Sword Progenitor

When he gave his sword art an identity, he felt something resonate within him. He felt a slight connection with the water around him unlike anything he had ever felt before. It was as if water had become a part of him, and not in the physical sense, either. His existence had changed, he had taken on the properties of water, if only a bit.

A small-scale shaking could be felt in the earth as Ken ran toward a random direction. The legion of rats would surround him, so he found no reason to hold his position.

A river flowed behind him as he sprinted toward the approaching rats. He kicked off the ground and slashed at as many incoming rats as he possibly could, making decently clean cuts on their bodies, instantly killing each one of them.

Killing with a working sword is so much easier! he inwardly exclaimed. Most of the rats that tried to sneak up from behind would be slowed down and injured by the sharp river produced by the jian, giving Ken time to slay them. The others that had successfully evaded the twirling water would only get the chance to get a few scratches in Ken reacted and sliced their bodies apart.

Every few slashes and leaps, he would do a few spins and rotations to build up momentum. He would do front flips with his sword landing on an enemy. The full three hundred and sixty-degree flip gave him a ton of force and made anything that was able to partly resist his increasingly powerful slashes split apart without much effort on his side.

Now that he had the power to annihilate the vermin with a single attack, Ken had more freedom to test his movements. He rotated his body in midair, striking at various wide angles. He did somersaults and flips, and even ducked lower and pushed off the ground with his free hand.

Not once, though, did he ever perform a thrust. He wasn able to do it because it wasn in his version of waters nature to pierce, but to wash away his enemies.

His water wasn a droplet, but a wave.

Slashing through the giant army of rats was easy, but their numbers were exponentially larger than the previous wave of smaller rats. Whenever they managed to hurt him, he would falter for an instant because of the much larger and deeper gashes that the monsters claws produced.

Unfortunately, the cuts and scratches began accumulating on his body, which inevitably made him slow down over time, but by that time, he had gotten so much momentum that his river had lengthened to one hundred meters, and he was able to slice through all the giant sewer rats with a weak, yet accurate slash.

He wasn to the point where he could call himself precise, but he was getting there, but he would still miss once in a while, which was what led to those cuts and gashes on his arms, legs, ribs and back.

The waves had become quasi-tsunamis, creating violent crashing noises that resembled a tsunami. This made Ken come up with a new move.

He waved his jian wildly, creating a trail of sharp, gushing waves that sliced all the giant sewer rats that tried to charge through his barrier. The waves continued to flow and drop to the ground as Ken ran in circles with smooth transitions.

This is really effective against mindless beasts! he thought in his mind. This one technique had managed to slay almost two hundred of those rats before the ones that had approached from behind thought to jump over the barrier, completely ruining his plans.

Ken adapted quickly, slicing upwards while somewhat maintaining his barrier at the same time. The improvisation covered all his surroundings, but weakened its overall power. Now, there was a chance that the sewer rats would break through the blockage of water and attack him. Albeit weak, those damages to his body would further impair his agility, lowering his battle prowess.

Hours passed, but the giant sewer rats kept on coming. Unlike the rats, Kens stamina didn have no end, and he was slowly reaching his limits. He had to slow his pace to preserve his energy, or he would risk becoming too tired and nearly collapse from exhaustion like last time. He would rather have gradual upgrades in his body than a sudden skyrocket in his physical capabilities. The latter, if not handled properly, could harm him in the long run, and he had no way to handle the drawbacks of an extremely draining fight properly as of now.

Eventually, the sewer rats stopped coming, and he wiped the floor with the rest of the army of the monsters, and he collapsed on the ground, heaving deep breaths as he reveled in his victory.

Hundreds of deep and wide gashes were on his back and limbs, but it was nowhere near the amount that he had gotten previously. His stamina was nearly completely exhausted, and he even experienced a few muscle spasms as he summoned water into his mouth.

As he rested, he thought, That technique I used should be a branch of Splitting Tide. Its sort of a defensive domain that I can use to protect myself against enemies while dealing damage. Ill name it Vortex.

