Shadow Slave

Sunny remained motionless for a while, then chuckled.

"No... that's crazy! It would never work."

Then, he stared at the wall some more.

...Would it?

'No way.'

The thought that had crept into his mind while he was thinking about the limitations of the Shadow Shell was so out there that it seemed utterly ridiculous. But the more he thought about it... the fewer reasons to discard it he saw.

'No, that's... that's a bit too strange, even for me.'

And yet, he could not find a logical reason for why it wouldn't be true.

Sunny hesitated for a while longer, then furtively looked around.

Then, he cleared his throat, stood up, and left the office.

If he wanted to test this bizarre theory, he needed to do it somewhere more private.

He left the Valor compound and made his way to the nearby dormitory, where most of the government staff still remaining within the siege capital lived. There, he entered his living quarters - which were a bit more spacious and had better amenities than that of both mundane and Awakened government workers - and locked the door behind him.

Being an Ascended had its perks.

within - and

didn't seem to be dangerous,

The principle was simple.

shadow an enemy, copying the very essence of

simpler battle styles. He had achieved that breakthrough while fighting Nephis in the

much more sophisticated styles, and do it much faster. It also gave him a glimpse of an intuitive understanding of the more esoteric components of the truly

step after collecting a vast library of techniques in the Dreamscape, which culminated during his first duel with Morgan. The inspiration Sunny

hardest one yet. Sunny had started his journey toward mastery of it by expanding his horizons and starting to shadow not only humans, but also Nightmare Creatures. In the bloody arena of the Red Colosseum, he had submerged himself into their perverted, demented, rabid minds... which allowed him to intuitively feel what the abominations he fought would do, but also put his own sense of self, if not his very soul,

actual self - which, of course, posed the risk

Name. It served as an anchor for what made Sunny an individual, and through it, he was

breakthrough enhanced the speed with which he could comprehend the battle intent and combat intelligence of those beings he shadowed even further, allowed him to actually perceive the flow of essence through their bodies as opposed to just feeling it intuitively,

The fourth step...

something he had to invent all on his own, with no one guiding him... as such, he wasn't even sure

the next steps of Shadow Dance went far beyond battle techniques... and would be much,

mastering Shadow Dance, he had achieved

Shadow Shell - a powerful tool he had created by bringing together various facets

was perhaps the most important - without deep comprehension of the desired form, Sunny would never be able to construct it from the shadows, and that was what his Aspect Legacy

was a limitation to

he still possessed a human body. No matter how much training he had put into making it as flexible and adaptable as possible, it was still a relatively rigid

what if... he added

of his Dormant Ability, Shadow Control, his

Dance -

perhaps, was the reason for the limitations

uh... let's just

succeeded... Sunny felt that he might just discover a direction that would eventually lead him to the next step of