Shadow Slave

As soon as the commentator mentioned Mongrel, the feed changed to the image of a menacing figure in black armor calmly walking through the forest, the blade of the infamous odachi resting on its shoulder. The lightless pits of the demonic mask's eyes stared directly into the camera, as if there was nothing but darkness beneath it.

As soon as Mongrel appeared on the screens, the chat exploded.

"YES! It's Mongrel!"

"Hail to the Lord!"

"Huh? Who is Mongrel?"

"...You mean hail to the LADY?"

Dimi laughed.

"Ah, yes. This guy. Well, Mongrel is a really impressive fighter, but the results may not be as predictable as everyone thinks. Every year, the same thing happens — at the later stages of the tournament, two distinct groups clash. One is the Dreamscape elites, and the other is newcomers attracted by the rewards. Historically, the newcomers tend to do better."

He sighed and shook his head.

"Plus, we don't really know a lot about Mongrel. Sure, he has a very impressive track record, but most of his wins were achieved against random opponents. Who knows what will happen when he faces the best of the best? If I were to bet, my money is still on Queen Bee. If anyone has a chance against the newcomers, it should be her."

Syclus nodded a few times, expressing his enthusiastic agreement.

"Sure! But, still, returning to Mongrel. Everyone is dying to know who he really is under that scary mask. And if anyone knows anything about you, Dimi, they'll know that you must have your guesses…"

The older man smiled, his eyes suddenly gleaming with excitement.

"Funny you should ask! Actually, I do have a theory…"

***

Corvus

"Challenger Fry was eliminated."

"Challenger Erax was eliminated."

into a flood of white sparks. These three Awakened attacked him as a group, and while their skill was not bad and even admirable,

for more than several seconds was already an

odachi in the air, Sunny shook the drops of blood off its blade

blood was bound to turn into sparks of light and disappear, too. But that

dangerous enemies, since each of them possessed a unique Aspect. They were cunning, resourceful, and unpredictable. That

long time ago, since being able to crush his opponents with brute force was detrimental to his main goal — polishing

Autumn Leaf — the Memory he used to change the color of his hair. Since it

must have looked gorgeous,

rush to eliminate as many other players as he could before the first leaderboard

of the inherent problem with the battle royale format of the qualifying rounds — as soon as true powerhouses revealed themselves, weaker participants were bound to band together and start hunting them

launching a coordinated attack on him,

had spent hundreds of days fighting for his life in the darkest depths of the

is going to be much more intense than

Sunny could finish this thought, an ancient tree next to him suddenly exploded into a cloud of splinters, and something sharp shot at him with incredible speed. Cursing, he dashed to the side

the

rolled over his shoulder and glanced at

'Curses! A sniper!'

from the sky,

his teeth and

***

His mightly muscles strained, and when he released the string, a thunderous sound rolled down the slopes of a tall hill the archer was standing

two commentators were not

so, I can say without a shadow of a doubt that Mongrel is not, in fact, one of the Forgotten Shore survivors, but actually the son of the secret child of the legendary Nightwalker, the

back to the skirmishes in the ancient forest, which were starting to happen more frequently

so! Well, that secret grandchild seems to be in big trouble! Despite Mongrel's savage victory over the three other challengers, now he seems to be in the crosshairs of