I stepped back into the water, reliving the sensation of that cold liquid swirling around me. As I did, I invested coins into my Agility stat.
[Investing 1890 coins in Agility.]
[Agility Lv. 3 - Agility Lv. 10]
Speed would the greatest asset I'd need to fight the Nightshades, the Grade 6 monster. Hell, I having one stat being level 10 wasn't enough.
(But I won't have enough coins if I invest them all into stats.)
I just spent nearly two thousand coins. Yeah, if I were to spend all my money and survive the scenario, it'd be worth it because of the scenario payout, but spending money because you know you'll get more is a bad financial habit. You have more when you save.
(Plus... plus, I can do this, as I am, right here, right now.)
I stepped into the water and approached the Nightshade. I felt like a ronin from a Japanese movie. I took my stance, facing down the enemy but... I wasn't calm. My breathing felt ragged - if I was breathing at all - and by looking at my bokken, I could see a subtle tremble in the object.
(Oh.)
I am shaking like a leaf.
(Shit, shit, shit, shit.)
Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuuuuuuckkkkk....
Realizing that... broke me. Doubt crept in, doubt in the strength I had, in the certainty of my actions.
Sudden thought, but I hate the movies and the books and the comics and the webtoons and the manga - any artistic medium that conveys hype moments.
We made violence feel so easy and accessible and cool, as if anyone could do it, but when push comes to shove? People balk. They shake like a leaf. Every thought that convinced me to do this felt like naive bravado now.
(Unfocused and untrained, that's what I am.)
People more experienced than me have died before: Soldiers, Marines, Navy Seals, Special Forces in the Army or in the Air Force. For the civilian side: Police, Firemen, or SWAT.
All of those people were individuals who formed teams and who trained and prepared themselves in order to confront the dangers of combat situations. Combat situations that invite death.
Yet they can still die. All it takes is one sniper. One IED. One criminal who drew his gun faster. One floorboard to give out as a fire rages, trapping you. Essentially, one unexpected element.
So who am I, a fifteen year old boy, to think that I can fight another monster from another world? What do I have that the people above don't? What will allow me to survive?
(I... I-)
I can't think of it right now. Why... why am I feeling like this? After what I've done...?
(Oh...)
A heavy hand grabbed my soul. Eight pairs of heavy hands seized me and my breath was taken from me. The hazy images of bodies flashed against my eyelids every time I closed them. I killed people from the old world that I used to live in, the people that I perceived as bastards. I did it... because it was easy. Because there was minimal resistance. Because I knew I could get away with it. Now there's a real challenge with real resistance... but I hesitate.
What is that mentality?
(A bully's.)
There's fighting and then there's killing. Then there's murder. Am I just an easy killer? One who is unable to fight? That is the question that cannot be answered if I do nothing.
I grit my teeth and temper my impatience. All of these feelings won't make me rush in. I wait for my moment, staring down my enemy.
Finally, it moves. The Nightshade's oblong feet rest on the little gravel shore bordering the river, somehow making no sound with every step it makes. It slips into the rushing water while chills run through my body. It's so inhumanely quiet, as if it doesn't exist in this reality. Silent night personified, coming towards me. The river water doesn't push up and froth against the Nightshade, as if physics aren't registering its existence.
I see it now, looming over me... the Nightshade. It's taller than professional basketball players. The arms, its entire body, and its mouth, dear god, its mouth - it's a perfect mess. An aversion to nature made manifest. The person who made this is sick in the head.
We stare each other down. The Nightshade and I are both unwavering. It's waiting for me and I'm waiting for it. The one who strikes first seizes the initiative, but also gives the most information. How could I strike with precision and obscure my movement?
"Ah."
[Constellation "General-Slayer" thinks you've come across a revelation.]
The river water coiling around my shins answers the question.
I launch myself into action against the Nightshade. It bears down on me, but I stand tall. I swing my bokken and-
-Swish-
-it cuts through the water, bringing a thick handful up into the air. The Nightshade leans back, not even flinching, but my water strike causes a few droplets to land on its face.
(This is the technique.)
I stand a few meters away, circling the Nightshade, striking the rushing river water into the air, causing it to land on its face.
(If I can get behind it-)
It lashes out at me.
"Holy shit!!!"
The tendrils from its arm start to undulate and pulse in my direction, lashing out like a living whip, a coil of snakes attached to a stick and used as a weapon.
