The Laughing Swordsman

Dark green mist gathered around Hex's body. As for Hex himself, he simply remained still.

The black beings with wings rapidly closed in, almost like a swarm of locusts. They opened their mouths wide, tearing open their cheeks in the process. 

Countless ear-piercing screeching sounds rang out. They were clearly not afraid of making their presence known.

Their hands were claws, with particularly sharp ends. The black beings raised these claws and swiped at Hex.

Right before their attacks landed, Hex's blue eyes shone a little brighter.

A dark green wave shot out from Hex, directly blowing back all the black beings and tearing them into shreds. The situation resembled moths being bewitched by a flame.

To the moths, the flame was irresistible, but if they got too close...

...they would burn.

Hex proceeded to let out a faint giggle.

"Oops!"

He raised his sleeve, letting a dark green translucent claw coalesce above his sleeve. As for the other black beings, they continued to charge towards Hex mindlessly. The fact that numerous of their kind had just fallen to him did not seem to intimidate them.

This time, Hex didn't sit idly by. He dashed in an arbitrary direction and slashed at the black beings with his claws, rending them apart.

Like that, Hex flew through the air, slashing any black being he came across. None of them were able to resist, or even land a hit in return. There was simply no time for them to swipe their claws.

In just a few moments, hundreds of these black beings were torn apart, their flesh and blood littered the ground.

...But they were not dead.

The pieces of flesh rolled across the ground like they were stones blown by the wind. They merged together, combining into black beings once more. The only difference was that they were about one and a half times larger and had grown extra features.

Some of these new black beings had two heads, while others had longer arms. There was one that grew a long tail, and a few that grew longer horns.

The total number of black beings had decreased, but they increased in size and made various adaptations to their body.

Hex didn't seem to be discouraged by this change. In fact, his giggles seemed to imply excitement. He continued to cut up the black beings into pieces, just as easily as he had before.

It's not that the black beings didn't resist, but before they could even finish half of their swipe, their claws would no longer be attached.

After a few moments, the scattered pieces of these black beings once again rolled across the ground and converged to even larger black beings.

While that was happening, Hex was hovering about a meter above the ground and rapidly flying across the empire. He would slash up any black beings on the way with a faint giggle.

If one looked from afar, they would see Hex leaving a trail of carnage...

...but that trail he left behind began to move and become something new.

As for Willow, the black beings didn't spare her either, even if they were relatively similar in appearance.

Like how the black beings did for Hex, they swarmed Willow in such great numbers, they looked like a black wave. It was as though they were the jaws of a beast trying to swallow their victim up.

However, Willow was not helpless just because a few injuries were weighing her down. A strong humming sound came from her sword, one that would cause great discomfort to those that heard it.

As the black beings screeched and swiped their claws, Willow drew a horizontal arc around her with her pitch black sword.

An ear-piercing screech rang out, as though Willow's sword was not moving against air, but metal.

The black beings were immediately torn into ribbons, splashing large amounts of blood into the sky.

Once the flesh hit the ground, they started to roll together once more. Willow noticed that a similar situation was happening for the black beings attacking Hex.

However, one difference was that the ones below Willow seemed to be... struggling.

In the end, although they formed into several large black beings, their numbers were a decent amount smaller.

Willow continued fighting off the black beings as they came for her, but was more focused on understanding the strange difference she experienced as opposed to Hex.

Willow slashed apart another black being, tearing it into ribbons. Blood sprayed out, filling the sky with a black mist. Suddenly, she came to a realization.

The black beings were unable to bring back the blood that they lost. It seemed that while the pieces of flesh were sentient, allowing them to merge, the same was not true for the blood.

However, when they did merge, there was a substantial increase in power.

Willow looked towards Hex, who was tearing through all the monsters with his claws.

She frowned.

"...If he kills them like that."

The black beings below her merged once more to form a single five meter tall version.

Willow clicked her tongue and slashed at the five meter tall black being. However, it did not split into ribbons like the others.

Only a thin wound appeared from his head to his torso.

Willow's eyes narrowed.

"This situation will spiral out of control far too quickly."

She held her sword out in front of her, letting it vibrate violently. It was as though a beast had woken up and roared to warn those that wished to disturb it.

The black being reached out its claw, which suddenly shot forward. It was as though its arm was actually an extendable baton.

However, Willow was too fast.

Right before the claw hit her, the pitch black sword suddenly stopped moving.

A shockwave rippled forth, blowing back the claw and making it explode into a bloody mist. It continued on and even wreaked havoc on the black being's body, tearing it to ribbons.

Willow sighed and then looked at Hex.

"....I have to stop him."