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Chapter 239 - Waiting Room (III)
🕑 Added 2025-03-31 23:00:05 +0000 UTCHow can I visualize all these paths?
How can I consciously choose the best one when I’m operating in the high stages of Overdrive, where rational thought takes a back seat and instincts drive everything?
Every action in a fight breaks down into three stages: input → decision-making → output.
Right now, my input is fast—insanely fast—thanks to Overdrive enhancing my senses. And not just fast, but detailed. I catch everything: smells, sound, heat, EM waves, movement vectors, tension shifts in muscle, eye flickers. It’s all there. High-fidelity data pouring in from every sense.
But the decision-making—that’s where it bottlenecks.
Overdrive hands that part over to instincts, experience, and muscle memory. Rational thought becomes sluggish, buried under the weight of raw physicality. So instead of considering multiple options, I latch onto one or two—the most aggressive, the most obvious, the most gut-driven.
And that’s not me. Not fully at least.
I’m not Ayu. Her style thrives in that instinctive state. It’s built for it. She’s honed that sense, sharpened it. But me? I nearly got myself killed by the lava dragon, acting on pure impulse. Same with the centipede—overcommitting to an opening that turned out to be a trap.
That kind of abandon… the thrill of fighting without thinking—it’s addictive. I know it well. Even after I overcame the addiction, I can’t deny I still enjoy it. But it’s dangerous. Ayu can walk that line thanks to her Awakening. She has that buffer. That safety net.
I don’t.
I need to think. To plan. To keep some part of my mind clear.
I need balance. Even just a little.
So when was my best performance?
Easy. The seventh boss.
That final sequence—I didn’t just react, I read. I planned. It surprised even myself. Everything just clicked. But why?
Because even though I was deep into Overdrive, two key things helped keep my rational mind sharp. Two stabilizers.
First: Chiara’s Pillar enhancement model.
Second: Lukas’ Pillar-based mental link. His boost amplified the same effect, almost like a second lens snapping into focus.
Together, they tilted the balance. I wasn't all instinct or all logic—I was both. That sweet middle ground where my mind could process patterns and possibilities while my body moved at full tilt.
Chiara’s model is still something I can use—at least until I reach its better version: the First Pillar State. That alone will sharpen my thoughts.
But Lukas’ link? I can’t count on that. It won’t always be there.
I need to forge my own balance.
I think on it for a while. I don’t like the idea of limiting Overdrive—that would mean a drop in my physical prowess.
But what if I…
Yeah. Yeah… why not? I could match Overdrive levels with the natural lows and peaks in the rhythm of a fight—lower to think, high to act. Micromanage it.
Ride the tempo.
Alright. Let’s give it a shot.
I raise my swords and settle into stance.
Eyes closed. Breath held.
Silence wraps around me like a second skin.
Slowly, I begin to place a representation of my nodes in space. One by one. A thousand points scattered across the void—silent, still, waiting. They flicker faintly like distant stars on a moonless night. Cold. Dormant. Each one calling to me.
I exhale.
The mental map takes shape in my mind.
Then—there it is. A path. Faint at first, like chalk sketched over the dark, but enough to follow. A slash here, a thrust there. A faint curve through three tight points. The first sequence.
I lower my stance, shift my balance.
And then—Overdrive.
It floods me like a storm breaking through still air. The pulse in my veins vanishes. The silence between seconds stretches. Every sound is sharper, every muscle taut, ready to fire.
Thrust.
My blade lunges forward. A node lights up—a star ignited.
Slash.
The second sword follows, catching another. Then another. They flare to life in my wake. One by one, my movements carve across the sky, blades drawing lines between stars.
A pattern forms. A shape. A sequence.
A constellation.
I finish the last motion with a sharp twist and stop. Swords still. Chest rising.
I lower Overdrive.
The world returns for an instant. Breath. Heat. Sweat trickling down my back.
And in that stillness, I see it—the next path.
This time it comes faster. I adjust. A shift in my lead foot. A change in the angle. My mind threads it together, tracing the next pattern through the field of stars.
Overdrive again.
Blades flash.
Each stroke connects, nodes flare—the rhythm smoother now. A rising tempo. Another constellation burns into existence.
Slash. Thrust. Turn. Step.
More precise. More fluid. My boots grate across the smooth floor, the edge of my swords singing through the air. My grip adjusts mid-motion. The sequence flows from my body like it had always been there.
Then—stillness again.
I breathe.
Lower Overdrive.
I scan the next cluster, reading it like a sky-watcher seeking patterns in the night. The pieces shift. Another path appears.
I grin.
Raise Overdrive.
And I’m off again.
One sequence after another. Slash, thrust, chop, strike.
