Shadow Slave

Some time later, Sunny saw Rain out, watched as she walked away, and then calmly closed the door.

As soon as she did, however, his placid expression evaporated.

"What the hell! How come I didn't know about this?!"

Hastily taking out his communicator, he accessed the network and searched for information about the Dream Tournament.

A few minutes later, he sat down on a chair, a little stunned.

"What is this insanity?!"

Sunny knew, of course, that Dreamscape duels were a popular form of entertainment — both among the Awakened, who participated in them, and among the mundane humans, who followed their favorite duelists and created boisterous fan clubs.

However, he had no idea that even the Great Clans paid attention to the illusory game.

Apparently, the creator of the Dreamscape held a big tournament each year, and each year, one of the Great Clans — either Valor, Song, or Night — sponsored the prize pool. Participants who managed to achieve good results were able to receive cash prizes, Memories, and even Echoes.

The rewards for the finalists were especially generous, and came directly from the Great Clan's armory. They were also of the Ascended Rank.

Sunny trembled, his eyes burning with avarice.

no… think about

Clans were obviously after a straightforward goal — keep an eye on the rising talents among the unaffiliated Awakened. But did it matter? Sunny had already failed to keep his fake persona under the radar. Anyone who paid attention to Dreamscape had at

to

That's what it

disdain for the tournament, Sunny got completely absorbed by the prospect of receiving Memories free of charge. He was

enough, there was another reason for why this tournament now seemed very alluring to

was to absorb as many styles as possible, to reinforce the foundation of Shadow Dance and make it more efficient. This way, he hoped to

were complex and unique. The more unique a style was, the harder it was for Sunny to gain

he had a magical ability to peer into the very essence of a style… this ability of his was more or less mundane, based on his own talent, mastery, and sensitivity to

sizable library of simpler styles, which would in turn improve his capacity to discern the patterns of more complicated ones with sufficient speed. After all, all styles were constructed out of the same basic elements. The more basic patterns

in the Dreamscape arenas was not that high… for obvious reasons. True talents had better things to do than play

aware of your weaknesses. In that regard, hidden tigers of the Legacy clans were very much like Sunny, remaining in the shadows until it was time to

could find were a few rare eccentrics and a rare gem here and there, not nearly enough to satiate Mongrel's hunger for a variety of distinct

battle skill, styles were not only about physical movements and mindset anymore. They weaved unique patterns of essence control into the technique, too, which Sunny couldn't perceive and was only able to infer from indirect clues. Sadly, he wasn't exposed to a lot of opponents

waste time in the Dreamscape were bound to show up, lured by the scent of rare Memories and Echoes.

weapon or armor could change their lives,

one stone. Compete for these prizes and enrich his

a

even more exposure to Mongrel, Sunny couldn't let such an opportunity go. Plus, he had some

reading everything he could find about the

***