[color=black][b][h2][s]Eyes[/s] Tentacles Without A [s]Face[/s] Body[/h2][/b][/color]
In due course, Motley and Erina came across a building that did contain food and potable water, and wasn't practically drowned under a layer of water. Since he didn't need the sustenance, the vampire allowed the kitsune to have her fill, remaining outside as she ate in order to keep watch. As it happened, they'd been travelling due south for a time, and were starting to draw near to a set of ruins just shy of the historical village, visible now somewhere down the road they were travelling... over. Most of the area was still extremely flooded, and things only looked to get worse as they entered the ruins in question, and what seemed to be the religious district beyond them. He imagined it wouldn't take more than a few minutes to get there at the rate they were moving.

Assuming they didn't experience any setbacks, of course. Naturally, reality didn't want to be so kind: one moment, he was still, pacing toward the water's edge, and the next, something had lashed itself round his right ankle and begun to drag him toward the depths with significant force. Surprised for but a moment, Motley promptly smashed his left foot into the ground beneath him, anchoring himself in place even as the lash- a tentacle, from the look of things- continued to try and pull him away, hard enough to force him into a split, and then to break his shin in half over the anchor point.

[color=black]'Okay, then,'[/color] Motley muttered to himself, gripping the tentacle back, [color=black]'A tug of war it is.'[/color] He yanked hard, pulling up a lot of extra tentacle, before grabbing another handful and pulling again, only to find himself experiencing a lot of resistance. Shortly followed by none at all, and then a lot more of the tentacle than he'd expected. Had he pulled it off of whatever sea beast he was trying to outpull? It did continue to move and coil round him, which was perhaps usual for a tentacle, considering how many nerves they had in them compared to the rest of any given mollusc's body. Or was that specifically octopodes? He'd never tried to find out if it applied to squids as well...

Not that it mattered, because it turned out the tentacle belonged to neither of those things. There was a lump attached to the opposite end, but the lump was undamaged and smooth... and had teeth instead of a beak, arranged within what seemed like a gurgling vertical mouth with no eyes... wait, no, the creature [i]did[/i] have eyes, only they were up at the gripping end of the tentacle, and that did make sense when he thought about it, since it needed to see what it was dragging down to consume...

[i]Is any of this theorising important?[/i] he mused, returning to standing and grabbing the tentacle thing below its head as the mouth lunged toward him. Idly, he took a controlled breath to send his Black Ripple through its form, drawing a shrill scream out of it as it shrivelled and died, before concluding that it probably was not important after all, since this creature was essentially irrelevant to his distant future. Perhaps it was unique to the city he was in? In any case, he didn't expect to see any others like it again.

He pirouetted off of one hand as another three tentacles lunged toward him from the murky depths, flipping back toward the house and taking stock of what was being presented to him: rather more of those creatures than he'd expected, and though he could probably take them all out himself, he did have an ally who might be somewhat more threatened by them if they realised she was alone in the house. Which was a shame, because he was about to draw them to her anyway.

The sight he came across as he entered the house's kitchen was a tad messy. Just a few smatters of food here and there, nothing much, but Erina appeared to be chewing a mouthful of some sort of dry cereal. He felt as if what she tried to say next was [color=bc8dbf]'Hey, Mot! You should have some of this, it's really good!'[/color] but since she was talking through a mouthful, the words were lost to him. Just in case it was that, though...

[color=black]'Never call me "Mot" again. I don't appreciate the nickname. Also, swallow your mouthful. Tentacles are about to attack you.'[/color]

She seemed confused for a moment. She stopped being confused as a couple of the tentacles barged into the room behind Motley, whose contribution to stopping them was mostly physical chops in this case, and just diverting enough that his ally could safely swallow her mouthful, then take on... yes, that was it. The same aspect she'd taken at the end of their fight, that of the old ghost by her side. The warrior of the two, he noted to himself, as she drew the blade at her hip. Immediately, she'd sliced a tentacle in twain, and then another, and another...

[color=bc8dbf]'Could you help out here?'[/color] she asked as she fought the tendrils off. [color=bc8dbf]'These are pretty fast for their length.'[/color]

Well, another one had just tried to curl round his leg, he supposed... stamping it down, he began fighting the creatures again, beating them to make a path out of the house, beckoning for the fox-girl to follow. He supposed he could probably use his Ripple here, but... well, he rather wanted the physical challenge against these animals, more than the generic success of just wilting them all away like so much dead grass.