Vortex was the first form in Splitting Tide, but he didn expect to make more than six forms. He had given it a name because it was peculiar and stood out among his other movements. There wouldn be too many of these because Splitting Tide was simple. Run, slash and kill. Besides, if there was something to be derived from the sword art, he was sure hed happen upon it in future battles.

For now, he reviewed his battle, and his thoughts landed on a specific moment right before he clashed with the first rat. It was when he named his sword art.

What does me naming a sword art have to do with an increase with my mastery? Mastering an element means to become familiar with it. Is it because me giving my sword art a name gave me a sudden understanding, or did the realization come before the naming? He fell further into that rabbit hole, ”My understanding of water pushed my existence in the direction of the properties of that substance. The changing of my existence happened when I gave it a name.

”So, this means that my existence will only change when I make the properties of water personal to me. ” He was making the water part of himself, which increased his connection to it. That was his theory, and Ken didn see any other explanation for what happened.

Basically, when I gain insights about my element, and use those insights to enhance a part of myself, my existence is added to and grows, becoming something more. It was difficult to describe supernatural phenomena that defied all scientific logic in words that Ken could understand, but he could somewhat understand the process.

He turned around and threw his jian into the expansive pool of blood and sighed, ”I suppose much will be clear as time goes on. Ill have to wait for my next breakthrough to verify anything. ”

Ken summoned a ball of water in his hands, and could immediately feel something different upon closer inspection. The water had a faint connection to his thoughts. He didn have to directly focus on the water to make it move. Instead, his thoughts would be read by the water, and it would move according to that.

So this is what it means to push my existence closer to water, he thought. Ken knew he was making good progress, even with nothing to base it off of. He had no external help, but he had managed to unravel and answer a few questions that would lead him to higher powers.

He felt proud of himself for doing that.

But, a new thought entered his mind after he had calmed down and organized his thoughts, What happened to mom, dad, and Portia?

He had been so focused on surviving that he had completely neglected the fact that his family and girlfriend still existed. If the three of them were going through the same hellish experience as he was, Ken wasn sure if they would survive. He could only hope that his situation was unique, and that he could find a way back to the real world to confirm that.

”Ill have to fight my way through these waves, then, Ken thought, playing around with the ball of water. ”If I get more insights into my element, I might be able to find a way out of this wretched shithole. ”

An infinite plain with seemingly no edges and a sky that could summon hundreds, if not thousands of monsters on a whim. That was what he was trapped it. He would need time to figure out how to get out of there, but he knew that he would find a way eventually. He couldn stay in there forever.

Ken went over to his jian and saw that it had already finished absorbing all the blood in the vicinity. This time, the amount of blood to be absorbed was much higher, so he had to pick it up and move it to another spot.

He nodded when he saw that the jian had sharpened and barely darkened in color once again I expected as such, he thought, Upgrades grow harder to acquire the stronger they get.

When he touched the jian, though, the material had changed. It was no longer a rough wooden carving of a jian, but it was sanded, polished and shined. It was approaching a color close to midnight red.

He picked the jian up and swung it around. It had gotten heavier, which suited his needs more. Too light a sword would cause him to overuse his strength and miss.

Then, he drew his sword back and covered his wounds with water. His water was clear, so he didn worry about his wounds being infected. Moreover, he wanted to sanitize those injuries. Who knew what kind of viruses those vermin brought with them? After making sure that the water masked all his scratches, he dashed forward and began his training again. He didn want to waste time, so he spent his recovery on practising his Splitting Tide sword art.

All of a sudden, a flash came from the sky, and thunder rumbled.

Huh. The lightning stopped while I was fighting. Interesting, Ken thought as he jogged at running speed. His foundation had heightened beyond what a normal human could achieve.

He hadn been aware that the storm had ceased its flashing because he was too focused on his fight against the giant sewer rats, but now that he had the time to think about it, he wasn sure what the storm was. It was clearly much more than a simple storm.

This ”storm ” spawned monsters, and it seemed to watch him as he fought. When his battle ended, it would continue on with its business.

It was as if the storm had some sort of consciousness.

Nevertheless, the second wave had been overcome.

He was one step closer to returning home. Little did he know, that step was only one of countless thousands.