The Laughing Swordsman

Apollo brought his bokken down and pressed his thumb against the hilt.

Yet, right when it seemed like he was going to put all of his strength into it, his thumb relaxed. It was as though a vicious knife suddenly became a harmless feather.

A wind blade whipped through the air, but its overall shape was quite distorted and it didn't travel that fast.

Then, it landed against a tree branch far away.

Numerous vines and several wooden spikes shot towards that tree branch, snapping the poor branch in the process. It was as though the entire forest was a venus flytrap. However, despite trying so many times, it was unable to catch its elusive prey.

Apollo continued to fly in a direction, while sending out wind blades in another direction.

He was essentially creating an illusory situation, where 'Apollo' was going in one direction, while he was going in another. None of the vines or wooden spikes went for him, but instead the fake Apollo.

Instead of having the fake him go in the opposite direction, he made their paths relatively parallel. However, as time passed, Apollo was getting farther from his fake version.

Naturally, this meant that it was much harder for him to keep this illusion up. After all, he had to send out a wind blade through several layers of branches without letting it so much as brush by them.

Not to mention, it would be essentially impossible once the distance was greater than ten meters as that was where Apollo's vision was cut off due to the black flame match.

However, Apollo seemed to be doing it with ease.

This was because he had memorized the terrain. Earlier on, when Apollo had been stepping on the tree branches, he wasn't just doing it for the sake of keeping a pattern up.

Apollo had spent twenty minutes just doing that, which would've been a bit excessive just for fooling Otis. However, that also meant his black flame match was nearing the end of its life. The only thing Apollo was holding was a tiny stub, still burning on stubbornly until its inevitable end.

He had also made the assumption Otis would evade him, but not do so by going to the opposite side of the forest. That was because if Otis had some tracking ability, it would basically be impossible to reach him undetected if that was the case.

By traveling through most of the forest already, he forced Otis to move.

With this, Apollo predicted his direction.

It was a big gamble, but he was right.

On Otis' side, he was being carried around by a set of vines. His red eye was wide open, while his normal one was fully closed. Otis was putting all he could to see the world through his red eye.

Part of the ability brought by that red eye was a tracking method whose effectiveness varied depending on a few conditions. It was how Otis was able to find Apollo in the first place.

He was frustrated by how slippery Apollo was, but didn't panic. Otis believed that he would get Apollo sooner or later. After all, in his eyes, Apollo was just running around aimlessly.

So long as Otis stayed away from Apollo, he would be fine.

However, that wasn't exactly the case.

When Apollo started sending out wind blades to fake his position, Otis did not expect anything at first. In fact, he didn't realize anything even when Apollo started throwing out wind blades and began diverting his path.

For a while, Otis was simply focused on attacking and evading what he thought was Apollo. However, Otis began to have a strange feeling.

It was one that told him something was off, but he couldn't tell what exactly it was.

Apollo was still in the general rage Otis could tell he was in, but for some reason, he was always at the very side of it.

Until eventually, he left it altogether.

This sent countless warning signals into Otis' mind, but it was too late now.

Apollo reached Otis and raised his bokken high. Then, it flashed.

A clear snap rang out and blood scattered into the air.

Otis was struck, but at the last second before he was hit, he instinctively whipped his arm around and blocked the attack. The result was a now horribly mangled arm.

Apollo hardly delayed with his second strike, but countless vines shot out and constricted his movement while a flower grew out of the tree and wrapped around Otis, before disappearing into the tree.

Several wooden spikes shot towards Apollo. He twisted his body, but it was simply too hard to completely dodge with all vines binding him.

A few dull thwacks rang out one after another.

Apollo was hit in the back first, knocking the wind out of him. Then, another wooden spike hit him on the shoulder, nearly ripping it off. Lastly, the final wooden spike slammed into his stomach, piercing through it entirely.

It was as though Apollo was being comboed by several people.

The wooden spike that pierced him continued to shove him downwards. Apollo's eyes widened while laughter began to seep out of his clenched teeth. He attempted to push the wooden spike off of him, but the speed at which they were going downwards was simply too much.

Apollo was barreling towards the ground.

However, he came up with an idea.

Apollo stuck his legs down as much as he could. Then, two audible snaps rang out before a loud bang.

Right when Apollo's feet touched the ground, he performed the basic shadow step technique and disappeared. Unfortunately, it came at the cost of broken knees.

Once Apollo reappeared, took to the air.

His legs dangled uselessly while large amounts of blood spilled out of his stomach wound. As though adding insult to injury, countless large purple flowers burst out of the ground.

They spat out some reddish-purple mist.

As Apollo flew through the sky, he moved the mist.

Letting Otis 'see' him.

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