Shadow Slave novel Chapter 1619

Sliding across the marble floor as he was being pushed back by a merciless onslaught of unhurried, but lethal attacks, Sunny was carefully observing Neph's movements.

'Why can‘t I make sense of it?‘

He shifted his weight, deflected the silver blade to the side, and used the long hilt of the odachi as a lever to spin its blade at an inconceivable speed. Nephis easily partied it with the crossguard of her sword, but Sunny was already transitioning from a downward slash into a rising stab.

Every movement flowed into anotherI forming a torrent of deadly steel.

'How strange.'

Nephis was the first person Sunny had ever shadowed. After years of training together and fighting side by side, he knew her better than anyone else. Therefore, it should have been easy to glimpse the true essence of her transcendent battle art, or at least start to unravel it.

And indeed, Sunny sensed the heart of her intent. Just like how Nephis could read his intentions through her sublime mastery of combat, he could predict her actions through Shadow Dance. But his perception was oddly shallow... he could guess what would happen, but not why it would happen.

Almost like those initiates who had only mastered the body, but not the mind.

Nephis evaded his stab by turning and leaning sideways, took a graceful step to shift her balance, and pulled her blade out of the bind. A split second later, it lashed out, almost striking his thigh. If Sunny was a beat too late, he would have had to receive her blow.

The Onyx Mantle was akin to a Transcendent armor, while the mirror sword was a strange hybrid between a Transcendent and a Supreme weapon that he himself had created. Considering that offense usually trampled defense in the ruthless world of the Nightmare Spell, a single strike was all it would take for him to lose the duel.

The silver blade might not break his armor immediately, but leaving a scratch on its onyx surface would be easy.

He disengaged and stared at Nephis impassively for a moment.

Apart from manifesting this avatar, Sunny was not using his Aspect. She had not promised to do the same, technically, but was still following suit. Whether it was out of respect for the Lord of Shadows or simply because Neph was just as starved for a good opponent as he was, Sunny did not know.

That was a part of the problem.

A transcendent battle art was tailored to a single user, seamlessly incorporating their unique traits and abilities. So, since Nephis was not using any of her Aspect Abilities, what Sunny was witnessing was not the true extent of her battle style, but rather a partial version of it.

Of course, he had hoped to extrapolate the missing pieces by experiencing the foundational technique, but it was not going well.

'Should I try to deduce what's missing?‘

Sunny had plenty of experience constructing his own battle art, so it was not impossible for him to guess what Nephis would have created.

'Let's see...‘

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