|Exploding Spear Art: Second Movement - Splitting Ocean|
Callan slashed down a few meters away from the rat, leaving only a scratch. He landed on the ground and immediately rolled to his left, the tail just right behind him. He raised his spear up and concentrated all his muscle strength on his right arm.
|Experimental: Bird Prey|
Callan immediately turned around when his spear left his hand. He faced the tail and crouched down to dodge. The rat’s tail stopped and it once again jumped off the ground, to the other side of the room. However, Callan was already running at that side of the room.
Using the giant clump of magic on the sword, he pulled the thin connecting magic thread and pulled his spear back. Do you know my biggest mystery about this tower? I could punch a hole in a wall made of stone, jump 30 meters in the air, and do a thousand push-ups, yet for some unknown reasons, I just seem so useless to every monster on this fucking God-Forsaken tower!!
“Argh!!” Callan screamed fueled by uncontrollable frustration. It was like one day you grew taller than your dad, but you realize 5’10 isn’t actually tall. When you go to a different country, you feel like a dwarf in big boy shoes. He spun his spear, dug his right foot into the ground, and stared at the falling rat.
|Exploding Spear Art: First Movement - Upward Stab|
Obviously, aiming for the rat’s balls. It was most definitely the vulnerable part. I mean, it was so long and felt so uncomfortable, those two giant jiggling spheres strapped on cloth, were the only viable target.
Magic raised from the tip of his spear. Then it went down taking the shape of an endless cone, falling like a gorgeous dress at a ball. Right hand at the middle of the pole, and left at the end. Faced the left, his arms stretched up, releasing his left hand like throwing a ball. Callan grabbed all that energy and sent it through his right arm, striking a hurricane below the rat.
The rat tried its best to jiggle its body, but it missed. Because of the speed Callan’s magic-imbued attacks needed, so as to not be disrupted by his thoughts, the reaction time from the rat was insane. It pierced its skin making another small hole on its body. Callan flipped back, dodging the shock from the ground.
Up and below, both places were chipped like a rat tried to eat it, well it is a rat. However as the more brittle tiles got thrown to the walls and pulverized at each drop, the damage was thankfully getting reduced.
Callan got bombarded with rocks, protected by his shield. He sliced it in half and threw them at the side, making the incoming rocks fly away. He sliced an incoming rock normally and the rat’s tail came into view at the rock’s ‘gift unpacking’.
Shit. Callan spun his spear, in an attempt to slice that tail as wide as his waist. The spear couldn’t even make a single spin and bounced on the tail, launching his arms to the far right.
|Exploding Spear Art: Fourth Movement - Dancing Troupe|
Callan used the repulsion to continue his Spear Art’s only movement that actually has footwork in it. He jumped up on the rat’s tail and climbed as fast as he could. The rat couldn’t attack with the speed as before, as it had to first think for a second about how would once again damage itself if it attacked stupidly… well, it shouldn’t care much, but his tail would be split and the sharp end would disappear.
The rat just attacked horizontally other than striking like a kid playing with ants using a stick. Callan jumped and grabbed onto the end tip of the rat’s tail. It spun in the air, going up as high as it could to gain the balance it took to twist its tail. Once it realized Callan was on his tail, it immediately dropped down to the ground, making Callan float in the air. Oh shit… this wasn’t my plan. Thank God I have magic.
Callan placed his spear below his feet and jumped to the rat’s head once more, aiming for his eye. He jabbed his arm and got his spear back directly into his hand.
|Exploding Spear Art: Fifth Movement - Falling Angel|
The rat twisted his tail like a heartbeat monitor, hurrying to kill the presence of a previous fear. Callan released a magic thread as thick as a bridge cable and hooked it into the dug eye of the rat. He pulled himself down and the rat’s tail dashed past into the air.
The rat stopped its tail and moved to his right, dragging Callan’s entire body, hitting its cheek loosely, and bursting his magic. Callan dropped to the ground, thrown by the speed, scraping the floor with his bare skin. He coughed up blood as soon as he stopped.
Callan’s spear was thrown to some place, he stood up immediately and hoped it wasn’t broken in any way. With his magic still lingering on the spear, he connected to it and grabbed the object it was on. Before, just losing focus made the magic disappear, but with the muscle memory of having used magic for years, it didn’t need a thought to even form on his weapon.
The spear came flying along with the rat’s tail. It wasn’t broken, thankfully, though the moment he grabbed onto it, he used the hilt to block the tail. He was blown into the air. He relaxed his upper body and put weight on his feet, making him tilt down, landing on his feet on the wall.
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Callan jumped straight to the incoming tail and used his spear as a pole to jump back on the tail. Unlike the word “Aura” a power similar to magic that enhances a person’s physical abilities, the tower’s magic didn’t have a feature like that. He had tried before to strengthen his actual physical body by speeding his magic circulation, but that had no effect at all. The only real theory left in his head was to speed up his muscle growth with magic, but he didn’t really have any knowledge of the human body.
