Struggling, the two swordsmen were once more in a desperate standoff. This time, however, they were not separated by a comfortable distance of a few meters.
No, one in heavy armor was kneeling, a long, one-edged blade in hand, short bouts of tremors running through its entire body.
The other stood high, his own blade far shorter, a golden shimmer through the thin, battered cloth covering his chest and his eyes almost entirely bloodshot as he forced down the blade with all the force the youth could muster.
He felt pain run through every fiber in his body as the light emanating from his chest only strengthened in intensity to the point it could no longer be overlooked.
And despite the pain that was now the only sensation he could feel, aching all over his body, a mad smile suffused his lips.
Struggling as their blades lost ground and gained it back in equal measure.
This could not continue.
The white, strained youth was well aware that he could not sustain the struggle for long.
So, deciding how to proceed, he wove his thoughts into action in one quick movement. With a sudden motion, he pressed down with all his strength, which the armored figure seemed intent on matching, not wanting to lose any ground. No, furthermore, it was trying to fight back, as the kneeling armored legs tremblingly began to straighten.
Noctis was gradually being suppressed. He could feel the armored opponent's massive frame rising from its knees, metal-clad knees pushing upward, shifting both their centers of gravity. Their blades locked, but the sheer weight behind the armored figure's weapon pressed down relentlessly, forcing Noctis to brace and adjust his footing, his boots scraping for balance on the rough stone surface. With every heartbeat, the towering figure squared its shoulders and leaned in, one gauntleted hand sliding lower on the blade for added leverage. Before long, Noctis sensed that his narrow advantage in quickness and skill would be overwhelmed. If the armored giant straightened fully and brought all its strength to bear, Noctis's sword would be battered aside, and all he had left was the desperate tension coiling through his exhausted muscles.
However, before that could come to be, the madman's smiling expression calmed down as the murderous glint in his eyes was replaced by a silent satisfaction.
Then, when Noctis felt the force produced by the armored man was about to become unbearable, the force produced by his blade suddenly vanished as it slipped below with the rest of his body. The large blade suddenly lost the resistance that held it in place and swung forward uncontrollably with a frightening amount of force, cutting into a wall of nearby thread.
"Haa!" Noctis let out a self-confident laugh, and he seemed to wind up for another strike.
His gamble had worked out. If the armored thing had simply held back, this would have gone terribly wrong.
The image of his body being smashed into the floor and cleaved in two flashed through the back of his mind.
This was the outcome he had wished for. Ready to strike down the wide-open armored man with one swift move, just before bringing down the blade, his body froze.
Noctis's expression tensed up and was replaced by one of exasperation as his eyes, which had become almost unseeing, traced the lone line that represented his fate, being snapped apart.
Was there only one future in front?
He suddenly redirected his stance and jumped back a few steps.
The next moment, the blade that should have been entangled within the threads came back with force he would have been unable to react to, cleaving through Noctis's previous position.
Watching the mighty, murderous strike, Noctis's expression turned grim.
It had been a sobering sight, paired with the alarm bells ringing in his mind, which only deepened the impression.
Right!
Something had to change.
Chastising himself for being pulled along by murderous, rage-filled bloodlust he had just experienced, Noctis took a moment's time to gather his thoughts.
Then his expression changed; with it, his eyes, which at this point had mostly lost their use, closed, and the air of arrogance that had encompassed and almost consumed him left without a trace.
It was time to change gears.
Jumping back, merely following intuition to avoid getting entangled in the environment, Noctis's mind wandered to a very recent memory. One far more ingrained within his mind, one with its beginnings and ends unclearly defined, only overlapping with certain parts of his being and greatly differing in others.
These memories were of a culture of the warship of knowledge. Not that of wisdom, but one of prophecy. One that was built on sacrifice and the prophecies of past and future.
A small settlement far different than his home at the Hive, as most people not originating within the Abyssal city called it.
A small settlement built around a temple, where none but wommen were allowed. Where one's eyes were gouged out when entering, being conscripted never to leave its service.
It was a temple filled with women, women whose eyes were missing, women who never left but one day a year.
And that had been a… joyous or… was it gruesome and terrifying day?
Nocits had difficulty to tell.
His mind told him that he should have felt disgusted, but his emotions, or at least a small part of them, did not agree.
Shaking his head to rid himself of the musings, Noctis threw his sword forward, aimed at the lone dark blur in the sea of gold tinged with red, some parts more pronounced than others.
Knitting his brows at the sight, Noctis had no time to ruminate as he followed a preplanned order of actions. His hands hidden behind his back, he traversed further back, building up more distance, without showing his back to the opponent.
Hearing a loud clang resound a few seconds later, Nocits did not stop.
Each hand of his was hidden from sight, as both produced silk one followed the movements of previous actions, quickly forming a sword or more of a dagger.
