At the center—
Itekan charged.
This time, there was no attempt to create distance.
Shadow spilled from his feet, racing across the ground toward the She-Wolf like living ink. It clung to the earth, spreading fast—hungry.
She leapt.
The shadow followed.
It surged upward in snapping tendrils, reaching for her limbs mid-air. She twisted with unnatural precision, her blade flashing twice—clean, efficient—severing two extensions before landing lightly atop a jagged slab of stone.
Itekan drew his hands to his chest, Spiritual Energy roaring to life.
His most destructive technique answered.
"Starbreaker!"
A beam of hyper-condensed SE erupted from his palms in a straight, searing line. The She-Wolf turned and fled instantly.
Starbreaker was overwhelming in raw force—but it carried a fatal flaw. Once fired, it moved in a single direction, rigid and unforgiving.
Unless—
Itekan shifted his arms mid-release.
The beam wavered, stiff and imperfect, but it worked—tracking her movements, forcing her constantly onto her heels as the ground behind her melted and split under the sheer heat.
She gasped as the beam grazed past her, heat scorching the air close enough to burn her cloak.
Distance won't work, she realized.
If she stayed away, she would be erased.
Her only option—
Close combat.
She dodged left, her body twisting in perfect rhythm with the beam's movement, spiraling around its edge while accelerating inward.
Itekan's breath caught.
She figured it out… on the first sight.
He didn't know whether to be impressed—or terrified.
In a blink, she was in front of him.
Too fast.
He barely had time to react.
She's fast—ridiculously fast. Faster than Shzekcl…!
He raised his arms defensively, bracing for impact.
Nothing hit.
She was gone.
Up? Down?
No—
Behind.
He spun just as her blade connected.
Pain exploded.
His arm dropped to the ground without his consent.
Itekan hissed—but didn't panic.
Before her eyes, bone reformed with a hiss of steam. Nerves rewove. Blood vessels reconnected. Flesh followed, sealing seamlessly.
In less than two seconds, the severed arm was whole again.
"You're stronger than the reports," the She-Wolf said calmly.
Itekan's irises darkened.
Shadows thickened, climbing his arms, coiling tighter, reinforcing him. The ground around his feet dimmed, as if light itself were being swallowed.
She didn't retreat.
Instead, she lowered her stance—center of gravity dropped, blade angled downward.
A hunter's posture.
Itekan vanished.
The She-Wolf reacted instantly, blade slicing through the space where his neck should have been.
He reappeared above her, fist wrapped in compressed shadow, slamming downward.
She crossed her weapon with a bracer hidden beneath her sleeve.
The impact shattered the stone beneath her feet.
Both were hurled apart as dust and debris rolled outward.
For a moment—
Stillness.
Then—
Itekan wove through hand seals and slammed his palms into the ground.
"Shadows' Hand: Shadow Roulette."
For a fraction of a second—
Sound vanished.
The battlefield inhaled.
Dust froze mid-air. Each grain hung suspended as shadows bled outward like spilled ink, swallowing the ground beneath her.
The She-Wolf's eyes widened.
Not in fear.
In realization.
Too late.
Shadow erupted upward—not as whips—
—but as spears.
They impaled her shoulders, abdomen, thigh—pinning her in a grotesque lattice. Blood misted into the air, suspended in the unnatural silence.
Her blade slipped from her fingers.
It struck stone.
Clink.
Sound returned.
Her body sagged—limp, drained, motionless.
The shadows held her upright like a macabre display.
Itekan exhaled slowly.
The darkness receded slightly.
He had kille—
"Watch out!" Itoyea shouted.
The impaled body dissolved.
Not into light.
Into shadow.
A hollow shell.
Before Itekan could turn—
She was behind him.
Twin blades plunged into his neck, tearing through muscle and artery in a single brutal motion.
A wet crunch.
Itekan's eyes widened.
His shadow flickered—
—and went still.
He collapsed.
---
Across the battlefield, one Wolvress lay unconscious. Another struggled to rise. More still stood.
Itoyea pressed a hand to the shallow cut on his arm, barely feeling it.
His gaze was locked on Itekan.
Waiting.
He knew the pattern.
He'd seen it again and again over the past two days.
Bones knitting.
Steam rising.
Shadow stitching flesh together.
During the Night-Shrill Covet Blood Bat siege, Itekan had done the impossible—fighting, shielding, healing without rest. Two days without sleep. Without stillness. Pouring SE into everyone but himself.
Every time he fell—
He rose.
But now—
Nothing.
No steam.
No movement.
The shadow beneath him lay flat.
Thin.
Like a dying flame starved of air.
Itoyea's chest tightened.
He'd healed us all… again and again…
Memories flooded in.
Itekan standing in the dark, hands glowing with shadow as he forced broken bones back into place—his own hands shaking.
His voice growing hoarse.
The hollow look in his eyes when the last bat fell.
Physically, the shadow spirit had sustained him.
But the mind—
The mind had never recovered.
And now, it had reached its limit.
Rage surged—vast, unfamiliar, uncontrollable.
Itoyea reached for his sword and drew it with a guttural sound ripped straight from his soul.
His eyes ignited into blazing white.
A violent energy—disturbingly similar to Bukanami's—erupted from his Spiritual Sea.
He raised the blade.
One sweep.
Every Wolvress before him was cleaved apart.
At the same instant, the sword Sensei Pwain had given him shattered—unable to endure the power coursing through it.
The She-Wolf stiffened.
She didn't need to sense the blade to know—it had been forged from some of the most durable materials on the planet.
And yet it broke.
What kind of energy does that take…?
Nearby, Bukanami finished cutting down an opponent and froze as the surge washed over him.
"So he's one of us…? A Dr—?!"
Itoyea flung the ruined hilt aside.
It hadn't even lasted a single swing.
Then he remembered—
The sword he had sworn not to use.
Not until he was certain he could survive it.
The only thing left from his family.
Somehow, he knew—
It was the only weapon in the world that could contain him.
And he called for it.
Hundreds of miles away, as Sensei Pwain and Meris Veyna clashed with Corinth Ransthrol and Absolam, Pwain felt a sudden void—
The sword vanished from his storage ring.
That moment's hesitation was all Corinth needed.
Steel flashed.
Pwain staggered back, blood pouring as one eye was lost.
Back in the dungeon—
The sword appeared in a blast of unfamiliar energy.
Itoyea caught it.
The moment his fingers closed around the hilt, the energy reversed—flowing inward as the blade drank him dry.
All of it—
Occurred within 0.842 seconds.
With the sword in hand, Itoyea stepped forward.
He unsheathed it in one smooth motion—
—and launched toward the She-Wolf.
After more than a millennium—
The Dragon Skin Sword met its first foe.
. . .
Spiritual Energy (SE)
Spiritual Sea (SS)
Spiritual Signature (SST)