There was a heavy bundle of severe feeling sensations flaring around every inch of , so of which more painful than others, but there were none at all that did not afflict any sort of stinging, sharpness, aching, nor throbbing whatsoever.
It was like my entire body beca a catalyst of pain - and Jay… grin-baring, light-bearing Jay was its wielder.
But if there was anything at all that I could say about the mont at hand… it'd be the fact that it was strangely familiar.
This pain, this predicant.
I distinctly rembered the last ti I found myself forcefully pinned up against a concrete slab. How the hell could I ever forget? The way my sight blurred and unblurred, the feeling of every breath… like a cinderblock pressing heavily against my chest. How I squird and how I writhed. It wasn't exactly a mory you'd keep in a ditch sowhere in the short-term.
The only thing that tore the similarities of past and present asunder was the lack of touch - any way you look at it, there was nothing that kept hovering inches from the ground, nothing that kept pressed against the wall.
Unlike the iron-grip of jagged claws, unlike the bruteness of Alia's approach, Jay hadn't the need to get up and close when it ca to inflicting harm on others.
Yet sohow, his just felt a lot more personal.
I felt myself moving again, not of my own volition. My hands, legs, torso, everything, it felt as if invisible strings had been tethered to every single part of and they were being pulled again - forcefully.
Jay pulled his arm back, and in turn, I was dragged along with it.
I was sent hurtling, like a speeding bullet expelled out the barrel of a gun, from one side of the room to the next, from one wall to the other. I didn't even know how fast I was going, where I was going, not until I heard… not until I felt the impact.
It sounded like a wet splat, felt like even more than that - the entirety of my left side bashing hard against concrete, and the entirety of my right eting the sudden plumt, crushing empty cardboard boxes on the floor.
What was up, what was down, left, and right, I didn't know what was what. I just knew I had to get back up on my feet and fast and so I did. Regardless of the immobilizing twinging on my left shoulder, regardless of my legs so numb to the core.
Had this been two months earlier, had this been a two-month-ago-, I highly doubt I'd even be standing as I was. That would have been knocked ice-cold way back at the initial collision.
At this point, agonizing pain wasn't just so faraway prospect I cross my fingers to avoid. Now, after everything… to , dealing with pain has beco just another part and parcel of my ever topsy-turvy life.
Didn't an it doesn't hurt like a fucking bitch though. The growing pounding in my battered skull can certainly vouch for on that front.
Swaying, steps unbalanced, I spun around my garbled sights trying to focus it front and center onto the murky figure before , echoing footsteps on steady approach.
Another impact like that and the janitor on duty will be scraping my brain matter off the walls all the way to next week, I just know it. I can't let that happen again.
I focused. Through soring lungs I breathed, determined. And through arms aching, outstretched, I steadied my intent.
Jay stopped at center stage of the room, peered over at , and cracked another amused smirk.
"That stance," He remarked, blowing a breath to ringed lips. "Oh, that takes way back. I rembered taking that sa stance too. Young, naive, magical-less, . Hey, indulge for a sec - you haven't a fucking clue what you're doing, do you?"
A question asked ant an answer is to be given, but seriously I felt like if I open my mouth even at the slightest slit, the only thing I'll be giving away then would be yesterday's eggs and toast.
Needless to say, Jay did not hear a single peep from . Not that it seed to bother him all that much going by his widening smile.
"I sense so magic coming from you. That's promising. Can you use it though? Co on, use it. I wanna see."
Now he was just trying to rile up - really, I much prefer him aggressive than patronizing, I really wish he'd just continue raising his hands against instead of mockingly stretching them out wide on either side, surrendering all show of hostility.
"Co on, do it!" He goaded. "Sothing simple, sothing easy. Knock over or sothing, you surely can do that much at least, right?"
There he was, adding literal insult to injury… but I wasn't going to let myself succumb to such underhanded tactics. I kept that focus, felt that whirring fan within flowing through my veins. Everything was within, I just gotta get it out past the surface.
Focus, focus…
No subjugating… that's still beyond you for now. Do what he did… if you can do what he did, if you can just stall him… maybe you might just make it.
So do it… do it...
"DO IT!"
Jay roared. He swiped an arm, instantly, no chance to elude, he whirled a thick book towards , a hard edge striking the side of my head with no chance to elude, before it went slumping down with a thud at my feet.