I jump, kicking up splashes of water as I try to avoid tripping.
[Constellation "Abyssal Black Flame Dragon" is cackling.]
[Constellation "Innumerable Hand of Madness" is cackling too.]
(Shit!!)
I do everything to prevent myself from landing on my ass. I throw myself back from the Nightshade, heading back to the shore I came from.
(Wait.)
Chills run through my arms and body. It's like a shockwave was sent through my flesh from my spine.
I turn around.
"Oh."
Three more Nightshades are there, standing on the gravel shore of this little river, waiting for me, smiling. Standing so still they felt like statues instead of living monsters.
(Although, do you even count as being alive?)
"Sssssszzzzaaaaaa...."
I heard a weird hissing to my right and turn back to the Nightshade that was standing in the river. Its mouth is wide open and countless thin tongues resembling wires are licking its teeth and hanging from its thin lips - if it had any.
-!Crick!-
The first sound the Nightshades made. I'm perpendicular to them so I turn to my left and see that one of the Nightshades have drawn closer.
[Constellation "Innumerable Hand of Persevering Madness" is sneering.]
My eyes dart back to the right and I see the river Nightshade is less than fifteen feet from me. The arms look like they can reach within seven feet. Would I see a Nightshade lunge at me?
(They trapped me on this side. The first sound it made was a simple distraction. A creature so silent, anything unordinary it does draws you in.)
I take a few steps back to reorient myself, keeping the four Nightshades in my peripheral vision so they're not in my blind spot.
(They like to move when I'm not watching.)
Including the four Nightshades and I, the five of us stood still for minutes as I thought to myself.
(I am a fool.)
I should've just run away. That would've been the safest option. Even if they chased me, the greatest safety measure is establishing distance. Why did I demand myself to fight? What do I have to prove? The thoughts tumbled in my mind like a landslide.
(Everything...) I thought bitterly.
I close my eyes and my head falls. I have to prove everything, especially to myself, but what is everything?
(That I can do this. That I can get that contract from Surt. That I can convince Dokkaebi Herald that I'm an interesting Incarnation. That I can kill-)
"-monsters, humans, demons, and Constellations."
I open my eyes and see this message.
[Constellation "Secretive Plotter" is wondering what you are muttering about.]
(I'm just a loser, muttering to myself as I'm about to die, aren't I?)
That final spark of rage. The ignition in my soul. The enraged thought, "This will not stand."
"I'll kill you all!!!"
[Constellation "Abyssal Black Flame Dragon" didn't hear what you said.]
[Constellation "Secretive Plotter" is interested in your sudden emotion.]
[Constellation "Innumerable Hand of Madness" is clapping.]
***
Ethan Nakamura exploded into movement. A surge of energy, maybe mixed with desperation, the will to live, and hatred... but hatred for what? Nonetheless, it fueled him. His sudden thrashing in the water prompted the Nightshades; they exploded into action too. They broke their unnamed silence with disgusting speed, moving too fast for the human eye to register.
With the speed of cheetahs, the feelers of a jellyfish, and the finesse of Muhammad Ali, all four Nightshades charged Ethan. They were still audibly silent while throwing out their arms, which the tendrils glistened in the morning sun, reflecting a sheen like a polished car. Perhaps these creatures were biological machines?
It didn't matter to Ethan in that moment. All that mattered was living and fighting, and proving that he could do it. He dodged swipes, weaved under arms, and smashed his old bokken into shins and knees.
[Constellation "Innumerable Hand of Madness" is impressed.]
[Constellation "The Black One, Lord of Muspelheim" is stroking their beard.]
At last, the Constellation that Ethan wanted the most attention from: Surt. Now he remembered why he convinced himself to do this.
("Only the greatest, the smartest, the craziest, and the most interesting will survive.")
Dokkaebi Herald's words echoed in Ethan's head. Ethan believed that being mediocre was the greatest crime. He needed to reach higher, claw further, walk forward to a place where no other human was willing to go.
So he'd take these risks again and again.
"Shit!!"
Ethan raised his bokken above his body and a Nightshade's arm tendril finally smashed into his small frame, but the force of the strike was taken by the block. The lash only smacked Ethan's back, deflecting off of his thick rain jacket. The Nightshade growled and as soon as it retracted its tendril, the appendage began to vibrate. Soon, it grew barbs, jutting out like the diamond-shaped scales of a dragon. The Nightshade updated itself, turning its arm into a barbed whip.
