Slash -> Flourish

[League]

Alright, knowing as I can, that I could skip Cleave in the sword combo to go straight into Flourish if it was so unlocked, I put a point into it. Now it seems that if you skip a legitimate part of the combo, you start back over. So now I'm doing a two hit combo, then starting back over with a three hit combo.

Will I actually have to supplant a point into Cleave to get the most out of Flourish? I was hoping to put 4 points in Flourish for this certain pirate, though it may have to become 3.