So, Callan just relaxed his legs and jumped. He ran, feeling like a loony toon character while a worm tried its best to attack him. Callan didn’t dare make the same mistake, so he just jumped over the tail, not like he needed it to reach the ceiling anyway, it just looked cool. Which, for the shit he was in, that was no moment to try looking cool.
|Exploding Spear Art: Fifth Movement - Falling Angel|
Callan dropped down to the rat’s right eye. The rat stopped its tail and began to move, dodging one more, but thankfully Callan had no magic thread to drag him with the rat. Callan landed on the ground, perfectly dispersing his magic before it became a waste of energy.
There was a huge problem in fighting the rat, it was that Callan didn’t have an actual way of fighting it. He was fast, that was definite, but the rat was too, and falling from the sky was definitely slower than just taking a single step for the two’s inhumane speed.
The rat ran to the other side and released poison from its mouth again. His tail followed like usual. Callan took a deep breath and closed his eyes. He inhaled slowly and just like before, it was weird… but it was a treat to have… the flow state. Callan jumped above the incoming poison and grabbed onto the rat’s tail like a grappling hook. He pulled the magic thread, propelling him forward, fearlessly charging forward. The entire world felt like it was a snail.
The rat’s tail came from behind. Callan looked back and just turned his body 180 degrees to face the tail, even though he was still flying to the rat. He reached his hand slowly, waiting to caress the tail. He placed his hand on it and just moved his body to the right, turning 180 degrees once more like nothing even happened.
Callan didn’t know what the fuck was happening. Actually, it was to the point he forgot he even went through a flow state just a few minutes ago. It was like his entire body was possessed by an unknown power, like his entire being reached a realm he could only call perfect.
It took a whole 6 seconds to reach the rat, and along with that amount of time, it had tried to attack Callan, failing flawlessly each time. He dodged everything like a slippery man made of rubber. But that feeling didn’t last long, Callan released his magic and pulled one more time to the rat’s eye. Third time’s the charm. This time, he can even notice the tiniest change in his hair. He pulled as hard as he could, even imagining the magic pulling him, it was just a pointless combination, but who cares?
Callan aimed his spear forward, surrounding it with a giant image of magic. A thread spurted out the tip of the spear and immediately sprinkled into multiple different lines falling to the opposite direction in the shape of a mushroom. It stretched far till it engulfed Callan’s entire body. It encased its body in a caged cocoon. Then the lines ran through his body all going back to the front of the spear. It formed a human body from feet to the head, exploding and sprouting wings on Callan’s spear. This time it wasn’t falling, it was flying.
|Exploding Spear Art: Fifth Movement(Variation) - Flying Angel|
It hit the eye of the rat, causing an explosion so strong it sent him flying to the other side of the room in just 2 seconds. Callan coughed up a huge amount of blood, his body stuck inside a small crater the impact of his body created.
The rat was finally blind, though that definitely was not that helpful. Just based on its ability to find Callan’s direction even when it hid under it, the rat definitely had something to sense him without the need of its eyes.
The rat screeched. “Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!” It was a high-pitched scream of the letter a, like a kid without a tongue crying. Callan immediately covered his ears and formed a disgusting expression, like wanting to throw up. It was worse than listening to a fork scrape a stainless plate.
The rat soon stopped and it released a small, but accurate ball of poison to Callan. He slid off the crater and landed on the pile of rocks below him. He was now gone from the flow state and it felt weird, it was like a hazy memory, or more accurately, it felt like a dream. It doesn’t matter how hard you try to remember it, it just tries to weirdly flee away and disappear.
Callan shook his head and stared at the giant rat bleeding from both its eyes. It didn’t even look weaker, it was actually scarier and looked much stronger. The number of scars on its body was a perfect match for those two bloodfalls.
“Ughhh…” Callan’s neck shook uncontrollably, the disgust just made his body jolt unconsciously. The rat directed its tail to Callan once again. His body felt heavy like a giant was standing on his shoulders. If only it was a shoulder angel. Well, that was one way to put a weird reference.
Callan ran, even if his body wanted to just sit and sleep. Maybe it was the cause of the flow state, but whatever it was, it was fucking distracting. Callan jumped over the pond of poison, still sitting in the middle of the room. He jumped in the air once more and this time he waited for the tail.
So, it came. Callan stayed in the air and stared at it. He stared. He stared. Well, he really just stared until the tail hit him, immediately getting wrapped by the rat and slammed into the ground. Callan grabbed the thick tail in front of him and just pushed his fingers inside.
“Ahhhhhh!!!!!!!!” Callan had his eyes closed and teeth gritting with the sound of clashing metal. He started to release the noise of a starting engine, his arms bulking from the strength he was exerting. They were getting larger and larger till the tail got ripped in an instant.
The rat immediately retracted its tail and Callan lay on the ground on his shiny, smooth, and rough bed. “Fuck! It feels like I’ve been here for hours… yet I only have 2 eyes and a piece of a tail as my progress. What am I? Digging a grave with a spoon?”