To put her decision into perspective, Jessica was just barely able to defeat a 5 of spades with severe injuries. Yet, she was planning on challenging a monster two levels higher than that.
Mia felt a sense of panic and had an idea of what she was trying to do.
"Jessica! Calm down for a second and think of your actions! Don't do things you can't take back!"
Finally, Jessica responded, but it was an angry scream.
"What does it matter?... It's not like I'd be able to live without sacrificing everyone else anyway."
With those words, she put the card into the padlock, and the crow within the cage spread out its wings, getting ready to fight. Mia wanted to say more, but it was already too late. She saw the man in a suit on a nearby tree and yelled at him.
"Let her give up! She is in no condition to fight!"
The man in a suit shrugged his shoulders, masking his enthusiasm that slipped out slightly.
"I may make the rules, but I do not control the decisions of those within. If she wishes to do something like this, then she is free to do so. Giving up by now is already too late, she had the opportunity before. And don't think you can help her in any way other than shouting. Even if you were more capable, I could easily stop and disqualify you."
Though while he said that, it appeared that Jessica had already done just that. She sat down on the ground for a moment before closing her eyes. After a bit of time, she fell onto her back, already asleep somehow.
As for the crow, it did not drop its guard down in the slightest, letting out a loud squawk. A dense black mist spread out among countless dark feathers. The tree itself was also quickly shrouded, becoming a mass of black mist and feathers.
The several feathers retracted back through the mist, obscured by them. Though for Mia, she could see them clearly since she had a different angle. All of the feathers oriented the same way, pointing towards Jessica, who was laying on the ground.
It was quite clear that they would soon shoot toward her like arrows, just without the wooden base or metal tip. Though ironically, their effectiveness might just be higher than normal ones.
Roughly a third of the feathers pulled back slightly before firing, turning into a blur and piercing through the black mist.
Even if Jessica hadn't fallen asleep all of a sudden, she wouldn't have been able to do much. The black mist obscured where the feathers were coming from until it was too late. Not to mention, there were numerous of them, even when not the entire volley was launched.
Every person watching thought that it was over. And this was the outcome that Jessica had wished for as well.
Though before the feathers went through the mist, her body twitched.
Then, she suddenly rolled over violently, without bothering to move the arms, letting them slam down into the ground one after another. Her limbs contorted strangely. While it was still within the limits of what a normal person could do, it was in an awfully strange way.
And with that, she dodged the first volley.
She was lying face up, but her eyes were still closed and her mouth hung open ever so slightly.
Though that was far from the first, as several feathers shot towards her. Jessica suddenly sat up, while bending her legs back. Then, she sprung up while her arms hung from her lifelessly, as though the muscles within them were severed.
With incredibly swift side-stepping, she avoided the feathers, which buried themselves deep in the ground, leaving only a hole on the surface. Their power was not to be underestimated. As for Jessica's movement, it was far faster than what normal people could do and consisted of movements that most wouldn't be able to replicate. Though that was far from the last, as with every second, more of them continued to shoot out at different angles. Her head jostled around like it was a bobblehead and her face showed that she appeared to be expressionless.
Still, she was able to dodge them while her knees were bent and legs spread out.
The black mist followed her movements, continuing to obscure her vision of the feathers. But it seemed to do little, as she continued to dodge most of them rather easily and was approaching the crow, albeit at a snail's pace.
Threatened, it doubled the amount of feathers it shot and shifted the way it targeted, sending a few more spread out to catch her, with a focus on forcing her to go back. Though it was at this point that Jessica suddenly opened the clasp to her black deck and pulled out a sword.
Yet, her movement in doing so was very unnatural, with her arm uncomfortably pressed up against the side of her body. She kept her elbow at the side of her hip, as though it was attached. Then, she swung the sword by moving her body and moving only the forearm. Several feathers were deflected in just a second each with painfully high-pitched clangs.
The sword moved up and down like it was a swimming fish. Similarly, Jessica moved incredibly erratically, sometimes hunching over and other times leaning back like she was doing the limbo. but was in a way that allowed her to move to the sides incredibly quickly. But that didn't mean it was straight forward. The movement was incredibly unpredictable, going at slight awkward angles, that the crow was having extreme difficulty in predicting.
It appeared to be more used to more normal human movements than this, and was struggling to adapt to this strange style. Which was a bit ironic.
The crow was currently generating feathers as fast as it was shooting them out. At the same time, Jessica was more or less making no progress towards getting closer. Yet, despite supposedly being injured, she showed no signs of faltering. Not even slightly.
In other words, they were at a stalemate.
Seeing this, Mia couldn't help but feel a range of emotions, but the main one was definitely confusion. After all, Jessica herself said that she wasn't all that strong, and yet this was happening. But at the same time, it really didn't seem like her usual self.
It was more than just the fact she almost seemed like a ragdoll being piloted. Mia got the vibes of some sort of insectoid rather than a person, to the point that just watching her strange movements somehow made her feel disgusted, to the point she was shivering. It was like she was actually looking at a centipede.
At this point, Jack had finally made it, still being carried by Seedy. He had a bright smile on his face, and his legs were regrowing decently well, he had already gotten his knees back and then some.
"Ah! It has already started! Thankfully I made it in time to see it."
He put his hand just above his eyes, blocking the sun from his view to get a better look. After watching Jessica's movements for a little while, he couldn't help but think that they were awfully familiar.
He tilted his sigh and mumbled to himself.
"Does she know the funny walking guy? Why is she copying him?"
Mia turned to look at him strangely. She was a bit weirded out that Jack seemed to know something about this, but was more curious than anything else.
"What do you mean? Have you... seen this kind of thing before?"
Jack scratched the side of his head a few times.
"There was this guy that came to see me while you guys were sleeping. He moved in a really funny way, just like her! He was talking about something about smelling blood, and he did all these weird moves and stuff, and had a lot of katanas and tentacles!"
Mia blinked a few times. Her eyes were filled with confusion by the strange explanation that was given. Still, she gleaned enough to know that Jessica's situation wasn't the exception.
That made her feel a bit of relief, and thought that maybe Jessica's emotions were not genuine, and influenced by something else. While that was wishful thinking, at least it wasn't necessarily impossible.
As for the man in the suit, he remained completely still, opting not to say anything. Though his sudden stillness said enough about what he was thinking.
The crow became quite frustrated by this stalemate. For whatever reason, Jessica seemed to have infinite stamina, which couldn't have been true. However, it wasn't as though the crow could similarly keep on going forever either.
In the end, it let out a screech, pulling back its wings while all the feathers behind the curtain of mist pulled back. For a brief moment, the fire of feathers stopped as the crow prepared.
And similarly, Jessica stood up straight like a scarecrow and tilted her head to the side.