Dimensional Descent

Leonel put his spear away and raised the little mink in his arms, observing the little guy curiously.

When he focused in on the blobs of black, Leonel realized something astonishing. Each one of them had a different character to them.

Those with stronger presences were larger while those with weaker ones were smaller. But, it wasn't just this either. Each seemed to have a different feel.

The largest of them carried a biting cold to them. There were two of them in total. One seemed to want to completely envelop you in an avalanche while the other was sharp like a thin, cooled knife slicing into your body.

Leonel felt like he remembered them from somewhere...

'Those 12 ice guards, two of them reminded me of this feeling!'

Leonel's eyes widened in realization. These blobs, they were the shadows of the enemies Little Blackstar had killed.

'Blackstar can't absorb them?' Leonel thought, confused. '... They're disappearing too.'

Leonel seemed to realize two things immediately after understanding what he was dealing with. The first was that Blackstar didn't seem capable of swallowing these shadows like he had the shadow of Simeon's numbered warrior. And the second was that they were slowly fading. The more powerful of them seemed to linger on for longer, but the weaker ones were already collapsing to the point Leonel could hardly sense them.

'There are two potential reasons for why Blackstar can't absorb them. It's either that he had an affinity limitation or it's that he can only take in one at a time. If it's the latter, then that means the only way he could take on a new ability is if he gave the one he has already...'

Leonel frowned, sinking into his own thoughts.

The ability Blackstar could mimic now came from one of Simeon's handpicked warriors. From Leonel's comprehension, it was an S-grade ability at worse.

That said, the ice guards were SSS-grade Invalids, so their abilities obviously likewise followed suit.

When he and the little mink worked in tandem, Leonel could gain an extension of this ability. This was what had allowed him to threaten Jilniya's life back then. Of course, at the time, Leonel had also relied on many other things like the

at him from the side with a confused light coloring her eyes.

'Huh?'

hand back, his heart

back, a slight tinge

realizing she might have to calm Leonel

"I..."

a deep

though something about myself would fundamentally change if I

absorb them?" Aina's

then the value of

but look toward the little mink with a new light in

on his shoulder as though showing off. Such a scene pulled out a smile from the depths of

don't think it's so simple." Leonel said slowly. "It's hard to explain, but I felt as though absorbing that shadow would take something away from me, almost as though it was taking an average of my shadow and this one to form

He was able to simulate that exact moment again and again in his Dream

'What if...'

his eyes. With Aina around him, he didn't have to worry about anything

appeared. But, this time, it wasn't himself but rather a perfect replica of Joel. Everything from his height, to his mannerisms, to his

had a 99% accuracy rating.

later, Leonel opened his eyes, his

who had been watching over Leonel this whole like looked to him with a half annoyed,

Leonel didn't mind one bit. To him, the information he gleaned from them was far more important than the strength

He couldn't just casually take action

time, Leonel