Shadow Slave

Sunny and Nephis stood opposite each other, holding training swords. Both felt more than a little disturbed by how much this scene resembled their bitter confrontation at the very top of the Crimson Spire.

Of course, today, the situation was completely different. They were just going for a friendly spar, not a battle to the death. There were no stakes in this training fight, no emotional investment… no complicated mixture of regret, fury, and resentment.

…So why did Sunny feel as though he had to prove something?

Forcing himself to relax, he glanced at Nephis and attacked. Their swords met with a deafening clangor.

A few seconds later, Sunny jumped away and shouted:

"Stop! Stop! Stop!"

Changing Star froze while he looked around, breathing heavily.

Sunny gritted his teeth and spat a muffled curse.

"Damnation…"

His idea to have a spar might not have been the wisest one he ever had. Yes, the underground dojo was designed specifically to allow Awakened to train their powers. It was isolated, reinforced, and heavily armored, able to transform into an impregnable bunker in case a Gate opened nearby and a tide of Nightmare Creatures flooded the district.

The interior was furnished with heavy plates of armor-grade ceramic alloy and supplied with training equipment meant to withstand the rigors of Awakened power.

…However, Sunny and Nephis weren't Awakened anymore! They were full-fledged Masters, and abnormal ones at that!

was shattered. A few plates on the floor were broken. If this continued, the repair bill for the dojo was going

yesterday. Before that, she had been a Sleeper, which meant that she had no experience of controlling soul essence

because Shadow Dance now allowed him

every Master had an instinctual understanding of how to augment their physicality with essence, but it still took some time to get used to it, and even more to master it. However, every Ascended before

fact, by the time Awakened reached Ascension, controlling essence was as natural to

for Nephis. Her return as a Master might have been miraculous, but it also deprived her

was out of

a deep frown, Sunny waved a hand in the air and forced

you will have to spend even more time relearning how to fight with its help. I had years

for a

using any essence at all.

core than him. But with all things considered, if both of them neglected using essence or augmenting themselves with their Abilities,

and concentrated. Each discarded their broken weapons and took new

moment later,

better. However… not by

to Shadow Dance and his familiarity with Nephis, it didn't take Sunny long to sense the core of her style. It had changed a lot and matured over the

could not master the style yet, he attuned himself to its flow and cadence

that Changing Star herself could do more or less the same. Her ability to discern, predict, and control patterns of combat was not based in affinity to shadows,

was thinking of doing, while she could predict what he had

sure what was happening! There had

just half of

instinctively using it. As the result, Sunny had to endure sudden outburst of speed, strength, and agility that were too chaotic to predict. Because he was holding