The other hand's movements were more crude, as they created something softer and more fitting for the threads Noctis produced.
The next instant, Noctis jumped to the side as he wrapped the object he had just created around his head, or more precisely, his eyes, blotting out the little he could see completely.
Thinking of his actions, Noctis felt compelled to chuckle, blinding his already close-to-useless eyes completely… blinding his eyes after swearing never to do so again- what irony.
But then what he saw was not complete darkness.
But that singular thread of fate originated from his body and split off into differing directions. To Noctis's altered senses, these threads appeared as luminous lines in a hazy darkness, each one humming with an impossible tension he both saw and somehow felt dragging against his skin and bones. Their texture was tangible in his mind: one glowed warm and steady, another cold and jagged, each vibrating with the resonance of potential futures. The air itself tasted heavy and sharp, tin and fire flooding his mouth as his instincts traced the nearest path to survival, every thread tugging at the edges of his perception with promise or threat.
There were fewer options than usualy but those that were seen were thicker.
Making the short observation, Noctis chose one of the strings that did not sever along its path and quickly followed it, the other strings fading as the one he followed grew in width.
No, it had grown even before Noctis had made the decision.
Jumping forward with all his might, his tendons and muscles aching all over his body.
I used the rune too long.
As he confronted the fact that he had gotten carried away before, Noctis didn't stop searching the darkness, searching the tapestry of fate in hopes of finding a solution for the current endeavor.
Jumping from string to string, following the path that guaranteed his safety the longest, Noctis dodged strike after strike in the dark world of his.
When he looked over at a cluster of severed fate, a place where death was almost certain, Noctis finally noticed something.
There was another string of fate, a string that did not originate from him, nor from the armored figure.
In truth, it truly had no strings that represented the very essence of life originating from it, which was truly out of the ordinary.
But there were some strings that had no connection to him, and every path to life was on a collision course with them.
The small strings did not quite originate where he estimated the armored figure to be, or where it would be, rather. In the first place, he only grasped its position by a tugging intuition, paired with the knowledge that some places had more severed fates than others.
With that said, the bundle of unconnected strings circling on a singular spot was located somewhere between him and a frightening amount of severed strings.
Not giving further direction of action, Nocits began following the most direct path to that silently waiting bundle of string.
With the sudden change of direction, Nocits quickly heard the clangor of metal grow louder as the heavily armored figure began its approach anew.
This time, however, he was approaching that sound aswell.
Feeling his heart race at the increasingly louder, pumping footsteps approaching, Nocits own movements were planned out as if he could see his surroundings and was not currently wearing a blindfold.
It was almost as if he had lived without the gift of sight or burden, as the temple maidens called it throughout his entire life.
Noticing the path he followed split first in two, then in three, one staying on the current path, another drifting to the side, and the third directing upward.
Not wasting a second, Nocits followed his currently overly sensitive intuition and jumped forward, straightening his body to the utmost.
Suddenly, a gust of air blew past him, accompanied by the loud sound of something being swung, ending in a loud explosion.
Landing on the ground a second later, he flawlessly converted his movements into a roll and, from there, without losing his velocity in the slightest.
Having overcome the armored figure's attack, Noctis's movements slowed down as he reached his goal.
Just in front of there was that bundle of string, winding up his arm for the brink of an eye. A tremor ran through the bundle of string.
It had noticed… but too late.
Without hesitation, Nocits struck forward, his hand breaking through a layer of something thin and silky. A layer of silk.
Beyond it, his hand reached a cavity, and there, he caught his target in his grasp and pulled back.
Within the bundle of thread that only he could see, it moved back. It was a bundle of thread in his unseeing eyes, but in his hand it had a very different texture. It was soft and smooth, but had a fragile core that could easily break, filled with light, probably hollow bones.
Not having the time to analyze its intricacies. After all, the situation was urgent.
Noctis began exerting force, but before he could crush the small, hand-sized bundle of string or whatever it was in reality. It let out a sound, a sound that made Noctis's entire being freeze and tremble.
"Chirp—ahm Craw."
Not moving for a moment, Noctis's hand eventually shakily moved to his face.
With brief hesitation, one of his fingers crammed beneath the blind fold, pulling down just enough for one of his bloodshot eyes to fall upon the bird that was held tightly in the palm of his hand.
It was not a small songbird, the one Lia cared about so much, the one he had learned to hate, but miss all the same. No, it was of an entirely different species, and yet that goddam sound.
"S-Stop squishing me, you roughean!"
He trembled.
That goddam sound that bird so loved to make.
Those chirps it gave off whenever it tried to gain attention.
"Ahm… Roughean?"
Staring at the black bird a raven, if he remembered right- a small trickle of tears ran along the left side of his face, as the bird, with its long beak, its thin legs, and glistening feathers, simply stared at him in stupefaction. Its body was tightly held in his grasp, as if he would never let it go.