If that lashed against Ethan's body, the barb would tear his clothes and the toxin would envenomate his flesh, but... Ethan would take these risks again and again, even though there's a price to pay for his ambition. What would be the final cost in the end? What would he be willing to pay?
"AAARRGGHHH!!!"
He shouts and ducks below the whirling whips of a Nightshade's arm and instead of an aggressive strike reminiscent of Japanese warriors, he takes a different stance and performs a different move.
He lunges and thrusts. Essentially, a stab.
(Please-!)
Ethan misses. The stubby, blunt point of his bokken misses its mark, merely glancing off of the Nightshade's thigh. It deflects due to poor form.
To his lack of practice and commitment to skill.
[Constellation "General-Slayer" is disappointed in your attack.]
(Fuck!!)
He freezes.
(Where do I dodge?!)
Ethan was under this Nightshade's right arm - he kept on dodging to his left, the Nightshade's right - because he didn't want to dodge into the Nightshade's guard, its range of motion. Arms naturally move inward because of the bend at the elbow.
But Ethan kept on doing that, so now he feared being predictable, so now he wanted to move unexpectedly, but dodging to the left would be too stupid. That didn't even factor the other three Nightshades around him.
Thus, he froze and was still under the Nightshade's arm. The tendrils swirl downwards.
(Fool.)
A Nightshade's tendrils, which constitutes the arms, can unfurl and move in any direction. The convention of dodging under an attack and striking the lower portion of the body didn't apply to a creature that had near-omnidirectional defense and offense.
The tendrils strike down towards Ethan. Fear jackknifes his heart. He crouches so low until he's almost completely in the water and he brings his bokken above his head, swinging it in a wide horizontal arc, akin to a helicopter blade.
The tendrils meet and curl around the wood and Ethan knows he won't be able to tug the bokken back without being touched.
With a burst of speed, he hurls himself forward as he lets go of his old bokken, reaching into his pants pocket and whipping out his other weapon - his dedicated tool for many years - in his right hand: his pocket knife.
In an uncharacteristic, fluid motion, he ejects the blade with his thumb, proceeds to gain a firm grip, and then holds it at an angle as he passes the standing Nightshade. The point meets flesh and there's resistance, but Ethan pushes against that resistance with all his strength until that resistance pops like a balloon.
(Shit!)
The Nightshade brought its left arm behind its back, bending it an obscene angle in order to strike Ethan, but he dips under the attack and stumbles a few feet away.
(More!!)
Ethan falls into the river hands first, and his wrists cry out from the impact, but now on all fours, he crawls like a mad alligator, moving faster in the water while still gripping his knife.
[Constellation "Abyssal Black Flame Dragon" is guffawing from your funny looking moment.]
Ethan turns his neck to look behind him like how Toby Macguire's Peter Parker did in the first Sam Raimi Spider-Man movie.
He sees it. A small, almost unnoticeable gash in the Nightshade's upper thigh. There's an ooze of purplish-black. Blood? What's that saying? If it bleeds, you can kill it? Perhaps.
(I did it. I landed a cut.)
The Nightshade he slashed stands still for a moment. Then it opens its mouth and screams.
"Sssssaaaaaagggghhhh!!!"
A shrill shriek. The other three Nightshades dash towards Ethan, bending themselves like wrestlers. Their mouths are open wide.
Three means of attack. The two arms that are on either side of them, and the leering, open jaw in the middle, dipping down, trying to bite like a wild animal.
What's three times three? Nine. Because all Nightshades were charging with inhuman coordination, Ethan must now deal with nine different means of attack from multiple angles. Or was it more due to the tendrils? Was it more due to the variations in which they can attack? Was nine means of attack or dozens because Ethan didn't factor in the combinations of all of those factors? Bites, swipes, and lashes. He also didn't factor the kicks from the Nightshade's legs or perhaps a simple tackle.
This boy... has spirit.
Yet he's beyond his britches.
-Ding!-
So that's why. That's why there would be a select few - perhaps out of pity, interest, or compassion - that would help him.
[A new Constellation has entered channel #HE-2020!]
[An unnamed Constellation is revealing their modifier!]
[Constellation "Innumerable Hand of Longing" is willing to aid you!]