Three of the Ocean Dwellers massive tentacles weighed down on Galahad like a mountain. Every time one of them raised up, it provided him with a short moment to breath and regain his bearings, before he was ruthlessly assaulted by the whip like mass.
Quickly he was pushed down to one knee, with the weight of his armour growing even more unbearable than before. Alas, he was just but a mere sleeper at 2/5ths of his original strength. It wouldn't be wrong to say that he was even weaker than a regular human, even with his fully saturated core.
All of this, caused for an unimaginable amount of pain to be coursing in his body.
"Everything hurts.. I'm tired.."
But more annoyingly..
'This isn't fun at all!'
He did not enjoy one sided beatings, whether it was him doing the damage, or being at the receiving end.
As exhaustion slowly started to wrestle the strength away from his eyes, Galahad fell to his other knee, kneeling pathetically on the ground. He was ready to give up, as the fighting spirit he'd been relying on so desperately, finally started exhaust.
But just as he glanced to his side, he saw Epsilon desperately running straight towards him, with Gracia peacefully sleeping in his arms as if it were just any other regular day. She looked relaxed, and still, almost like a preclean doll frozen in time.
It made him feel strange, stirring a resolve deep within that was powerful enough to reignite his passion. It was certainly was not love, but somehow, it forced him to keep going. It invited a new strength, the determination to keep defending no matter what.
"Come at me!!"
But Just as he found the willpower to force himself to remain standing, the three tentacles gradually retreated back into the surface of the lake.
"Running? You can't run now!? Not when you've gotten me all excited like this, it isn't fair!"
As if the universe was responding to his wishes, the surface of the water broke once more, as several more of the Ocean Dwellers tentacles wrapped around the pillars of the stone bridge. The whole structure shuddered and groaned, as the colossal thing hauled itself upwards and climbed out of the water.
The moment it rose into view, one of its tentacles shot forwards, quickly slapping Epsilon right off the bridge with Gracia in hand.
His face, albeit, not horrified, quickly fell into something on the borders of fear, but also confusion.
"Uh.. on second thought.. how about we take a short break?"
The Ocean Dweller, glaring in his direction with a faint malice, simply roared before all 8 of its tentacles flew right in his direction.
"Wa-wait! Time out! TIME—"
**
Everything that happened next was a haze.
His consciousness constantly faded in and out, hovering on the borders between dream and reality. Half his mind saw the past of the Ocean Dweller, and unexpectedly it was also that of a human.
The other half of his mind, was plagued with nothing but water. It was vast, possessing a crushing darkness where the luminous light could not reach. Silence felt eternal, pressure mounted with every meter, the water cold and still, broken only by slow, invisible currents. It felt endless.
Somewhere in those depths though, he heard a voice.
"E...i.!"
It sounded so far away, yet somehow so close. He thought that maybe he had imagined it, but not too long later, he heard it again. This time it was much clearer.
"E...Si..n!"
And again.
"Epsilon!"
Stirring awake, reality began to settle as it was quickly followed by panic. Devolving back to his instincts, the first thing he tried to do was breath. But to his dismay, his lungs were immediately flooded by water, as his chest further tightened from the strain.
His body thrashed aimlessly, arms clawing at the weight of water, every movement making him feel slower, heavier, weaker. Quickly his limbs grew heavy, his vision narrowed, and sounds vanished into a muffled hush.
"Epsilon, calm down! You need to swim up! You do know how to swim right??"
Hearing Bob's voice once more, his panic instantly ceased. Thinking quickly, he scrolled through all of his memories like a picture book, as he then came across something he learned in the awakened academy.
Back then, he had spilt his mere 2 week long education in half. One for the standard combat class which everyone took, and the other for the very uncommon wilderness survival course, which specialized in adapting to the environment.
Swimming was only covered for a day, and even then it was only just theory, but right now, he needed to squeeze as much as he could from it, and then improvise from there.
He kicked hard against the heavy pull of the water, arms sweeping upward in steady strokes as bubbles trailed from his mouth like silver sparks. Muscles burned, his water filled lungs tightened, but the close shimmer of light above kept pulling him on. The water grew brighter, warmer, and with one final push he broke through its surface, gasping as he chocked for a good moment, before air flooded his lungs.
Despite that desperate struggle, the first thing that came to mind was,
'Dying because I didn't know how to swim would be too embarrassing.'
He could already imagine the amount of jokes Nero would make.
Bob screamed in his head,
"What the hell are you doing?? If you have enough time to monologue, then you have enough time to swim!"
Snapping him out of his short moment of victory, the wails of the Ocean Dweller echoed above him like a drum.
'Above?!?'
The second he looked up, one of its large twisting tendrils extended down from over the bridge, and dropped straight towards him. Inhaling heavily, he had no choice but to brace his body as it slammed straight into him, pushing back under the waves.
Right after though, it retracted back as it went to go thrash about else where. The second it left, Epsilon struggled to swim back up.
'I think it broke my arm.'
The Ocean dweller had climbed out of the water and onto the bridge. In the chaos, he ended up getting knocked right off it as it occupied the whole space. But now that it was out in the open, It was surrounded by its weakness, light. All of its senses were in disarray, so all it could do now was uselessly thrash about until it crushed everything in the area.
Or knocked everyone off the bridge, back into its territory.
"Shit, where's Gracia???"
Without even having to ask, Bob abruptly left his body.
Flying up, he recalled how she was all skin and bones, meaning that she'd be most likely floating somewhere, rather than sinking all the way down. Very quickly he located her, before hovering right above where she was for Epsilon to swim to.
'She's okay.. Now how the hell do I get out of here???'
Utilizing his senses over light, Epsilon could still feel Sylas standing on the bridge. He wasn't meditating anymore, but was instead running right towards the Ocean Dweller.
'What the hell is he doing??'
Galahad on the other hand.. was all over the place. It was hard to explain, but he was sure that he hadn't used his dormant ability.
Looking up, he could see that the water in the chimera forests lake was flooding back down. Eventually it would fill, and he would be able to climb back onto the bridge. However, as Sylas had already pointed out earlier, the Ocean Dwellers territory would be back in the bridges proximity. If it retreated into there and regained its senses, it would spell the end for all of them, so waiting for the water was not an option.
Epsilon tried to find anything he could climb instead. The walls were a horrible option as they were flat like slate, and the pillars supporting the bridge were even worse.
'Isn't there really nothing I can do??'
Once again, another one of the Ocean Dwellers tentacles reached out from over bridge, this time slamming right next to him. Holding onto Gracia tightly in order to not lose her again, the tide the tentacle created pushed him into the air, before he splashed back down.
Watching the tentacle climb back into the sky before it uselessly hit somewhere else, gave him an idea. A very, very suicidal idea. Confirming with the Judgement attribute that it was the best thing he could do right now, he hesitated if he could really do it.
"Oh what the hell, I'm going to die anyway."