My body moves like a dance, my blades carving constellations into the void.
Each stroke stitches the heavens together—stars igniting in my wake, each path a thread in a growing web of light.
Not a single path, but many. Not a single slash, but all that could be.
Swordsmanship is no longer about movement.
It’s about the infinite possibilities between them.
The path I take… and the ones I leave behind.
Overdrive rises and falls like the tempo in an orchestra—building tension, dropping into silence, soaring to a climax.
My swords trace the night sky, lighting stars. Each constellation merges into the next, a flowing sequence of patterns, filling the gaps, igniting the void.
But… it’s not enough.
Something’s missing.
My movements feel constrained, too narrow in purpose. Wait—why does my sword need to touch every star?
Why limit myself?
Swordsmanship isn’t just about hitting.
It’s about shaping the battle. About control.
It’s the feints, the guiding strikes, the missed blows that lead to real ones. It’s the movement that wasn’t meant to connect—but forced the opponent to move, to guard, to fall into your rhythm.
So why am I swinging just to hit?
Swordsmanship wasn’t born to land every strike.
It was born to win.
I need pressure. I need an opponent. I need a fight.
I take a deep breath. The stars that had once been lit now dim, fading into silence.
We’re back at the beginning.
So how do I do this? Should I visualize an enemy? But fighting while limiting myself to maneuver through the nodes—that’s too much of a disadvantage... unless the enemy is constrained by them too. Like a game of Go. An empty board where each player places a sequence, each trying to win.
But for that to work, I need to understand the enemy I visualize inside out. The seventh boss? No. Its anatomical structure is too different from mine.
Then a thought clicks—something a world-class chess player once said during a casual interview: "Sit at the chessboard and play with yourself." So… why not? Why not fight against myself? The person I know best.
I even remember Houston saying Darius frequently spars against himself. That alone gives it weight. So… why not try?
My eyes remain closed. I begin to visualize a perfect copy of myself. It’s not hard. The figure takes shape quickly, standing just a couple of steps ahead.
But the nodes—they’re only around me.
To make this fair, my copy needs its own identical set. Two mirrored boards. Two players. One game. The progress is shared—if a node lights up in his set, it can’t be used in mine, and vice versa.
Ok. We’re getting somewhere.
Each turn, I or my copy selects a set of nodes and executes a realistic sword sequence. The other defends, reacts, counters. And then it flips. One plays. One answers.
The goal? Simple: cover all the nodes in a realistic exchange. But the best case? That the final node is struck in the same moment the final blow lands.
Slim odds.
But… not zero.
Alright.
Let’s see how it goes.
I think. I choose.
I step forward.
Overdrive surges—sharp, immediate, total. I act.
The floor grates beneath my boots as I slide into motion.
One blade carves upward, the other thrusts low—a rising arc into a tight stab meant for the ribs. A sudden flick of the wrist disguises the shift. One, two, three… twenty-one—stars ignite in quick flashes across the stellar map, forming the first constellation.
Then I stop.
Overdrive drops.
I breathe.
And I become him.
The copy.
My own stance mirrored in perfect form. The echo of my strike lingers in my body as memory. The first slash? I raise my left sword, tilt the angle, guide it away. The thrust? A sidestep, light and efficient, then a downward flick—redirect, control.
Now it’s his turn.
My turn.
Which path? I see five. Seven. All viable. But I don’t need viable—I need dominant. The one that claims ground, denies options, squeezes space until there’s nothing left but loss.
I choose.
Low step forward. A slash to the leg—feint. Deeper in. The true threat comes from the left, a thrust aimed for the gut. No time to block cleanly. The enemy must pivot. Must yield space.
Overdrive again.
I strike.
Nodes light up, the air parts, the floor scrapes. Another constellation etched.
Drop it.
Back to me.
Alonso.
The pressure comes fast. Aggressive. That thrust leaves me with a single narrow window. I pivot hard, sliding my foot wide, twisting my torso just enough. The blade misses by a breath.
I redirect the dodge into a spin. Not to strike. To bait.
Feint.
He reacts.
And I rise into it—blade flashing, catching a node, then another. The path extends, lights dancing with each movement.
Drop Overdrive.
Think.
The next cluster. The map is shifting fast. I see a new opening, barely visible—tight, efficient.
Push.
Overdrive.
Blades lash forward. More stars flare, etched into memory.
Drop.
Breathe.
Visualize the next. The tempo is building, pulsing like a song. I’m not improvising anymore. I’m composing.
I move again.
Strike. Evade. Redirect. Stars fall into place.
But it’s not enough.
Not anymore.
I can’t just answer the last move. That’s reaction. That’s survival.
To win, I need to build the board—not just fight on it. I need to limit him. Corner him. Shrink his options, one sequence at a time.