"DO IT!"
He swiped again. An overfilled box.
"DO IT!"
Again. A cracked monitor tossed, crumbling to pieces onto a blood-stained floor.
"FUCKING DO IT."
Another. Missing only by inches. An entire aluminum shelf smashing, breaking, into the wall, dismantled into clattering, rolling chunks of tal.
No more jeers, gone with the mockery - his rage returned with a burning vengeance, and he seethed and fud, staring at with a fury like nothing else. I've never seen so much hate in a person. So much disdain focused towards .
I never thought I'd end up being an object of hatred.
"You? You! Holding the loyalty and trust of the most powerful Elf-Knight in Asteria?! Soone like you - powerless, useless - her Master? It's a joke. IT'S A FUCKING JOKE!"
His left foot thundered against the concrete, fracturing into fissures and cracks surrounding the impact.
"You don't deserve her! You didn't deserve her! You never will!" Another stomp, his right, splintered even more. "Took her! Stole her! I was the one - she was supposed to - YOU RUINED EVERYTHING!"
Jay's voice was growing hoarse, every shout seed to just add fuel to already blazing flas. I couldn't stand still, not when his hands, his fingertips were twitching the way they were.
Because sothing tells , that next ti he swung again… bruised and bleeding as I was… he won't be swinging to miss.
He'll kill .
I wanted to say, wanted to point it out to him that he just might - but the glint in his eyes, the gritting of his teeth - there wasn't a single sliver of rationality left in that enraged expression.
Needed to move.
"Give her back," He lifted an arm, hovering those sa jagged chunks of tal laying sprawled by the wall. "SAY YOU'LL GIVE HER BACK!"
I lunged myself off to the side, barely feeling a sharp whistling wind graze the back of my head. Landed in a pile, and as I did, my eyes fell, and found the serrated remains of that aluminum shelf burrowed deep into the concrete.
Three pieces stuck on that. I counted seven that hovered… Jay still had four more at his command. I couldn't stay there, I spurred, weaving around and scattering rubbish into the air as I did.
"Now you're gonna run," He muttered in dismay. "See? Can't do anything. What happened to magic? What happened to fighting , huh? What happened to your FOCUS?!"
Another two impelled straight towards , narrowly eluded, by throwing my entire weight down - it saved , but it just added to my agony, everything was bleeding, aching… and I just winded myself.
I got up, straining, grunting - mustering all effort I had.
His voice again. "Where's the determination?!"
Another shrill whistling piercing through the empty air - I wasn't up yet. I jerked, impelling a throbbing leg forward… sending just a little bit more forward.
Wasn't far enough.
The throbbing turned to searing, as the tal sliced at my calve, gouging open a gash that instantly spurted blood. That was it. I couldn't get up, sit up… I can't stand up anymore.
It's always the leg, why is it always the leg?!
Can't give in, I can't let it end here. One arm over the other, one hand then the next… haul yourself, drag yourself!
I chanced a glance at Jay, the desperation in my eyes eting the insanity in his. I wanted to plead, scream at him to stop. But it was no use, words couldn't anything more.
He spoke again, his arm swinging… and the one last hunk of tal darted straight for my head.
"Where is your - !"
I didn't get to hear the last of his sentence. I braced myself, clasped my eyes shut, holding in a breath for that swift mont of collision. I didn't feel it happened - I thought it was because I was dead.
I wasn't.
A clangor rang aloud. The deep ear-piercing reverberation of tal against tal echoed and echoed.
My eyes fluttered open. The first thing I saw was that sa hunk of tal split thoroughly in two by the middle on the floor just re inches away from . A glinting then caught my eye, a blinding shimr… a glistening tip… of a sword…
I felt my heart skip a beat, as the rest of the scene swiftly began to assemble itself.
Those long locks of white hair were no longer still and unmoving, those steady hands squeezed the hilt of the sword, wielding in a way that always seed like second nature.
She was moving again - Ash sohow was moving again… and in the blink of an eye, she ca to my rescue. So fast, not even Jay had seen her.
He stood there, I saw his face so ridden with disbelief, as Ash spoke out to him again, her voice dripping with more venom than I could ever imagine.
"Intent?"
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