(A/N~ sorry the fight is draggin on longer than expected)