A wide slash.
A thrust into space—not meant to land, but to force a dodge. The copy retreats. Predictable. I follow—not with aggression, but with control. I’m not chasing him. I’m guiding him. Shaping the tempo.
Each sequence I choose now isn’t just about damage. It’s about control. About occupation.
Each node I claim denies one from him.
Feints come naturally now. Not distractions, but wedges—prying open space, then sealing it.
He fights back, of course.
It’s me, after all.
He adapts. Finds narrow seams. Reverses pressure. Even turns one of my baits into a counter—almost catches my side.
But I twist out, and in that breath, I see it.
It’s not just the current move that matters.
It’s the next.
And the one after.
And the one after that.
I have to plan three steps ahead. Five. Like chess. But instead of pieces, it’s my own body. My blades. My breath.
I picture it. The stars I haven’t touched. The ones he could reach. I think of constellations that don’t exist yet, but could—if I let them.
I won’t.
Overdrive again.
Slash. Spin. Step.
Drop.
A constellation forms—mine. Not just a sequence of motion.
A trap.
I press again. Not to strike—but to corner.
Each blade carves a future. One that cuts off his past. The more I think, the more I plan, the more inevitable it becomes.
He can’t win with power.
He has to win with space.
And I’m taking that from him, one shining star at a time.
This isn’t a duel.
It’s a war of positions.
And I’m winning the map.
One sequence after another.
Until eventually…
He’ll have nowhere left to run.
He tries to escape. But I’m already there.
My blade slashes not at him—but across the future. A wide arc that scorches through five untouched nodes, locking down entire sectors of the field. His field. He dodges, but the path behind him shrinks with every step.
But then he moves. He disengages, dashing back—outside the circle we’ve been using to fight so far.
Smart. And why not?
There’s no arena. No set boundaries.
Wherever we move, the stars follow.
Blades clash—but only in my mind. I stop my strike just short, imagining the collision, picturing the resistance. No ring of steel, no jolt through the arms. Just the silent agreement of a duel played in thought, each halted blade tolling the rhythm of a song only I can hear.
We surge across the void. The stars rotate around us. The constellations spiral and twist.
He tries to flank, to find another angle. But I beat him to it.
I press forward.
A wall appears. White. Silent. Featureless.
He leaps, rebounding off it to dodge the strike—but I follow. Boots screech across the surface as I run along the wall sideways, my blades chasing his heels, our stars etching into it like glowing calligraphy.
He turns.
So do I.
We leap—upside down now. The gravity is mine to command, and we spiral across the ceiling. The floor, the wall, the sky—it all blurs together as the stars trail behind our movements, painting the world in lines of light.
I laugh.
I can’t help it.
My blood is singing, my heart pounding. The thrill is too much to contain.
Each strike pushes him back.
Each dodge from him is narrower.
Each second, the tempo rises.
A strike.
A clash.
A flurry of movement.
Only twenty-two nodes remain.
But he’s desperate now.
He carves a path—wild, efficient. Seventeen stars claimed in a single dash. Perfect. Bold. He blocks the shortest path between the rest, fencing me in with a sequence of tight, narrow strikes.
Only five left.
He thinks he’s won.
But I’m grinning.
I see it.
Four stars are together.
And one is a fifth apart.
A node too far for one blade alone.
But I have two.
I chuckle, breath ragged, sweat dripping down my back.
I strike.
Four stars in a flowing arc—each one a perfect step in a rhythm I no longer think about.
Then the fifth.
The last node.
He knows.
He sees it too.
He braces. He moves to intercept—the only angle possible to stop the thrust he expects.
But that’s where he’s wrong.
Because I don’t thrust.
I fall.
My stance drops low, knees nearly buckling from the twist. I let the momentum carry me forward, my body angling down, weight collapsing into the motion.
He steps into my path.
Perfect.
I push with all I have, twisting my torso at the last moment, spinning like a comet across the sky.
The map bends with me.
The last star shifts.
My off-hand blade curves upward—not forward—arcing behind his guard, a spiral that defies the straight lines of logic. A feint so complete it changes the shape of the cosmos.
Overdrive flares.
My body roars.
And the sword—
The sword finds its mark.
Right at the moment.
At the angle.
At the time.
I see it.
I see through his eyes.
The copy.
Me.
I try to block.
I can’t.
He can’t.
I’ve lost.
I’ve won.
The final node ignites, a flare brighter than all the rest.
The stars pause.
The pattern is complete.
The constellations shimmer—blinking, pulsing, woven into a single, beautiful design.
No chaos. No randomness. A tapestry of war and will drawn across the night.
The space breathes.
And for one fleeting moment… the void becomes art.
